BONGSKRIEG!
Luftwaffe bombers blamed as cost of restoring Big Ben soars by ANOTHER £18m
BLAST damage from Luftwaffe bombs dropped on Westminster almost 80 years ago i s being blamed for part of a massive rise in the cost of repairing Big Ben.
MPs will this week be asked to fork out another £ 18 million on restoring the world-famous landmark after being told of previously undiscovered damage dating from the Second World War.
Sources claim that only now has the full impact of an air raid in May 1941 on the tower been revealed.
But it will mean that the Big Ben revamp, originally approved in 2015 with an initial budget of £29 million that two years later was hiked to £61 million, will now cost close to £80 million.
Last night, MPs vented their anger at the soaring cost and said it would cast doubt on the Commons actually going ahead with the much bigger planned £4 billion restoration of the whole Palace of Westminster. One senior MP said: ‘If what’s happening with Big Ben tells us anything, it’s that the official estimate for revamping the whole Palace isn’t worth the paper it’s written on. As soon as we’ve moved out for that works, they’ll tell us, “Sorry – the budget for that’s doubled too.” ’
Big Ben and the Elizabeth Tower that houses it are encased in scaffolding as part of a four-year refurbishment due to be finished by 2021. But The Mail on Sunday has learnt that contractors have discovered that a Luftwaffe raid on
May 10, 1941 which destroyed the Commons Chamber and blew out the south clock face of Big Ben, had a much larger ‘collateral’ effect on the tower, including extensive damage to stonework.
They say it has only been during the restoration project that the true extent of this damage has been exposed. A parliamentary spokesman said last night: ‘As the real condition of the tower is fully revealed, our knowledge of the extent of the damage and our understanding of the work required develops.’