Mea

[Gladys]

There was a report this morning on MR on evidence given in the revived inquiry and, yet, no comment.

 

Meself, I thought some of the submissions made were quite interesting, like the 'lights will go out over the island at 5 pm one day if we do not have a new power station' and Mr P's credentials were that he sucessfully ran a hotel chain.

 

All good stuff, but so far has proven nothing other than there was a bit of a panic which resulted in bad decisions when looked at with the great benefit of 20:20 hindsight.

 

However, there were huge sums involved, the implications of which will continue for many a year for the island, and now it appears a perfunctory exercise where boxes will be ticked, but we will not be sure that the lessons which should have been learnt have, indeed, been learnt.

 

To quote Oscar Wilde; 'to lose one umpty zillions is misfortune, but to lose two umpty zillions is just careless.'

 

NB: Will check quote, but I am sure you know where I am coming from.

[Celt]

Not forgotten by me. I'm waiting for some more interesting pints to be made known before i form an opinion.

 

Interesting so far so hear the Mr Proffit seemed to look and treat the , Government, the Treasury, the MHK's, the MLC and the Manks taxpayer with so much contempt .

 

Maybe he knows better than us.

 

Strange to hear that he's stated he could save the MEA £9million. Wounder where that went?

[jim]

we have electickity, I'm pluged in now, so no one really cares......

 

come the revelution i have a generator

[asitis]

I am afraid Tynwald were railroaded into making decisions which admittedly with hindsight were perhaps incorrect and another huge waste of money occurred. Huge similarities with the current massive expenditure at the airport hope this does not turn around and bite but wouldn't bet on it.

[Theodolite]

Don't you worry Gladys, there's plenty tuning in.

 

James Davies, for Manx Radio, is doing an excellent job reporting on the Public Enquiry. Well done Manx Radio too for bringing this one to us.

[jimbms]

Ask Gags he works for the MEA

[Tugger]

Electricity in the Isle of Man is now so expensive that alternative energy sources might become much more economically viable.

 

If only I knew someone with Manx connections who was now running a company dealing with alternative energy sources.

 

We should prosecute the swine and be done with him.

[Gladys]

Evidence given that he thought the reporting rules did not apply to MEA. Is there a case for some claim against him? It is one thing to honestly make a bad decision, but another to act with reckless disregard or to knowingly flout the rules which apply to your situation.

[Grianane]

Its interesting that the Treasury officials are so clear that the MEA was founting the rules and not complying with procedures applicable to all Government bodies, but what the f*ck did they do about it. Ok the MEA was in the wrong but the Treasury seems to have sat back and watched it happen without intervening, either the officers or more probably the political Members made a decisison to let the MEA continue to break the rules.

[Sparky]

Apparently the one report they did get said it would all come in on budget! The only thing was it didn't say which budget.

[matty]

Found attached report online somewhere a while back.

meafinalreport010705.pdf

[Chinahand]

Evidence given that he thought the reporting rules did not apply to MEA. Is there a case for some claim against him? It is one thing to honestly make a bad decision, but another to act with reckless disregard or to knowingly flout the rules which apply to your situation.

Is the "he"/"him" here Proffitt? If so I think you are over personalizing the issue.

 

The issues concerning the applicability of Financial Directives and Treasury Audit to the MEA were well known and a cause of - how should it be phrased - lots of "discussion" involving the MEA and various politicians and civil servants at the time of the placing of the orders for the new power station etc.

 

It will be fascinating to see how this comes out and how hindsight will colour the analysis!

 

In my opinion, the way this issue was handled, by all sides, in part created the breakdown which lead to the loans situation.

 

This is well before the PKF report, but my understanding is that it wasn't that rules were flouted, but rather that there was a robust exchange of views about the applicability of rules and then a lack of engagement. It could be said that the MEA became semi-detached as a result of this, with all the consequences: the ship had sailed and Treasury etc did little to understand its course.

 

At the PKF executive summary says:

 

[W]e have found no evidence to suggest that either the Government departments involved or the MEA have acted other than as they each saw fit under their perceived remits. Nevertheless it is apparent that those perceived remits, taken in aggregate, were insufficient, allowing a very substantial breakdown in communication between the MEA and Government, as a result of which Government has not been sufficiently cognisant of developments at the MEA.

[P.K.]

[W]e have found no evidence to suggest that either the Government departments involved or the MEA have acted other than as they each saw fit under their perceived remits. Nevertheless it is apparent that those perceived remits, taken in aggregate, were insufficient, allowing a very substantial breakdown in communication between the MEA and Government, as a result of which Government has not been sufficiently cognisant of developments at the MEA.

Let me paraphrase this little gem:

 

The project management was completely crap but nowhere does it say it had to be anything other than completely crap.

 

The most telling points for me are the deliberate use of the MCC and the fact that the extra Barclay loans would have been cheaper if done via Tynwald which, of course, the project team arrogantly chose to ignore.

 

Says it all really...

[QLD-Bloke]

[W]e have found no evidence to suggest that either the Government departments involved or the MEA have acted other than as they each saw fit under their perceived remits. Nevertheless it is apparent that those perceived remits, taken in aggregate, were insufficient, allowing a very substantial breakdown in communication between the MEA and Government, as a result of which Government has not been sufficiently cognisant of developments at the MEA.

Let me paraphrase this little gem:

 

The project management was completely crap but nowhere does it say it had to be anything other than completely crap.

 

The most telling points for me are the deliberate use of the MCC and the fact that the extra Barclay loans would have been cheaper if done via Tynwald which, of course, the project team arrogantly chose to ignore.

 

Says it all really...

 

Depending how you define 'project team' but I doubt the Board were involved in the day to day stuff and the project team doing the work surely weren't involved in borrowing decisions. Arguably, the Chief Executive had a foot in both camps and therefore was the only person with a complete overview.

 

Can't remember if this was said the last time we took this story out for a spin but didn't the Board come out and say (letter to tynwald members from the former chairman?) that the reason for the use of MCC was to save time at a point when delay would cost in excess of £50,000 per week and going through Treasury would have wiped out any savings?

 

I suppose the key part about the recent hearing is that the committee is looking at Treasury and DTI when searching for causitive errors - that puts them ahead of most of the members who just want Proffitt's head on spike - and this ought to give rise to a reevaluation from all those who think it's just one 'side' that was at fault.

 

Can't wait for the DTI evidence!

[P.K.]

Depending how you define 'project team' but I doubt the Board were involved in the day to day stuff and the project team doing the work surely weren't involved in borrowing decisions. Arguably, the Chief Executive had a foot in both camps and therefore was the only person with a complete overview.

Sure those actually "doing the work" as you put it were probably not involved in the financial side but the way I define "project team" is Mr Proffitt and his merry men. Those who as a matter of course should have been having regular meetings with the Tynwald lot as well as producing progress reports, costings, projections, CPA's, SWOT's and all the rest you would expect from those running a large PUBLICLY FUNDED project. Alas of which there was none. Well why was that I wonder?

 

Didn't the Board come out and say (letter to tynwald members from the former chairman?) that the reason for the use of MCC was to save time at a point when delay would cost in excess of £50,000 per week and going through Treasury would have wiped out any savings?

One of my favourite excuses - "we didn't approach you because a delay would cost in excess of £50k a week etc etc etc blah-di-blah-di-blah...." and so on. This load of old rubbish is all based on an assumption that an approach to those actually funding the project would cause a costly delay. Which, of course, is an assumption based on the square root of naff-all. It's just a piss-poor excuse for not keeping Tynwald informed.

 

In any event who wants anyone's head when you can have a trowel ready?