According to Private Eye there is a bit of a conflict of interest with Carillion.. KPMG (who audits Carillion along with Balfour Beatty) allegedly advised the DfT when it was deciding to go ahead with the £56 bn HS2 project. Usual story of ridiculous overbidding, hugely overpaid management, and the taxpayers taken for a ride all in the name of "FREE MARKET" economics of course.

According to Private Eye there is a bit of a conflict of interest with Carillion.. KPMG (who audits Carillion along with Balfour Beatty) allegedly advised the DfT when it was deciding to go ahead with the £56 bn HS2 project. Usual story of ridiculous overbidding, hugely overpaid management, and the taxpayers taken for a ride all in the name of "FREE MARKET" economics of course.

 

Yes, they also hand over the Conflict Of Interest Award of 2017 to the Leader of Bournemouth Council for an issue. Currently under police investigation, and co-incidentally our Chief Executive was let go shortly before. The Council seems unable to hold onto senior staff who point out problems with political decisions.....

One day in the not too distant future the big 4 are going to come to a crossroads where they have to seriously contemplate splitting into two with the audit business becoming a completely seperate firm from the rest. Clean break with no shared partners, exec boards or even branding. Only way to avoid these conflict of interests.

 

Although I’m not sure there really is one here. The teams that would be auditing the construction firms wouldn’t have a single team member in common with the team consulting the gov. Surely if KPMG can see what a state they’re in and what they bid they’d know it was undercosted and could advise against picking their client? That id believe as a conflict of interest.

 

 

Very interesting to see what happens next given how ingrained Carillion are in the public sector. If this was a Labour government I wonder if we would be genuinely looking at nationalisation to protect government interests and keep these key projects going

Probably should be a public enquiry to find out what has been going on though? KPMG had to withdraw from its government contract of drawing up "delivery" plans for the Grenfell Tower inquiry, because it audits some of the companies involved...

 

Anyway I thought this was somewhat spooky:

 

Carillion chairman Philip Green said it was a "very sad day" for the company's workers, suppliers and customers.

 

Not ANOTHER Phillip Green led company going into liquidation. : (

Edited January 15, 20187 yr by Doctor Blind

Probably should be a public enquiry to find out what has been going on though? KPMG had to withdraw from its government contract of drawing up "delivery" plans for the Grenfell Tower inquiry, because it audits some of the companies involved...

 

Anyway I thought this was somewhat spooky:

Not ANOTHER Phillip Green led company going into liquidation. : (

I think it's a different Philip Green. I'm sure more would have been made of it if it had been the same one.

 

We can also be confident that the press would be screaming blue murder if a Labour government had awarded massive contracts to a company known to be in financial difficulties.

"CORRECTION; Yesterday I said taxpayer bill for Carillion likely to be 'tens of millions.' Actually, it's looking like 'hundreds of millions.' Senior official told me that £600m 'the kind of figure once we have paid through the nose for new private contractors to take on the work'"

 

Adonis tweet. SO familiar a situation to local gov staff...

 

I notice the Tory rags are not reporting on the cost to the taxpayer and the threat to tens of thousands of jobs on the front pages. Apparently, Iceland (the firm) doing away with own-label packaging (very worthy news item, but not in the same league) is more important. Though scooping beans out of a trough and into tins one by one might get messy :lol:

As the NHS undergoes attack by stealth undercover of Brexit, I wonder if I'm alone in thinking that Jeremy c**t looks like the evil twin of Ryan Giggs who escaped from his parents attic?

It has now come to light that both PwC (the firm appointed by the court to liquidate Carillion) and EY both refused to act as administrators because they didn’t think they’d get paid. PwC/Court has told creditors to expect less than 1p in the £1 on debts owed by Carillion.

 

A substantial amount of the work Carillion does is actually done by sub-contractors who were paid in 120 day terms!! There’s an estimated 30,000 business in the supply chain impacted by the collapse.

It really is outrageous that a large company can get away with waiting 120 days to pay an invoice. How is a small business supposed to operate on those terms?

 

We now find that Carillion had just £29 million in cash and around £1 billion of debts. We also hear that they continued to pay dividends to their shareholders and generous bonuses to the directors. This was going on while the pension fund was seriously underfunded.

It really is time that gross mismanagement by company directors was made illegal - as in prison sentences unless they can demonstrate all clear attempts to stop personal gains while they fail in their job and either try to put it right or resign in favour of someone else who is prepared to do that.

