COURTROOM wrangles over major building projects are nothing new for the multinational famed for its role in the tortured construction of the new Wembley stadium.
There was acrimony even before the project began when Australian construction giant Multiplex scooped the coveted contract from under its former bidding partner Bovis.
The firms’ joint proposal to redevelop the stadium for £390 million was thrown out by the Wembley board in 2000, only for Multiplex to sneak back days later with a cheaper bid of its own –outraging Bovis.
READ MORE: NHS Glasgow launches legal action against Brookfield Multiplex
Things did not go to plan, however. By the time the revamped ground finally opened its doors in March 2007 – 18 months late – the bill had spiralled from £326m to £757m, making it the world’s most expensive sports stadium.
Multiplex, which was bought in 2007 by Canadian property developer Brookfield, becoming Brookfield Multiplex, laid the blame on its lead contractor, Mott Macdonald.
In December 2008, Brookfield Multiplex sued Mott Macdonald for £253 million for allegedly failing to prepare a robust plan for the steelwork design, forcing numerous costly design changes. Mott Macdonald denied the claims.
The two firms eventually settled their dispute out of court in June 2010.
In July 2010, Brookfield Multiplex also agreed to pay Aus$110 million to investors who alleged Multiplex had failed to keep them up to date on cost blowouts associated with the beleaguered project. Multiplex Group made no admission of liability as part of the settlement.
Brookfield Multiplex also faced the wrath of owners at a $60m apartment complex in Sydney who fought a lengthy court battle for their right to sue the consortium in order to recover the cost of fixing alleged defects in common areas.
However, in October 2014, Australia’s High Court ruled unanimously against the owners in a landmark ruling criticised for making it harder for property owners to claim compensation.
READ MORE: Expert appointed to head infection control at Glasgow superhospital
More recently, it emerged that NHS Lothian had settled out of court after being warned that suing over drainage problems, heater batteries and void fire detectors at Edinburgh’s new children’s hospital was too risky.
An Audit Scotland report, published in August, detailed how NHS Lothian bosses had sought legal advice over court proceedings against IHSL Ltd– the consortium which included Brookfield Multiplex as the lead contractor for design and build.
The report said NHS Lothian had “identified a number of issues that it believed were non-compliant with the original contractual requirements” for the Royal Hospital for Children and Young People .
However, the health board eventually agreed to pay £11.6m to the consortium to carry out remedial works after legal opinion “did not give the board sufficient confidence that the likely benefits of pursuing resolution through legal redress in the courts outweighed the qualitative and quantitative implications of such a route”.
NHS GGC has a fight on its hands.
Why are you making commenting on The Herald only available to subscribers?
It should have been a safe space for informed debate, somewhere for readers to discuss issues around the biggest stories of the day, but all too often the below the line comments on most websites have become bogged down by off-topic discussions and abuse.
heraldscotland.com is tackling this problem by allowing only subscribers to comment.
We are doing this to improve the experience for our loyal readers and we believe it will reduce the ability of trolls and troublemakers, who occasionally find their way onto our site, to abuse our journalists and readers. We also hope it will help the comments section fulfil its promise as a part of Scotland's conversation with itself.
We are lucky at The Herald. We are read by an informed, educated readership who can add their knowledge and insights to our stories.
That is invaluable.
We are making the subscriber-only change to support our valued readers, who tell us they don't want the site cluttered up with irrelevant comments, untruths and abuse.
In the past, the journalist’s job was to collect and distribute information to the audience. Technology means that readers can shape a discussion. We look forward to hearing from you on heraldscotland.com
Comments & Moderation
Readers’ comments: You are personally liable for the content of any comments you upload to this website, so please act responsibly. We do not pre-moderate or monitor readers’ comments appearing on our websites, but we do post-moderate in response to complaints we receive or otherwise when a potential problem comes to our attention. You can make a complaint by using the ‘report this post’ link . We may then apply our discretion under the user terms to amend or delete comments.
Post moderation is undertaken full-time 9am-6pm on weekdays, and on a part-time basis outwith those hours.
Read the rules here