Thames Garden Bridge

Debate between Lord Deighton and Lord Roberts of Llandudno

Thursday 9th January 2014 Lords Chamber

[Lord Deighton]

With respect to the Heritage Lottery Fund, the fundraising programme has not yet begun. That is the job of the noble Lord, Lord Davies, and his team at the Garden Bridge Trust, and I am sure that they will approach every possible potential supply of money. With respect to replacing anything that is displaced by the bridge, I understand that that does not represent a logistical problem—but I do not have a specific answer, frankly, to the berthing question.

[Lord Roberts of Llandudno (LD)]

Can the Minister assure me that, if this sort of money is available for this project, money will also be available, through one fund or another, to assist with the renovation of places such as Aberystwyth promenade that have been damaged so severely in the past few weeks by the winds, gales and flooding?

[Lord Deighton]

The general answer to that question has to be along the same lines. Just as this project still needs to pass the business case to be allocated the £30 million that is pencilled in, similarly we will do our work on other projects in a sensible way and respond to priority needs as they occur. I should just point out that the reason that the Treasury is putting in £30 million is that it is the sensible way to kick-start a fundraising effort. It is much easier to fundraise when people can see that the Government are behind a project and that it the first part of the funding has already been raised.