The
Scottish Parliament Building is the home of the
ScottishScotland is a country that is part of the United Kingdom. Occupying the northern third of the island of Great Britain, it shares a border with England to the south and is bounded by the North Sea to the east, the Atlantic Ocean to the north and west, and the North Channel and Irish Sea to the...
ParliamentThe Scottish Parliament is the devolved national, unicameral legislature of Scotland, located in the Holyrood area of the capital, Edinburgh. The Parliament, informally referred to as "Holyrood", is a democratically elected body comprising 129 members known as Members of the Scottish Parliament...
at
HolyroodHolyrood is an area in Edinburgh, the capital of Scotland. Lying east of the city centre, at the end of the Royal Mile, Holyrood was once in the separate burgh of Canongate before the expansion of Edinburgh in 1856...
, within the
UNESCO World Heritage SiteA UNESCO World Heritage Site is a place that is listed by the UNESCO as of special cultural or physical significance...
in central
EdinburghEdinburgh is the capital city of Scotland, the second largest city in Scotland, and the eighth most populous in the United Kingdom. The City of Edinburgh Council governs one of Scotland's 32 local government council areas. The council area includes urban Edinburgh and a rural area...
. Construction of the building commenced in June 1999 and the Members of the Scottish Parliament (MSPs) held their first debate in the new building on 7 September 2004. The formal opening by
Queen ElizabethElizabeth II is the constitutional monarch of 16 sovereign states known as the Commonwealth realms: the United Kingdom, Canada, Australia, New Zealand, Jamaica, Barbados, the Bahamas, Grenada, Papua New Guinea, the Solomon Islands, Tuvalu, Saint Lucia, Saint Vincent and the Grenadines, Belize,...
took place on 9 October 2004.
Enric MirallesEnric Miralles Moya was a Spanish Catalan architect. He graduated from the School of Architecture of Barcelona at the Universitat Politècnica de Catalunya in 1978. After establishing his reputation with a number of collaborations with his first wife Carme Pinós, the couple separated in 1991...
, the Catalan architect who designed the building, died before its completion.
From 1999 until the opening of the new building in 2004, committee rooms and the debating chamber of the Scottish Parliament were housed in the
General Assembly HallThe Assembly Hall is located between the Lawnmarket and The Mound in Edinburgh, Scotland. It is the meeting place of the General Assembly of the Church of Scotland.-History:...
of the
Church of ScotlandThe Church of Scotland, known informally by its Scots language name, the Kirk, is a Presbyterian church, decisively shaped by the Scottish Reformation....
located on
The MoundThe Mound is an artificial hill in central Edinburgh, Scotland, which connects Edinburgh's New Town and Old Town. It was formed by dumping around 1,501,000 cartloads of earth excavated from the foundations of the New Town into the drained Nor Loch which forms today's Princes Street Gardens. The...
in Edinburgh. The access to this facility was via a new glazed porch, discreetly placed in the SW corner of Mylne's Court off the Lawnmarket in the midst of some of the
University of EdinburghThe University of Edinburgh, founded in 1583, is a public research university located in Edinburgh, the capital of Scotland, and a UNESCO World Heritage Site. The university is deeply embedded in the fabric of the city, with many of the buildings in the historic Old Town belonging to the university...
's Hall of Residences. All traces of this porch were eradicated, and the west wall where it stood returned to a blank wall, immediately after the new parliament opened. Office and administrative accommodation in support of the Parliament were provided in buildings leased from the City of Edinburgh Council. The new Scottish Parliament Building brought together these different elements into one purpose-built parliamentary complex, housing 129 MSPs and more than 1,000 staff and civil servants.
From the outset, the building and its construction have been controversial. The choices of location, architect, design, use of non-indigenous materials (granite from China instead of Scotland), and construction company were all criticised by
politiciansThe Politics of Scotland forms a distinctive part of the wider politics of Europe.Theoretically, the United Kingdom is de jure a "unitary state" with one sovereign parliament and government...
, the
mediaScottish media has a long and distinct history. Scotland has a wide range of different types and quality of media.-Television:BBC Scotland runs two national television stations...
and the Scottish public. Scheduled to open in 2001, it did so in 2004, more than three years late with an estimated final cost of £414 million, many times higher than initial estimates of between £10m and £40m. A major
public inquiryA Tribunal of Inquiry is an official review of events or actions ordered by a government body in Common Law countries such as the United Kingdom, Ireland or Canada. Such a public inquiry differs from a Royal Commission in that a public inquiry accepts evidence and conducts its hearings in a more...
into the handling of the construction, chaired by the former
Lord AdvocateHer Majesty's Advocate , known as the Lord Advocate , is the chief legal officer of the Scottish Government and the Crown in Scotland for both civil and criminal matters that fall within the devolved powers of the Scottish Parliament...
,
Peter FraserPeter Lovat Fraser, Baron Fraser of Carmyllie, PC, QC is a Scottish politician and advocate.He was educated at Loretto School, Musselburgh, East Lothian, and graduated BA and LLM , Gonville & Caius College, Cambridge, before going to the University of Edinburgh...
, was established in 2003. The inquiry concluded in September 2004 and criticised the management of the whole project from the realisation of cost increases down to the way in which major design changes were implemented. Despite these criticisms and a mixed public reaction, the building was welcomed by architectural academics and critics. The building aims to conceive a poetic union between the
Scottish landscapeThe geography of Scotland is highly varied, from rural lowlands to barren uplands, and from large cities to uninhabited islands. Located in north-west Europe, Scotland comprises the northern one third of the island of Great Britain...
, its
peopleThe Scottish people , or Scots, are a nation and ethnic group native to Scotland. Historically they emerged from an amalgamation of the Picts and Gaels, incorporating neighbouring Britons to the south as well as invading Germanic peoples such as the Anglo-Saxons and the Norse.In modern use,...
, its culture, and the city of Edinburgh. This approach won the parliament building numerous awards including the 2005
Stirling PrizeThe Royal Institute of British Architects Stirling Prize is a British prize for excellence in architecture. It is named after the architect James Stirling, organised and awarded annually by the Royal Institute of British Architects...
and has been described as "a tour de force of arts and crafts and quality without parallel in the last 100 years of British architecture".
Location
Comprising an area of 1.6
haThe hectare is a metric unit of area defined as 10,000 square metres , and primarily used in the measurement of land. In 1795, when the metric system was introduced, the are was defined as being 100 square metres and the hectare was thus 100 ares or 1/100 km2...
(4 acres), with a perimeter of 480 m (1570 ft), the Scottish Parliament building is located 1 km (0.6 mi) east of Edinburgh city centre on the edge of the
Old TownThe Old Town of Edinburgh, the capital of Scotland, is the medieval part of the city. Together with the 18th-century New Town, it is a UNESCO World Heritage Site. It has preserved its medieval plan and many Reformation-era buildings....
. The large site previously housed the headquarters of the Scottish and Newcastle brewery which were demolished to make way for the building. The boundary of the site is marked by the
CanongateThe Canongate is a small district at the heart of Edinburgh, the capital city of Scotland.The name derives from the main street running through the area: called Canongate without the definite article, "the". Canongate forms the lower, eastern half of the Royal Mile in Edinburgh's historic Old Town....
stretch of the
Royal MileThe Royal Mile is a succession of streets which form the main thoroughfare of the Old Town of the city of Edinburgh in Scotland.As the name suggests, the Royal Mile is approximately one Scots mile long, and runs between two foci of history in Scotland, from Edinburgh Castle at the top of the Castle...
on its northern side, Horse Wynd on its eastern side, where the public entrance to the building is, and Reid's Close on its western side. Reid's Close connects the Canongate and Holyrood Road on the southwestern side of the complex. The south eastern side of the complex is bounded by the
Our Dynamic EarthOur Dynamic Earth is a science centre in Edinburgh, Scotland. It is a prominent visitors attraction in the city, and also functions as a conference venue. It sits in the Holyrood area, beside the Scottish Parliament building and at the foot of Arthur's Seat....
visitor attraction which opened in July 1999, and Queen's Drive which fringes the slopes of the Salisbury Crags.
