A FIRM specialising in the supply and maintenance of forklift trucks has created 30 jobs after securing a 100m contract.

In one of the biggest UK contracts of its kind Bishop Auckland based Rushlift will cover the management and maintenance of more than 2,000 vehicles across 800 sites for Jewson owner Saint-Gobain.

The ten year deal, covering the UK and Ireland, comes after a two year tendering process and will see the workforce at the County Durham firm increase to around 280. It includes engineering, account management and administrative personnel, with more appointments expected to follow.

Rushlift Chairman, Peter Cosgrove said: "It is one of the largest contracts in the industry and from our point of view it is transformational.

"The agreement is on an unprecedented scale and we are excited by the opportunities and challenges it presents our business. It's a superb vote of confidence in our business values and approach.

"It is fantastic news and a great credit to our employees."

During the long tender process Rushlift were given opportunities to demonstrate their abilities at several Saint-Gobain sites, opportunities which, Mr Cosgrove believed, allowed the company to outperform its competitors.

"We were up against all the major firms in the industry, a lot of them bigger than us.

"We have been in negotiations for two years, there has been a lot of hard work gone into it."

A world leader in the production, processing and distribution of construction materials, France based Saint-Gobain, whose brands include the JP Corry and Gibbs & Dandy builders' merchants chains, as well as Jewson, oversees its UK and Ireland logistics from a base in Southampton.

Saint-Gobain Fleet Director, Ian Berrill, said: "Having the UK's largest fleet has many benefits but also many challenges.

"Being able to manage the fleet makeup, control costs and respond to our changing needs is crucial."

As well as its base on the South Church Enterprise Park Rushlift employs more than 100 mobile engineers servicing customers from Aberdeen to Cornwall.

Having started life as Rushlift Mechanical Handling in Bishop Auckland in the early 1980's, it was bought by the Specialist Hire Group Ltd, of which Mr Cosgrove is a co-founder, in 2002 and now operates from four offices across the UK.

Leading customers include British Airways, Comet and Magnet.

Saint-Gobain has operations in 64 countries and employs 191,500 people. It can trace its history back to 1665, when it was created by Louis XIV and Colbert to restore the French economy and started producing glass on an industrial basis.