The collapse is easy to explain - constant lowest bid wins scenario, if you lose more money than the job is worth, you go bust. And how does the likes of Carillion constantly undercut prices? By relying on pushing wages and workers benefits down for skilled staff, and using unskilled for skilled or semi-skilled work. Boss is OK though £600k and he left the company and still gets paid FFS! It's the likes of companies like this that have been complicit in 'the race to the bottom'. There's a large set of major roadworks near me, 18 months long, not surprising when you never see more than about 10 blokes on site. The traffic management is appalling, with very confusing lane changes, little or none lane markings and poor signage. If I didn't drive this route on a regular basis I would struggle to know what to do. I often see visitors swapping lanes in dangerous ways.
What I have found interesting is some of the commentatars on TV who seem shocked that companies operate like this with payment terms of 90 days (changed last year to 120 days) to subbies, with the majority of the real workforce being subbies. 20,000 direct employed probably means more like 80,000 or more subbies on a regular basis
