At last week’s Overview and Scrutiny Committee meeting, the subject of the Highways PFI came up.
Chair of the committee, Cllr Vanessa Churchman, advised members that she’d been contacted by the PFI project lead, Jay Jayasundara, in relation to the forthcoming decision on the preferred bidder.
Mr Jayasundara has requested that the call-in on the forthcoming preferred bidder Delegated Decision be dis-allowed. The chair of the committee has full power to decide whether a call-in of a Delegated Decision can be dis-allowed or not.
Specific to preferred bidder decision
It was re-iterated that the decision to go ahead with the Highways PFI had already been agreed in principle by the full council. The item being discussed was specifically in relation to a preferred bidder decision.
It was explained that if the decision was called-in, it would delay the entire process.
Cllr Churchman explained that the appropriate paperwork needed to be ratified and approved by a Government minister before the August recess commenced, otherwise there would be problems with the entire project.
Views of committee members
The chair reminded the committee that the decision was ultimately hers but welcomed the views of her fellow committee members.
Cllr Webster felt it “would be foolish not to allow it through to the next stage. We’ve gone down a long line now and it should go through”.
Cllr Ward commented that Mr Jayasundara “gets enough of a grilling” at meetings of the review board, was totally confident in his ability and would accept his advice to dis-allow the call-in.
Cllr Fuller said that although he was aware of “one or two critics” to the Highways PFI, that he felt residents wanted to see it happen as soon as possible.
Cllrs Stewart, Cameron and Humby all concurred with what had been said. Cllr Bacon had left the meeting by this point so was not able to share his views.
The chair said that she would take the views forward and decide whether to disallow the call-in.
