Stop dithering on Midland Met - MP's message to Government after Carillion collapse
Stop dithering and start work – that is the message from a Black Country MP to the Government about the stalled Midland Metropolitan Hospital.
John Spellar has called for urgent action on the £350 million ‘super hospital' in the wake of a damning report about construction giant Carillion.
Bosses at Carillion, which was working on the Midland Met site when the firm went under, were this week described as ‘shysters’ as MPs published their scathing findings.
Mr Spellar said more needed to be done to get work up and running once again.
At Cabinet Office Questions yesterday the Warley MP urged Ministers to ‘stop dithering and start work again’ on the Smethwick site.
Mr Spellar said that since the collapse of Wolverhampton-based Carillion, he had raised the halt of construction ‘with the Cabinet Office several times, with health ministers, and even twice here in the chamber with the Prime Minister’.
He also said that the scathing Select Committee report, which criticised bosses ‘clearly demonstrates the urgent need to deal with the late payment culture in the construction industry – hitting many subcontractors’.
Directors at the firm were said to be ‘stuffing their mouths with gold’ at a company, which was ‘a giant an unsustainable corporate timebomb’, in the explosive report.
Mr Spellar said: “This Carillion report clearly demonstrates the urgent need to deal with the late payment culture in the construction industry – hitting many subcontractors.
“But, most important and pressing for me – four months after the Carillion collapse – is the ongoing shutdown of the Midland Metropolitan Hospital.
“I’ve raised this with the Cabinet Office several times, with Health Ministers, and even twice here in the Chamber with the Prime Minister.
“So, when is the Government going to stop dithering and start work again on this much-needed hospital?”
