It would appear that Grayling 'misled' the house when he said no money had been spent on the no-boats contract. In fact it was £800,000 on consultants, one of whom said not to touch them with a stick and the other said they couldn't reach a conclusion on no evidence.
https://www.theguardian.com/politics/20 ... 1549916764
A report by Whitehall’s spending watchdog found the Department for Transport (DfT) “spent approximately £800,000 on its external consultants Slaughter and May, Deloitte and Mott MacDonald”.
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The National Audit Office said the consultancy Mott MacDonald identified “significant execution risks” relating to the Seaborne bid. Deloitte could not make a formal assessment of Seaborne because it had only been incorporated in April 2017, auditors said.
The emergence of the spending appears to contradict Grayling’s statement in the House of Commons on Monday, when he said: “We haven’t spent any money on this contract.”
And Eurotunnel are suing the DfT because the tendering process was 'undeclared'.
Meanwhile, the company behind Eurotunnel launched a high court action against the DfT, accusing the government of a “secretive and flawed procurement exercise” for the backup ferry service in the event of a no-deal Brexit.
At a hearing in London on Monday, Eurotunnel’s barrister, Daniel Beard QC, said the procurement process for “additional capacity for transport of goods across the Channel” had been “undertaken without any public notice being issued”.
Chances of him resigning - 0%.
87.5 %
12.5 %
- By youngian
- By spoonman