Restoration and Renewal (Report of the Joint Committee)

Lord Swire Excerpts

Wednesday 31st January 2018 Commons Chamber

[Valerie Vaz]

The hon. Gentleman sums it up perfectly, and I cannot add anything more to that.

The governance of the project is another major area of concern. There will be a sponsor body and a delivery authority. We had a very helpful seminar, which we might be able to set up for Members. It looked at the two successful projects of Crossrail and the 2012 Olympics and how the sponsor body and the delivery authority were set up and operated; we on the House of Commons Governance Committee, which I sat on, heard from Sir David Higgins on how he operated with those two bodies. He said he spent time building up the relationship and the two bodies acted in concert. As Members will know, Baroness Jowell was, when a Member of this House, successful in ensuring the delivery of a very successful Olympics. I know the situation now is slightly different as we do not have an end-date as we did with the Olympics, but Sir David Higgins made it very clear that so long as the professionals, who will be on the delivery authority, have a Gantt chart—I did not know what it meant then, but I do now—so there is a timeframe and the costs are allocated, there should not be any need for any overrun.

[Sir Hugo Swire (East Devon) (Con)]

What does the hon. Lady say to the argument that if Members were still somewhere in this place, they would be able to have far greater oversight of the works in progress, which would incentivise the building works, because if we decant that incentive goes away?

--- Later in debate ---

[Pete Wishart (Perth and North Perthshire) (SNP)]

Of all the things this House can do to endear itself to our constituents, spending billions of pounds on renovating our place of work is not one of them. In these days of austerity and tightening of belts, and with the impending economic disaster of Brexit coming our way, I would bet this would be near the bottom or at the very bottom of the public’s concerns. The sums involved are simply eye-watering—£3.6 billion rising to £5.7 billion, and that is before all the unforeseen difficulties and the additions that hon. Members will certainly want to factor in. So it is no surprise whatsoever that people are making an estimation that this could come in at a cool £10 billion to £12 billion.

As with so many things that fundamentally impact on my constituents, I thought I would ask a few of them what they thought about these proposals. It was no surprise that they were not seen all that favourably. Mrs McLeod from Pitlochry just said curtly:

“You must be joking”

Mr Morrison from Errol said:

“In these days of food banks and austerity I am sickened that they are even thinking about this”.

Mr Mac Donald from Kinloch Rannoch just casually inquired:

“why are you even still in that place, it’s time to come home to your own Parliament here”,

a sentiment with which I wholeheartedly concur.

[Sir Hugo Swire]

rose—

[Pete Wishart]

I will make a bit of progress and give way in a moment.

Surprisingly, no one in my less-than-scientific survey of a few people in Perth and North Perthshire thought there were any admirable qualities in spending billions on a parliamentarians’ palace. I am pretty certain that, even if I went looking for anyone who thought there were, I would not find any in my constituency.

Let me compare and contrast what is happening in this Chamber with what has just been happening in the Scottish Parliament, where we are setting out our budgets. We are allocating billions of pounds to socially useful programmes that will enable our citizenry. What are we doing here? We are talking about spending billions of pounds on a royal palace to accommodate Members of Parliament. Nothing could distinguish better the priorities of these two Parliaments.

I do, however, accept that we have an issue. [Hon. Members: “ Oh really!”] Yes. Because of the decades of prevarication and indecision, this building is practically falling down. The failure of successive Government to face up to their responsibility in looking after this place means we now have a building that could, as people have said, face a catastrophic failure at any time.

The mechanical and electrical engineering systems are already well past their use-by date and the risk of that catastrophic failure rises exponentially every five years. Some of the high-voltage cables in the building are decaying, and fire is an ever-present risk, only compounded by just how easily any fire would spread. Most worryingly, as we have heard from the Deputy Leader of the House and the Leader of the House, there is a substantial amount of asbestos in the building. Mice and other vermin are a common feature, and I have heard that some staff even have names for the mice that they frequently acquaint with on a daily basis. It is not a robin we need in this House, but a flipping big eagle to pick up some of the huge mice that kick about this place. The Palace of Westminster is simply falling down.

The most important aspect that we have to consider is our responsibility for the staff who work in this place. This is a workplace for thousands of people, and we are putting them at significant risk by staying here.