£9,167,000 and rising! (Darlington and Sedgefield Liberal Democrats)

Darlington and Sedgefield Liberal Democrats <joe.kelley@darlingtonlibdems.org.uk>

£9,167,000 and rising!

December 24, 2007 6:00 PM

In November 2007, the cost of the Pedestrian Heart, to that point, was reported as £9,167,000. The original budget was £6,952,000. So, they've overspent by £2,215,000 so far.

The Pedestrian Heart project suffered from bad project planning and bad financial planning; with a bit of bad luck thrown in.

The Labour Cabinet asked the Council for an extra £2,268,000 in September 2006 and at the same time asked a Council committee to find out what had gone wrong. Why did the gas main discovered during the project not show up on the original surveys? Why didn't the Council employ a professional project manager? Why did the contract say that the Council would pay a hugely disproportionate amount towards any unexpected costs?

Fifteen months later and the Committee has still not published its report. We understand that the report has been available for a few months.

Why can't it be made public? The latest news is that its release has been postponed until next year. What bad news is it hiding? We shall see!

During 2007, all the stops were pulled out to get the project finished. Large numbers of Darlington Borough Council staff were assigned to the job. Their wages should have been added to the cost of the project whilst they worked on it. Were they?

Council staff continue to work on what's called snagging jobs, like filling with resin the numerous chips in the huge stone slabs that make the flower beds.

Is that work being added to the cost of the project? It should be.

We look forward to the new year when the true costs of the project should be revealed. Perhaps the report will also tell us who's to blame and pass on some lessons to be learned from this expensive exercise.