Morgan Sindall sues consultant over Old Trafford cricket ground defects

Morgan Sindall is seeking damages from a consultant over defects on Old Trafford Cricket Ground.

The case against consultant Capita Property and Infrastructure is set to go ahead after a court ignored the consultant’s pleas to throw it out on the basis that the contractor sat on the evidence for too long. A legal expert said the judge’s decision had given some “helpful guidance” on when attempts to strike out a claim may succeed or fail.

Morgan Sindall was working on a design and build job to redevelop two stands at the iconic site back in 2011, at a cost of £12.3m. It appointed Capita as engineering consultant the following year – while also appointing steel specialist Sabre Structures to work on the site.

The contractor is suing Capita for £10m worth of damages after it found defects in Sabre’s designs. It alleges that Capita did not meet its contractual obligations after it failed to review Sabre’s defective designs, or to “warn sufficiently strongly and sufficiently early of the defects in Sabre’s design”.

Details of the defects are not outlined in the legal case, but it was reported in 2013 that the stadium had to be reinforced with support columns so that the ground, which is owned by Lancashire Cricket Club, could be used for international fixtures, with subsequent alterations being demanded by the client.

Sabre collapsed into administration in September 2012.

Legal documents show that Capita blames Sabre for the defects and is arguing that the onsite problems were caused by Morgan Sindall’s decision to use Sabre’s designs over its own.

The consultant has added that it “provided warnings” on the design defects, but that its capacity to provide warnings was contingent on it receiving enough information from Morgan Sindall.

“[Capita] is not responsible where it was not provided with such information and/or [was] not provided with it early enough,” it said.

The case is set to go ahead after Capita failed to convince the judge, Mr Justice Eyre, to throw out the claim because Morgan Sindall had left it too long to pursue. Morgan Sindall argued it only delayed the claim because it wanted to coordinate its action with another it recently launched against Sabre’s former insurer Aviva.

Aviva, Morgan Sindall argues, is liable for Sabre’s mistakes under a law allowing insurers to be pursued if the company they represent goes under.

Speaking to Construction News about the case, Eric Johnstone, a senior associate at law firm Brodies, said that the case has highlighted when an attempt to throw out a case may fail or succeed.

“Strike-out is a significant step, and the court are only likely to do so where they consider the approach to be particularly serious,” he said. “Putting a claim on hold is not, of itself, an abuse of process, so there is a need to look at each situation on its own merits to determine whether an abuse of process has occurred.”

Morgan Sindall declined to comment. Capita has been approached for comment.