Costs of county council’s new offices ‘out of control’
INDEPENDENT COUNCILLOR SAYS FIGURES ARE ‘AN EMBARRASSMENT’
COSTS for new Nottinghamshire County Council offices are said to be “spiralling completely out of control” with construction on a £5m Worksop base due to get under way this year.
The Conservative-led authority previously estimated in 2020 that the cost of building its new Worksop office, as well as the relocation of some Retford services, would be around £2.75m.
The latest estimate for the Worksop office alone, published late in March, is £4,836,600. The building of the new Worksop base comes on top of ongoing work to build a new headquarters at the former Top Wighay farm site, due to cost £18.3m.
Councillor Jason Zadrozny, leader of the Independent Alliance opposition group on the county council, said: “Costs of the Conservative County Council offices are spiralling completely out of control. These latest figures should be an embarrassment to top Tory county councillors like Keith Girling and Ben Bradley, and the fiscally incompetent Conservatives who are overseeing costs going through the roof.
“The Conservatives always said the point of these new, luxury buildings was to save money but they are living in cloud cuckoo land if they don’t think costs including the office at Worksop and the new, controversial offices at Top Wighay Farm, near Hucknall will continue to rise.”
The new Worksop building will primarily be used to deliver services for children and families, services which are currently run from three bungalows. The council says the new building on Newgate Street will provide an improved environment for children and families and help to boost the recruitment of staff. Planning permission is already in place and building work is due to start this summer, with the whole project due to finish late next summer.
In terms of why the council could not have simply moved into an existing office building, the authority said: “Other council-owned buildings in the Worksop locality were considered as to whether they could house the services, with a review taking place in early 2024.
“This review considered the council’s estate of service buildings in the town to see if they had both the spare capacity and design to provide suitable spaces and this failed to identify any viable alternatives.”
The new headquarters at Top Wighay, to replace County Hall in West Bridgford, is due to be completed early next year.