THE government expects to sever links with its design and delivery partner for the abandoned Overdale project within the next few days – after paying them £34 million.
Infrastructure Minister Tom Binet said that the contract with ROK FCC had a natural break point, which meant that it would be ‘fairly simple’ to terminate the relationship, opening the way to a series of smaller contracts for the hybrid option proposed by ministers this week.
‘ROK FCC had been given a specified piece of work to do, which was to bring the architectural drawings up to RIBA stage 3, and that’s where we are at the moment. That is a natural break and there would have had to be another agreement going forward, so we have reached the natural break point,’ he said.
The pre-construction fee of just over £34m paid to the company was ‘not all money wasted’, Deputy Binet said, as he defended – on the grounds of risk management – the decision to abandon what he said would have become a billion-pound development at Overdale.
‘It was an enormous amount of money to expend at a given point, simply because you have to bear risk management in mind. I do come from a commercial environment where I’ve borrowed money, so I am familiar with risk management and I’ve seen a couple of times in the course of my life where we’ve been on the edge a bit and had some anxious moments.
‘All I’m trying to do is bring whatever experience I’ve got from a lifetime in the commercial sector to bear in the public sector. I think people have been quite glib with public money in the past and I don’t think that’s what we need to be at the moment,’ he said.
Following the announcement of the government’s change of direction earlier this week, Deputy Binet said he was in the process of developing a formal proposition to rescind the decision on Overdale and formalise the hybrid option, which would see a smaller development at Overdale, supported by building at Kensington Place, Gloucester Street and Les Quennevais.
Treasury Minister Ian Gorst will also bring a new proposition to the States to detail how the new approach, which Deputy Binet hopes may save up to £170 million according to the best estimate in the report published on Tuesday, will be funded.
Speaking about the history of the controversial development planned for Overdale, Deputy Binet criticised the process which had led to the States’ decision to proceed at Overdale but was not inclined to point the finger at those involved.
‘I haven’t come to this role with a view of being critical of anybody. It is complicated.
‘Each person who has endeavoured to bring things to a conclusion has faced their own set of difficulties, not least of which being that they are working in a political arena where there are many different approaches and opinions,’ he said.
Chief Minister Kristina Moore has said the hybrid proposal has ‘ended a period of indecision’.
