Q41 Geraldine Smith: Had it been turned down, as the planning inspector wanted to do, that would have been the end of it. Did they not anticipate that it would have been turned down by a planning inspector? You were employing consultants, spending £10 million on consultants including planning consultants. Do you not think that you should get your money back from those planning consultants, if they did not realise that it would be turned down by an inspector?
Sir David Normington: But we got planning permission for this site.
Q42 Geraldine Smith: Yes, only because the Secretary of State overruled the planning inspector-which is quite unusual.
Sir David Normington: Yes, but that is not my decision. I have no influence over what the then Deputy Prime Minister decided to do. He took that decision.
Q43 Geraldine Smith: I guess they were in a very difficult situation.
Sir David Normington: He is entitled, in law, to take the judgment on the basis of the case before him. He turned down one and he accepted the other. Our advisers advised-as it turned out, rightly-that we had the best chance of succeeding here, because it was a brownfield site. I want to say one other thing, if I may. The £30 million that we spent was spent between 2001 and 2005. It is a long time ago. I think it really will not do to-
Q44 Geraldine Smith: It is still £30 million. I think most taxpayers would think it was still their money that was being wasted.
Sir David Normington: I was simply taking your point about the police. That money is not available to spend on the police now. That is 2001.
Q45 Geraldine Smith: I am well aware of that.
Sir David Normington: Yes, but you made the point and I just wanted to make sure that nobody here thought that that money would have been available to spend on the police.
Q46 Geraldine Smith: I think that what we are here for is to make sure you do not waste another £30 million this year or next year on something else. You ploughed ahead with this project, even though asylum applications were halving between 2002 and 2003. Did these consultants not notice, or these people who were being paid an absolute fortune, that things were changing?
Sir David Normington: Yes-which was a success, of course. The number of asylum applications were coming down, first by 50% and then by 75%. The judgment was taken-and I can only report to you how it was-that, even against the background of the number of asylum claims in 2004, we should go ahead, because the asylum claims were still running at a high level and it was still worth trying out a different way of accommodating asylum seekers. As all Members will know, the accommodation of asylum seekers is a big and controversial problem, and this was thought to be a novel and different way of doing it, rather than dispersing them round the country. I do not believe that I should say that the people who took that judgment at that point were wrong to judge that that should be tried. That is what they were doing.
Q47 Geraldine Smith: Looking at other sites, how much did you spend on consultants looking at those sites?
Sir David Normington: In the report the costs are attributed, because it is not able to do it absolutely precisely. It is about £28 million on Bicester and the rest, up to £33 million-£4½ million, nearly £5 million, I think I am right in saying-about £4 million on the rest. That is a rough-and-ready attribution, because at the beginning there was a search for sites and we are not really able to attribute those costs. It was to the whole programme, really. We made a two-thirds, one-third apportionment.
Q48 Geraldine Smith: Can I ask what is going to happen? There are obviously people living there who are extremely concerned. They have spent many years going through the planning process, the sword of Damocles of the detention centre hanging over their head. What is the future for them? When are you going to make it clear to them what your intentions are?
Sir David Normington: I hope it will not be too long before we are able to do that, but I will not take this decision-
Q49 Geraldine Smith: How long?
Sir David Normington: I cannot say that to you.
Q50 Geraldine Smith: A year? Two years? Five years?
Sir David Normington: No, I cannot say that to you. Ministers will take this decision and they will take it as soon as they can, on the basis of the best possible advice.