Parliamentary Buildings (Restoration and Renewal) Bill

Lord Forsyth of Drumlean Excerpts

2nd reading (Hansard): House of Lords
Monday 8th July 2019 Lords Chamber

[Baroness Evans of Bowes Park]

The purpose of the Bill is to set up the bodies that will do the detailed costings of the work. I will come to the outline business case, of which obviously that will be a crucial part, towards the end of my remarks.

The Bill also provides for the relationship between Parliament and the sponsor body, including consultation with Members. This is a hugely significant and costly project, so both the Government and Parliament must ensure that it represents and delivers value for money for the taxpayer.

The Bill establishes a Parliamentary Works Estimates Commission, made up of two Members of this House and two from the other place, which will lay the sponsor body’s estimates of expenditure before the House of Commons and play a role in reviewing the sponsor body’s expenditure. It is through these annual estimates that the programme will be funded and approved by MPs. Further financial controls will be put in place, including a requirement that the estimates commission consults the Treasury on the annual estimates for the funding of the R&R programme and has regard to any subsequent advice.

The sponsor body is made up of parliamentarians representing both Houses and includes experts in running similar large-scale projects such as the Olympic Games, and, in terms of heritage, includes the former chief executive of Historic England. The delivery authority will be made up of architects, engineers and individuals with programme management, commercial and contracting experience. They will formulate the designs, costs and timings of the works, with proposals brought forward to Parliament for approval in 2021. We are confident that the arrangements being put in place will deliver the necessary restoration works and at the same time provide reassurance that taxpayers’ money will be protected.

The passage of the Bill in the other place was swift, with Second Reading passing without division and Committee completed in a single day. The Bill also passed Third Reading without a Division.

On Report, four amendments were made to the Bill. Two amendments were supported by the Government. The first required the sponsor body, in exercising its functions, to have regard to the need to ensure that educational and other facilities are provided for people visiting the Palace of Westminster. The second provides for the automatic transfer of external members of the shadow sponsor body to the statutory body. This will bring continuity to the sponsor body, while providing an opportunity for it to evaluate its needs for its membership.

Two amendments, resisted by the Government due to deficient drafting and our view that they were not required in primary legislation, passed on Division at Report. One requires the delivery authority to have regard to companies’ policies on corporate social responsibility when allocating contracts. We accept the principle of this amendment, but it will require some minor and technical changes to make it workable.

The second places a duty on the sponsor body and the delivery authority to ensure that the economic benefits of the parliamentary building works are delivered across the UK. The Government resisted this amendment as it contravenes public procurement law: specifically, that location is not something that you can have regard to when allocating contracts. Again, we accept the principle behind the amendment, but it will be necessary to revise its wording to ensure that it does not cut across procurement law obligations.

Finally, a couple of matters were raised on Report which the Government agreed to consider further in this House. First, Members in the other place considered whether the sponsor body should have regard to the need to conserve and sustain the architectural and historical significance of the Palace of Westminster, including the outstanding universal value of the world heritage site. The Government are absolutely committed that the work undertaken will ensure that the architectural, archaeological and historical significance of the Palace of Westminster is preserved for future generations, but we have been of the view that the best way to achieve this is through existing planning processes.

We have also been mindful of including the UNESCO heritage status of the Palace of Westminster in the Bill, given that it also covers Westminster Abbey and St. Margaret’s Church. We must be careful that, as the Joint Committee that undertook pre-legislative scrutiny said, explicit provision which aims to protect the heritage of the Palace does not,

“override opportunities to renew and enhance its purpose”.

The Government will therefore bring forward an amendment that strikes a balance between the preservation and protection of the Palace’s heritage, while delivering the renovations and accessibility modifications that we all want to improve the functionality of the Palace.

Secondly, there was considerable interest in the other place for the sponsor body to publish an annual audit of companies awarded contracts to establish their size and geographical location. The Government are keen for the benefits of the parliamentary building works to be shared across the UK, particularly among SMEs. Under the provisions of the Bill, the sponsor body already has to prepare and publish a report at least once a year on the parliamentary building works and the progress that has been made towards their completion. We will bring an amendment to place a further requirement on the reporting of contracts on the sponsor body. Throughout the passage of the Bill, the Government have sought to work collaboratively with parliamentarians to ensure both that the right arrangements are in place to deliver the restoration and renewal of the Palace and that these reflect the will of Parliament. I look forward to continuing in that spirit with noble Lords.

