Work and Pensions Committee opens investigation into Carillion collapse

The Committee has published an initial set of questions to The Pensions Regulator (TPR) and the pension scheme trustees on the demise of the firm with a “giant pension deficit and a mountain of debt”.

The UK’s second largest construction company was placed into compulsory liquidation on Monday following unsuccessful emergency financing talks with its lenders and the banks. The company employs 20,000 people in the UK and has debts of £1.15 billion and a pension shortfall of over half a billion.

Frank Field MP, chair of the Committee, said: “I am pleased that the Liaison Committee will be investigating Carillion – the company’s collapse begs questions across government.

“We have some specific concerns on the pensions side. It beggars belief that a company can be allowed to run with such apparent recklessness—and be so lucrative for the directors and shareholders – when it has a giant pension deficit and a mountain of debt.

“I will be proposing we take evidence from the company directors, the trustees, the pensions regulator and the auditors who somehow concluded Carillion was a going concern.

“Where our concerns overlap we will look to work closely with the Business Committee, as we have done successfully in the past.”