Part way through the five-week installation of a brand-new classroom for the North Lanarkshire school, head teacher Paul McKeever sent the Portakabin team the pupil’s S.O.S.

He wrote: “I am writing to you to ask for help with something really important. We have just had some new and special additions to our school family…. five beautiful ducklings have recently hatched… but we have a BIG PROBLEM! … We hope since you are amazing builders that you might be able to help us by creating a special raised large duck house … to keep out the foxes.”

“We’d been teaching our pupils all about ducks and they were so excited by the arrival of the five little ducklings,” said Paul. “When they wrote about a place to protect them from foxes, we thought we would ask the advice of the Portakabin team – we were absolutely thrilled when they designed and built a new Duck House for us in a matter of days. It was very special gift for the school and we can’t thank Portakabin enough.”

Portakabin (Scotland) site manager Nick Butler said: “When we received the letter from the pupil, we knew it was our duty not to duck the challenge and took on the task without getting in a flap. We’ve received more than 40 thank you letters from the children at Stepps Primary which were lovely to read and we’ve met up with them to see how the ducklings are enjoying their new home. We were delighted to help.”