The Political Destruction Left Behind After Carillion’s Collapse
- U.K. company involved in everything from roads to school meals
- Labour says government should bring contracts back in-house
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Carillion Plc, the U.K. construction and services company that collapsed under 1.6 billion pounds ($2.2 billion) of debt, was hardly a household name. But its failure puts another big problem into Prime Minister Theresa May’s already overflowing inbox.
While U.K. voters may not know the company, they relied on its products: It built hospitals and roads, maintained prisons and supplied school meals. So the government’s first problem is to ensure that those contracts -- there are around 450 of them -- continue to function. Then there are pensioners to protect, and suppliers and banks who are owed money. The company employs 43,000 people worldwide, almost 20,000 of them in the U.K.