COUNCIL officers will meet with contractors in a bid to minimise the extra costs to construction projects delayed by the coronavirus pandemic.

Glasgow's City Administration Committee has agreed officers should engage with the construction industry to agree how to reduce the cost to the council while ensuring work is completed as quickly as possible.

A phased plan to restart work in the construction sector is scheduled to get under way from Thursday.

"The restrictions on construction will result in delays to the completion dates of a number of existing capital projects," a report to the committee stated.

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"Additional costs are being, and will be, incurred on those projects as a result of those delays, and from additional requirements for physical distancing which may be implemented in the future."

It added the assessment of the costs is a "complex and detailed" process which requires discussions with individual contractors and therefore it is "difficult to estimate with any level of accuracy" how much extra money will be required.

"However it was likely that in some cases current approved capital budgets would need to be increased to meet these extra costs," the report stated.

Additional costs due to the delay include plant hire, security and safety checks while there will also be an impact from "re-starting construction but within new guidelines on physical distancing".

There is a risk associated with the possible failure of suppliers or contractors due to the pandemic.

Budget changes of more than £100,000 need to be approved by the committee before the money can be committed to the project.

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The report added: "This tends to happen very rarely for projects already in delivery as most additional costs can be contained within the approved project contingency.

"However no project contingencies will have made allowance for the impact of a pandemic and so are unlikely to be able to fully contain additional costs resulting from Covid-19.

"The financial implications will be recorded as being costs directly attributable to Covid-19 and reported to the Scottish Government in a similar way to other revenue costs arising from Covid-19.

"Wherever possible actions will be taken to contain additional costs within existing approved budgets; this may include utilisation of available project contingency, reducing the scope of an approved project or transferring available budget from another approved project."

Members also decided the financial implications should be reported back to the committee as soon as they can be.