Plans for a £29m asylum accommodation centre that was never built showed a "startling absence of common sense", an MP has claimed.
Select committee chairman Edward Leigh issued stinging criticism of the Home Office scheme to build a holding centre in Bicester, Oxfordshire, as a report into the affair was published on Thursday.
The report from the Commons public accounts committee said the Home Office’s business case had taken no account of local or national opposition, the risk of planning delays or of changes to the government’s asylum policy.
Leigh said the project "embodied lack of foresight, poor business planning and a startling absence of common sense.
"No development has taken place on the site, which is lying semi-derelict, and the taxpayer has lost some £29m," he added.
And shadow immigration minister Damian Green said the "expensive failure" had been the product of "long-term incompetence by immigration ministers, who failed to notice that asylum numbers were dropping just when they were planning this new centre".
Work on the Bicester pilot proposal began in 2001, as part of a wider £33.7m programme to build 10 centres across the country.
Rising costs
But the entire scheme was abandoned in 2006 because of the falling number of asylum applications, rising costs and an improvement in the times taken for processing asylum applications.
The Home Office was left with the site, valued at £4.6m, but had to pay contractor Global Solutions Limited nearly £8m in termination fees, on top of £7.6m the company had already received for design work.
The MPs' report blamed the supplier costs on the government's decision to sign a contract with its referred bidder before completing the outline and detailed planning processes.
Within the £29m spent on Bicester, more than £1m went to two consultants employed because the Home Office did not have anyone with the right skills.
Consultants
An unnamed financial adviser was paid £614,300, with an annual salary that reached £200,807 by the end of scheme, more than three times the amount paid to the civil servant project manager.
Another £497,900 was paid to a single procurement adviser. In total, consultants received £6.3m of the total spent on Bicester.
In conclusion, the MPs report said all government departments and bodies could learn lessons from the "innovative" project.
They included the need for strong governance procedures when engaging consultants early in a project's life, the importance of consultation with interested parties, such as the local community and a need to take account of policy changes.
A spokesman for the Home Office, which now intends to build a secure immigration removal centre, said changed circumstances and project delays had forced the change of mind.
"Our experience with this project has taught us some important lessons, and this, along with the other improvements put in place, has led to an overall positive impact for the public," he insisted.
Dods Parliamentary Communications Ltd