What MPs said about the collapse of Carillion and its board.
- “Even as the company very publicly began to unravel, the board was concerned with increasing and protecting generous executive bonuses.”
- Finance director Richard Adam “was the architect of Carillion’s aggressive accounting policies and resolutely refused to make adequate contributions to the company’s pension schemes, which he considered a “waste of money”.
- “The mystery is not that it collapsed, but that it lasted so long.”
- “We have no confidence in our regulators.”
- “The perception of Carillion as a healthy and successful company was in no small part due to its directors’ determination to increase the dividend paid each year, come what may.”
- “Honouring pension obligations over decades to come was of little interest to a myopic board who thought of little beyond their next market statement.”
- “Carillion relied on its suppliers to provide materials, services and support across its contracts, but treated them with contempt.”
- “The board was either negligently ignorant of the rotten culture at Carillion or complicit in it.”
- Richard Adam’s sale of £776,000 shares “were the actions of a man who knew exactly where the company was heading once it was no longer propped up by his accounting tricks”.
- “Carillion could happen again, and soon.”
