The Tribune

By NEIL HARTNELL Tribune Business Editor THE Public Accounts Committee (PAC) yesterday accused the main contractor working on the $113 million New Providence Road Improvement Project (NPRIP) of using "poorly trained staff in order to avoid paying standard labour rates", adding that delays in the project's completion had cost Bahamian taxpayers "millions of dollars". The PAC, in its report on the Road Project that was read out and tabled in the House of Assembly, said by hiring lower quality workers and training them up, Argentinean contractor, Jose Cartellones Civiles (JCCC), may have compromised the quality of work. Referring to a report to the Road Project's Disputes Board on October 23, 2010, the PAC report said: "The Ministry of Works and Transport was concerned that JCCC was not using sufficient numbers of skilled operatives, but was constantly training up an inexperienced workforce, and this took time and compromised quality. "Also, having gained experience, the operatives would leave JCCC and seek better paid employment elsewhere. The Ministry of Works and Transport stressed that market rates for experienced operatives needed to be paid to attract and retain the right quality of operatives." JCCC had directly employed some 420 Bahamians on the project, with a further 75 to 80 working for its sub-contractors. Pointing out that the contractor "had difficulty in identifying local contracting rates for workers", JCCC paid unskilled workers $4.50 per hour, with masons and operators getting $6.50 and $8.50 respectively. In its conclusions, the PAC said the 18 months taken by the Road Project's engineer, Mott McDonald, to produce a Schedule of Issues that would deal with any disputes and manage the project, and eight months to produce a Contract Programme, had all led to delays. The June 2010 work programme presented to the Government by Mott McDonald recommended increasing the Road Project's work fronts from four to eight, and the monthly work spend rise from $5 million to $7.5 million. The PAC said its findings were that the road project was "unnecessarily delayed, and those delays cost the Bahamian public millions of additional dollars. Here again your committee found that absence of adequate oversight, poor supervision and management by professional companies paid to protect the interests of the public, failed in this duty. "This failure was in no small way responsible for the frustration of motorists, harsh disruptions in the lives of residents, irreparable loss of business for Bahamian companies and severe damages to hundreds of vehicles."