Award of West Coast Rail to FirstGroup Cancelled

The government’s rail franchising policy has been thrown into disarray after the award of a new contract to run the West Coast mainline rail franchise was cancelled because of “technical flaws” in the bidding process. This is a partial victory for incumbent Virgin Trains, which had mounted a legal challenge to the decision to award the contract to rival FirstGroup and will also come as a blow to FirstGroup where investors had welcomed the new franchise as a strong revenue generator. Shares in the company fell by as much as 20 per cent in early trading. Patrick McLoughlin, the recently appointed transport secretary, said he was talking to Virgin Rail about the possibility of continuing to run the line after December 9 having previously indicated it would nationalise the line. The only certainty, the DfT said, was that “it won’t be FirstGroup”. go to link>>>