Metronet Rail consortium makes pre-tax profit of £29m

Metronet Rail,  the consortium that won two of the three 30-year PPP contracts for the £15bn upgrade of the ageing London Underground, has made a pre-tax profit of £29m – well down on last year’s figure of £47m.

The group operates through two subsidiaries – SSL and BCV.

Annual results from Metronet Rail SSL, which operates on the sub-surface lines, show a margin of 4%, a big fall from the previous year’s staggering figure of 8.3% - more than twice that achieved by any UK construction group.

Turnover (12 months to 31 March) ran to £320m, similar to the previous year, but pre-tax profit was down from £27m to £13m.

Redundancy costs were £5m higher at £6m, while pension costs increased to £11m. 

The members of the Metronet consortium are WS Atkins, Bombardier and Balfour Beatty.

The consortium’s second element, Metronet Rail BCV, logged a profit margin of 4.7%, down on the previous year’s figure of 6.3%.

Metronet BCV works on the Bakerloo, Central, Victoria and Waterloo & City lines. There was a pre-tax profit of £16m from a turnover of £340m.

Redundancy costs were higher at £5.4m.