New Home Office 'too small'

The old site was built in 1970

The Home Office has been accused of "poor planning" after it emerged its new headquarters will be too small to accommodate its entire staff.

A report from the National Audit Office (NAO) revealed that the building at 2 Marsham Street in Westminster - currently still a hole in the ground - will not have space for all of its workers.

When the project was announced in March last year, the Home Office said it was intended to vacate five offices in Millbank and Victoria, bringing most staff together at a single address.

It is due to move into the new building, on the site of the old Department of the Environment building, in 2005.

But the NAO has found there were 4,900 Home Office and Prison Service staff - but space for just 3,450.

The Home Office was unable to say whether staff numbers would go up or down between now and 2005, the report added.

World famous architect

The department will pay a monthly charge for the building and services which will amount, over the 29-year life of the project, to £311m at current prices.

The NAO disclosed that in 2000 the developers, French-owned Annes Gate Property, were asked to provide for an extra 500 staff in the building but planners prohibited further expansion.

The new Home Office site, designed by world-class architect Sir Terry Farrell, will also feature affordable housing, shops and a creche.

Sir Terry was responsible for the security service MI6's landmark building on the south bank of the Thames, and the redeveloped Charing Cross station.

The current Home Office, 50 Queen Anne's Gate, will be refurbished at a cost of £100m to re-house the Department for Constitutional Affairs.

Temperatures inside the 21-storey concrete monoliths, completed in 1970 at a cost of £5m, could reach 30C (86F) in summer, while in winter the heating took two days to reach habitable levels.