...and back on the NHS (still not giving me any help or assistance as I continue to be unable to go to work due to 2 parents who can not look after themselves, 4 weeks on). I see there has been a dramatic decline in life expectancy in many regions of the country (the poorer ones) of a year since 2011. Jeremy c**t took charge of the NHS in 2012, so it's fair to say the absolute c**t has personally caused the earlier deaths of many many people and can feel well pleased to have achieved his aims of reducing the burden of older people (and many younger suicidal people). Well done you total rhyming slang.

 

It would be wrong to wish the death of a fellow human being. However, in order to save lives, I have a moral dilemma about it.

Yes, I saw that story on the front of the Times - as you say it has only really occurred in the former Industrial heartlands and now economically weaker parts of the UK, but the falls of a year or more in just the past six years are quite shocking! It tells a story of a widening gap between the poorer forgotten parts of the UK and the more affluent London/SE and as you say speaks to the failure of this health secretary and government in maintaining a good standard of social care in these areas.

It really is time that gross mismanagement by company directors was made illegal - as in prison sentences unless they can demonstrate all clear attempts to stop personal gains while they fail in their job and either try to put it right or resign in favour of someone else who is prepared to do that.

 

I quite agree - but unfortunately that wouldn't prevent the damage being done before they were caught.

Another example of the calibre of Tory appointments...

 

From the Mail (I know, I know, but maybe you can forgive me this one)? :teresa:

 

http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-52...asectomies.html

 

 

Give 'unemployed wasters' vasectomies: Theresa May's new youth Tsar sparks fury by calling for jobless parents to be sterilised

 

Tory rising star Ben Bradley criticised families on benefits with lots of children

 

He made the controversial comments in a now deleted blog penned in 2012

 

MP for Mansfield has apologised for the comments and said he has 'matured'

 

*************

 

In situations like this, you're always left wondering if they genuinely regret saying it, or merely regret *being caught* saying it? :thinking:

 

Edited January 17, 20187 yr by vidcapper

Another example of the calibre of Tory appointments...

 

From the Mail (I know, I know, but maybe you can forgive me this one)? :teresa:

 

http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-52...asectomies.html

Give 'unemployed wasters' vasectomies: Theresa May's new youth Tsar sparks fury by calling for jobless parents to be sterilised

 

Tory rising star Ben Bradley criticised families on benefits with lots of children

 

He made the controversial comments in a now deleted blog penned in 2012

 

MP for Mansfield has apologised for the comments and said he has 'matured'

 

*************

 

In situations like this, you're always left wondering if they genuinely regret saying it, or merely regret *being caught* saying it? :thinking:

 

From what I've read, he wasn't actually emending compulsory vasectomies or anything like that. That said, his remarks were clearly stupid and offensive. Mind you, he was in his early twenties at the time, so his claim to have matured is more plausible than Toby Young's feeble excuses.

From what I've read, he wasn't actually emending compulsory vasectomies or anything like that. That said, his remarks were clearly stupid and offensive. Mind you, he was in his early twenties at the time, so his claim to have matured is more plausible than Toby Young's feeble excuses.

While it is more plausible, it should be noted that he's still only 28 now.

Good to see that the former chief executive of Carillion, forced out for being rubbish at his job, has managed to find another job. He is in charge of inspections at a nuclear power station. What could possibly go wrong?

It really is outrageous that a large company can get away with waiting 120 days to pay an invoice. How is a small business supposed to operate on those terms?

 

We now find that Carillion had just £29 million in cash and around £1 billion of debts. We also hear that they continued to pay dividends to their shareholders and generous bonuses to the directors. This was going on while the pension fund was seriously underfunded.

120 days is utterly criminal but speaks to the power of large dominant firms in this market. I think the final figure is up at £1.3bn.

 

Some more detail over how the collapse has come about has emerged across today.

 

RBS pulled the plug in the end by refusing to take any further part in their restructuring attempts. From what I understand, Carillion then approached us and EY about entering administration. Unlike the Government we actually do our due diligence when we enter an engagement and too have 2 big 4 firms say "We don't think we're going to get paid" is truly a damming indictment on Governmental contracting processes. With the pair of us (poor forgotten about Deloitte the only Big4 firm not in someway linked to this) having no faith in Carillion paying us, never mind surviving, it was liquidated.

 

 

Tories trying to hit back today at saying ⅓ of carillon contracts were awarded under Labour. Without realising that means in a shorter time they doubled the amount of contracts awarded to this firm who have been on the brink now for a while.

Labour were last in power nearly eight years ago. I assume Carillion were a going concern at the time. That being the case, how is it relevant that they were awarded contracts by a Labour government?

Right? It was a strange 'comeback' by May. Didn't really understand what they were trying to achieve.