Restoration and Renewal

Lord Colgrain Excerpts

Wednesday 13th July 2022 Lords Chamber

[Lord Colgrain (Con)]

My Lords, I am sure that I speak for all of your Lordships when I say that I am very fond of this building. My affection has grown as a result of having been a member of your Lordships’ Finance Committee for over four years. This gave me the opportunity to clamber all over its structure, up both Victoria and Elizabeth Towers, and on top of and underneath Westminster Hall, inspecting stained glass and other windows, all to investigate excellent works that were in progress, or which had been completed and had appeared in the accounts. It is fair to say that, in large part, notwithstanding all the scaffolding that we can see, the outside of the building is in pretty reasonable condition. I am not going to rehearse the comments already made by so many noble Lords about the internal conditions, other than to continue to highlight the difficulties attached to the unknown quantity of asbestos and the state of the cellars and basement—a tour of which should be obligatory for all able-bodied Members of both Houses. Lastly, there is the situation regarding fire hazards, whereby, as your Lordships know but can chillingly be reminded, there is a requirement for 24-hour fire marshals, who detect one fire a month on average in this building.

So my interest in R&R has developed a personal focus, and my two questions for the Leader of the House are these. What real progress has been made since 2016? How much money has been spent on R&R to date? With regard to the first, I have seen a disappointing lack of focus on an operational level, which on occasion has led to a manifest waste of money without accountability. By way of an example, a management consultancy study was initiated to explore the design and cost for a floating dock on the river to facilitate the transport and unloading of building material that was forecast to be needed for R&R. This was done without prior consultation with the river authority, which when asked said that it had not granted permission for such a structure. Another example is the laying of an electric cable at Millbank House, infinitely more costly than necessary and with a much greater time delay than was forecast because the correct permissions had not been sought at the right time from Westminster City Council. Those are small examples, but they illustrate the disquiet that some of us feel as we inch forward slowly on this endeavour. Has anyone really thought through how and within what timescale world heritage site authorities, historic building conservation officers and the council will work together on whatever grand plan the proposed new joint commission will come up with? What likelihood is there that they will concur with whatever plans are proposed in any event?

The stop-go history of R&R to date tells its own story of obfuscation, just now so eloquently put by my friend the noble Lord, Lord Best. His speech should very much echo in our collective memory. For my part, having a passing knowledge in my professional life of the hiring and firing of people, I recently tabled two Questions with a view to finding out how much these comings and goings have cost in terms of personnel costs, both full time and agency. The first was to the Senior Deputy Speaker regarding R&R costs paid for by your Lordships’ House since 2014, the answer to which is £58 million, with staff costs at £7.5 million and contractors at £51 million.

The second question was to the sponsor body and the delivery authority, to ask what their costs have been since they were established in April and May 2020. I am glad that your Lordships are sitting down, because the answer—in a six-paragraph reply—was that for two years, between 2020 and 2022, the figure was £212 million, of which £33.5 million was salary costs and £151 million related to contractor costs. I know that contractors are expensive, but what do we have to show for this investment? Any reference to long-term value to be gained from design and survey work, programme delivery, and project and programme management is debatable, since within a very short period of time all costings and designs become redundant and need to be reworked. Within that figure, £11 million was spent on work assessing and preparing decant locations. Is that really what it cost to direct us toward the Queen Elizabeth II Centre as a location option for this House?

Since we are pretty much back to where we started, my questions to the Leader of the House are these. First, should your Lordships have confidence that the new mandate for the R&R programme will bring about the cessation of what to date has proved to be in large part an egregious waste of money? Secondly, will its success or otherwise remain dependent on the whim of the Commons? I fear that history will not be kind to us if we continue to procrastinate and fail to make a decision before an accident occurs in this marvellous building. I echo in very large part the excellent speech of the noble Lord, Lord Blunkett.