West coast mainline franchise

And they have to refund the bidding costs to all the bidders which is going to be expensive given that First and Virgin were not the only bidders and it reputedly cost Virgin £14 million.

They are saying £40million in total possibly. But that does not account for the salaries of all those civil servants who worked on the bid. There will have been a large team working on it I am guessing.

Sounds similar to the Bombardier fiasco where they ignored certain criteria in the tenders offered and Siemens got the work, even though the Bombardier train was up and running and the Siemens one was still a work in progress and could cost a fortune if problems are found.

They couldn't run a bath. How many more times is this sort of thing going to happen?

I always found it hard to believe that Branson would lose the line.

With Bombardier they didn't factor in things such as job losses and the end of any train making facilities in this country; also any cost incurred by the fact the Siemens engine [or rolling stock, not sure which] was still a prototype and could need modifying [after it had broken down].

Somewhere along the line I think dopes have got into all systems to do with Govt contracts and manage to sound good - only afterwards are the implications recognised when it all goes public and it is too late - maybe this train thing will cause a re-think on other issues.

my suspicion is that they need to recruit more savvy people from private sector and rely less on career civil servants. But I could be wrong.
Dept of transport is not the most glamorous of ministries.

The Dept. of Transport has still got quite a way to go before it rivals the MOD in incompetence and waste. Being a cynic about all our past governments, I am highly suspicious and would like to know 'who benefits?'.

On the other hand - occam's razor - why look for a conspiracy theory when plain old incompetence may well be the simplest explanation

On the news tonight it says taxpayers will pick up the £40M bill. Sigh.

And yet again, that's us

There have been nastier governments in the past and their have been more corrupt governments but for sheer b****y incompetence this lot take the biscuit. Can't they do anything right the first time. They announce policy and three weeks later withdraw it because someone points out the blinding obvious problem they have failed to realise. They award contracts and then a few days later go Oops! we made a mistake, sometimes they can right it sometimes they can't. Bombardier, West Coast Mainline, and those are only the ones that immediately jump to mind. Still what do you expect when you put the government in the hands of people who have never held a proper job in their lives outside politics.

I really do wonder how much incompetence actually remains hidden and never comes to light.. I dread to think.

You get a pretty good idea if you read Private Eye!

"The one thing that you might expect the Conservatives to be good at. Competence. Competence? Have you ever seen such an incompetent, hopeless, out of touch, U-turning, pledge-breaking, back-of-envelope writing, make-it-up-as-you-go-along, miserable shower than this Prime Minister and this government."

Never thought I'd agree with Ed Milliband but........

Now its the BBC helping their presenters etc avoid paying tax and national insurance, now they have admitted it will they claw back the lost tax or will they make us work till we drop to make up the shortfall that the 'lovies' have been assisted in withholding in fact it seems they have been encouraged and we have paid for it with our licence fees.

It's a problem with all governments of any colour. Take P.F.I., computers in the N.H.S etc. The fact is unlike the private sector 'heads do not roll' and usually the incompetence get's covered up and the Civil Service are dab hands at promoting or shifting employees who are incompetent. At the Labour conference Balls and Burnham bent over backwards to say they 'got things wrong'. They are all as bad as one another. This is another fiasco and I wonder where it will conclude. Who gave different papers to the bidders, or have I got that point wrong?.

muganny.

As for the B.B.C. they are a disgrace. I get annoyed when I see programmes and presenters having a snide dig at others when they are nothing more than hypocrites doing it themselves. All public sector employees and anybody paid their wages or fees by the tax payer should pay the correct tax and national insurance or not receive a penny. They certainly do not have the right to chastise others.

I see from today's Guardian that one of the suspended civil servants is a former Goldman Sachs executive director.

Good for Richard Branson! I read somewhere that he might be interested in taking on the IW ferries which are charging the earth to cross a strip of water a couple of miles wide eg £160+ for a car with 4 passengers! It's cheaper to go abroad. Noone wonder the Island economy is dropping fast.

Do you think it was the same team that allocated ATOS it's extra pip franchises?