£1m spent on bid to keep the Metro

Jun 16 2009 By Adrian Pearson, The Journal

METRO bosses are paying up to £1m in a bid to run the railway they already own.

As competition to run trains in Tyne and Wear continues, staff at Nexus have insisted their financial support for the in-house team does not mean they have a vested interest in securing success, but admit they may have to write off the cost of their bid.

Nexus has been forced into using taxpayers’ money to fund the bid after the Government said it would not offer £300m for Metro improvements unless train bosses offered private companies the chance to run one of the UK’s most reliable rail systems.

Although Nexus have not revealed the cost of putting together a bid to run their trains, it is understood private sector bids from three companies are at around £1m each. German railway Deutsche-Bahn, Dutch consortium Serco-NED and Hong Kong’s MTR Corporation, are all on the list, with varying degrees of state support for each company.

Last night The Journal was informed of rumours one bidder was preparing to pull out of the bidding process, a claim Nexus said it could not comment on.

RMT regional organiser Stan Herschel said Nexus had a duty to protect taxpayers’ money.

"We said right at the beginning that this sort of money would be wasted.

"If they are mounting a serious bid to keep the Metro in public hands then presumably it will be a fully resourced bid with similar amounts being spent as the private sector.

"But they will probably accept that this money is just to be written off, denying the Metro that additional investment at the same time."