Skip to main content

Qualifications and Curriculum Authority: Location

Volume 486: debated on Thursday 15 January 2009

To ask the Secretary of State for Children, Schools and Families what estimate he has made of the cost of the relocating of the Qualifications and Curriculum Authority headquarters to Coventry. (245832)

The current estimate of relocation costs is £48 million. An additional, £16 million provision is shown in the 2007-08 Annual Accounts relating to unoccupied lease obligations for current London offices.

Given particularly that accommodation costs in the West Midlands are lower than those in central London, the relocation of QCA is expected to deliver cost savings in the long term.

The 2004 Lyons review recommended that Government make the significant investment required to relocate organisations out of London and the South East, and concluded that there would be positive economic benefits to areas into which organisations were relocated.