The Conservative shadow transport secretary has called for an investigation by the National Audit Office into public-private partnerships following the collapse of Metronet.

Shadow transport secretary Theresa Villiers has written to the auditor general, Sir John Bourn, to call for an investigation into the operation of the contracts following a critical report by the audit body last year on PPPs cost to the taxpayer, writes The Guardian.

She said: ‘[Gordon Brown] received many warnings at the time of the problems that the structure would involve, yet he disregarded them all, despite the fact that there were a range of other options that could have been considered. Now the chickens are really coming home to roost.’

Villiers added: ‘During their first investigation of PPP, the NAO highlighted that nearly half a billion had been spent on consultancy fees. It is now vital that lessons are learned from the wind-up of Railtrack and that costs are not allowed to escalate as they did disastrously in that case.’