The restoration and renewal of the Palace of Westminster is of “paramount importance” as the cost of maintenance continues to rise and the building is “now deteriorating faster than it can be fixed”.
That’s according to a strategic review conducted by the ‘sponsor body’ overseeing the Houses of Parliament Restoration and Renewal programme.
The report revealed that the cost of maintenance was £369m in the four years since 2015, and £127m in 2018/9 alone.
It said: “As the Public Accounts Committee noted in their October 2020 report on the programme, significant and timely action is needed to protect the Palace and all those who work in it.”
The review has also confirmed that MPs will need to be relocated to Parliament’s northern estate and peers to temporary accommodation at the QEII Conference Centre. The report said that even if the programme took a “do minimum” scope, work to the 150-year-old building would cause major disruption to Parliament and take several years to deliver.
The restoration team will now continue to develop a costed plan for the programme of works, expected to create thousands of jobs and apprenticeships across the UK in industries such as digital design and engineering as well as traditional crafts including carpentry and stonemasonry.
The work will include more than 100 investigative surveys, with specialist teams analysing 1,100 rooms and more than 3,000 windows. The team will also work with Parliament to determine the functions the building needs to have in future as well as improvements in areas like accessibility.
The plan could also see a dry dock erected alongside the Palace, giving engineers better access to the full length of the building.
The restoration plan will be submitted to Parliament for final approval. Work is expected to begin on the Palace of Westminster in the mid 2020s.
Sarah Johnson, chief executive of the Restoration and Renewal Sponsor Body, said: “The iconic home of Parliament is in urgent need of restoration. The review has found new ways of carrying out the complex project, focused on getting value for money, and we will continue preparing a detailed and costed restoration and renewal plan that will for the first time give Parliament a true sense of the costs and timescales of restoring the Palace of Westminster.”
David Goldstone, chief executive of the Restoration and Renewal Delivery Authority, said: “We are absolutely committed to getting on with the job, making sure we spend money effectively, focusing on the vital and essential work that needs doing to protect and restore the world-famous Palace of Westminster while supporting thousands of jobs nationwide.”
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Time to let the old building go, stop wasting public money on yesterdays governance.
Time for a new building please
looks like nature might do Guy Fawkes’s job for him.
I agree that a new building would be a better option, and it could be smaller if it had no House of Lords full of unelected people asleep- saving tax-payers’ money twice over!
In the scale of things the cost is immaterial, since the building is the symbolic heart of our democracy, national heritage and history and must survive. As for a new building, just look at the pathetic efforts in Scotland or Wales for examples of what you might get !
Sounds like another excuse to sell it.
I commented right at the start that the most economic way to solve the problem is to lose our societies hang ups on old buildings and to tear it down and build a new Parliament building that is “Fit for purpose”.
The Palace of Westminster is to all intents and purposes only fit to become to become a pile of hardcore.
It does not even come anywhere near Fit to serve the purpose that it is asked to fulfil and is a huge burden on the public purse.
There must be acres of space around the country to construct a new Parliament building in a place better suited and more central thereby bringing our society more together.
The Royals have an estimated 3 trillion ( euros/dollars) in assets. They own the entire shoreline of that Island they reside on ( now being ‘leased’ to the windy companies n for billions and a 25% cut on all profits.
So the already poor subjects of that kingdom are to now pick up the tab of refurbishing of another one of the Aristocrats Pride and Showcases?
Perhaps, like the monarch it’s self, it’s time to simply let it go. The past they both represents is not inspiring for what has to be done into the future……Perhaps that spot could be useful for a space port if the Empire’s subjects ever decided to do some work in the space exploration (they sure got screwed on their Brexet). If it ever decides to change from “glory” of the past to looking to the future other then permitting things like “The Great Reset” program designed to …?….send a wooden windmill into orbit?
“In the scale of things the cost is immaterial, since the building is the symbolic heart of our democracy, national heritage and history and must survive. As for a new building, just look at the pathetic efforts in Scotland or Wales for examples of what you might get !
Brian Collins, 11 March 2021”
Sorry Brian but I have to disagree. The Westminster building may represent some selected history (mainly of England, not UK) but definitely not “democracy”. It represents the oppression of the working classes, Britain’s Imperialistic adventures, exploitation of other nations and their resources, various misguided and unjustified wars, and the hereditary power, wealth, and privilege that has prevented Britain from becoming an equal society. The cost is definitely not immaterial to me. If the building is not fit for purpose it should not be retained for misguided sentimental reasons, especially when it really has little architectural merit. I would be glad to see it turned to rubble.
Having toured the Scottish Government building I am very impressed, it can’t be fully appreciated until the interior has been seen. It is one of the most people-friendly modern buildings I have been in.
RK and Brian – really appreciate both of your thoughts. RK, what about moving beyond iconoclasm, seeing the building restored, properly interpreted to honour all the histories it represents, and saving it’s embodied energy and artistry. If you simply destroy it, don’t you risk pretending all of those things never happened or worse, that it was of little significance that they happened because it was all simply swept aside and replaced with some unsustainable set of concrete towers? I reckon working towards a day when that building tells the stories of all affected by it would be the optimal outcome. Adapt it, appropriate it, but don’t waste it.