In the immediate vicinity of the building is the Palace of Holyroodhouse, which is bordered by the broad expanse of
Holyrood ParkHolyrood Park is a royal park in central Edinburgh, Scotland about a mile to the east of Edinburgh Castle. It has an array of hills, lochs, glens, ridges, basalt cliffs, and patches of whin providing a remarkably wild piece of highland landscape within its area...
. To the south of the parliamentary complex are the steep slopes of the Salisbury Crags and
Arthur's SeatArthur's Seat is the main peak of the group of hills which form most of Holyrood Park, described by Robert Louis Stevenson as "a hill for magnitude, a mountain in virtue of its bold design". It is situated in the centre of the city of Edinburgh, about a mile to the east of Edinburgh Castle...
. The Holyrood and Dumbiedykes areas, to the west of the site, have been extensively redeveloped since 1998, with new retail, hotel and office developments, including Barclay House, the new offices of The Scotsman Publications Ltd.
Project history
Before 1707, the
Kingdom of ScotlandThe Kingdom of Scotland was a Sovereign state in North-West Europe that existed from 843 until 1707. It occupied the northern third of the island of Great Britain and shared a land border to the south with the Kingdom of England...
was a
sovereign independent stateSovereignty is the quality of having supreme, independent authority over a geographic area, such as a territory. It can be found in a power to rule and make law that rests on a political fact for which no purely legal explanation can be provided...
which had its own legislature—the
Parliament of ScotlandThe Parliament of Scotland, officially the Estates of Parliament, was the legislature of the Kingdom of Scotland. The unicameral parliament of Scotland is first found on record during the early 13th century, with the first meeting for which a primary source survives at...
—which met, latterly, at
Parliament HouseParliament House in Edinburgh, Scotland, was home to the pre-Union Parliament of Scotland, and now houses the Supreme Courts of Scotland. It is located in the Old Town, just off the Royal Mile, opposite St Giles Cathedral.-Parliament Hall:...
on the Royal Mile in Edinburgh. The Act of Union, passed in 1707, created an incorporating
political unionA political union is a type of state which is composed of or created out of smaller states. Unlike a personal union, the individual states share a common government and the union is recognized internationally as a single political entity...
between the Kingdoms of Scotland and
EnglandThe Kingdom of England was, from 927 to 1707, a sovereign state to the northwest of continental Europe. At its height, the Kingdom of England spanned the southern two-thirds of the island of Great Britain and several smaller outlying islands; what today comprises the legal jurisdiction of England...
. The Union merged the Parliament of Scotland and the
Parliament of EnglandThe Parliament of England was the legislature of the Kingdom of England. In 1066, William of Normandy introduced a feudal system, by which he sought the advice of a council of tenants-in-chief and ecclesiastics before making laws...
into the
Parliament of Great BritainThe Parliament of Great Britain was formed in 1707 following the ratification of the Acts of Union by both the Parliament of England and Parliament of Scotland...
which was housed in the
Palace of WestminsterThe Palace of Westminster, also known as the Houses of Parliament or Westminster Palace, is the meeting place of the two houses of the Parliament of the United Kingdom—the House of Lords and the House of Commons...
in
LondonLondon is the capital city of :England and the :United Kingdom, the largest metropolitan area in the United Kingdom, and the largest urban zone in the European Union by most measures. Located on the River Thames, London has been a major settlement for two millennia, its history going back to its...
. As a consequence,
ScotlandScotland is a country that is part of the United Kingdom. Occupying the northern third of the island of Great Britain, it shares a border with England to the south and is bounded by the North Sea to the east, the Atlantic Ocean to the north and west, and the North Channel and Irish Sea to the...
was directly governed from London for the next 292 years without a legislature or a Parliament building of its own.
Pressure for an independent parliament grew in the 1970s with the growth of the
Scottish National PartyThe Scottish National Party is a social-democratic political party in Scotland which campaigns for Scottish independence from the United Kingdom....
and monies were invested into the conversion of the former Royal High School on Calton Hill into an official parliament. Whilst much of this conversion was completed (including creation of the main debating hall) and the building was renamed
New Parliament HouseThe Old Royal High School is the name commonly given to a historic building on Calton Hill in Edinburgh which formerly housed the school of that name. The metonym Regent Road, from the street address, is used within the school community to distinguish it from the school's other past sites...
it was determined that the facility was too small for its stated purpose (as and when that purpose arose). Failure to create an independent parliament, following the rather onerous conditions of the 1979 devolution referendum, led a campaign group to set up adjacent to the Royal High School at the foot of the access road to Calton Hill. Starting informally this became a permanently manned "vigil" to keep the concept in the public mind. This led to the Royal High School being the "popular" choice of site in the public (and particularly SNP) mindset.
A
referendumThe Scottish devolution referendum of 1997 was a pre-legislative referendum held in Scotland on 11 September 1997 over whether there was support for the creation of a Scottish Parliament with devolved powers, and whether the Parliament should have tax-varying powers. The referendum was a Labour...
of the Scottish electorate, held on 11 September 1997, approved the establishment of a directly-elected Scottish Parliament to legislate on most domestic affairs. Following this, the
Scottish OfficeThe Scottish Office was a department of the United Kingdom Government from 1885 until 1999, exercising a wide range of government functions in relation to Scotland under the control of the Secretary of State for Scotland...
, led by the then
Secretary of State for ScotlandThe Secretary of State for Scotland is the principal minister of Her Majesty's Government in the United Kingdom with responsibilities for Scotland. He heads the Scotland Office , a government department based in London and Edinburgh. The post was created soon after the Union of the Crowns, but was...
,
Donald DewarDonald Campbell Dewar was a British politician who served as a Labour Party Member of Parliament in Scotland from 1966-1970, and then again from 1978 until his death in 2000. He served in Tony Blair's cabinet as Secretary of State for Scotland from 1997-1999 and was instrumental in the creation...
, decided that a new purpose-built facility would be constructed in Edinburgh, to house the Scottish Parliament.
Initially, three sites in and around Edinburgh were considered as possible locations for the building, including St Andrew's House/New Parliament House (better known as the imposing former Royal High School on Calton Hill) St Andrews House being the home of the Scottish Office—later the Scottish Government;
Victoria QuayVictoria Quay is a Scottish Government building situated in Leith, Edinburgh. Designed by Robert Matthew Johnson Marshall, construction began in 1993 and the building was officially opened by the Queen on Monday 1 July 1996...
at
Leith-South Leith v. North Leith:Up until the late 16th century Leith , comprised two separate towns on either side of the river....
docks (adjacent to the major Scottish Office building there) and
HaymarketHaymarket is an area of Edinburgh, Scotland. It is in the west of the city and is a focal point for many main roads, notably Dalry Road , Corstorphine Road and Shandwick Place .Haymarket contains a number of popular pubs, cafés and...
on the vacant railway goods yard, in the west end of the city. The Holyrood site was not entered into the picture until after the official closure date of the competition between the three sites. The date for announcing the winner over-ran and on the date of the expected announcement instead it was announced that they were going to "rethink their decision" (inferring that indeed a decision had been made) and add the Holyrood Brewery site into the running (which had only just closed). However negotiations with the brewing company Scottish and Newcastle, who owned the land, resulted in the company indicating that they would be able to vacate the site in early 1999. As a consequence, the Secretary of State for Scotland agreed that the Holyrood site merited inclusion on the shortlist of proposed locations. The Scottish Office commissioned feasibility studies of the specified areas in late 1997 and in January 1998, the Holyrood site was selected from the shortlist.
Following on from the site selection, the Scottish Office announced that an international competition would be held to find a designer for a new building to house the Parliament. A design committee was appointed under the chairmanship of Dewar, and was tasked with choosing from a shortlist of designs. Proposals were submitted from internationally renowned architects such as
Rafael ViñolyRafael Viñoly is an Uruguayan architect living in the United States.-Biography:He was born in Montevideo, Uruguay to Román Viñoly Barreto, and Maria Beceiro ....
