§ Mr. Harry GreenwayTo ask the Secretary of State for the Environment what arrangements are being made for the purchase of a site for the millennium exhibition. [13022]
§ Mr. GummerThe Government are committed to the establishment of a national exhibition at Greenwich in 2000 to mark the new millennium and to the regeneration of the Greenwich peninsula. English Partnerships, which will be responsible for the regeneration of the Greenwich peninsula and for providing the site for the exhibition, has agreed terms with British Gas to acquire the site for £20 million. The exhibition site must be delivered to the Millennium Central, the company which will be responsible for delivering the exhibition, by September 1997. It is essential, therefore, that English Partnerships acquires the site immediately in order to commence the works essential to achieving this objective.
Parliamentary approval of this new expenditure will be sought in a supplementary estimate for the regeneration countryside and wildlife vote (class VI, vote 2). Pending that approval, urgent expenditure estimated at £20 million will be met by repayable advances from the contingencies fund.