RESPONSE TO QUERIES FROM THE PAC HEARING 16 DECEMBER 2010
During the hearing at the Parliamentary Advisory Committee on the M25 PFI Procurement in December, I agreed to respond to the Committee on three points. I am also including the information that Martin Capstick agreed to provide on the multi modal studies.
(a) Senior Responsible Officer-Ian Scholey
Ian Scholey's current role does not involve him in any work for the Highways Agency or Department for Transport either directly or indirectly. He is currently on secondment to Balfour Beatty Capital from Parsons Brinckerhoff This commenced in January 2010, and has involved preparing bids for PFI projects in Ireland, prequalifying for the DART Underground in Dublin and various rail PPP projects in the USA and Southern Europe. He has confirmed that in his work for Parsons Brinckerhoff after he left the Highways Agency he worked on projects for Network Rail.
In respect to why he left the Agency Ian has confirmed that he was approached by a head hunter for Parsons Brinckerhoff for a the role of Operations Director for Rail who had knowledge of working with Network Rail. His previous employment to the Agency was with Railtrack-the company acquired by Network Rail in 2002. He felt there was little opportunity for him to progress further in the Agency in view of reductions in the roads programme and he wanted to return to the rail industry and the private sector.
He was made a formal offer by Parsons Brinckerhoff in early March 2009, and he left the HA at the end of June 2009 following M25 Financial Close. He has complied with the requirements of the Business Appointment Rules.
(b) Costs of Consultants in the Highways Agency
The information that you requested about the costs of consultants (those who are not part of a contracted out service or project) and Highways Agency staff are given below.
|
|
1 May 2010 |
1 Dec 2010 |
|
Number of Consultants |
333 |
131 |
|
Estimated annual cost of consultants (£m) |
30.3 |
11.9 |
|
|
|
|
|
H A staff (annual cost £m) |
143.6 |
139.8 |
|
Of which funded from administration costs |
52.2 |
49.5 |
|
No of HA staff (full time equivalent) |
3872 |
3698 |
|
Of which funded from administration costs |
1278 |
1163 |
|
|
|
|
|
Ratios: |
|
|
|
Spend on consultants per £100 HA pay (£) |
21.08 |
8.52 |
|
Spend on consultants per £100 admin pay (£) |
58.03 |
24.06 |
|
No of consultants per 100 HA staff |
8.60 |
3.54 |
|
No of consultants per 100 admin staff |
26.06 |
11.27 |
(c) Multi Model Study on M25
In response to the Committee's request for a note on the amount of money spent on consultants involved with the Multi-Modal Studies (of which the M25 Orbit Study was just one), my fellow witness Martin Capstick (Director of Strategic Roads and National Networks at the Department for Transport) has provided the attached information.
I have read the draft transcripts of the hearings on 1 and 16 December and enclose factual corrections to questions 10, 31, 88, 191 and 209.
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