The conspiracy theorists were at it again last month, after the director of construction for the Olympic Delivery Authority (ODA) hinted that its delivery partner, headed by Ray O’Rourke, might get involved in building projects.

Contractors had previously been told that Laing O’Rourke, as part of the CLM consortium employed by ODA to oversee the design and construction, would not be bidding for Olympic jobs.

ODA director of construction Howard Shiplee told a conference on London 2012: ‘We can call upon CLM if there is an immediate construction need as a “deliverer of last resort” – that’s if we’re not getting the response from the market we need.’

A spokesman for O’Rourke told Construction News that its role was to deliver the works, adding: ‘If delivering for the client means project managing in a hands-on manner in the event of exceptional circumstances, then we would assess how we could do that for the client, but it’s very much a hypothetical situation.’

The story has raised fears that O’Rourke might muscle in on bids. The other view is that if projects end up with only one bidder then prices could get out of hand.

Shiplee’s comments and the discussion it has provoked could act as a deterrent to bidders who are trying to decide whether or not to tender.

Source

Construction Manager

Postscript

See page 14 for Chris Blythe’s view on other comments made by Howard Shiplee at the conference.