UK Construction and Law

Morgan Sindall Construction appoints Nick Corrigan area director for the North East and Cumbria

By Staff Writer  |  17 August 2026

The contractor has recruited the former head of Willmott Dixon's North East region to lead a business delivering public and private schemes worth up to £100m across defence, education and leisure, procured through frameworks including NEPO, SCAPE and Pagabo.

Morgan Sindall Construction has appointed Nick Corrigan as area director of its North East and Cumbria business. He joins from Willmott Dixon, where he spent close to thirteen years and latterly ran the North East region as its director.

Mr Corrigan brings thirty years in the industry, much of it spent in the North of England, including close to twelve years with The Miller Group before his move to Willmott Dixon. His recruitment puts a competitor's regional leader at the head of a business that trades on the same public sector clients and the same procurement routes he has worked for over a decade.

This is a part of the world I know well and care deeply about. There's huge potential for growth in both the North East and in Cumbria, not least because of the renewed focus from the top levels of government on rebalancing the UK economy and supporting the UK regions.

Nick Corrigan, Area Director, North East and Cumbria, Morgan Sindall Construction

Schemes worth up to £100m across the region

The business Mr Corrigan takes on is currently delivering public and private sector schemes worth up to £100m across the region, with projects in the defence, education and leisure sectors, and it procures much of that work through regional frameworks including NEPO, SCAPE and Pagabo.

The shape of that workload explains why the role matters. On framework procured public work, the area director is the person who decides which lots to chase, which bids carry the company's name and how the local supply chain is assembled around them, and those calls are made region by region rather than from a head office. Whoever holds the post effectively sets the contractor's appetite in the North East for the next several years.

He reports into the contractor's northern leadership. Simon Arnott, managing director for Morgan Sindall Construction in the North, said the appointment reflected where the region's workload is heading.

There is a great deal of focus on investment in the North East and Cumbria and Nick is exactly the kind of leader we want at the helm of our regional business.

Simon Arnott, Managing Director, Morgan Sindall Construction in the North

A group with momentum behind the hire

The appointment lands in a strong year for the wider group. For the six months to 30 June, Morgan Sindall reported revenue of £2.56bn, up 8 per cent, and an operating profit of £111.5m against £91.3m in the same period last year, with interior fit out continuing to outperform traditional construction.

For the North East supply chain the practical point is continuity rather than change. An area director arriving from the region's other major framework contractor knows the same clients, the same education and defence programmes and the same subcontract market, and the work will flow through the same frameworks either way. What changes is which bid carries his signature.