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There was uproar in the Scottish Parliament today when it was announced
that building work on the new Scottish Parliament building would be
suspended with immediate effect.
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| How Parliament should have been built |
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| The small mistake the builders made |
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The Speaker, George Reid (Greid for short) announced
that the projects' main contractor had admitted to him in a private
meeting that they had in fact been building the Parliament upside
down.
Thomson Watson Anderson and Thyssen (TWAT) insisted
that they had made an honest mistake that any builder could have
made. They had tried to contact Enric Miralles the Catalonian architect
responsible for the design, in order to verify their understanding
of his plans. Unfortunately Miralles had died in 2000 and despite
a global search that lasted from February 2001 until December 2002,
that had involved 140 consultants and cost in excess of £120
million, they had been unable to locate him.
Gried told Parliament that the builders "were
very, very sorry and had promised it wouldn't happen again".
He suggested that Parliament debate the following options that TWAT
had suggested were available in the light of the revelations:
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That all MSP's would
be issued with iron boots and that all walkways, paths
and access points would be built using magnetised iron.
This would allow MSP's to keep a proper sense of perspective
at all times, even though they would be walking upside
down. |
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That all press personnel,
photographers, camera-operators, would have to report
on parliament and take film or photographs of the Scottish
parliament whilst adopting an upside down position. |
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That the building be
self-righted using a risky technique involving small nuclear
warheads and several miles of strong elastic bands. |
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That they demolish
the building and start again. This would mean tripling
the overall cost for the project as the cost of demolition
would be high. |
A spokesperson for Greid said that the Scottish Executive
would be recommending the re-building option.
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