Lend Lease to keep Bovis

Ross Taylor, chief executive of Bovis Lend Lease, has vigorously denied that the parent group Lend Lease, an Australia-based property outfit, will put its Bovis subsidiary on the market.

"There is no way that Bovis will be sold out of the Lend Lease group," said Taylor. "Noises coming from the corporate end of the parent company caused angst to some Bovis staff, but we will remain a 100% subsidiary and we will be left to get on with our own business.

"We've got a strategy and an agenda. Bovis makes a strong positive contribution to the group. We are strongly positioned in the UK market, where we have had a good year.

"We've found that the market here has stayed buoyant, although the outlook is a bit uncertain in the office sector. I'm upbeat about the prospects for the future."

Taylor said that a management buy-out was a non-starter. "We're too big for that," he said.

Last year Bovis contributed half of the group's profit, and the latest financial figures, due out soon, are likely to show that proportion climb higher still. Bovis gives Lend Lease a global platform, a good client base and a security of income as a result of the project workload provided by those clients.

However, the recent fall of Lend Lease's share price on the Australian stock exchange has led to chief executive David Higgins standing down. Lend Lease said it expects to reveal a profit after tax of more than £72m this year.