Q11 Matthew Hancock: So coming back to the original question, do you think that there's anything that the agency could have done to have made this happen more quickly?
Graham Dalton: I'm sure in hindsight there would have been some things that could have been done. There could have been some earlier decision taking.
Q12 Matthew Hancock: So which of the delays could have been shorter? You've just said it didn't need to take nine years, so which of the delays could have been shorter?
Graham Dalton: I think the various stages could possibly have been run a little bit faster.
Q13 Matthew Hancock: Which stages?
Graham Dalton: I'm afraid I'm not in a position to say. Any-
Q14 Matthew Hancock: Sorry, no-hold on. You've just told me that various stages could have been done quicker. The Chair's first question was "What could have been done more quickly?" You've told me various could have been done and I asked you which ones and you've told me that you can't tell me. That doesn't make sense. How could you have done this quicker?
Graham Dalton: I apologise if I seem to be-
Q15 Matthew Hancock: Not answering the question.
Graham Dalton: There is a lot to be done in each stage. If these phases go through-
Q16 Chair: Do you want to go to appendix one?
Graham Dalton: I'd be happy to.
Q17 Chair: I think that's the right one. Appendix one, page 32. In 2000, you commissioned the report.
Graham Dalton: That's right.
Chair: Now, what could you have done more quickly so that we didn't end up with a contract that hit the credit crunch and we didn't spend nine years from deciding something had to be done to actually just letting a contract, not even completing the work?
Graham Dalton: I think there was probably time at around decision making after the report was published and time selecting when to go in, between 2002 and probably 2004, when it went into targeted programme for improvements. So there's a question around there. Certainly between 2004 and 2005, there was a lot of initial design, a lot of assessments so as to work what was the optimum procurement. There was a lot of time then spent between 2005 and 2006, between OJEU and tenders actually going out, on preparing those tender documents. I think that was time well spent. There is always a question of whether it could be done more quickly, but also whether that would have been at the expense of the quality of the documents that went to tender.
Q18 Mr Bacon: Well, they were expensive enough. Most of the documentation was done by consultants, wasn't it?
Graham Dalton: Much of the design and the preparation of documents was done by consultants. That's right.
Q19 Mr Bacon: So it was, and you spent an enormous amount of money doing that. There is a section specifically on the use of advisers. You spent a total of £80 million-this is figure 9-and there was £14 million on lawyers. The technical working, excluding the design works, was £21 million and £41 million in total excluding the design works, then another £24 million just on technical advisers and design works. So I'm not quite clear why, if you were spending all this money on getting all this external help, it should have taken so long. Why, when you were buying in this help, couldn't it have been done more quickly?
Graham Dalton: I think there's a question of the sequence to be worked through. It's not just a question of putting more and more people on and running an infinite number of people all at the same time to come up with an answer; but it was about preparation of tender documents and contract documents, and those were being done in parallel with preparing the technical scopes and specifications.
Q20 Mr Bacon: On which you spent a total of £80 million. The point about this is, going back to the Chairman's first question: this is a bit of road widening. There's a map here showing where it is- it's not even the whole M25; you're talking about two chunks. Even from the decision to do it, when the Government publicly said we are going to do this, which was two or three years after the original study, it still took you the length of the Second World War after that to let the contract. Why?
Graham Dalton: The construction work, the improvement works-absolutely right. That is some road widening; it's two sections. Actually, the contract and design were done for the four sections that are there, including the later upgraded sections as well. This is also about the contracts for the maintenance for a period of 30 years and getting the performance specifications right for maintenance, and it included setting up for transfer of the Dartford Crossing also to go into the contract.
Chair: You're telling us what happened, you're not telling us why. We've got to go and vote. I'm going to come back and ask you the same question.
Q21 Ian Swales: Maybe you can work through it, because my first question would be, what was in the ORBIT Report? I wasn't around at the time. How detailed was that? It took two years and two months to do. What did it tell you? How much work was already there at that point?
Chair: So perhaps whilst we vote-and we will try and reconvene as quickly as we can-you can think about what you could have done more quickly.
Sitting suspended for a Division in the House. On resuming-
Chair: Apologies for that; we would be better delaying because I think otherwise, it will be too disruptive and I think the issues are really important in this. Are you okay with that, everybody? We'll have to reconvene and you might, by the time we reconvene, be able to answer some of our questions. So apologies to the witnesses and apologies to the public, but I just think if there's four Divisions on the trot, it's madness.
Mr Bacon: Okay.
Chair: Sorry.