History

The VGC Group has become a family of more than one thousand people, encompassing a workforce as diverse and rich as our society. Throughout our history, we have stayed true to our founding values of honesty and integrity.

The business was established in 1960. It has been in current ownership since 1977, when Sean Fitzpatrick and Bart Keaney took over. They focused on providing skilled trades and labour for civil engineering projects. A subsidiary company, Cole Hire, was set up to manage a growing vehicle fleet. VGC began to secure high profile labour contracts, including the Channel Tunnel rail link, Queen Elizabeth II bridge, Manchester metro and Sheffield Supertram.

Encouraged by its success in railway projects, in 1998 the company established a dedicated rail industry division headed by Laurence Mckidd, formerly a project director with Balfour Beatty. New contracts with London Underground, Euston station remodelling and the Heathrow Express rail link soon followed and further enhanced the company’s position in a competitive market.

The new millennium brought continuing success and recognition by standards organisations. In 2005 another division, VGC Training, was set up to handle growing training requirements and ensure that the VGC workforce remained at the very forefront of its industry. A year later, VGC Personnel was formed to provide companies with the best professional and technical people, and the VGC Group launched our equality, diversity and inclusion programme.

In 2007 the VGC Group was restructured into a formal divisional organisation with VGC Labour Solutions, VGC Personnel, VGC Rail Projects, VGC Construction, VGC Training and Cole Hire operating under the VGC Group umbrella.

The business continues to thrive, successfully combining old-fashioned family values with forward-thinking business attitudes. The VGC Group now provides people, projects and services across Britain, working safely and successfully with virtually all of the major civil engineering and rail infrastructure contractors in the UK.

We continue to focus on outperforming the competition and exceeding client expectations. We are proud of our history and excited by the future.