Before I conclude, I will turn briefly to the issue of this House’s temporary decant during the restoration and renewal of the Palace, which I know is of great interest to noble Lords. As I stated earlier, the Motion passed by this House in early 2018 was clear that, as part of R&R, we would temporarily leave the Palace so that the works could be done more quickly and in a cost-effective way. As noble Lords will know, the Bill is concerned not with the details of your Lordships’ accommodation during the period of refurbishment of the Palace but with the governance arrangements required for the successful delivery of the R&R programme. The sponsor body established on a statutory footing by the Bill will be responsible for delivering the decant accommodation for the House of Lords, in line with your Lordships’ requirements. It will be for the sponsor body, as part of the outline business case that it expects to present to Parliament in 2021, to set out the detailed, costed arrangements.

I assure noble Lords that the shadow sponsor body is keen to hear from Members about the proposed decant accommodation, and this engagement has already begun in earnest. Last year’s survey was followed by individual interviews with more than 150 Members of your Lordships’ House, and a similar number from the other place, to gain more detailed views on Members’ ideas, priorities and concerns around decant; that has continued with smaller, focused discussions on particular design themes. The results of this engagement are currently being reviewed and will feed into further work as part of the programme. In addition, the chair of the shadow sponsor body has written to APPG and committee chairs in both Houses to seek their feedback on the sort of facilities that they may require in the future. Plans for the decant of the House of Lords are in their early stages and there will be ample further opportunity for Members to feed into the process—I encourage all noble Lords to do so. I understand that the R&R programme team will carry out further engagement with noble Lords in the autumn.

The Bill is critical to the next stages of development of this important parliamentary project.

[Lord Forsyth of Drumlean (Con)]

I am grateful for the ongoing consultation with Members about the decant process. Can my noble friend explain how that process will be accountable to this House?

[Baroness Evans of Bowes Park]

As I said, there will be consultation during the process but, ultimately, the sponsor body needs to bring an outline business case—the final proposal with costings, details and decant options—back to both Houses. Both Houses will vote on it, and that will be the final decision. Today, we are doing important work to enable the detailed work that noble Lords are obviously incredibly interested in, but it will return to Parliament for a final vote.

To repeat myself slightly, once the sponsor body and delivery authority have been established in statute, they will design an outline business case that the sponsor body must bring back to Parliament for approval and which will set out the scope, timing, delivery method and cost of the works. Only once the outline business case has been approved will the sponsor body and delivery authority be able to commence the substantial works on the Palace.

I very much hope that noble Lords will support the Bill’s timely passage so that we can begin to undertake the vital and increasingly pressing work to ensure that the Palace of Westminster is fit to serve as the home—

Parliamentary Buildings (Restoration and Renewal) Bill

Lord Forsyth of Drumlean Excerpts

Committee: 1st sitting (Hansard): House of Lords
Monday 22nd July 2019 Lords Chamber

[Lord Forsyth of Drumlean (Con)]

My Lords, I support the amendment, although I am not sure that it goes quite far enough. I agree with everything that the noble Baroness, Lady Deech, said.

I declare an interest in that, every day when I come here, I walk through those gardens. A number of times I have seen them being dug up and changed. There is a beautiful play area for children at one end that has been dug up and changed at least two or three times and there have been various other changes, while the visitor centre has taken away a fantastic view of the building. One might argue that that has a great purpose and it is very welcome to bring more children here, but I think that the point made by the noble Baroness, Lady Deech, about the pressure of people, parking and security is really important.

We are not a planning committee but we have a duty to protect Parliament. I have been associated with these Chambers and Parliament generally for some 36 years—

[Lord King of Bridgwater (Con)]

One of the new boys.

[Lord Forsyth of Drumlean]

One of the new boys indeed. I hope that, like me, my noble friend Lord King comes here every day and is filled with wonder and a sense of, “How on earth have I managed to get here?” It is a very special place and it is important that in the process of renewal we do not lose what we have.

We are talking not just about the building but about the environment and the immediate environs, as my noble friend Lord Cormack said. I see that park in winter, spring and summer. I see the children in their playgrounds, I see the office workers having their picnics, I see the lovers on the benches behaving quite properly, I see people doing interviews in front of that wonderful view of the tower, and it has enormous value. If we are to have 10 years of construction and disruption in this place, what on earth would possess us to add to that by having another major project, not even on the surface but underground?

