Restoration and Renewal (Report of the Joint Committee)

Tom Brake Excerpts

Wednesday 31st January 2018 Commons Chamber

[Valerie Vaz]

May I just finish addressing some of the issues that have been raised?

Some Members have asked whether we could move one Chamber at a time. Anyone who has visited the basement, as many Members have, will have seen all the wires and pipes. When the new technology was put in place, it was a patchwork effect. For example, the wi-fi was just slapped on, alongside the pipes. Those systems run along the whole building. Fires and floods do not respect any boundaries between the House of Lords in the House of Commons; for them, this is just one building, so if work has to be done, it has to be done to the whole building.

[Tom Brake (Carshalton and Wallington) (LD)]

Does that not underline the fact that decanting half the building would be problematic, because the services run throughout the whole of the building and we therefore cannot decant just half of it?

[Valerie Vaz]

I agree. I cannot add anything further to that.

--- Later in debate ---

[Tom Brake (Carshalton and Wallington) (LD)]

On behalf of the House Commission, I would like to set out briefly for the House the background to the northern estates programme and its link to the proposed restoration and renewal of the Palace.

The northern estates programme covers Norman Shaw North and South, 1 Parliament Street and Derby Gate, where works are due to start later this year. Those buildings house around a third of Members and our staff. The Norman Shaw buildings were brought into use as offices for Members and their staff in the 1970s and now require major works, as does 1 Parliament Street. The Commission gave its approval to a major programme of refurbishment and renovation of the northern estate at the end of 2015, following scrutiny by the Administration and Finance Committees. The plans approved were to do the minimum necessary.

The plan at the time was to decant Members from the northern estate to 7 Millbank, do the works on the northern estate and then return Members to the northern estate. However, during 2014-15, security advice hardened against the use of 7 Millbank for Members. At the same time, Ministers were persuaded to pass Richmond House to Parliament. We finally got the keys to that three weeks or so ago.

The plan changed, and this time it was to decant northern estate Members into Richmond House after some improvements. It also became clear from the Joint Committee report that the courtyard of Richmond House, which has been referred to a number of times, was the only viable location within the secure perimeter for an interim Chamber.

Now a much more ambitious programme of works is being planned on and around Richmond House. It involves construction of what is, in essence, a replica Chamber for use during R and R that can be used as a contingency Chamber in the longer term, as agreed by the Commission in September. It also involves construction of immediate surrounds of Lobbies, business offices and so on, as well as Committee rooms and the necessary decant space for the third of Members and their staff whose offices are in the Palace.

Subject to the outcome of today’s debate, we will probably sequence the main work on the rest of the northern estate, decanting one building at a time while we prepare the Richmond House block. The costs are substantial, with very roughly half attributable to the need to restore the old northern estate and half to a decant to enable restoration and renewal of the Palace. In return, we will have a contingency Chamber that can have many functions and a legacy building that can play a vital part in our education and outreach efforts, as well as providing space that should, in time, enable us to end our reliance on expensive leased office space for hundreds of parliamentary staff.

Those were words from the Commission. I would now like to say a few words of my own. We must get on with this, and that is why I support amendment (b). I have been involved as Deputy Leader of the House, in a ministerial capacity, from 2012 to 2015 and then on the House of Commons Commission, and I am afraid there has been much delay and procrastination on this. I agree that the Leader of the House has grasped this and is moving forward, but there has been much delay. The excuses for why we cannot proceed have been multiple.

This is an opportunity to create a Parliament fit for the 21st century. I agree with the earlier point on electronic voting and also that we should have a horseshoe Chamber in which every Member of Parliament has a seat, which most people in most environments would expect to be the norm. We need a fully accessible Parliament for visitors and Members of Parliament. It is not right that Members of either House who are in a wheelchair cannot in some cases even get into the Chamber and certainly cannot sit, for instance, with their own party. That is something that needs to be addressed as well.

[Vicky Ford (Chelmsford) (Con)]

rose—

[Tom Brake]

Finally, we have an opportunity to create an exemplar environmental building, incorporating state-of-the-art retrofitted environmental measures, built to the best environmental standards and minimising the environmental impact of the building—by transferring waste and building supplies up and down the river, for example.

I fully support the delivery authority and board model that is proposed. That model was very successful in delivering the Olympics, partly because all the parties were bound together and agreed to proceed with that project. I hope that we might reach the point where we agree to do the same in relation to the renewal of the mother of all Parliaments.

[Several hon. Members rose—]