Carillion

Andrew Bridgen Excerpts

Monday 15th January 2018 Commons Chamber

[Mr Lidington]

The official receiver is clearly an independent authority—rightly so—but where we are talking about a contract to provide services to a Government Department or a Government agency, obviously that Department or agency has to decide whether the particular provider will deliver what is needed in terms of the quality and speed of public service. We are protecting the public service contracts on the basis of the value that they provide to the public, not where they might have got to in their development. Clearly, it is for the official receiver, in the first place, and for the relevant Departments to look at each project on its own merits and to assess how best to take it forward and through what type of provision.

[Andrew Bridgen (North West Leicestershire) (Con)]

Does my right hon. Friend agree that companies do not fail—directors and management teams fail? Does he also agree that capitalism without bankruptcy is like Christianity without hell: there is nothing to keep us on the straight and narrow? Carillion is finished, but demand for its services continues. The jobs will be recreated, and in future the management will have to be better.

[Mr Lidington]

I cannot match my hon. Friend’s theological knowledge, but the central point he made at the end is right: this work in providing public services will still need to be done. People will still need to be employed in the provision of support services, facilities management, repairs and maintenance, and so on. Although that will not be done by Carillion in future, it will be done by another provider, and the need to employ numbers of people will remain.