MoD has 200-year lease on torn down homes
John Ferguson Security officials are paying more than £500,000 pounds a year in rent on hundreds of homes that have been demolished.
The shocking waste of Ministry of Defence money – £515,203 in 2018-19 and £539,859 in 2017-18 – has been revealed in documents released under freedom of information laws to the SNP.
The MoD admitted to having signed a 200-year lease on 184 buildings that have been torn down but refused to give their location.
A spokesman said: “Inevitably, some properties need to be replaced as they reach the end of their economic life.
“The locat ion of some properties, on active MoD sites, mean they are unsuitable to return and demolition is more cost effective. The properties that have been demolished were leased to the MoD under a 200- year agreement with Annington Homes.”
Politicians have criticised the huge waste at a time when the department has complained about a lack of resources. It has been claimed there is a black hole of at least £ 7bil lion in the Government’s 10-year plan to equip the armed forces.
Documents describe the rental payments as “contractually due for 182 demolished properties” and state the MoD has “no beneficial use”.
SNP MP Gordon Macdonald said: “This is a needless waste f rom a UK Government department that should be keeping a better eye on how it uses public money.
“Unfor tunately thi s is becoming a pattern with the MoD. Taxpayers rightly expect the Government to keep a close eye on how it spends their cash and, if money is used unwisely, they need to make sure to learn from their mistakes.
“There’s a long list of ways this money could be better spent – the MoD need to set out how they’ll avoid it happening again.”
Ian Murray, Scottish Labour MP for Edinburgh South, said: “These are huge sums of money being squandered at a time when thousands of military jobs have been cut.
“MoD staff are overworked and under incredible pressure as a result of Tory cutbacks, and they will be furious to see managers wasting money like this.”