Alan Clawley’s Library Blog

WHY SO EXPENSIVE?

04-12-2009

Birmingham taxpayers aren’t just shelling out for a new library in Centenary Square. As Alan Clawley reveals they’ll also have pay unspecified compensation to The Rep for lost earnings, and to replace perfectly functional buildings which are being demolished.

We all know that the Library of Birmingham project is hugely expensive, but the Council hasn’t said much about why this library should be more expensive than renovating the Central Library and even more expensive that the much bigger Richards Rogers library one proposed for Eastside.

In replying to my questions, Chief Executive Stephen Hughes reveals that this is not because its such a big library – as we know, its not that big at all - but because the cost includes compensating the REP for the buildings that will have to be knocked down to fit it onto the car park site.

I asked him why the Council was paying to build facilities for the REP at all and why they were being funded from the libraries budget.

He replied, ‘The City Council will pay for the replacement of those Rep facilities which are being demolished to make way for the Library of Birmingham.

‘This funding is from corporate financing for the library project and it would seem a reasonable expectation on the part of the Rep that the City Council meet such costs in order to facilitate the progress of the project’.

As to how much this will cost he could only say, ‘ We expect to know this information shortly when the Final Lump Sum agreement is reached with Carillion’.

Asked whether the Rep will be making a financial contribution, Mr Hughes’s answer was a definite ‘No’.

My fourth question was whether the City Council will compensate the Rep for loss of income from the closure.

Here Mr Hughes was equivocal with the answer, ‘In general terms, yes, although the financial arrangements are considerably more complex than your question would suggest, since the Rep is already funded by City Council and Arts Council grants and derives only a percentage of its revenue from directly generated income’.

Finally, I asked if the two-year closure of the Rep will cost the City Council lost Business Rates.

And his reply was, ‘ The Rep will cease to pay business rates on the existing theatre but will incur rates payable on the temporary premises they will occupy during the period of closure’.

Mr Hughes’s replies show how far the council will go to get itself out of the hole that dug for itself when it decided that the new library had to fit into the car park in Centenary Square at all costs.

No one begrudges the Rep due compensation for the resulting inconvenience and disruption, but it is the council tax payers of Birmingham who will pay all the bills. And that’s not to mention the sheer waste of demolishing buildings that are only twenty years old and which were not even declared ‘unfit for purpose’.

They were just ‘in the way’.

Alan Clawley is Secretary of Friends of the Central Library.

Birmingham Council is invited to respond. Email editor@thestirrer.com

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