We have seen the presentations and sketches of what it would look like and, frankly, I do not think it would enhance the beauty, simplicity and value of that space, which is also very much valued by tourists. I support the amendment but I hope that, at a later stage, we will have one that does more than just make this point in the way that this one does—that we have an amendment that actually makes it clear to those responsible for this project that it is not just about the park; it is about Parliament as a whole and preserving the precious heritage that we are all privileged to have the responsibility for.

I welcome and totally support everything that the noble Baroness, Lady Deech, said. My noble friend is rightly keen to argue that we want a very successful Holocaust memorial project. I think the venue that he described would be a far better one; it would involve less controversy and, I venture to suggest, it would be possible to achieve rather more quickly than will be the case given the controversy and the difficulties that we have. I support the amendment.

[Lord Carlile of Berriew (CB)]

My Lords, I support the amendment that was moved so clearly and eloquently by the noble Lord, Lord Cormack. I agree entirely with the other things that have been said so far.

Over a mere 36 years in association with this Palace, I have quite often gone into those gardens for moments of deliberation and relaxation. The reason why I do so is that they contain one of the most wonderful public sculptures in the world, “The Burghers of Calais”. It is a much better location for that casting of the statue than you find, for example, in Calais. It is a sculpture of international moment and very much part of the UNESCO World Heritage Site. With the other two memorials that the noble Lord, Lord Cormack, referred to, there seems to be quite enough for small gardens of that size, particularly when there is another site for the Holocaust memorial available for sure on the much more capacious site of the Imperial War Museum—I will speak about that in a moment.

I am very committed to the erection of a Holocaust memorial. My sister Renata and I share a father but not a mother. We do not share a mother because her mother died in Auschwitz-Birkenau in 1944. A framed copy of her death certificate hangs on the wall of my sister’s house in the Midlands. It does not tell the entire truth. It says she died of smallpox, when she was almost certainly murdered because she had smallpox. These events are very important to us as a family. We believe Renata’s and my paternal grandparents died in Auschwitz-Birkenau. We do not know exactly how, but it was probably by being taken straight from the train to the gas ovens.

I suspect that many people in your Lordships’ House have been to Auschwitz-Birkenau. I am afraid once was enough for me—I shall not go again. Anybody who has been there will realise how momentous, vile and treacherous those events were and what effect they have on those families, whether they be religious or secular—I am not a religious person at all. This is the history of many people in this country and indeed quite a lot of people in your Lordships’ House and the other place.

I regard this memorial as an absolute necessity, but what does it need? I have been to Holocaust memorials around the world when I have been able to. Yad Vashem is an extraordinary memorial, set in a great space. Last year, I went to the new Holocaust memorial in Warsaw, Poland. Poland has a mixed reputation for its attitude to Jews, even since the Second World War. However, if your Lordships have not been there, I have to tell you that the new memorial in Warsaw is a sensational place. It dominates a big square. You can walk around it and through it; you can go to restaurants in the streets around it. The whole of that area has been created and recreated to accommodate that memorial.

In my view, a memorial to the Holocaust needs room to view, room to breathe, room to reflect and room to police. The site for the memorial in Victoria Tower Gardens certainly does not have the room to police. The road between Lambeth Bridge and the Palace of Westminster is often closed to traffic when important events are taking place here, or on the not insignificant number of occasions when there is a suspicion of a raised terrorist threat level. It would be a sitting target for terrorists and would not be difficult to access. It would not be possible to create a ring of steel around it, which can be done on a big site in a careful, considerate and not particularly obvious way.

A memorial such as this should have space—as at Auschwitz, which is on a huge site—for coaches to bring and set down older schoolchildren who are learning about modern history, including the history of the Holocaust. There should be space for them to be corralled in an appropriate way, with time to listen to their teachers. They should be able to see the light of day. I do not understand the desire for an underground memorial. To be able to understand what happened to these people, you need light. The children’s memorial at Yad Vashem, which is a hall of mirrors with candles, is based on seeing light, not being in a subterranean space. I say to your Lordships, with the feeling I hope I have shown, because I believe in this proposition—