Only 17 out of 2,806 bids from Scottish firms get nod for Olympics

Published on Sunday 31 January 2010 21:32

FIRMS in Scotland have been awarded just 17 contracts to work on the London Olympics, despite bidding for 2,806.

Scottish companies' share of the contracts to deliver the 2012 games currently amounts to just 2 per cent of the total budget.

Another 35 companies have been awarded sub-contracts, but the total amount for Scottish firms amounts to just 100 million of a total 5 billion.

Business leaders and politicians have criticised the uneven distribution of contracts to firms north of the Border.

London-based contractors have won more than a third of the work needed to deliver the Olympics, to be held in two years' time.

Pete Wishart, SNP MP for Perth and Perthshire North, said: "Scotland has about 9 per cent of the population and should be securing that share (of contracts]."

Scottish business leaders have warned that a lack of experience in building programmes could affect Scottish firms for the 2014 Glasgow Commonwealth Games.

David Lonsdale, assistant director of CBI Scotland,

said: "If you win business for the Olympics you're going to have the track record, knowledge and experience to win contracts. We would certainly encourage more Scots firm to wake up to the sizeable commercial opportunities the games provide."

Graham Bell, of Edinburgh Chamber of Commerce, said: "Is there a feeling the process has been biased to the south and London among Scottish firms? Yes there is."

A spokesman for the Olympic Delivery Authority said that geography is not a factor in awarding contracts to Scots firms.

"Scottish companies have already won contracts totalling tens of millions of pounds," he said.

"There are still millions of pounds worth of business opportunities between now and 2012."

A spokesman for Scottish Enterprise said:

"There are still many companies in Scotland which either haven't registered or fully completed their profile, and subsequently are missing out."