Infracos face rivals for £1bn extra Tube work

TubeLines and Metronet will face competition from Birse, Gleeson and Taylor Woodrow for the £1bn, five-year framework package of Tube maintenance work.

The trio enters the fray as “alternative providers” to the two Tube PPP infracos. They will all compete against each other for work extraneous to the PPP.

The work packages, ranging in value from £100,000 to £100m, will include station expansions and improvements, line enhancements and extensions, staff accommodation and major works such as the Croxley Rail Link.

Some of the first framework contracts to be let will be the Victoria Station and the Shepherds Bush station enhancement works.

London Underground (LUL) will also look at introducing more alternative provider framework contracts at a later date. The framework contractors and infracos may be awarded smaller works directly, but large packages will entail mini-competitions.

Peter Zuk, chief programmes officer for LUL’s PPP/PFI contracts, told CJ: “We have £10bn to invest over the next five years in improving and expanding the network, half of which is in the PPP, but there is a lot of work to do over and above that.

“In some cases there will be a need to offer that work to the infracos, but if we don’t reach agreement with them, we will offer it to our alternative providers. We believe competition is a good thing.”

He said he did not expect the infracos to welcome the increased competition, but warned that LUL will continue to look for more ways to make TubeLines and Metronet more competitive.

He said: “The reason for this is that we don’t have the ability to bring sufficient pressure on the infracos and this will help.

“Our job is to be vigilant about costs. And we are certainly looking for more ways to make the process more competitive. One way is to have mini-competitions.”

However, Zuk was keen to emphasise that the framework is not just a way of increasing competition and introducing benchmarking.

He said: “Our alternative providers may find themselves competing against the infracos, but no contractor likes to be used as an estimating department, so as a good client we need to provide the prospect of real work.

“This is a real programme, but we also hope that through this process we get smarter about cost,” Zuk said.