Introduction

The roof of Westminster Hall, one of the oldest parts of the Palace of Westminster

183. The House of Commons occupies a diverse range of buildings, including part of the Palace of Westminster, a Grade I listed building situated in a World Heritage Site; other listed buildings such as the two Norman Shaw buildings, one of which is described below; and the recently completed Portcullis House. As distinctive as Barry's design of the Palace of Westminster was Pugin's work on the interior design and furnishings. As part of the introduction of resource accounting and budgeting (see paragraph 20) estimates of the values of the House's assets must regularly be made and published. The total fixed assets of the House were valued at over £933 million at 31 March 2002, with the House's share of the Palace of Westminster accounting for the majority of this sum.23]

184. The House is charged with preserving and maintaining these assets while, at the same time, providing the modern office facilities required by Members and staff. Similarly, the Parliamentary Archives preserves original Acts of Parliament from the fifteenth century onwards, and other historical manuscripts including the death warrant of Charles I, but also must tackle the modern concepts of freedom of information and electronic records management. The sections below describe how the House met these challenges in 2002/03.

Parliamentary Estate

Introduction

185. The maintenance of the parliamentary estate is primarily the responsibility of the Parliamentary Works Services Directorate, which reports to the Serjeant at Arms but provides services to both Houses. Some £27 million was spent by the Commons in 2002/03 on the works programme, excluding Portcullis House, the main features of which are described below.

Norman Shaw South

186. Work was completed in January 2003 to restore the Norman Shaw South building to provide pleasant offices for 65 Members and 86 staff.

187. Norman Shaw South was built between 1902 and 1906 under the supervision of J. Dixon Butler for the Metropolitan Police Receiver's office. Richard Norman Shaw RA had previously designed the Norman Shaw North building and he acted as design consultant on the south building. These two buildings represent the principal London work of Norman Shaw and their importance is recognised by the fact that the north building is Grade I listed and the south building is Grade II*.

188. The restoration has included the installation of modern heating, ventilation, electrical services, lifts and disabled facilities; internal refurbishment and redecoration with careful retention of original features; external stone cleaning and roof repairs; and the inclusion of security facilities and fire precautions.

Main Committee Rooms: Palace of Westminster

189. Eleven committee rooms on the main Committee Corridor in the Palace of Westminster have been restored and equipped with modern facilities. The work started with room 14 in 1998 and is due to be completed with rooms 15 and 16 during the summer of 2004. The scheme entails the installation of air conditioning, sound insulation, modern microphone systems for audibility and broadcasting, and the restoration of interior decoration and furnishings. In addition, works of art have been relocated within committee rooms to complement the paintings on the Committee Corridor (see below) and there are plans to name committee rooms after Prime Ministers to reflect the theme of the Corridor.

Courtyard Stone Restoration

190. The external stone restoration of the Palace is continuing with Commons Court and Commons Inner Court, which are due to be completed at the end of the 2004 summer recess. More important than the obvious removal of grime is the cutting out of decayed stone and its replacement with new carved limestone, quarried from Clipsham, Rutland.

191. The timetable for the courtyard stone restoration programme is dictated by the periods when courtyards are free of other work and can be handed over to contractors. Thus, in earlier years, the schemes to modernise the House of Commons kitchens and install the Terrace Cafeteria prevented access to the Commons Court; and, for the next three years, the modernisation of the Lords refreshment department will prevent access for stone restoration in Peers' Court. The cleaning and restoration of stonework in the courtyards is both a noisy and disruptive process. The revised sitting times for the House have limited the times at which such work can be undertaken. The current contract has therefore been extended, at some cost, to enable work to take place at weekends.

Old Palace Yard and the Golden Jubilee Sundial

The new analematic sundial in Old Palace Yard

192. The restoration of Old Palace Yard was completed in October 2002 wit

h the installation of the analematic sundial to mark the Queen's Golden Jubilee. Old Palace Yard is now paved in granite to remind passers-by that it is part of the Palace of Westminster. Gas lanterns define the square, street clutter has been reduced, and more space has been made available for pedestrians and visitors.

Security

193. As a result of the current security situation, a security action plan was adopted in consultation with the House of Lords. Improvements implemented include a number of physical measures to regulate vehicles and pedestrians entering, leaving and traversing New Palace Yard.

Works of Art

194. The Curator of Works of Art has continued to work closely with the Speaker's Advisory Committee on Works of Art on the use of the House's Collection and the acquisition of new works of art.

195. A major re-hang of paintings has been completed on the main Committee Corridor - a part of the Palace frequently seen by visitors - featuring images of 22 Prime Ministers in chronological order from Sir Robert Walpole to Sir Winston Churchill. The paintings featured include works from the House's own Collection as well as works on loan. Improvements have also been made to the lighting of the Corridor so that the paintings can be seen better. Bronze busts of Lord Callaghan, Harold Wilson, Sir Anthony Eden, Harold Macmillan and James Ramsay MacDonald have been relocated in Members' Lobby. Taken together, these projects form a coherent and striking presentation of the House's collection of Prime Ministerial images.

196. A newly acquired bronze bust of Lady Castle, together with previously commissioned bronze busts of Lord Heseltine and Lord Jenkins, have been placed in prominent positions near Committee Rooms in Portcullis House. Three new portrait commissions are about to be undertaken of contemporary politicians which will also be placed in Portcullis House.

