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£2bn funding row threatens work on three Tube lines
Dick Murray06.07.09
THE Tube is facing a new financial crisis with a £2billion funding row.
Leaders of the RMT union are warning of "another potential privatisation collapse" which could put essential upgrades and thousands of jobs at risk in the run-up to the 2012 Olympics.
Tube Lines, which holds the contract for repairs and refurbishment for the Piccadilly, Northern and Jubilee lines, is trying to cut £2billion from the £7.2billion it estimates its seven and a half year works programme which begins next July will cost.
Transport for London has estimated the work can be done for £4.1billion and the government arbiter says it should cost between £5.1billion and £5.5billion, leaving a £2billion black hole in the Tube Lines budget. Bob Crow, the RMT leader, said: "There is a £2billion stand-off between Tube Lines and TfL on the works programme on the Piccadilly, Northern and Jubilee lines with Tube users and Tube workers caught in the middle."
Tube Lines and TfL are negotiating costs. TfL has issued "restated" terms to Tube Lines but these have yet to be agreed.
A spokeswoman said Tube Lines had only recently submitted its response.
Reader views (3)
For the first time in LUL history, it has been made mandatory that senior managers must have a component of financial awareness.
Think of that - until 2009 they were deemed not to need such training - is it any wonder they can't manage the taxpayers' coin?
LUL Managers are too busy spending £2,000,000 per year on employment tribunals caused by them to care about such minor matters as funding shortfalls.
The tribunals occur because LUL senior managers are still selected from the ranks of the old boys club, done their time etc club - they are therefore incompetent which leads to bad management practices and decisions which leads to strikes.
Assets and liabilities - what was it Ken said - 'The only difference between me and Bob Kiley is that he wants to sack 100 and i want to sack 250 of LUL's management'.
- Andrea, Amersham,Bucks
Tube lines has at least been getting on with the job of upgrading the parts of the Underground (JNP) for which they are responsible for.
Given the lack of inflaion at the moment we need to know how much of the difference is down to cost and how much is due to Boris trying to do things on the cheap!
As someone who unlike his predecessor rarely uses the underground so what would he know about it?
The government has made enough money available for this parliament so just get on and spend it, otherwise Peter Mandleson will do it for you!
- Melvyn Windebank, Canvey Island, Essex
As someone who uses the Underground very frequently, I have yet to see one tangible improvement for all of the £billions spent so far on 'improvements'. The Queensway station on the Central Line was closed for six months to install new elevators and refurbish the station, yet the new elevators break down more frequently than the old ones. Similarly, with the 'improvements' to Lancaster Gate station. The Jubilee Line has been closed virtually every weekend for the last year for what I have been told is improved signalling. Why wasn't this work done when the Jubilee extension was built only 10 years ago? The line that seems to me to operate most reliably and consistently is the one that has received little or no 'improvements' -- the Bakerloo line.
Consider that all of the deep Underground lines were opened within a few years of each other at the start of the twentieth century, and were all built for just a fraction (even taking into account the devaluation of currency over 100 years) of what the 'improvements' are to cost.
The PPP has been just a massive, massive waste of taxpayer money -- as was predicted by Ken Livingstone and others before Blair & Co shoved it through.
- Phil Jones, London UK
