Local view for "http://purl.org/linkedpolitics/eu/plenary/2002-12-17-Speech-2-253"
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"en.20021217.7.2-253"2
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". – I am grateful to the honourable Member and I will happily send to him and to Mr Collins, who I know has a longstanding interest in this matter, the full statements that were originally provided to Parliament, but I am sure the figures will be of interest.
I shall summarise at this juncture in response to the precise points that Mr Hyland raised. One of the Commission’s fundamental aims throughout the negotiations on the contract on the Berlaymont was safeguarding the interests of the European taxpayer. The whole project has taken so long and will take some time longer – until 31 December next year – partly because of difficulties arising from the clearance of asbestos in the building which was vacated in 1991. This clearance took about two years longer than originally planned for. Secondly, the arrangements for managing the renovation of the Berlaymont were also delayed. Thirdly, disputes of a variety of kinds, including litigation, have added at least several months – indeed we can probably start counting in years – to the renovation.
The problem is that delay means cost, and one of our objectives was to ensure that we only accepted a fair share of the costs. We therefore accepted that any additions that we required, particularly in relation to the further demands of enlargement, would be met by the Commission, as is only fair. We also wanted design adaptations to make the building fully accessible and state-of-the-art. The net result of all that is that the actual annual price that we will pay of EUR 31.9 million per annum, at an interest rate that we negotiated in recent months, will be lower than the cost anticipated when the protocol, the memorandum of understanding, was signed between the Commission and the Belgian Government in 1997.
The overall cost of the Berlaymont meanwhile has gone up but, because of the contractual arrangements, our contribution to that cost is fixed, whereas the Belgian Government has an obligation to meet additional costs arising. I am more than happy to provide the full figures in the communication that we gave to Parliament and the Council in October and I will see that they are with the honourable Member before tomorrow evening."@en1
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