The Houses of Parliament is falling down. What is to be done?

Mice under the floorboards. Falling masonry. Leaky sewage pipes. Asbestos everywhere. 

Britain has no shortage of historic buildings in need of repair. But none presents a challenge on the scale of that facing the Houses of Parliament, the heart of British power and politics on the banks of the River Thames, and which ranks among the world’s most recognizable buildings.

The occupants of this vast and dilapidated building, however, the elected and unelected politicians who work in what is formally known as the Palace of Westminster, cannot decide how to go about renovating it. Nor can they agree on where they should legislate during the work.

“We’re becoming a laughingstock,” says Meg Hillier, a member of Parliament for the opposition Labour Party who chairs the Public Accounts Committee. “We want to run the country, but we can’t make a decision about the place we work in.”

The debate over how to manage such a complex refurbishment, which could cost as much as $16.5 billion, has been going on for years. But Ms. Hillier’s committee warned in May that there was “a real and rising risk” that a catastrophe such as the fire that broke out at Notre Dame in Paris could destroy the building before it could be renovated.

Houses of Parliament Restoration and Renewal Programme

The iconic Parliament building, officially known as the Palace of Westminster, is seen from across the River Thames.

It is not an easy building to overhaul, covering 1.2 million square feet over seven floors linked by almost 3 miles of corridors. While the main neo-Gothic structure was erected after a previous building burned down in 1834, parts of the palace are much older, such as Westminster Hall, the vaulted 11th-century hall where Queen Elizabeth II lay in state last year for five days before her funeral.

A deadline. Or maybe not ...

The extent of the rot, and the dire risks facing the building and its inhabitants, are well known. In 2018, lawmakers voted to create an independent body, run by lawmakers, administrators, and outside experts, to manage the renovation project. They also agreed to move out while the project was underway. But those decisions were scrapped last year, sending the effort back to square one.

Parliament has now set itself a December deadline for a decisive vote on a plan of action. But that deadline is hostage to British politics: Facing an election next year, members of Parliament (MPs) may prefer to postpone a vote so that they cannot be accused during a possible campaign of wasting public money on a refit of their own offices at a time of economic hardship.

Meanwhile, Ms. Hillier reports that the toilet outside her office leaks onto the floor below, where buckets have been deployed to collect the water. Other MPs complain that crumbling staircases to their offices are often closed by safety officers. Sections of the building’s exterior are covered by scaffolding and nets to protect passersby from falling masonry.

Beyond these daily inconveniences for the 3,000 people who work in the building is the risk of a major fire or flood. Among the most pressing concerns is what to do about the basement. A central underground passage built for ventilation that runs the length of the building is now a tangle of steam and gas pipes, electric wires, and telephone and data cables. One MP compared the drooping electrical wiring to “jungle creepers.”

Houses of Parliament Restoration and Renewal Programme

A surveyor examines a door bolt in the Parliament building, parts of which are over 900 years old.

While the building exudes ancient tradition and pomp, its architectural design and construction – particularly its ventilation system – were groundbreaking in the mid-19th century, says Henrik Schoenefeldt, a professor of sustainable architecture at the University of Kent who has studied the original designs. 

“It’s a technologically complex building and that adds to the challenge” of renovation, he says. 

The Gothic towers that make Parliament’s silhouette so recognizable, for example, are in fact air shafts connected to an internal network of flues and channels. The stone walls are hollow and grafted onto a steel frame, masking a complex system of ventilation and climate control inside a building that has more than 1,000 rooms. This allowed lawmakers to seal their windows against the noxious air pollution outside and the stinks wafting up from the Thames. 

Much of this system is still intact and is another aspect of heritage preservation, says Professor Schoenefeldt, who has been working with surveyors to map out the air circulation features. “It's not just about the arts and architecture. It’s also about the technology of the building,” he says. 

The green bench effect

As MPs debate next steps, building staff has upgraded the fire alarm system, adding sensors and sprinklers, while some outdated electrical and mechanical systems have been replaced. Fire wardens patrol the building around the clock.

“We are getting on with work across the Parliamentary estate to ensure the safety of those who work and visit here, and to support the continued business of Parliament,” a Parliament spokesperson told the Monitor in a statement. 

Houses of Parliament Restoration and Renewal Programme

Workers repair a section of roof on the British Parliament building.

Critics say it’s all too little, too late, and that neglect of basic maintenance is one reason why the cost of long-term renovation has spiraled. Writing for “Politics Home,” a U.K. website, architectural historian James Stevens Curl laments “a deplorable pusillanimous national tendency to avoid spending money on maintenance. All buildings require maintenance, and failure to carry it out for reasons of ‘economy’ is daft.” 

Those who want to bring the project in-house argue that doing so will make it easier to control costs. Edward Leigh, a Conservative Party MP, said in a parliamentary debate that the independent body had offered “wildly expensive proposals” and would provide “very bad value for money.” 

But the biggest sticking point has been how lawmakers would carry on their work during a multiyear renovation of the building. Mr. Leigh is among a group of MPs who oppose any plan that would require them to move out, or “decant” in the parliamentary vernacular. The anti-decanters insist that building repairs can be effected around them and that moving offsite into a temporary chamber would be a waste of money. 

This resistance is more about status and tradition than value for money, suggests Alexandra Meakin, a politics professor at University of Leeds who has studied the renovation program. “For many MPs, sitting on the same green benches in the House of Commons where Winston Churchill sat, … that’s the reward they get” for being members of Parliament, she says. “To have that taken away is very upsetting.” 

Though fears of a backlash against the expense certainly unnerve lawmakers who face a tough reelection campaign, such concerns may be misplaced. Polls show that voters are more upset that MPs “are letting a piece of British heritage fall into the Thames” than by the cost of fixing it, says Professor Meakin, who is a former parliamentary researcher.

“The public,” she says, “have a far more mature and nuanced view of the situation than politicians give them credit for.”

Editor's note: The original story misspelled James Stevens Curl's middle name.