Builders fined £60m for submitting rigged bids for UK construction contracts

A total of 10 UK-based firms were fined almost £60m 'for colluding on prices through illegal cartel arrangements when submitting bids in competitive tenders for contracts.'

Some of the best known construction firms in Britain have been slapped with combined fines of almost £60m (€68m), and three company directors have been disqualified, for illegally colluding to rig bids for contracts for high-profile public and private contracts.

The UK's competition regulator said 10 firms were involved in rigged contracts were worth a total of £150m which included high-profile works on a training college for the Metropolitan Police, Bow Street Magistrates Court, as well as at Selfridges department store in London, work for Oxford and Coventry universities, a shopping centre in Reading, and office projects and other building sites in central London and the English midlands.  

A total of 10 UK-based firms were fined almost £60m "for colluding on prices through illegal cartel arrangements when submitting bids in competitive tenders for contracts", the  Competition and Markets Authority said. 

"One or more of the 10 building firms had submitted so-called cover bids "that were deliberately priced to lose the tender", the regulator said.    

"These bids were rigged, deceiving the customer that they were competitive when that was not the case. Each of the 10 firms was involved in at least one instance of bid rigging between January 2013 and June 2018," it said. 

The construction firms cover some of the best-known international building industry names based in the UK. They include Brown and Mason, Cantillon, Clifford Devlin, DSM, Erith, JF Hunt, Keltbray, McGee, Scudder, and Squibb.  

The largest fines were imposed on Erith at over £17.5m, Keltbray at £16m, Scudder at £8.2m, JF Hunt at £5.6m, McGee at £3.7m, 
Brown and Mason at £2.4m, and Cantillon at £1.9m. 

The regulator also said it had secured the disqualifications of three company directors — David Darsey, formerly of Erith for a period of five years and 10 months; Michael Cantillon, formerly of Cantillon, for seven years and six months; and Paul Cluskey, currently a director of Cantillon, for four years and six months.