Birmingham City Hospital victim of building bids scandal

Sep 27 2009 by Alison Dayani, Sunday Mercury

MIDLAND hospital bosses are considering legal action against construction giants who were exposed in a bid-rigging scandal.

Some of the UK’s largest building firms including Balfour Beatty, Carillion and Interserve were hit with fines totalling £129.5 million by the Office of Fair Trading after secretly colluding to push up prices.

But Midland taxpayers who paid over the odds for NHS and schools contracts may soon see large sums of cash returned to the public sector – via the courts.

Birmingham’s City Hospital was stung on two contracts totalling nearly £800,000, both times by firms Wygar and Thomas Vale who placed artificially high bids for a new toxicology lab and a satellite renal dialysis unit in 2001.

Jessamy Kinghorn, spokeswoman for Sandwell and West Birmingham NHS Trust, which runs the hospital, said managers would now be pouring over the OFT report.

“We were asked to supply information on some contracts to the Office of Fair Trading but have not been made aware of any problems,” said Ms Kinghorn.

“The legal team will get a copy of this latest report. If irregularities have taken place, then we will have to consider legal action to recoup the money.