£2.8bn Tube framework stalls, 12 contractors left jobless

Vital improvement work on the London Underground worth £2.8bn has been put on hold as a funding crisis on the Tube network bites.

Contractors expecting a work bonanza via the Vendor Capital Programme have been left jobless.

Twelve firms won a place on the £2.8bn programme back in August:

• Balfour Beatty
• Carillion
• Skanska
• Taylor Woodrow
• Birse Metro (Balfour Beatty subsidiary)
• Mansell Construction (Balfour Beatty subsidiary)
• Costain
• Dyer & Butler
• Bam Nuttall (Edmund Nuttall)
• Geoffrey Osborne
• Morgan Est
• YJL Infrastructure

 But no work has come through the system during the last four months.

The VCP framework covers contracts of all sizes for station improvement and congestion relief, tunnel cooling, disabled access and staff accommodation.

One contractor said: “My understanding is there is no work coming through on VCP because there is no money to spend. It has been put into a holding pattern while London Underground  tries to get more money from the Government.”

LUL chief Tim O’Toole warned the London Assembly Transport Committee last week that programmes will be sacrificed in the event of a shortfall in
PPP funding.

He said: “You would then have to turn to other works so the choices would be obvious. It would be the major congestion release schemes, it would be further cutting back on tunnel cooling, it would be further cutting back on other essential work on upgrading the Tube.”

LUL’s step-free access programme has already been decimated with 15 out of 24 projects mothballed. A rail contractor commented: “Lots of them have been shelved, including some already through the design stage. This is vital work for disabled access.”

Transport minister Lord Adonis said last week that Transport for London would get no extra cash beyond its current £39bn 10-year settlement.

LUL funding has also been hit by the cost of taking Metronet’s PPP contracts in house after it went bust last year.

A LUL spokesman said: “The VCP is very much alive. Work is in progress to generate an updated projection of possible work from project plans.”