700 kilometers of roads return to Estradas de Portugal's management

Paul 03 December 2013

roadworks January 2014 sees the return of over 700 kilometers of roads to the direct management of Estradas de Portugal as a result of the renegotiation of contracts with various concession holders.

This move is said to represent a saving of €47 million over the next three years.

Estradas de Portugal said that these changes are as a result of agreements with the concession holders hammered out last year.

"The transfer of these roads that were formerly part of the subconcession contracts involve roads along the West Coast, Pinhal Interior, Transmontana, Alentejo, the Algarve and Baixo Tejo and will allow the company to achieve a saving in contracted maintenance costs," said the company.

Worryingly, the savings are from the contracted maintenance costs so road users are duly warned to expect a further decline in Portugal’s infrastructure.

Comments

0 #3 Mark H 2013-12-04 21:17

I am not praising any political party in saying this, but while I was working for the UK Civil Service, the government decided that too many businesses were going bust because they were not being paid in a reasonable time. To combat this all government departments were required to provide a written explanation from the officer responsible for processing the payment every time a bill was not paid within 2 weeks. These were sent to the Office of the Deputy Prime Minister. While this sounded like another bit of meaningless bureaucracy, attitudes soon changes when Mr Prescott started turning up in person at peoples desks asking for further details, and a chat with their line managers. Suddenly this practical approach quickly reduced payment times! Unfortunately, it has now been undermined as a force for good by cynical practices that favour suppliers, so we are left with cases like the MoJ paying for ankle cuffs for offenders that have long ago died or are already released!.

0 #2 tom 2013-12-04 14:11

A "complete" budget for any job is basic.

It might be a good idea too to offer sub contractors for public works a government signed bank guarantee for getting paid rapidly after finishing the job. The average time for payments goes up to 2 years or more. Who's financing that, the sub-contractor ? Public works shouldn't be keyword for going broke.

+1 #1 Mark H 2013-12-04 02:38

I wish the UK government would wake up to the fact that these PFI/PPP deals are too expensive in the long term, and that short term gains intended to boost election chances are paid for again & again over the next 10, 25 or even 50 years. Buying the contracts back may be expensive in the short term, but are better value in the longer term, as long as maintenance is budgetted for. Often the original reason for these deals in the first place is the lack of investment over many years, resulting in the excuse of poor services being used to justify the outsource or PPP/PFI deal, only to find that the cost is higher than if the in house costs had been met in the first place. It just seems that these private companies are in business solely to make a profit!