Vince Cable

The endless saga of delays in the completion of construction work at Trafalgar School, which has now lasted two years, continues and parents and staff are seriously worried that there will be further delays continuing into next term.

The last few weeks have seen further massive disruption after teachers were bitten by pigeon mites from birds nesting in the roof, and on the advice of Rentokil several rooms had to be cleared for over a month for fumigation, displacing a year group (6).

Like the other problems at the school, this disruption can be traced back to the failure of Jarvis, the PFI contractor, which has now sold on its contract to another company SMIF.

Vincent Cable MP who raised the problems of the Jarvis contract in Parliament on several occasions has been contacted by parent governors to help resolve the issues said: "this is an appalling mess and the performance of the contractors, mainly Jarvis, has been intolerably bad. The Director of Education is personally leading negotiations to get work finished by the next school year but is tied by unsatisfactory contracts. There must be no further slippage."