,
Michael WilfordMichael Wilford CBE is an English architect from Hartfield, East Sussex. Wilford studied at the Northern Polytechnic School of Architecture, London, from 1955 to 1962, and at the Regent Street Polytechnic Planning School, London, in 1967...
and
Richard MeierRichard Meier is an American architect, whose rationalist buildings make prominent use of the color white.- Biography :Meier is Jewish and was born in Newark, New Jersey...
. Twelve designs were selected in March 1998, which were whittled down to five by the following May. The five final designs were put on public display throughout Scotland in June 1998. Feedback from the public displays showed that the designs of the Catalan architect
Enric MirallesEnric Miralles Moya was a Spanish Catalan architect. He graduated from the School of Architecture of Barcelona at the Universitat Politècnica de Catalunya in 1978. After establishing his reputation with a number of collaborations with his first wife Carme Pinós, the couple separated in 1991...
were amongst the most popular. The design team took account of public opinion on the designs and invited all five shortlisted entrants to make presentations on their proposed designs before announcing a winner.
On 6 July 1998, it was declared that the design of Enric Miralles was chosen, with work being awarded to EMBT/
RMJMRMJM is an international architectural practice founded in Edinburgh, Scotland in 1956 by architects Robert Matthew and Stirrat Johnson-Marshall. The first offices of the practice were its headquarters in Edinburgh, and another in London...
(Scotland) Ltd, a
SpanishSpain , officially the Kingdom of Spain languages]] under the European Charter for Regional or Minority Languages. In each of these, Spain's official name is as follows:;;;;;;), is a country and member state of the European Union located in southwestern Europe on the Iberian Peninsula...
-Scottish
joint ventureA joint venture is a business agreement in which parties agree to develop, for a finite time, a new entity and new assets by contributing equity. They exercise control over the enterprise and consequently share revenues, expenses and assets...
design company, specifically created for the project. Construction, which was undertaken by
BovisLend Lease Project Management & Construction is the international project management and construction division of Lend Lease Group.-History:...
, commenced in June 1999, with the demolition of the Scottish and Newcastle brewery and the beginning of foundation work to support the structure of the building. MSPs began to move into the building complex in the Summer of 2004, with the official opening by the Queen taking place in October of the same year.
Parliamentary complex
|
| 1 Public Entrance 2 Plaza 3 Pond 4 Press Tower 5 Debating Chamber 6 Tower one 7 Tower two 8 Tower three 9 Tower four 10 Tower five, Cannongate Bldg. 11 Main Staircase 12 MSPs' Entrance 13 Lobby 14 Garden 15 Queensbery House 16 MSP building 17 Turf roof 18 Carpark and vehicular entrance 19 Landscaped park |
Miralles sought to design a parliament building that could represent and present a
national identityScottish national identity is a term referring to the sense of national identity and common culture of Scottish people and is shared by a considerable majority of the people of Scotland....
. This intractably difficult question was tackled by displacing the question of identity into the landscape of Scotland. In a characteristically poetic approach he talked about slotting the building into the land "in the form of a gathering situation: an
amphitheatreAn amphitheatre is an open-air venue used for entertainment and performances.There are two similar, but distinct, types of structure for which the word "amphitheatre" is used: Ancient Roman amphitheatres were large central performance spaces surrounded by ascending seating, and were commonly used...
, coming out from Arthur's Seat." where the building would reflect a dialogue between the landscape and the act of people sitting. So an early goal of the design was to open the building and its public spaces, not just to Edinburgh but to a more general concept of the Scottish landscape. Miralles intended to use the parliament to help build the end of Canongate—"not just another building on the street...it should reinforce the existing qualities of the site and its surroundings. In a subtle game of cross views and political implications."
The result was a non-hierarchical, organic collection of low-lying buildings intended to allow views of, and blend in with, the surrounding rugged scenery and symbolise the connection between nature and the Scottish people. As a consequence the building has many features connected to nature and land, such as the leaf shaped motifs of the roof in the Garden Lobby of the building, and the large windows of the debating chamber, committee rooms and the Tower Buildings which face the broad expanse of Holyrood Park, Arthur's Seat and the Salisbury Crags. Inside the buildings, the connection to the land is reinforced by the use of
Scottish rockThe geology of Scotland is unusually varied for a country of its size, with a large number of differing geological features. There are three main geographical sub-divisions: the Highlands and Islands is a diverse area which lies to the north and west of the Highland Boundary Fault; the Central...
such as
gneissGneiss is a common and widely distributed type of rock formed by high-grade regional metamorphic processes from pre-existing formations that were originally either igneous or sedimentary rocks.-Etymology:...
and
graniteGranite is a common and widely occurring type of intrusive, felsic, igneous rock. Granite usually has a medium- to coarse-grained texture. Occasionally some individual crystals are larger than the groundmass, in which case the texture is known as porphyritic. A granitic rock with a porphyritic...
in the flooring and walls, and the use of
oakAn oak is a tree or shrub in the genus Quercus , of which about 600 species exist. "Oak" may also appear in the names of species in related genera, notably Lithocarpus...
and
sycamoreSycamore is a name which is applied at various times and places to three very different types of trees, but with somewhat similar leaf forms....
in the construction of the furniture.
The Parliament is actually a campus of several buildings, reflecting different architectural styles, with a total floor area of 31,000 square metres (312,000 sq ft), providing accommodation for MSPs, their researchers and parliamentary staff. The buildings have a variety of features, with the most distinctive external characterisation being the roof of the Tower Buildings, said to be reminiscent of upturned boats on the shoreline. The inspiration had come from
Edwin LutyensSir Edwin Landseer Lutyens, OM, KCIE, PRA, FRIBA was a British architect who is known for imaginatively adapting traditional architectural styles to the requirements of his era...
' sheds, made from upturned herring busses (boats) which Miralles saw on a visit to
LindisfarneLindisfarne is a tidal island off the north-east coast of England. It is also known as Holy Island and constitutes a civil parish in Northumberland...
in
NorthumberlandNorthumberland is the northernmost ceremonial county and a unitary district in North East England. For Eurostat purposes Northumberland is a NUTS 3 region and is one of three boroughs or unitary districts that comprise the "Northumberland and Tyne and Wear" NUTS 2 region...
. It is said that in the first design meeting, Miralles, armed with some twigs and leaves, thrust them onto a table and declared "This is the Scottish Parliament" reinforcing the unique and abstract nature of the parliamentary campus.
The north-western boundaries of the site, the MSPs' building, Queensberry House and the Canongate Building reinforce the existing medieval street patterns "expressing intimacy with the city and its citizens". The south-eastern aspect of the complex is extensively landscaped. Concrete "branches", covered in turf and wild grass extend from the parliamentary buildings, and provide members of the public with somewhere to sit and relax. Indigenous Scottish wildflowers and plants cover much of the area, blending the Parliament's grounds with the nearby Holyrood Park and Salisbury Crags. Oak, Rowan, Lime and Cherry trees have also been planted in the grounds. Adjacent to the landscaped area of the complex, where it meets Horse Wynd, there is an open plan piazza, with bike racks, seating and external lighting shaped like rocks incorporated into concrete paving. Three distinctive water features provide the centrepiece for this area.
References to Scottish culture are also reflected in the building and particularly on some of the building's elevations. There are a series of "trigger panels", constructed out of timber or granite. Not to everyone's taste, these have been said to represent
anvilAn anvil is a basic tool, a block with a hard surface on which another object is struck. The inertia of the anvil allows the energy of the striking tool to be transferred to the work piece. In most cases the anvil is used as a forging tool...
s, hairdryers, guns, question marks or even the
hammer and sickleThe hammer and sickle is a part of communist symbolism and its usage indicates an association with Communism, a Communist party, or a Communist state. It features a hammer and a sickle overlapping each other. The two tools are symbols of the industrial proletariat and the peasantry; placing them...
. Shortly after the official opening of the building, Enric Miralles' widow,
Benedetta TagliabueBenedetta Tagliabue is an Italian architect. She lives and works in Barcelona.-Education:In 1989 she graduated in Venice from the "Istituto Universitario di Architettura di Venezia" in Italy....
