Railtrack liquidator gets a grilling

RAILTRACK'S liquidators are under pressure from shareholders to identify documents that could have a crucial bearing on their claim for redress from the Government.

The shareholders' action group is seeking records to show that Railtrack was forced into administration, largely wiping out their investment.

Joint liquidator Jamie Smith, of Deloitte, got a grilling at a meeting yesterday over the documents and over the £380-an-hour fees for winding up RT Group, the successor to Railtrack.

Shareholder John Edwards asked if professional fees of £3.67m - including £1.25m to property agents Jones Lang Lasalle, £1.5m to bankers Lehman and £739,000 to solicitors Ashurst Morris Crisp - were 'unreasonably high'.

Smith said: 'Clearly they were very large sums of money, but we are dealing with very complex negotiations.'

Edwards asked: 'We should be grateful that it was not a lot more?' Smith replied: 'I wouldn't go that far.'

Another investor asked if charges were rounded up to the nearest hour because 'at £380 an hour nobody would do a half hour's work on anything'. Smith said Deloitte charges in six-minute units.

The fees were approved by 97.8% of proxy voters. Smith has returned £1.26bn, or 243p a share, to investors.

A further payment of 9p to 17p is likely about June. Because of litigation fears, the wind-up may go on until 2009.