197. Conservation work has been carried out on a number of items in the House's Collection, including a full-length portrait of the 2nd Earl of Liverpool and a painting of the Coronation Banquet of King George IV. The marble statues of Sir William Harcourt and John Bright have been cleaned, and a statue of Baroness Thatcher, damaged while on loan to the Corporation of London, has been repaired and conserved. A new programme of labelling for some of the most prominent pieces in the Collection has been implemented. Following a full inventory check of the Collection, all works of art have now been barcoded and the Collection's database updated.

198. An exhibition of cartoons by Sir David Low was held between May and October 2002, which included a number of cartoons from the House's own collection. The exhibition was held in Westminster Hall, providing a high-profile and very accessible location. Plans are under way for future exhibitions to be held in the Hall.

199. The Works of Art Committee has continued to seek significant acquisitions to the Collection, including a portrait of William Wilberforce by George Richmond, a portrait of William Pitt the Younger by Gainsborough Dupont and a portrait of James Ramsay MacDonald by Ambrose McEvoy. Other notable acquisitions include: two pictures by Sylvia Pankhurst; portraits of Jo Grimond and Ernest Bevin; and a photograph of Sir Winston Churchill.

Documents

Parliamentary Archives

200. The Parliamentary Archives (the House of Lords Records Office) is responsible for developing and implementing records management policy and practices for both Houses of Parliament. Both Houses have adopted a common policy on records management, and are committed to the improvement and maintenance of effective records management processes. This will support efficient access to information and enable Parliament to comply with relevant legislation, including the Data Protection Act 1998 and the Freedom of Information Act 2000.

201. During 2001, both Houses agreed to the use of a common classification scheme for all parliamentary records, in order to improve the retrieval and sharing of information across departments. Over the last year, Commons departments have been introducing this scheme for all paper records. Most departments expect to have completed the classification of all paper records and to be using the Parliamentary Classification Scheme for all new paper records by the summer of 2003. As part of this programme of work, all staff involved with the creation of records have attended training in the use of the scheme and in basic good practice for records management. A short presentation on records management is now also routinely included in the induction programme for new members of staff.

202. Early in 2003, work was started on arrangements for the development of the Parliamentary Records Disposal Authority. The Disposal Authority will be linked to the functional classifications in the Parliamentary Classification Scheme, and will identify how and when records created by parliamentary staff should be stored and disposed of. Disposal can mean either the destruction or deletion of records after a stated time or their transfer to the Parliamentary Archives for permanent preservation. A process for developing and agreeing a disposal authority and the priority functions for the first phase of the work has been agreed.

203. An electronic records management specialist was recruited in February on a consultancy basis in order to recommend a strategy and to assist with the development of electronic records management functional requirements. The work will feed into the Document Management Project which is considering the implications of electronic records management applications and the work of the Information Standards Project Board which is establishing the metadata standards to be applied to all information systems.

204. The Parliamentary Archives ensures that departmental records of both Houses of Parliament worthy of permanent preservation are selected and archived. A project is under-way to develop a comprehensive online catalogue of archival holdings, which will be accessible in the public search room and on the internet. The implementation of the Freedom of Information Act in January 2005 will facilitate access to many records which are currently only available to the public after thirty years. A process is being developed to ensure that any information which is covered by an exemption (such as personal information about a named individual, or material relating to parliamentary privilege) is clearly identified (see page 35).

Conservation of Library stock

205. Maintaining the House's core collections of parliamentary papers and other official documents, and ensuring public access to their contents by preparing indexes, is a key responsibility for the Library. The Library has continued to preserve and, where appropriate, conserve these important areas of its stock. Conventional conservation is, however, both expensive and labour-intensive, with the added disadvantage that it makes the volumes more difficult to use and does nothing to provide wider access to their contents. The Library has therefore been looking at digitisation as an alternative to conventional conservation, particularly for Hansard. A business case for digitising Hansard was in the final stages of preparation at the end of the year and it is hoped that the project will start towards the end of the 2003/04 financial year.

206. Work has continued, in conjunction with British Museum staff, on preparing for the long-planned transfer of approximately 16,000 of the Library's older books to the King's Library of the British Museum. The volumes are often rare, with fine bindings, and of scholarly or antiquarian interest; in preparation for the transfer, they have all been moved to the Library's store in Broad Sanctuary and any essential conservation has been undertaken. The transfer to the King's Library, which is planned for June 2003, will mean that they will be kept in appropriate surroundings and made available for use by scholars in the British Museum's Central Library.

History of Parliament Trust

207. The History employs 29 staff and in 2002/03 received grant-in-aid of £1.1 million from the House of Commons Administration Estimate and £260,000 from the House of Lords Estimate. Its most ambitious work to date was published in July 2002 by Cambridge University Press. The House of Commons 1690-1715 details the parliamentary lives of 1,982 men who sat in the House in the period, and politics and elections in over 300 constituencies. The published History as a whole now covers a total of 281 years of parliamentary history in 28 volumes. Work continues on further sections of the History dealing with the Commons from 1422-1504, 1604-1660 and 1820-32 and the Lords from 1660 to 1832.

208. A project to create an electronic version of the first volume of the Commons Journals, covering the period from 1547 to 1628, was piloted during the year. The digitisation was done to a high standard of accuracy, with the addition to the electronic text of a level of tagging which allows highly specialised searches to be made. The History is overseeing the digitisation of further volumes, although without the same level of tagging in order to reduce costs.