, revealed that the design is simply that of a window curtain pulled back. Her late husband however, enjoying the use of ambiguous forms with multiple meanings, had previously said he would love the profile to evoke an icon of Scottish culture, the painting of
Reverend Walker skating on iceThe Reverend Robert Walker Skating on Duddingston Loch, better known by its shorter title The Skating Minister, is an oil painting by Sir Henry Raeburn in the National Gallery of Scotland in Edinburgh. It was practically unknown until about 1949; today, however, it is one of Scotland's best known...
. The architectural critic
Charles JencksCharles Alexander Jencks is an American architectural theorist, landscape architect and designer. His books on the history and criticism of Modernism and Postmodernism were widely read in architectural circles and beyond....
finds this a particularly apt
metaphorA metaphor is a literary figure of speech that uses an image, story or tangible thing to represent a less tangible thing or some intangible quality or idea; e.g., "Her eyes were glistening jewels." Metaphor may also be used for any rhetorical figures of speech that achieve their effects via...
for balanced movement and democratic debate and also notes the irony that Miralles too was skating on ice with his designs for the building. Elsewhere, in the public area beneath the debating chamber, the curved concrete vaults carry various stylised
SaltiresThe Flag of Scotland, , also known as Saint Andrew's Cross or the Saltire, is the national flag of Scotland. As the national flag it is the Saltire, rather than the Royal Standard of Scotland, which is the correct flag for all individuals and corporate bodies to fly in order to demonstrate both...
. Here the architect intends another metaphor; by setting the debating chamber directly above the public area, he seeks to remind MSPs whilst sitting in the chamber that their power derives from the people below them.
The Scottish Parliament Building is open to visitors all year round. On non-sitting days, normally Mondays, Fridays and weekends as well as during parliamentary recess periods, visitors are able to view the Main Hall of the building and can access the public galleries of the debating chamber and main committee rooms. Guided tours are also available on non-sitting days and these allow visitors access to the floor of the chamber, the Garden Lobby,
Queensberry HouseQueensberry House is a 17th century Category A listed building in the Canongate, Edinburgh, Scotland, incorporated into the Scottish Parliament complex. It contains the office of the Presiding Officer, two Deputy Presiding Officers, the Parliament's Chief Executive, and other staff.The mansion...
and committee rooms in the company of a parliamentary guide. On sitting days, members of the public must purchase tickets for the public galleries of both the chamber and committee rooms.
Sustainability
The Scottish Parliament Building was designed with a number of sustainability features in mind. The decision to build the Parliament on a brownfield site and its proximity to hubs of
public transportThe transport system in Scotland is generally well-developed. The Scottish Parliament has control over most elements of transport policy within Scotland and the Scottish Government's Enterprise, Transport and Lifelong Learning Department is responsible for the Scottish transport network with...
are seen as sustainable, environmentally friendly features. A minimum of 80% of the electricity purchased for the building is required to come from renewable sources and solar panels on the Canongate Building are used for heating water in the complex.
A high level of insulation was used to keep the building warm during the winter months. This approach, however, brings with it the potential problem of overheating during the summer due to solar heat gains through the glazing, body heat and the use of computers and electric lighting. Standard solutions to the problem usually involve using energy intensive
HVACHVAC refers to technology of indoor or automotive environmental comfort. HVAC system design is a major subdiscipline of mechanical engineering, based on the principles of thermodynamics, fluid mechanics, and heat transfer...
systems. The Scottish Parliament Building, however, reduces the requirements for such systems to only 20% of the accommodation by a variety of strategies. Natural ventilation is used wherever possible. A computerised management system senses the temperature in different parts of the Parliament and automatically opens windows to keep the building cool. During summer months, the building opens the windows during the night time when it is unoccupied and permits the heavy concrete floors and structure to cool and rid themselves of heat absorbed during the day.This then helps to keep the building temperature down during the day by absorbing the excess heat from the glazing, occupants and electrical equipment. Some of the concrete floors are further cooled by water from 25 metres (80 ft) deep bore holes beneath the parliamentary campus which also provide water for the toilet facilities. The building achieves the highest rating in the
Building Research EstablishmentThe Building Research Establishment is a former UK government establishment that carries out research, consultancy and testing for the construction and built environment sectors in the United Kingdom...
's Environmental Assessment Method (
BREEAMBRE Environmental Assessment Method is a voluntary measurement rating for green buildings that was established in the UK by the Building Research Establishment . Since its inception it has since grown in scope and geographically, being exported in various guises across the globe...
).
Debating chamber
The debating chamber contains a shallow elliptical horseshoe of seating for the MSPs, with the governing party or parties sitting in the middle of the
semicircleIn legislatures, a hemicycle is a term for a semicircular, or horseshoe shaped, debating chamber where deputies sit to discuss and pass legislation. Though composed of Greek roots, the term is French in origin...
and opposition parties on either side, similar to other European legislatures. Such a layout is intended to blur political divisions and principally reflects the desire to encourage consensus amongst elected members. This is in contrast to the "adversarial" layout reminiscent of other
Westminster style national legislaturesThe Westminster system is a democratic parliamentary system of government modelled after the politics of the United Kingdom. This term comes from the Palace of Westminster, the seat of the Parliament of the United Kingdom....
, including the
House of CommonsThe House of Commons is the lower house of the Parliament of the United Kingdom, which also comprises the Sovereign and the House of Lords . Both Commons and Lords meet in the Palace of Westminster. The Commons is a democratically elected body, consisting of 650 members , who are known as Members...
, where government and opposition sit apart and facing one another. There are 131 desks and chairs on the floor of the chamber for all the elected members of the Scottish Parliament and members of the Scottish Government. The desks are constructed out of oak and sycamore and are fitted with a lectern, a microphone and in-built speakers as well as the
electronic votingElectronic voting is a term encompassing several different types of voting, embracing both electronic means of casting a vote and electronic means of counting votes....
equipment used by MSPs. Galleries above the main floor can accommodate a total of 255 members of the public, 18 guests and 34 members of the press.
The most notable feature of the chamber is the roof. The roof is supported by a structure of
laminatedGlued laminated timber, also called Glulam, is a type of structural timber product composed of several layers of dimensioned timber bonded together with durable, moisture-resistant adhesives. This material is called 'laminating stock' or lamstock for short.By laminating several smaller pieces of...
oakAn oak is a tree or shrub in the genus Quercus , of which about 600 species exist. "Oak" may also appear in the names of species in related genera, notably Lithocarpus...
beams joined with a total of 112
stainless steelIn metallurgy, stainless steel, also known as inox steel or inox from French "inoxydable", is defined as a steel alloy with a minimum of 10.5 or 11% chromium content by mass....
connectors (each slightly different), which in turn are suspended on steel rods from the walls. The connecting nodes were fabricated by
welderA welder is a tradesman who specializes in welding materials together. The materials to be joined can be metals or varieties of plastic or polymer...
s for
Scotland's oil industryThe economy of Scotland is closely linked with the rest of the United Kingdom and the wider European Economic Area. Scotland has the second largest GVA per capita of countries in the United Kingdom after England, though it is still lower than the average of the United Kingdom as a whole...
. Such a structure enables the debating chamber to span over 30 metres (100 ft) without any supporting columns. In entering the chamber, MSPs pass under a stone lintel—the Arniston Stone—that was once part of the pre-1707 Parliament building,
Parliament HouseParliament House in Edinburgh, Scotland, was home to the pre-Union Parliament of Scotland, and now houses the Supreme Courts of Scotland. It is located in the Old Town, just off the Royal Mile, opposite St Giles Cathedral.-Parliament Hall:...
. The use of the Arniston Stone in the structure of the debating chamber symbolises the connection between the historical
Parliament of ScotlandThe Parliament of Scotland, officially the Estates of Parliament, was the legislature of the Kingdom of Scotland. The unicameral parliament of Scotland is first found on record during the early 13th century, with the first meeting for which a primary source survives at...
and the present day Scottish Parliament.
