Aramark's Combined Services Division has won or retained several key contracts with a combined turnover in excess of £3.5m with the Ministry of Defence.

The company has also won its first childcare service contracts in the UK.

Wins include a five-year deal turning over £600,000 a year at training centre RAF Halton in Buckinghamshire; a four-year, £440,000-per-annum deal at weapons and aircraft centre RAF Boscombe Down in Salisbury, Wiltshire; and a five-year, £200,000-per-annum contract at defence communications base Minerva House in Swindon, Gloucestershire.

Aramark has also extended by five years its £300,000-a-year contract at the Defence Animal Centre in Melton Mowbray, Leicestershire, and added a further year to its contract at the MOD Fire Services Central Training Establishment in Manston, Kent, which is worth £450,000 a year.

Other retained contracts include a five-year, £1.1m-a-year contract at the Royal Logistic Corps base in Grantham in Lincolnshire and a three-year contract at Rapier Barracks in Scunthorpe worth £450,000 in annual turnover.

Aramark's first UK childcare contracts, starting in September, are worth a combined £400,000 a year in turnover and cover two MoD Logistics sites in Bath.

Aramark will provide crèche facilities for as many as 100 children aged from six months to five years, for four years at Ensleigh and for three-and-a-half years at Foxhills.

by Angela Frewin