The Aspire Housing Group has bought training company Project Management in a deal announced this week.

Project Management, which helps disadvantaged young people in north Staffordshire find work, will retain its own identity within the Group and will operate as a social enterprise.

Project Management’s new chief executive is Will Nixon, also Aspire’s director of operations. He said: “Both organisations are fully committed to the delivery of excellent services and to helping individuals fulfil their true potential. By integrating our talents and resources, I am confident we will go from strength to strength, help reduce benefit dependency and make a positive impact for the communities and individuals we serve.”

And Aspire’s chief executive Sinead Butters added: “We are keen to ensure that as a business we do all we can to improve our customers’ life chances, and those of everyone living in north Staffordshire.

“Getting more young people into long-term employment benefits them and society as a whole.”

Newcastle-under-Lyme-based Aspire has refused to reveal how much it paid for Project Management, which has provided bespoke training and life-coaching programmes for nearly 9,000 unemployed and excluded teenagers since it was established in 1982 and now turns over £2m a year.

Retiring Project Management MD Sean Canavan said: “We are immensely proud of the track record of success we have had in helping so many people gain full-time apprenticeships and jobs.”

Project Management provides around 500 job and training opportunities a year, mainly to teenagers leaving school without any qualifications or facing exclusion from education. It has the largest Entry to Employment contract in Staffordshire and runs Homeworks, a home improvement and environmental service for elderly and vulnerable council tenants.

Aspire Housing owns and manages 8,500 properties across north Staffordshire, mainly in Newcastle-under-Lyme. It was set up in 2000 to take over housing stock transferred from Newcastle-under-Lyme Borough Council.

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