Cut into the western wall of the debating chamber are laminated glass panels, of different shapes, intended to give a human dimension to the chamber. At night, light is shone through the glass panels and is projected onto the MSPs' desks to create the impression that the chamber is never unoccupied. Natural light diffuses into the chamber and is provided by "glass fins" which run down from light spaces in the ceiling. Glimpses out of the chamber are given to the landscape and city beyond, intentionally, to visually connect the MSPs to Scotland. The necessities of a modern parliament, banks of light, cameras, electronic voting and the MSPs' console have all been transformed into works of craft and art, displaying the sweeping curves and leaf motifs that inform the rest of the building. Such is the level of craftsmanship, a result of the union of Miralles' inventive designs, superb detailing by RMJM and excellent craftsmanship in execution, that Jencks was prompted to state that the [Parliament] is "an
arts and craftsArts and Crafts was an international design philosophy that originated in England and flourished between 1860 and 1910 , continuing its influence until the 1930s...
building, designed with high-tech flair. You really have to go back to the Houses of Parliament in London to get interior design of such a high creative level—in fact, it is more creative".
On 2 March 2006, a beam in the roof of the debating chamber swung loose from its hinges during a debate, resulting in the evacuation of the debating chamber and the suspension of parliamentary business. Parliament moved to other premises while the whole roof structure was inspected and remedial works were carried out. The structural engineers,
ArupArup is a global professional services firm headquartered in London, United Kingdom which provides engineering, design, planning, project management and consulting services for all aspects of the built environment. The firm is present in Africa, the Americas, Australasia, East Asia, Europe and the...
, stated that the problem with the collapsed beam was entirely due to the failure of one bolt and the absence of another. There was no design fault. The engineers concluded, in a report to MSPs, that the damage is likely to have been done during construction work on the chamber roof, in the latter phases of the project. The report also indicated that whilst one of the bolts was missing, the other was broken and had damaged threads commensurate with being over tightened or jammed, which twisted the head off, or came close to doing so.
Garden Lobby
The Garden Lobby is at the centre of the parliamentary complex and connects the debating chamber, committee rooms and administrative offices of the Tower Buildings, with
Queensberry HouseQueensberry House is a 17th century Category A listed building in the Canongate, Edinburgh, Scotland, incorporated into the Scottish Parliament complex. It contains the office of the Presiding Officer, two Deputy Presiding Officers, the Parliament's Chief Executive, and other staff.The mansion...
and the MSP building. The Garden Lobby is the place where official events as well as
televisionTelevision in Scotland mostly consists of UK-wide output, with some national variations, the level of which has varied in the past. Though there have been calls for such, Scotland still has no major television channel of its own...
interviews normally take place and it is used as an open social space for MSPs and parliamentary staff.
The main feature of the Garden Lobby are the rooflights, which when viewed from above resemble leaves or the early
ChristianA Christian is a person who adheres to Christianity, an Abrahamic, monotheistic religion based on the life and teachings of Jesus of Nazareth as recorded in the Canonical gospels and the letters of the New Testament...
"
vesicaThe vesica piscis is a shape that is the intersection of two circles with the same radius, intersecting in such a way that the center of each circle lies on the circumference of the other. The name literally means the "bladder of a fish" in Latin...
" shape and allow natural light into the building. The rooflights are made from stainless steel and the glasswork is covered by a lattice of solid oak struts. The route through the Garden Lobby up the main staircase to the debating chamber has been described as "one of the great processional routes in contemporary architecture."
MSP building
The MSP building is connected to the Tower Buildings by way of the Garden Lobby and stands at the western end of the parliamentary complex, adjoining Reid's Close. The block contains offices for each MSP and two members of staff, fitted out with custom-designed furniture. The building is between four and six storeys in height, and is clad in granite. MSPs occupy 108 of the total 114 rooms in the building. Each office is divided into two parts—one for the MSP, with a floor space of 15 square metres (160 sq ft) and another part for their staff, which has a floor space of 12 square metres (130 sq ft). The most distinctive feature of the MSP block are the unusual windows which project out from the building onto the western elevation of the parliamentary complex, inspired by a combination of the repeated leaf motif and the traditional Scottish stepped gable. In each office, these bay windows have a seat and shelving and are intended as "contemplation spaces". Constructed from stainless steel and framed in oak, with oak lattices covering the glass, the windows are designed to provide MSPs with privacy and shade from the sun. Criticism has been levelled at the design of the windows by some MSPs who claim that the design blocks out natural light from their offices. To remove the uniformity from the western side of the building, the windows jut out at different widths and angles. At its north end, the building is six storeys high (ground floor plus five) stepping down to four storeys (ground floor plus three) at the south end.
Other buildings
Four tower buildings fan out along the front, or eastern edge, of the parliamentary complex and are notable for the curvature of their roofs. The Tower Buildings are home to the public entrance of the Scottish Parliament and to the Main Hall which is located on the eastern side of the parliamentary complex, beneath the debating chamber. A stone vaulted ceiling is the principal feature of the Main Hall, which has cross like representations carved into it, reminiscent of the
SaltireThe Flag of Scotland, , also known as Saint Andrew's Cross or the Saltire, is the national flag of Scotland. As the national flag it is the Saltire, rather than the Royal Standard of Scotland, which is the correct flag for all individuals and corporate bodies to fly in order to demonstrate both...
—the national flag of Scotland. The main hall contains permanent exhibitions on the role of the Scottish Parliament, as well as public seating, a visitor information desk, a shop, lockers and a
crecheChild care or day care is care of a child during the day by a person other than the child's legal guardians, typically performed by someone outside the child's immediate family...
. Like much of the parliamentary complex, the materials used to construct the Main Hall and its vaulted ceiling include
KemnayKemnay is a town west of Aberdeen in Scotland. It has a population of about 4,500 .- History :The villagename Kemnay is believed to originate from the Celtic words that mean bend and river due to...
Granite from
AberdeenshireAberdeenshire is one of the 32 unitary council areas in Scotland and a lieutenancy area.The present day Aberdeenshire council area does not include the City of Aberdeen, now a separate council area, from which its name derives. Together, the modern council area and the city formed historic...
in north east Scotland and
CaithnessCaithness is a registration county, lieutenancy area and historic local government area of Scotland. The name was used also for the earldom of Caithness and the Caithness constituency of the Parliament of the United Kingdom . Boundaries are not identical in all contexts, but the Caithness area is...
stone which is used in much of the flooring in the buildings. Connected to the Tower Buildings in the eastern portion of the complex are the Media and Canongate Buildings, which house the
ITInformation technology is the acquisition, processing, storage and dissemination of vocal, pictorial, textual and numerical information by a microelectronics-based combination of computing and telecommunications...
and
procurementProcurement is the acquisition of goods or services. It is favourable that the goods/services are appropriate and that they are procured at the best possible cost to meet the needs of the purchaser in terms of quality and quantity, time, and location...
departments of the Parliament, as well as media offices and the Scottish Parliament Information Centre (SPICe). The centrepiece of the Canongate Building is a two-storey
cantileverA cantilever is a beam anchored at only one end. The beam carries the load to the support where it is resisted by moment and shear stress. Cantilever construction allows for overhanging structures without external bracing. Cantilevers can also be constructed with trusses or slabs.This is in...
structure, with the building connected at one end by reinforced concrete and 18 metres (60 ft) of the building suspended above ground and protruding outwards unsupported by any columns.
Originally dating from 1667,
Queensberry HouseQueensberry House is a 17th century Category A listed building in the Canongate, Edinburgh, Scotland, incorporated into the Scottish Parliament complex. It contains the office of the Presiding Officer, two Deputy Presiding Officers, the Parliament's Chief Executive, and other staff.The mansion...
is an example of a seventeenth century
GeorgianGeorgian architecture is the name given in most English-speaking countries to the set of architectural styles current between 1720 and 1840. It is eponymous for the first four British monarchs of the House of Hanover—George I of Great Britain, George II of Great Britain, George III of the United...
