The Treasury committee is to examine government plans to spend around £4bn on repair work on the Houses of Parliament, saying an inquiry is needed to establish on what basis the funding is required, as a report on the issues from Deloitte is insufficiently detailed
The committee is inviting written evidence and views on the options as set out in Deloitte’s consultants’ report and the report of the joint committee set up to look at refurbishment issues.
Andrew Tyrie, chairman of the Treasury committee, said: ‘The restoration and renewal programme is estimated to cost between £3.5bn and £4bn over five to eight years. Neither the report by Deloitte nor that by the joint commission provides enough of the evidence needed to come even to a preliminary decision on these proposals.
‘So the Treasury committee will attempt to collect some of it. This is why the committee has called for evidence on this massive, and hugely expensive, restoration project. The proposals certainly need thorough scrutiny.’
The committee is seeking views on the comparative costs of the various options, and the effect of restating this on a constant price basis and discounted at an appropriate discount rate. In a letter to David Lidington, leader of the House of Commons, Tyrie suggests that the net present cost calculations do not align with the Treasury’s ‘green book’ on best practice in discounting.
This follows on from correspondence at the end of last year, when Tyrie asked Lidington to provide the comparative net present costs of each of the delivery options when taking into account the relative price effect, and outline the comparative net present costs on a constant price basis (i.e, with inflation taken out.)
The committee is seeking more information on the estimated annual operating costs at today's prices for each of the delivery options once the restoration and renewal programme is completed, plus more detail about the technical problems and risks involved in undertaking the work with a partial decant compared with a full decant.
It wants feedback on the scope of the work and whether it could be scaled back, and on the costs associated with having either or both Houses of Parliament cleared and out of operation for the duration of the work.
The committee also wants to investigate whether it would be possible to carry out full restoration over shorter periods than 11 and 32 years respectively with a partial decant or with no decant, and whether the start date could be delayed beyond 2020.
Deloitte’s report is here.
The joint committee report is here.
Tyrie’s letter to Lidington is here.
