Unpaid Contractors Cast Shadow Over Fibre Garden’s Cumbria FTTP Rollout

The community driven Digital Dales (Fibre GarDen) project, which recently began work to roll-out a 100Mbps Fibre-to-the-Premises (FTTP) broadband network to 580 premises in the rural Cumbria (England) villages of Garsdale and Dentdale, is trying to recover after unpaid contractors downed tools.

Anybody familiar with the project, which is costing around £650,000 to deploy (details), will know that it has already struggled its way through plenty of concerns from local politicians (here) and not to mention a problem with backhaul capacity suppliers (Network Rail denied them access and so an alternative was found).

Despite all these issues the ITS Technology Group, which is managing the construction phase of the 64km long fibre optic route, finally began to lay the first sections of fibre optic cable from the outskirts of Sedbergh during mid-April 2015. ITS Tech hired TS Trenching and related sub-contractors to do most of the civil works (e.g. digging and laying cable) and a rough route map can be found below.

The plan was that the first properties should be able to access the new services by this summer 2015 and in May 2015 Fibre GarDen posted an update to say that they were “pleased with the quality of the work undertaken by TS trenching“. If only it was so simple.

At the same time the project also admitted that they were “struggling to secure the release of funds which had been allocated to the project by DEFRA“, which was largely blamed on a de-scoping administrative delay by BT (i.e. removing the Fibre GarDen area from the local Broadband Delivery UK programme) over which Fibre GarDen had no real control.

Sadly this delay “led to the unfortunate interruption of construction progress” and this was described by the project as being “inconvenient to TS trenching“. But in the same update the project team confirmed that the funding woes had been resolved and that work would continue, albeit ending on the following comment.

Fibre Garden May 2015 Update (here):

“ITS remain fully committed to the project and to contributing their share of the funding. They too have a lot of work on at present and the fact that they are willing to devote considerable resource to Fibre GarDen is a further reflection of their commitment. There is no problem with either ITS funding or the relationship between Fibre GarDen and ITS as some rumours have suggested.”

After this there were several months’ worth of blog updates, which talk vaguely about meetings, planning, the weather and wayleaves, but which also offered precious little information on the physical roll-out progress or any pictures of the actual deployment. Fast forward to the end of August 2015 and we’re given the reason why, albeit absent of much detail.

Fibre Garden 28th August 2015 Update (here)

“We came across difficulties that resulted in a cessation of on-site work in July and we have, since then, been putting in place more robust arrangements with our contractor to ensure we can get the project on track at the earliest.

We are disappointed to report that inappropriate heavy machinery was used on Longstone Fell and for the inconvenience this situation caused for the landowner. All mitigation works have now been undertaken and our contractor will be undertaking a full network route inspection to ensure that, in future, site works are appropriate to the particular ground conditions.”

It’s important to note that the “inappropriate heavy machinery” comment does not appear to be related to TS Trenching. ISPreview.co.uk understands that a company called Trench Cut from Kent was brought in to mole-plough after TS Trenching left the job and they apparently ran into a bog.

The same update also announced that MAP Group had taken over the task of building the network route, seemingly as a replacement for TS Trenching, and again there is the promise of “significant progress over the coming months“, with DEFRA also agreeing to revise its final funding claim deadline from September to 13th November 2015.

Naturally we were curious about the aforementioned “difficulties” and had also been seeing comments from unhappy contractors, which complained that ITS Tech had not paid them anything for the work they did; work that was previously said to have “pleased” the Fibre GarDen team.

ISPreview.co.uk has subsequently spoken to TS Trenching, which appears to confirm the unpaid contractors’ situation. According to TS Trenching, they raised concerns about funding early on and claim to have been given assurances that “if we did not get paid [by ITS Tech], Fibre GarDen would pay me“. But when ITS Tech didn’t pay them, the Fibre GarDen team didn’t either and so, they claim, work was stopped.

At this point TS Trenching acknowledges the BT de-scoping delay and its impact, although they add that “the whole reason for partnering with [ITS Tech] was to cash flow the project and gap fund where needed” but “[ITS Tech] were not prepared to spend any cash.” The contractor further claims that “even a local coal yard where we arranged storage [for three drums of cable duct]” also evicted the project due to non-payment.

A TS Trenching spokesperson told ISPreview.co.uk:

“They have used every excuse going for none payment, we have had two payments to date but have failed on payment plan. Other contractors have contacted myself as to why we stopped works, but are not surprised when told why.

I find it hard to understand Fibre Garden are still believing the excuses for no progress, all the landowners are fed up of the lies they are being told and the locals are asking questions, they are not stupid but are being treated as so. The shareholders need to be asking where their money has gone. My subcontractor has had to let his staff go as a result and find a job himself.”

The situation demonstrates the huge impact that even a small administrative delay can have to such a project, although it also raises questions about why Fibre GarDen and ITS Tech were unable to resume the work once BT’s de-scoping confirmation had come through.

In the meantime Phil Knowles from TS Trenching continues to make his frustrations felt by posting on Fibre Garden’s Facebook Page, often with comments like, “New contractor for ITS for them not to pay!!! like the last contractor, Ts trenching still waiting to be paid!!“.

However ITS Tech say that TS Trenching have already been paid, from ITS’s own pot, for part of the work completed and they are confident of progress in the coming months.

David Cullen, ITS Executive Director of Networks, told ISPreview.co.uk:

“It is well documented that the funding process has been long and tough. In a bid to meet grant deadlines, ITS and TS Trenching started the build when we believed the de-scope process was imminent. Unfortunately, further delays (that in the end were resolved with intervention from BDUK) meant that TS Trenching took the decision to down tools. Part payment has been made to them, and the balance will be settled once some remedial works are completed to the satisfaction of the landowner.

ITS had become increasingly concerned about the pressure that grant processes and compressed timescales put on small contractors’ finances and resources. As a result of this, we had in anticipation established a partnership with a larger contractor, MAP Group, to undertake ALL of our duct construction and fibre provision nationally. This is the only other contractor that has, and continues to be involved. It halted works after a short time on site to conduct a full review of the planned route to be undertaken, to confirm the best way to deliver the infrastructure. This is underway at the moment. Work will resume with MAP Group once this is complete and agreed with the Fibre GarDen board.

In short, the set of circumstances has led to a ridiculously protracted process, which has in turn led to issues that in all honestly could have very probably been handled better by everyone (hindsight is a wonderful thing). However, they are all issues that anyone battling to provide next generation broadband to the deprived areas of the UK risk facing almost daily. The important thing is what you do about them. MAP Group, Fibre GarDen and ITS are now extremely confident, that after 6 years, the project is now in a very strong position. Feet will be back on the ground by the middle of October and in sufficient force to see the network build complete by the end of Q1 next year.”

Meanwhile the latest update from Fibre GarDen reads a bit like other posts from earlier this year, with more news of meetings and promises of progress, yet the hard part appears to be actually delivering upon those and getting the civil works done.

Fibre Garden, ITS Tech and MAP Group met again yesterday to “start a detailed review of the route” and discuss any problems with local landowners before they re-start construction. “By so doing some of the earlier mistakes will be avoided,” said Dave Ryall of Fibre GarDen. The proof, as they say, is in the pudding.. or in this case the digging.