Edinburgh
townhouseA townhouse is the term historically used in the United Kingdom, Ireland and in many other countries to describe a residence of a peer or member of the aristocracy in the capital or major city. Most such figures owned one or more country houses in which they lived for much of the year...
and contrasts with the modern architecture of the rest of the parliamentary complex. For much of its modern history, Queensberry House has been used as a hospital, army barracks, a refuge and a geriatric hospital. In 1996, the geriatric hospital closed and the building was incorporated into the Scottish and Newcastle brewery, who owned the surrounding site. The building has been extensively refurbished, and returned to its original height of three storeys to provide facilities for the
Presiding OfficerThe Presiding Officer of the Scottish Parliament is the speaker of the Scottish Parliament, elected by the Members of the Scottish Parliament, by means of an exhaustive ballot. He or she also heads the Corporate Body of the Scottish Parliament and as such is viewed as a figurehead for the entire...
, Deputy Presiding Officers, the Chief Executive of the Scottish Parliament and various parliamentary support staff. Internally and externally the building has been strengthened with reinforced steel and concrete. The original timber flooring has been replaced throughout with a mixture of carpet, vinyl, oak and Caithness stone. Queensberry House also contains the Donald Dewar Room, dedicated to the founding First Minister of Scotland who died in October 2000. The room hosts the personal collection of books and other memorabilia donated to the Parliament by the family of Donald Dewar after his death.
Artwork and features
There is a wide variety of artwork and sculptures in the Scottish Parliament ranging from specially commissioned pieces to official gifts from overseas parliamentary delegations. The intention of including artwork and sculptures in the building reinforces the desire of Miralles that the project should reflect the nature of Scotland, particularly its land and people. In order to facilitate the incorporation of art into the building, a consultative steering group was established by the
Scottish Parliamentary Corporate BodyThe Scottish Parliamentary Corporate Body is a body of the Scottish Parliament responsible for the administration of the Parliament. It also has a role in provision of services to Commissioners and other statutory appointments made by the Parliament....
(SPCB) under the chairmanship of
Jamie Stone MSPJames "Jamie" Stone is a Scottish Liberal Democrat politician. He was a member of the Scottish Parliament for the constituency of Caithness, Sutherland, and Easter Ross, which is the northern-most mainland Scotland constituency and one of the largest constituencies in Britain...
with the remit of deciding which artworks should be chosen. Over 80 pieces of artwork have been chosen by the steering group to be displayed in the building.
As well as artwork and sculptures, quotations, furniture and photography have been commissioned as part of the art strategy. A range of quotations have been inscribed onto the stonework in and around the parliamentary complex. Beneath the Canongate Building façade is the Canongate Wall, constructed from a variety of indigenous Scottish rocks such as
Lewisian gneissThe Lewisian complex or Lewisian Gneiss is a suite of Precambrian metamorphic rocks that outcrop in the northwestern part of Scotland, forming part of the Hebridean Terrane. These rocks are of Archaean and Paleoproterozoic age, ranging from 3.0–1.7 Ga. They form the basement on which the...
, Torridonian sandstone and
EasdaleEasdale is one of the Slate Islands, in the Firth of Lorn, Scotland. Once the centre of the British slate industry, there has been some recent island regeneration....
slateSlate is a fine-grained, foliated, homogeneous metamorphic rock derived from an original shale-type sedimentary rock composed of clay or volcanic ash through low-grade regional metamorphism. The result is a foliated rock in which the foliation may not correspond to the original sedimentary layering...
. The stones are set into large concrete casts, each one inscribed with a quotation. There are a total of 24 quotations on the Canongate Wall. Etched along the lower stretch of the wall is a pictorial representation of the
Old TownThe Old Town of Edinburgh, the capital of Scotland, is the medieval part of the city. Together with the 18th-century New Town, it is a UNESCO World Heritage Site. It has preserved its medieval plan and many Reformation-era buildings....
of Edinburgh based around a sketch by Enric Miralles showing the view of the Old Town from his bedroom window in the
Balmoral HotelThe Balmoral is a luxury five-star hotel and landmark in Edinburgh, Scotland, known as the North British Hotel until the late 1980s. It is located in the heart of the city at the east end of Princes Street, the main shopping street beneath the Edinburgh Castle rock, and the southern edge of the New...
.
The Main Hall of the Parliament contains a number of distinctive features and sculptures, including the gold-plated
Honours of Scotland sculpture. Presented by the Queen upon the opening of the Parliament building, the sculpture is modelled on the actual
Honours of ScotlandThe Honours of Scotland, also known as the Scottish regalia and the Scottish Crown Jewels, dating from the fifteenth and sixteenth centuries, are the oldest set of crown jewels in the British Isles. The existing set were used for the coronation of Scottish monarchs from 1543 to 1651...
, the
crownA crown is the traditional symbolic form of headgear worn by a monarch or by a deity, for whom the crown traditionally represents power, legitimacy, immortality, righteousness, victory, triumph, resurrection, honour and glory of life after death. In art, the crown may be shown being offered to...
,
sceptreA sceptre is a symbolic ornamental rod or wand borne in the hand by a ruling monarch as an item of royal or imperial insignia.-Antiquity:...
and the
swordA sword is a bladed weapon used primarily for cutting or thrusting. The precise definition of the term varies with the historical epoch or the geographical region under consideration...
of the state, and combines these three separate elements into one composition. During meetings of the original Parliament of Scotland, the actual Honours were always present but since 1819 they have been permanently housed in
Edinburgh CastleEdinburgh Castle is a fortress which dominates the skyline of the city of Edinburgh, Scotland, from its position atop the volcanic Castle Rock. Human habitation of the site is dated back as far as the 9th century BC, although the nature of early settlement is unclear...
. The 11 m (36 ft) long Visitor Information Desk also stands in the Main Hall. Commissioned by the art strategy group, the desk combines a unique design constructed from oak and sycamore and functions as a workstation for six members of parliamentary staff. At a cost of £88,000 the desk has been criticised by some over its price and functionality.
Another feature gifted to the Scottish Parliament by the Queen, following its inauguration in July 1999, is the parliamentary
maceThe ceremonial mace is a highly ornamented staff of metal or wood, carried before a sovereign or other high official in civic ceremonies by a mace-bearer, intended to represent the official's authority. The mace, as used today, derives from the original mace used as a weapon...
. The mace is housed in a glass case in the debating chamber and has a formal, ceremonial role during meetings of the Parliament. The mace sits in front of the Presiding Officers' desk and is made from silver and inlaid with gold
pannedGold panning, or simply panning, is a form of placer mining that extracts gold from a placer deposit using a pan. The process is one of the simplest ways to extract gold, and is popular with geology enthusiasts because of its cheap cost and the relatively simple and easy process involved. It is the...
from Scottish rivers and inscribed with the words:
Wisdom,
Compassion,
Justice and
Integrity. The words -
There shall be a Scottish Parliament (which are the first words of the
Scotland Act 1998The Scotland Act 1998 is an Act of the Parliament of the United Kingdom. It is the Act which established the devolved Scottish Parliament.The Act will be amended by the Scotland Bill 2011, if and when it receives royal assent.-History:...
), are inscribed around the head of the mace. At the beginning of each session in the chamber, the case is removed to symbolise that a full meeting of the Parliament is taking place.
Critical response
Public reaction to the design of the building has been mixed. In the first 6 months of the building being open to the public, 250,000 people visited it, which
Presiding OfficerThe Presiding Officer of the Scottish Parliament is the speaker of the Scottish Parliament, elected by the Members of the Scottish Parliament, by means of an exhaustive ballot. He or she also heads the Corporate Body of the Scottish Parliament and as such is viewed as a figurehead for the entire...
George ReidGeorge Newlands Reid, PC , is a Scottish politician. From February 1974 to 1979 he served as a Scottish National Party Member of Parliament for Clackmannan and East Stirlingshire. He was elected in 1999 as a Member of the newly established Scottish Parliament as a regional MSP for Mid Scotland and...
has said showed the public were "voting with their feet". Critics of the building, such as
Margo MacDonaldMargo MacDonald MSP is a Scottish politician and former Scottish National Party MP and Deputy Leader...
