ART AND SCIENCE BUILDINGS, GREAT BRITAIN.—Class I. (Hansard, 15 April 1915)

§ Sir F. BANBURY
I should rather like to ask one or two questions with regard to the new Science Building, South Kensington. The wording of the Estimate is, Erection of a new Science Museum on the site of the present Southern Galleries (the Royal Commissioners for the Exhibition of 1851 will contribute a sum of £100,000 towards the scheme). Total cost not yet ascertained. First of all, I really do think, when we are asked to vote a sum of money towards this particular building—apparently the amount we are asked to vote this year is £15,000—we ought really to know what the cost of the building is going to be. Up to 31st March this year, £19,300 has been spent, but it seems rather absurd to ask the House to vote a further £15,000 towards a scheme, the total cost of which has not been ascertained. At the risk of wearying the House, I must repeat what I said before, that this is not the time to go into these large schemes for the erection of new buildings, and, as the Office of Works has not yet ascertained what the cost of them will be, they might perfectly well pospone this Vote to another year. Why should they not postpone it for another year? It docs not put the matter back in any kind of way, because only £19,000 has been spent, and if postponed it would enable them to find out what the total cost is going to be. I do not think in these days, with a Budget of over 200 millions, let alone the question of War expenditure, we ought to vote in this House large sums of money, when it is not known what the cost of the object is going to be. In the ordinary course of events I should divide on the matter, but, of course, I shall not do it now, though I hope the hon. Gentleman will 70 give us some assurance that this particular scheme will not be proceeded with at present.

§ Mr. BECK
I think, in a word, I can meet the main criticism of the hon. Baronet. If he will look at the footnote he will see that, as regards any addition to the £110,000, there is £40,000 additional payable by the Royal Commissioners for the Exhibition of 1851, and I am told that, with the sum we are voting to-day, the total to which we are committing ourselves is £150,000, and that is completely covered by this Vote to-day and the Grants which appear in the Estimate.

§ Sir F. BANBURY
That does not meet my point. What I want an assurance upon is this: there is no hurry for this scheme; it could stand over for a time. The hon. Member's explanation hardly agrees with what appears in the Vote, which is that the original total Estimate is £110,000, and there is a footnote: "£40,000 additional payable by the Royal Commissioners for the Exhibition of 1851." That appears to indicate that the original total Estimate was £150,000, of which £40,000 is payable by the Commissioners for the Exhibition of 1851. If the hon. Member looks at the marginal note he will see that the total cost has not yet been ascertained. When the Office of Works Vote was before the Estimates Committee, we ascertained that it was the habit of the Office of Works to put down the original total Estimate, and then, when we asked on what figures it was founded, and whether it was really an original total Estimate, or merely a shot, we found out it was merely a shot, and I remember saying that that was not the way in which Estimates should be brought before the House of Commons.
We did make a representation which, so far as I can make out, the Office of Works has completely ignored. That recommendation was that they should not make a shot at what a thing was going to cost, and put down an original total Estimate when, as a matter of fact, they had no idea what the cost would be. In this case they put down an original total Estimate, and a marginal note saying that the total cost had not yet been ascertained, which absolutely contradict each other. They must think the ordinary Member of Parliament is either so lax or so foolish that he will not see the marginal note contradicts the statement in the column. Unless there may be excellent and urgent reasons for going on with the work, which the 71 hon. Member has not told us, I hope the hon. Gentleman will, at any rate, postpone for a year further expenditure on this matter, and also that he will endeavour in future to get the Office of Works, before coming down to the House of Commons and asking for large sums of money like this, to find out, I do not say exactly, but approximately, what the actual cost is going to be.

§ Sir JOSEPH LARMOR
I have been cognisant of the long negotiations between the Royal Commissioners for the Exhibition of 1851 and various public bodies in connection with this matter for many years. I understand, subject to correction from the hon. Member on the Treasury Bench, that the result of the negotiations was that the Royal Commissioners out of their funds gave a site for a Science Museum on condition that the Government was to put up the building, or bear a considerable part of the expense of putting up the building. The purpose of the building was to hold a large and very valuable collection of historical and scientific models, such as exist nowhere else in Europe, except, perhaps, in Munich, and which up to now have been housed in sheds. I thoroughly appreciate the point of view of the hon. Baronet, that we should embark on no unnecessary enterprise which would delay the great national object in which we are all so much interested. But there is the other side. We should not unduly delay matters which have been in progress for five or six years, and which are going on in the ordinary course, merely on a technical point. I very much hope that the work of the Science Museum, which has really been threshed out by several public Commissions for years, should not be unduly interfered with.

§ Sir F. BANBURY
This is not merely a technical point. I do not know what my hon. Friend means by that statement. My object, first of all, is to have an assurance as to what the cost is going to be. My second point is that we should not employ men at the present moment on works which are not urgent, when they might be doing something which is very much more valuable to the interests of the State.

§ Sir J. LARMOR
I do not question that.

§ Sir F. BANBURY
My objection was not upon a technical point, but it was a much greater objection.

§ Mr. BECK
I am afraid I did not explain the matter very well, partly because I hardly dared to say anything about Estimates to the hon. Baronet opposite, and partly on account of my limited experience of this work. The position is that the £150,000 which we are committed to to-day is an amount which is already contracted for. The note which has been alluded to refers to two more sections which are proposed, but which we are not committed to by this Vote to-day, and the cost of those sections has not been ascertained. I can assure the hon. Baronet that the section for which the contract has been made amounting to £150,000 will be an absolutely accurate estimate.