Source · Select Committees · Public Accounts Committee
Recommendation 29
29
Accepted
Corporate Officers of both Houses now hold overall responsibility for building works.
Conclusion
On 1 January 2023, the Parliamentary Works Sponsor Body (Abolition) regulations 2022 came into effect. These set out that the Corporate Officers of the Houses would, acting jointly, “have overall responsibility for the Parliamentary building works.”71 The Sponsor Body’s previous responsibilities, as set out in previous legislation, will also be relevant including to prepare a strategy for consulting Members of Parliament; funding the Delivery Authority and overseeing their activities; determining the strategic objectives of the building works; and promoting public understanding of the purpose of the works.72 Before these changes, the Clerks’ were to engage the House of Lords and House of Lords Commissions and represent their views to the Sponsor Body. They had an agreement with the Sponsor Body to provide a formal mechanism for consultation and cooperation.73
Government Response Summary
The Corporate Officers acknowledge their new overall legal responsibility for the building works under the Act, and detail the mechanisms they will use, such as formally recording disagreements, to manage their duties, especially in the event of significant concerns.
Government Response
Accepted
HM Government
Accepted
The Clerk of the House and Clerk of the Parliaments agree with this recommendation. The Corporate Officers acknowledge that the legal responsibility for decisions relating to the Parliamentary building works is theirs under the Parliamentary Buildings (Restoration and Renewal) Act 2019, subject to the requirements set out in the Act to consult with Members and others. They also have other statutory responsibilities, such as the responsibility for fire safety in the Palace. The House of Commons already has a limited process equivalent to a ministerial direction, which applies only in the context of a disagreement with the Speaker or other Members about procedure. In that situation, the Clerk of the House would place a note in the Library recording the disagreement. The House of Lords has an agreed Lords governance framework which states that “Where the Accounting Officer objects to a proposed course of action by the Commission on grounds of propriety, regularity, value for money or feasibility such that they are bound by their statutory duties to reject that course of action, they shall present a memorandum to that effect to the Commission which will be minuted.” In this context, an equivalent of a ministerial direction would be of very limited value, as there is no-one with the authority to “direct” the Corporate Officers in relation to the building works. Therefore, in the event of a significant disagreement on appropriate schemes for the Restoration and Renewal works, the Corporate Officers would instead record their disagreement in formal Board minutes and through correspondence (which could be laid in the Libraries of both Houses). The Corporate Officers have already put on record at the R&R Programme Board on 5 June that they would be unable to support a construction scenario for the works if they felt that it presented an extraordinary level of unmitigated risk to anyone on the Estate, including staff, contractors and visitors.3 In other statutory contexts, similar mechanisms would be used to record the Corporate Officers’ disagreement with a decision taken by either House.