The investor which bought KPMG’s UK restructuring arm is vying with Lord Hammond, the former chancellor, for control of Amey, one of the UK’s biggest outsourcing groups.

Sky News has learnt that HIG Capital is the only other remaining bidder for Amey in an auction that could generate a price tag of more than £300m.

HIG is bidding against Buckthorn, an investment firm where Lord Hammond now works as a part-time partner.

Amey, which oversees scores of public sector contracts in the UK, is being sold by Ferrovial, the Spanish infrastructure group.

The company is one of Britain’s biggest outsourcers, employing roughly 15.000 people.

Among the contracts it refers to on its website are the maintenance of the UK defence estate, keeping 60 prisons “safe and compliant” during COVID-19, and developing the power programme for the HS2 high-speed rail link.

HIG backed the buyout of KPMG’s UK restructuring business, which has since been renamed Interpath, earlier this year.

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It was unclear on Thursday whether either of the two bidders, or an unidentified party, was the leading contender to buy Amey.

Ferrovial decided earlier this year to relaunch an auction of Amey, two years after a previous attempt to sell it was abandoned.

The Spanish infrastructure group, which owns a big chunk of London Heathrow Airport, has contemplated a sale of its entire global services business for some time, with Amey the subject of a standalone auction process.

The initial attempt to divest it was unsuccessful amid uncertainty about the future of a controversial £2.7bn roads contract in Birmingham.

A dispute with the city’s local authority was resolved in 2019, although Amey only finally extricated itself from the deal last year.

The tidying-up of Amey’s business is likely to provide prospective buyers with a clearer view about the company’s valuation in a sector which has been rocked by several prominent corporate collapses in recent years, including that of Carillion.

Morgan Stanley is handling the auction of Amey.

HIG declined to comment.

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