By james art 
GoogleThe construction firm behind a £112m hotel complex being investigated by the Serious Fraud Office (SFO) says it is “proud” of its work on the scheme.
Liverpool company The Flanagan Group built the Birmingham hotel and conference center for Unite The Union.
He said he completed the work to the union’s “very specific and changing requirements” and disagreed with the complex’s estimate of £29m – around a quarter of the construction cost.
Unite said it was pursuing legal action “to recover money lost to the union”.
“radical changes”
The project was conceived as an investment for Unite that would also help save the union – Britain’s largest – on hotel and conference costs.
It includes a four-star Aloft hotel with 195 bedrooms, a conference center that can accommodate more than 1,000 people and office space.
It was reported that the initial estimated cost of the complex was £57m, around half of the final bill.
The Flanagan Group said there were many reasons why costs had changed, including “radical changes in design and working practices”.
The company said the hotel was originally planned as a five-storey, three-star plan, but this has been changed to a six-storey, four-star specification.
The Flanagan Group added that the union had issued a “contractual directive” requiring all workers to be union members, all workers to be paid nationally agreed rates without any agency labour, and that British building materials must be used when is possible”.
The construction firm said it had “embraced the challenges and we delivered the project through the Covid-19 lockdown whilst incorporating all those changes which would obviously have affected the initial cost”.
PAThe hotel and conference center scheme was conceived and built under former Unite general secretary Len McCluskey.
He described it as a “fantastic investment” and has since said Unite’s internal investigations into the scheme were “reasonable” and “will answer all questions”.
A KC-led inquiry commissioned by current Unite general secretary Sharon Graham identified a missing £14m which was described as a “mystery” and did not appear in the project’s final accounts.
While Unite said it was trying to get its money back, The Flanagan Group said it was still owed “significant sums” by the union and was taking its own legal action to collect it.
“Disgusting Attacks”
The union said Ms Graham had been subjected to “three years of vile attacks” from inside and outside the union and that its own investigations had revealed “serious financial irregularities under the previous regime led by Len McCluskey and supported by the United factional group left”.
A spokesman for the Flanagan Group said: “We cannot comment on any internal Unite political machinations or speculate on the ambitions of the current Unite general secretary, but we would like to make clear that this scheme was delivered fairly and should be seen as an outstanding asset to the Union.”
The spokesman added that the company had never been contacted by the SFO in the two years since it was first suggested the agency was investigating the scheme.
A Unite spokesman said Ms Graham had “kept her promise to leave no stone unturned in exposing any wrongdoing that occurred before her election”.
The spokesperson did not respond to the Flanagan Group’s claims.