Carillion

[Walt Zingmatilder]

Can affected business afford the Carillion issue and Brexit? I've always thought business would have the last word on May's conservatism whose fate is now bound with Brexit.

[Rhiannon]

As I understand it Carillion is the victim of shorters, or certainly their financial problems have been made far far worse by them. It raises the question as to whether there needs to be regulation of hedge funds effectively betting on a firm to collapse, especially one with ties to the State such as this.

https://www.fool.co.uk/investing/2017/07/24/an-important-lesson-from-carillion-plcs-70-share-price-drop/

[Aruntraveller]

From personal experience I am not at all surprised, this from last year:

http://www.huffingtonpost.co.uk/entry/nottingham-university-hospitals-carillion-contract_uk_5891f523e4b064366c57c9c6

The problems the hospital had with Carillion cannot be understated. Still this is what happens when a bidding process takes place that puts the emphasis on money rather than quality.

[Rhiannon]

And I think govt departments tend to go with what they know, even if what they know is crap.

[Harrowby Hall]

I think - I hope - that Carillion may be instrumental in causing the present government to re-examine its apparently dogmatic view that private enterprise can always do things more efficiently than public enterprise ... and thus be instrumental in halting the privatisation-by-stealth of the NHS.

[Rhiannon]

Newsthump are on form today.

http://newsthump.com/2018/01/15/uk-construction-industry-in-crisis-after-government-mistakenly-bails-out-marillion/

[Nearly Sane]

At this stage rather than apportioning blame or trying to avoid it, I would prefer to see elected reps and workers reps and those of the company and all involved working together to sort out this as best as can be achieved for the workers in thee company, those companies affected by this, and those dependent on the services provided by it.

The causes are likely to be complex and need some form of inquiry but that will be a longer term objective. Unless someone is for no form of a mixed market, then notionally we all have some responsibility for such a system, and even those who want the means if production commonly owned aren't going to achieve that in the next couple of months, while people will be worried about how they pay the mortgage.

[Humph Warden Bennett]

FWIW our workplace engineers were employed by Carillion for three years until that corporation lost the contract.

"Carrion" would perhaps be a better name for them (and I am sure that the boys would cheer me on were they on this site).

[splashscuba]

As I understand it Carillion is the victim of shorters, or certainly their financial problems have been made far far worse by them. It raises the question as to whether there needs to be regulation of hedge funds effectively betting on a firm to collapse, especially one with ties to the State such as this.

https://www.fool.co.uk/investing/2017/07/24/an-important-lesson-from-carillion-plcs-70-share-price-drop/

Actually, it's because it was in such a bad state that people were betting against it. They collapsed, not because of their share price, but because they had massive debts that the major creditors refused to let continue.

[jeremyp]

As I understand it Carillion is the victim of shorters, or certainly their financial problems have been made far far worse by them. It raises the question as to whether there needs to be regulation of hedge funds effectively betting on a firm to collapse, especially one with ties to the State such as this.

https://www.fool.co.uk/investing/2017/07/24/an-important-lesson-from-carillion-plcs-70-share-price-drop/

The share price has almost no impact on a business's ability to operate. When a company's share price goes down, it doesn't magically have less operating capital. Where it does have an effect is in raising new capital, which you normally do by selling shares.

If people were short selling Carilliion, it was because the company was already in trouble.

[Walt Zingmatilder]

Carillion took their eye off the ball and the government didn't do anything about it because their limited attention abilities are absorbed with Brexit.

[floo]

I hope the poor taxpayer isn't going to be clobbered when sorting out this terrible mess.

[Harrowby Hall]

I understand that a number of schools and hospitals used Carillion as a service provider - cleaning, catering etc. - presumably in consequence of the Whitehall mantra that the private sector can deliver specific services more efficiently than can the public sector. However, Carillion's own inadequacies have led to some of these organisations taking services back in-house and finding that they can have total control over the quality of the work.

Our micromanaging government model is obsessed with efficiency at the expense of effectiveness. One hope I have (in vain one, I suspect) is that government in the UK will become less centralised. I suppose giving organisations the freedom to manage themselves at the operational level is a start.

[Humph Warden Bennett]

FTR Carillion used to have the maintenance contract at my work, the boys & girls did not like them because they gave them cheap prison style grey uniforms.

[Rhiannon]

FTR Carillion used to have the maintenance contract at my work, the boys & girls did not like them because they gave them cheap prison style grey uniforms.

Presumably the use of child labour didn't go down well either.

[Humph Warden Bennett]

Presumably the use of child labour didn't go down well either.

Oh they would have got away with that if they could   

[Walt Zingmatilder]

Press playing down the Carillion thing. Move along now nothing to see here.

[Walt Zingmatilder]

Looks like May is trying to suggest her party's role in the Fiasco was under the influence of Tony Blair since the previous administration signed a third of Carillions contracts.

In press arithmatic that makes the Labour Party 900per cent worse than the Government.

[Humph Warden Bennett]

Looks like May is trying to suggest her party's role in the Fiasco was under the influence of Tony Blair since the previous administration signed a third of Carillions contracts.

In press arithmatic that makes the Labour Party 900per cent worse than the Government.

In the run up to the 1997 General Election the Tories kept referring to "The last Labour Government" who had left office some eighteen years earlier.

We have all seen it all before.

[Walt Zingmatilder]

I actually don't think people give a shit about Carillion and if they are affected they will just roll over.

[Walt Zingmatilder]

Kwarteng blaming labour for Carillion fiasco on channel 4

[jeremyp]

I hope the poor taxpayer isn't going to be clobbered when sorting out this terrible mess.

I'm afraid we'll have to. It's either that or watch the collapse of many institutions that rely on Carillion services and see Carillion's employees out on the streets without jobs.