To those who are concerned that it is not possible to shave money off the proposed building costs for a Pool on the Dartmouth Road site:

Capita Consulting prepared an options report for the Council dated August 2005. This report considered no less than 15 options - all of which retained Louise House. The public were consulted on the very cheapest of the all the options considered.

The most expensive option in August 2005 was to retain the existing Pools frontage and provide a new 25m pool and a learner pool - essentially the same as we are currently being offered although the layout was different because it was not going to use the park area. It provided 19 parking spaces in front of the building. This option was expected to cost ?7.43m at Summer 2005 prices and ?8.31m by the time the pool had been built in 2008.

The Mayor and Cabinet paper of February 2009 gave the cost of building new Pools on the existing site as ?12.2m at 4th quarter 2010 prices and adds this comment:

"Construction tender prices are currently falling and early tendering may produce lower prices than indicated, but there remain considerable uncertainties and the costs shown (above) are considered to be prudent".

Inflation (as measured by RPI) from summer 2005 to the present has been about 10% (index has gone from 192-211) so the previous building should not cost more than about ?8.2m at current prices. (OK, so building costs may have gone up by more than RPI but it can't be that different). Building costs are likely to be falling at present. So how can anyone seriously believe the ?12.2m price? Either the previous consultants were wrong, or the present ones are wrong. Capita who prepared the previous price had recent experience of building Swimming Pools. The current price is based on "estimated costs of construction per m2". Why should we believe the present costings?

In my view, cost savings on the ?12.2m should be easily achievable but no-one in the Council seems interested in looking for them. Why?