MSP, have pointed out that the high number of visitors does not prove that all of them like the building. As well as cost, criticisms of the building stem primarily from the modernist and abstract architecture, the quality of the building work and the location of the building.
The mixed public reaction contrasts sharply with the response from architectural critics. Its rampant complexity, iconography and layering of meaning and metaphor are widely regarded as producing a building which is "quite a meal". This prompted Catherine Slessor, writing in the
Architectural ReviewThe Architectural Review is a monthly international architectural magazine published in London since 1896. Articles cover the built environment which includes landscape, building design, interior design and urbanism as well as theory of these subjects....
, to describe it as "A Celtic-Catalan cocktail to blow both minds and budgets, it doesn't play safe, energetically mining a new seam of National Romanticism refined and reinterpreted for the twenty-first century." Jencks attempted to dampen criticism of the cost overruns by questioning how 'value for money' might be judged. For him, the building is not just a functional or economic enterprise, it is an exploration of
national identityScottish national identity is a term referring to the sense of national identity and common culture of Scottish people and is shared by a considerable majority of the people of Scotland....
and in comparing it to other comparable assemblies, not least the
Palace of WestminsterThe Palace of Westminster, also known as the Houses of Parliament or Westminster Palace, is the meeting place of the two houses of the Parliament of the United Kingdom—the House of Lords and the House of Commons...
, he argues the cost is comparable. The conception of the building has been singled out for praise, particularly in the way it re-establishes Scotland's traditional focus towards mainland Europe and its values by means of the layout of the non-adversarial debating chamber and the creation of the public spaces in front of the building, "where people can meet and express themselves as a force". In an era of the Bilbao effect and the iconic building, Jencks is impressed that rather than being a monumental building, as is usual for capital landmarks, the building creates a complex union of nature and culture that nestles itself into the landscape.
The building has also won a number of awards, including an award at the VIII Biennial of Spanish Architecture, the RIAS Andrew Doolan Award for Architecture, and the 2005
Stirling PrizeThe Royal Institute of British Architects Stirling Prize is a British prize for excellence in architecture. It is named after the architect James Stirling, organised and awarded annually by the Royal Institute of British Architects...
, the UK's most prestigious architecture award. The inclusion of the Scottish Parliament Building on the shortlist for the Stirling Prize in 2004, led the judges to describe the building as "a statement of sparkling excellence". In October 2005 the building was identified as
Scotland's 4th greatest modern buildingIn 2005, the Scottish architecture magazine Prospect published a list of the 100 best modern Scottish buildings, as voted for by its readers.-The list:...
by readers of
Prospect magazineUrban Realm, formerly Prospect, is a quarterly architecture and planning magazine published in Scotland, with a focus on Scottish issues. The magazine was established as Prospect in 1922 by the Royal Incorporation of Architects in Scotland , and is the UK's oldest architectural magazine...
.
Timeline of cost increases
The construction of the Scottish Parliament Building has generated controversy in several respects. Rising costs and the use of public money to fund the project generated most controversy. Initial estimates for constructing a new building were projected to be between £10m and £40m in 1997. By early 2004, the estimated final cost of the project was set at £430m, some ten times greater.
| Date |
Cost |
Reason |
| 24 July 1997 |
c£10m-£40m |
The first cost projection provided by the Scottish Office is for housing MSPs in a new Scottish Parliament. The estimate takes no account of the location or design of any new building. |
| 6 July 1998 |
£50-£55m |
The design of Miralles is chosen and the revised estimate updates the preliminary figure recognising that the initial projection was based on a cleared site of 16,000 m² (172,222 sq ft) on brownfield land in Leith, Haymarket or Holyrood. The figure does not include VAT Vat or VAT may refer to:* A type of container such as a barrel, storage tank, or tub, often constructed of welded sheet stainless steel, and used for holding, storing, and processing liquids such as milk, wine, and beer...
or site acquisition costs. |
| 17 June 1999 |
£109m |
First Minister, Donald Dewar provisionally estimates the costs at £109m. The increased figure takes account of consultancy fees, site costs, demolition, VAT, archaeology work, risk and contingencies. |
| 5 April 2000 |
£195m |
Cost projections increase by £86m. |
| November 2001 |
£241m |
The new figure is officially announced and takes into account increases in space and major design changes resulting from a changed brief over the previous year. Rising costs are also blamed on construction problems ahead of an attempt to try to complete the building project by May 2003. The then Presiding Officer Sir David SteelDavid Martin Scott Steel, Baron Steel of Aikwood, KT, KBE, PC is a British Liberal Democrat politician who served as the Leader of the Liberal Party from 1976 until its merger with the Social Democratic Party in 1988 to form the Liberal Democrats...
informs the Finance Committee of the Scottish Parliament that rescheduling work is increasing costs. |
| December 2002 |
c£300m |
A cost increase to £295m in October 2002, is reported to be due to increased security needs, requiring that bombproof cladding be incorporated into designs for the external fabric of the building. Rising costs are also put down to "hidden extras" in the construction process and by December 2002 "ongoing delays" raise costs above the £300m barrier. The completion date for the building slips again, and plans for a grand "Opening Ceremony" are shelved indefinitely. |
| September 2003 |
£400m |
In July, the new Presiding Officer, George ReidGeorge Newlands Reid, PC , is a Scottish politician. From February 1974 to 1979 he served as a Scottish National Party Member of Parliament for Clackmannan and East Stirlingshire. He was elected in 1999 as a Member of the newly established Scottish Parliament as a regional MSP for Mid Scotland and...
produces the first of his "monthly reports" on the cost and schedule of the building, and provides a figure of £373.9m. The new figure comes in the light of reports that consultancy fees for the project top £50m. By September costs break the £400m barrier and are blamed on construction problems in the interior of the building. |
| February 2004 |
£430m + |
Costs are revealed to have increased again due to further problems with construction. The official opening of the building is tentatively put back again to some time in 2005, however the building finally opens in October. |
| February 2007 |
£414.4m |
The final cost is announced by the Scottish Parliament Corporate Body, a reduction of £16.1m on the previous estimate. |
Controversy
Notwithstanding the level of controversy surrounding cost, the Scottish Parliament Building proved controversial in a number of other respects: the decision to construct a new building, the choice of site, the selection of a non-Scottish architect, and the selection of
BovisBovis Homes Group plc is a second tier national British housebuilding company based in New Ash Green, Kent. It is listed on the London Stock Exchange and is a constituent of the FTSE 250 Index.-History:...
as construction manager after having earlier been excluded from the shortlist. In 1997, the initial cost of constructing a new Parliament building was given as £40 million, a figure produced by the Scottish Office, prior to the September 1997 devolution referendum, and subsequently revealed to be the figure for housing MSPs. Further controversy surrounding the project sprang from the selection of the Holyrood site, which was a late entrant onto the list of sites to be considered, and the rejection of the
Royal High SchoolThe Old Royal High School is the name commonly given to a historic building on Calton Hill in Edinburgh which formerly housed the school of that name. The metonym Regent Road, from the street address, is used within the school community to distinguish it from the school's other past sites...
on Calton Hill, long thought to be the home of any future devolved Scottish Parliament. After a formal visit to the Royal High School by Dewar and his aides on 30 May 1997, it was rejected as unsuitable on the grounds of size and location.
Control of the building project passed from the Scottish Office to the cross-party
Scottish Parliamentary Corporate BodyThe Scottish Parliamentary Corporate Body is a body of the Scottish Parliament responsible for the administration of the Parliament. It also has a role in provision of services to Commissioners and other statutory appointments made by the Parliament....
(SPCB) on 1 June 1999, headed by the Parliament's then Presiding Officer, Sir David Steel, at a time of increasing costs. Rising costs sprang from the need for a formal entrance and the need to accommodate parliamentary staff in light of better knowledge of how Parliament was working at its primary location on the Royal Mile, where it was clear there were staff overcrowding problems. With the cost increases in mind, and heightened media interest in the Holyrood Project, the Members of the Scottish Parliament held a debate on whether to continue with construction on 17 June 1999 voting by a majority of 66 to 57 in favour to complete the project.
