Hope for Christmas signing of Greater Manchester PFI

I'm hopeful I can relax over Christmas

 
Cllr Neil Swannick, GMWDA

The Authority has announced that the majority of the funding for the 25-year deal has been secured by preferred bidder Viridor Laing and both parties are now only awaiting credit approval from the banks – which is anticipated to take approximately three to four weeks.

Funding includes a capital contribution of £70 million from the Authority, “in respect of additions that have been made to the works originally procured”, while the Bank of Ireland is set to be the “lead bank” to finance the deal (see letsrecycle.com story).

The comments came as the Greater Manchester Waste Disposal Authority (GMWDA) acknowledged the “direct impact” which the challenging economic conditions had had on delaying the project – which was originally due to reach financial close in early 2007.

Councillor Neil Swannick, chair of the GMWDA said: “We are ready to sign the contract as soon as the Banks have completed their processes of approval. We have a timeline from the Sponsors and Funders with milestones in place for close. Sponsors and Funders are working with the Authority to achieve close at the earliest opportunity”.

The Authority explained that its meeting of the 21st November (see letsrecycle.com story) was to review progress to close. Members, who were appraised of the current position and strategy, were supportive of the process designed to achieve an early close.

Cllr Swannick said: “This is the largest waste services contract to be let in Western Europe, the complexity of the project and sheer volume of the documentation, coupled with the unforeseen credit crisis, some delay is not unexpected. Indeed it is normal for many major contracts of this size and duration to experience some date changes.

“Our focus is ensuring that we reach the earliest possible close and that we then set out about the real task with Viridor Laing of implementing a world class waste management solution for the residents of Greater Manchester”, he added.

Speaking to letsrecycle.com today, Cllr Swannick described the next two weeks as a “critical fortnight” when several banks would reach the end of their credit approval processes.

He added: “I'm hopeful I can relax over Christmas”.

The GMWDA handles waste disposal for 958,000 households in Bolton, Bury, Manchester, Oldham, Rochdale, Salford, Stockport, Tameside and Trafford and is the largest of six English waste disposal authorities that were created under the Local Government Act 1985.