WARRINGTON Borough Council has sold a warehouse in Haydock for more than £50million.

The council, which is under scrutiny for its £1.8bn debt, sold the shed to Clarion Partners Europe this week for £50.8million.

It bought the unit, which was built in 2019, for £45million the same year.

It is currently let to Movianto UK Limited, a market leading healthcare supply chain service, on a 15-year lease.

Clarion Partners Europe has now invested £170 million on behalf of its UK-only logistics fund in five months.

Florina Capraru, director at Clarion Partners Europe, said: “Haydock is an outstanding UK logistics location in one of Europe's most densely populated and under-supplied regions, which has experienced significant rental growth outperformance in recent years.

"With the UK market increasingly characterised by the bifurcation between institutional quality, sustainable properties and everything else, with Grade-A space accounting for 72 per cent of take-up in 2023, the opportunity to acquire a modern, institutional-quality logistics asset further added to the appeal."

Rory Buck, managing director at Clarion Partners, added: “This latest acquisition demonstrates our expertise in sourcing compelling investment opportunities across the UK, enabling us to deploy capital at speed into highly revisionary, tenant critical assets leased to blue chip businesses."

It was revealed earlier this week that Moody's had withdraw the council's credit rating amid concerns over its accounts not being signed off.