Winson Green operator savaged by MPs over Olympic fiasco

THE security firm G4S, which supplies the private sector management of Birmingham’s Winson Green prison, has been severely criticised by MPs for failing to deliver on its Olympic contract.

G4S lost around £50m when it failed to provide the 10,000 security staff needed to patrol the Olympic Village during the Games. The move prompted the Government to draft in troops to ensure safety could be maintained.

The Home Affairs Committee report into Olympic Security has been critical of the role played by G4S and MPs have said the £57m management fee set to be awarded to the company should not be paid.

MPs have also said the firm should compensate people who gained the proper accreditation for security work but were never give shifts.

The contract awarded to the firm for the Olympics is said to be worth around £237m.
In a statement, G4S said it noted the report findings and accepted full responsibility for the inability to deliver the contract in full.

It said it was conducting a full review to determine in detail what went wrong with the execution of the contract and specifically why the contract execution issues were not identified earlier.

The review is nearing completion and its findings are expected to be announced before the end of the month.

“G4S estimates that it will incur a loss on this contract in the region of £50m. This includes an estimate for the additional costs incurred for the deployment of the increased military and police and penalties and liabilities due under the terms of the contract.  It has consistently made clear that the British taxpayer will not bear any additional costs,” it said.
 
It added that the £57m management fee was not a profit due to the company.  It said this related substantially to real costs which have been incurred such as wages, property and IT expenditure. The final financial settlement is currently under discussion with LOCOG, the Games’ organiser.

“G4S recognises that some candidates will not have received the level of service that they should expect during the recruitment of security officers for the Olympic and Paralympic Games,” added the company.

“G4S has already agreed a process, in conjunction with the GMB Union, for compensating those candidates who completed training and accreditation or made a significant journey through the recruitment process, but were unable to work at the games.  The process for handling these enquiries has already begun.

“The company acknowledges and regrets the serious failing of not identifying the workforce shortfall at an earlier date.  As soon as the company knew that it could not assure the full workforce numbers in the build up to the Games, the relevant people at LOCOG and the Home Office were informed.”  

G4S said it had a longstanding track record of delivering on Government contracts to a consistently high standard and therefore, everyone connected with the company was extremely disappointed that the firm had been unable to deliver on its full commitments.

It has also thanked the police and military for their support during the Games.

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