This is complex and frustrating. Having looked into the matter and had officer briefings it seems clear to me that the council has by and large got things right. The issue seems to be the contractor has over run on its own costs and is trying a number of tactics to recover them from the council. At the same time, it might have failed to meet the specifications required in the contract.
The County continues, quite rightly, to hold the contractor BNL to its obligations under the design and build contract for the guided busway. Unfortunately, this will result in a delay in bringing it into service. The northern section is substantially complete but has six significant defects that the county require the contractor to put right before we accept it into service. If we accept it before the defects are sorted out the long term liability is likely to move to the county, which no one wants. A summary of the situation is as follows:
•Key defects need to be rectified
•CCC will not takeover until they are
•BNL are refusing that these items are defects effectively paralysing the process
•CCC can’t terminate the contract on this basis
•Need to continue seeking rectification of these issues
This is very frustrating and likely to end up in expensive legal action against the contractor. Lets hope there is a “pint and a pie” solution to this problem but I don’t think it very likely.
