The boss of sacked Berkeley contractors ProActive has denied his firm rushed to put up a roof truss at the site which must now be taken down and fixed.

Yesterday?s said contractors are having to remove one of the four roof trusses at a cost of thousands of dollars because struts had not been welded.

But yesterday Mr. Ebbin said the truss was deliberately put up in that state to create room to work on the other three trusses which provide the main support for the roof.

?We put that up with the consent of Works and Engineering ? we didn?t have the space. It was not hasty or rushed,? he said.

The firm then had trouble hiring a crane to finish the truss said Mr. Ebbin.

?They chose to take it down. We had no intention of taking it down.?

Workers are now doing remedial work on the truss which needed sandblasting, capping and painting.

Mr. Ebbin said remedial work was needed because of months of delay after his firm was sacked by Government, not from shoddy workmanship.

He said he was happy with what his workers had achieved and he said if they were still there the main building would have been finished by Christmas.

?Why close it down when you have 100 people working on it to have nobody working on it for four months? It?s been sitting there in the rain.?

He said ProActive was vigorously pursuing its case for unlawful termination from the contract to build the new senior school.

Work on the site ground to a halt in August when contractor ProActive was axed by Government on the project which is years behind schedule and millions of dollars over-budget.

Last night ProActive?s legal advisor Julian Hall said arbitration would probably begin early in the new year.

He said ProActive was waiting for the independent assessment report, due to be delivered today, before it can put together the particulars of its statement of claim.