In August 1999, the architect informed the project group that the Parliament would need to be further increased in size by 4,000 square metres (43,000 sq ft). A subsequent costing revealed that taking into account the increased floorspace net construction costs had risen to £115m by September 1999. Early in 2000, the SPCB commissioned an independent report by the architect John Spencely. The report concluded that savings of 20% could be made on the current project and that scrapping the project completely at that stage or moving to another site would entail additional costs of £30m. Spencely also cited poor communication between the SPCB and construction officials as increasingly costly. Given the outcomes of the Spencely report, MSPs voted to continue with the construction project on the Holyrood site in a debate in the Scottish Parliament on 5 April 2000.
The project was also complicated by the deaths of Miralles in July 2000, of Dewar the following October and the existence of a multi-headed client consisting of the SPCB, the Presiding Officer and an architectural advisor. The client took over the running of the project from the Scottish Executive (formerly the Scottish Office) while it was already under construction. Subsequently, the events of 9/11 led to further design changes, especially with regard to security, which again resulted in rising costs. However, it was later rejected that the re-designs required to incorporate greater security into the building structure were the "single biggest" factor affecting the increased costs of the project.
By March 2004 the cost had reached the sum of £430m (compared to an original budget of £55m in July 1998 when the architects were appointed). This equates to £85 for each of the 5.1 million people in Scotland. A report published by the Auditor General for Scotland in July 2004 specifically identified elements that contributed to both increasing costs and the delay in completing the project. His report criticised the overall management of the project and stated that had the management and construction process been executed better, costs could have been reduced. The report attempted to identify the reasons why there had been an acceleration in cost from £195m in September 2000 to £431m in February 2004 and concluded that over 2000 design changes to the project were a major factor. The building was finally certified for occupation in the Summer of 2004, with the official opening in October of the same year, three years behind schedule.
Fraser Inquiry
In May 2003 the First Minister,
Jack McConnellJack Wilson McConnell, Baron McConnell of Glenscorrodale is a British Labour life peer in the House of Lords. He was third First Minister of Scotland from 2001 to 2007, making him the longest serving First Minister in the history of the Scottish Parliament...
, announced a major
public inquiryA Tribunal of Inquiry is an official review of events or actions ordered by a government body in Common Law countries such as the United Kingdom, Ireland or Canada. Such a public inquiry differs from a Royal Commission in that a public inquiry accepts evidence and conducts its hearings in a more...
into the handling of the building project. The inquiry (known as the Holyrood Inquiry, or the Fraser Inquiry) was headed by Lord Fraser of Carmyllie and held at the
Scottish Land CourtThe Scottish Land Court is a Scottish court of law based in Edinburgh with subject-matter jurisdiction for disputes between landlords and tenants relating to agricultural tenancies and matters related to crofts and crofters. The Chairman of the Scottish Land Court is ranked as a Senator of the...
in Edinburgh. The inquiry took evidence from architects, civil servants, politicians and the building companies. Evidence was taken over the course of 49 hearings and the final report ran to 300 pages.
Criticisms
Presenting his report in September 2004, Lord Fraser told how he was "astonished" that year after year the ministers who were in charge were kept so much in the dark over the increases in cost estimates. He also stated that a Parliament building of sufficient scale could never have been built for less than £50m, and was "amazed" that the belief that it could be was perpetuated for so long. He believed that from at least April 2000, when MSPs commissioned the Spencely Report to decide whether the building should continue, it should have been realised that the building was bound to cost in excess of £200m. Furthermore, £150m of the final cost was wasted as a result of design delays, over-optimistic programming and uncertain authority.
Despite having only an outline design, the designers RMJM/EMBT (Scotland) Ltd stated without foundation that the building could be completed within a £50m budget. Nevertheless, these estimates were believed by officials. The two architectural practices in the RMJM and EMBT joint venture operated dysfunctionally and failed to communicate effectively with each other and the project manager. The death of Miralles also gave rise to a substantial period of disharmony. The Brief emphasised the importance of design and quality over cost, and was not updated despite considerable evolution of the design. Ministers were not informed of grave concerns within the Scottish Office over the cost of the project and officials failed to take the advice of the cost consultants.
The Scottish Office decided to procure the construction work under a "construction management contract", rather than under a
Private Finance InitiativeThe private finance initiative is a way of creating "public–private partnerships" by funding public infrastructure projects with private capital...
, in order to speed construction, but without properly evaluating the financial risks of doing so, and - in a decision that Fraser stated "beggars belief" - without asking Ministers to approve it. This was one of the two most flawed decisions which the report singled out, the other was the insistence on a rigid programme. Officials decided that rapid delivery of the new building was to be the priority, but that quality should be maintained. It was therefore inevitable that the cost would suffer. The client was obsessed with early completion and failed to understand the impact on cost and the completion date if high-quality work and a complex building were required. In attempting to achieve early completion, the management contractor produced optimistic programmes, to which the architects were unwise to commit. The main causes of the slippage were delays in designing a challenging project that was to be delivered against a tight timetable using an unusual
procurementProcurement is the acquisition of goods or services. It is favourable that the goods/services are appropriate and that they are procured at the best possible cost to meet the needs of the purchaser in terms of quality and quantity, time, and location...
route.
The inquiry was widely seen as clearing Donald Dewar for the initial mishandling of the project. This came after speculation suggesting that Dewar was aware that the initial costs of a new Parliament Building, circulated to the public, were too low. However in his report, Lord Fraser stated "there was no evidence whatsoever, that he [Dewar] deliberately or knowingly misled MSPs. He relied on cost figures given to him by senior civil servants." The inquiry also resisted the temptation to "lay all of the blame at the door of a deceased wayward architectural genius [Miralles].....costs rose because the client wanted increases and changes or at least approved of them in one manifestation or other."
Reaction and recommendations
In his report, Lord Fraser set out a number of recommendations stemming from the inquiry. Primarily, in terms of design selection and when using an international architect linking with a Scottish based firm, the report advised that a full analysis of the compatibility of different working cultures and practices needs to be made.
Lord Fraser advocated that when "construction management" contracts were used, civil servants or
local governmentLocal government in Scotland is organised through 32 unitary authorities designated as Councils which consist of councillors elected every four years by registered voters in each of the council areas....
officials should evaluate the risks of such a contract and set out the advantages and disadvantages of embarking upon such a route before their political superiors. Alongside that recommendation, Lord Fraser stated that independent advisors should be retained and have the ability to communicate their advice to ministers, without those views being "filtered" by public officials. Similarly, where civil servants are part of large project management contracts, clear guidelines of governance should be set out and be as rigorous as standards applied in the
private sectorIn economics, the private sector is that part of the economy, sometimes referred to as the citizen sector, which is run by private individuals or groups, usually as a means of enterprise for profit, and is not controlled by the state...
.
Following publication of the report, Jack McConnell stated that the Fraser recommendations would be fully implemented, and that fundamental reform of the civil service was already under way, with trained professionals being recruited to handle such projects. The First Minister emphasised that he was keen to see an increase in the specialist skills of civil servants, in order for them to be able to administer projects of such magnitude in the future.
John ElvidgeSir John William Elvidge KCB is the former Permanent Secretary to the Scottish Government. He was appointed in July 2003, replacing Sir Muir Russell. He retired from the post in June 2010.-Early life:...
, the most senior civil servant in Scotland, admitted that best practice had not been followed and apologised for the way the project had been handled. He did not rule out the possibility of taking disciplinary action against civil service staff, although subsequent Scottish Government investigations resulted in no action being taken against individual public officials involved with the project.
See also
- Architecture
Architecture is both the process and product of planning, designing and construction. Architectural works, in the material form of buildings, are often perceived as cultural and political symbols and as works of art...
- Building construction
- Cost overrun
A cost overrun, also known as a cost increase or budget overrun, is an unexpected cost incurred in excess of a budgeted amount due to an under-estimation of the actual cost during budgeting...
- List of buildings
- Politics of Scotland
The Politics of Scotland forms a distinctive part of the wider politics of Europe.Theoretically, the United Kingdom is de jure a "unitary state" with one sovereign parliament and government...
External links