By SEAN DOUGLAS Friday, November 13 2009

PLANNING Minister Emily Gaynor Dick-Forde yesterday promised to look into an apparent discrepancy between the $460 million cost of the Ministry of Education tower quoted by her to the Senate last week, and the $611 million sum quoted in the Budget’s Supplementary Public Sector Investment Programme (SPSIP).

She seemed to suggest $611 million might be a final cost, to include outfitting the building, but said she first needed to investigate these figures.

Last Tuesday she told the Senate that Cabinet had agreed a price-hike in July, 2007 from an original $367.8 million to $460 million, to add fees for architects, consultants, civil works, and a new project manager.

However the SPSIP laid in Parliament on September 7, said, “The estimated cost of the project is $611.1 million. The building commenced in 2005 and is scheduled for completion in 2009.”

Dick-Forde replied by asking under which Ministry the SPSIP had quoted $611 million, to which Newsday replied, Udecott.

It was in fact listed on page 126 of the SPSIP as Public Administration: Udecott.

Dick-Forde said, “That’s the problem. Udecott does not get any direct subventions, nor is it allocated in PSIP money in the Budget. The Ministry of Education tower, the numbers that I quoted flow from Cabinet decisions on the cost. The original cost, in my memory, was $367.8 million, and there was a subsequent Cabinet decision to increase the figure...”. She said the cost- hike was not due to an increase in the cost of construction, but due to added fees that had not been included in the original contract-sum which then rose to $460 million.

“Other costs will be added on which will have to do with the fit-out of the building,” she added.

She promised to ask her Permanent Secretary to look at the $611 million figure in the SPSIP. “The Ministry of Planning does not allocate any money. No money is allocated to the Udecott in the Budget. All the money that they get comes from works done for client ministry.” She suggested that perhaps the $611 million figure might be listed under the Ministry of Education.

“But the figures that I give are Cabinet-approved figures for the project,” she said.