The Department for Transport (Dft) could soon be sharing offices with the Ministry of Defence (MOD) as the government presses ahead with its cost cutting property disposal. Since 2010 the government has vacated over 1,000 buildings, reducing the costs of managing its estate by over £350 million.
Sold: Admiralty Arch will become a luxury hotel
Cabinet Office Minister Francis Maude is determined to press ahead with the drive which has already seen the sale of his own department’s Admiralty Arch offices to a hotel developer. Later this year the Department for International Development will be moving from Palace Street to an unoccupied property in Whitehall as the austerity measures continue.
The reduction of the government’s vast property portfolio is being overseen by the Efficiency and Reform Group which has now identified the MOD’s building on the banks of the Thames as underused. At the same time the DfT is approaching the end of the lease on its Victoria offices prompting the proposal that the two departments should share accommodation.
However the plans are being resisted with both parties raising objections to the move. The DfT argues that taking space in the riverside property will turn out to be more expensive than renewing the lease on its current building while the MOD is concerned that the plan could compromise security.
Supporters of the proposal dismiss the security issue by pointing out that counter-terrorism staff share a building at the Home Office without encountering any problems and insist that the two departments could easily be kept apart by a similar ‘glass wall’ method.
Last year the Cabinet Office published full details of the government’s commercial property portfolio showing that it comprised of 13,900 buildings throughout the UK spanning over 16 million square metres. More than 550 of these were reported to be unoccupied.
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