Sunderland City Council spent over £70,000 cleaning the windows of its new City Hall building in fourteen months amidst a crippling cost of living crisis, The Northern Echo can reveal.
Data obtained by the Echo through an FOI request reveals that between December 2021 and February 28 2023, the Council forked out an eye-watering £77,310 on window cleaning.
The Northern Echo filed the same FOI request to other North East councils, as the data recieved now shows Sunderland’s bill is £68,174 higher than Newcastle’s £9,136 over the same period.
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The City Hall building, now occupied by Sunderland City Council and other tenants such as Gentoo opened its doors in March of last year after construction began in 2019.
The multi-million-pound City Hall is one of many new buildings on Livingstone Road, built on the site of the old Vaux Brewery after its closure in 1999.
Dr Antony Mullen, leader of the Sunderland Conservative party and councillor for Barnes Ward, has hit out at the Labour-controlled council - calling the bill “excessive”.
He said: "Sunderland City Council does not own City Hall, it spends £2.5m per year on renting floor space, alongside Gentoo, Sunderland College and the DWP. I hope that the cost of window cleaning will be divided between all of the building's tenants.
"The amount the Council has spent on window cleaning is excessive - this is spending by politicians, for politicians.
“Labour needs to re-assess its priorities and put people before themselves, as the public will simply not accept Council Tax increases each year only for their money to be spent on Council luxuries."
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Leader of Sunderland City Council, Graeme Miller, responded to the report and stated the move to City Hall has actually saved money.
Cllr Miller said: “This ridiculous non-story being pushed by the Conservatives is a desperate bid to score much-needed political points ahead of the local elections.
“City Hall is made almost entirely of glass; therefore of course it is going to have a significantly higher window cleaning bill than your historic, traditionally-constructed council offices built 60 or 70 years ago.
“Secondly, the move to City Hall – which was built to the highest of standards by some of the best contractors in the North East - has saved the City Council approximately £130,000 in electricity bills alone, never mind gas, a vastly smaller maintenance bill, massively reduced CO2 emissions and the significant wellbeing benefits felt by our employees and users of the building. While we always strive for efficiency, our window cleaning bill pales in comparison when looking at the bigger picture.
“The Tories should also bear in mind that City Hall neighbours one of the largest building sites in the North of England, where work continues apace at the UK’s most exciting urban regeneration project – Riverside Sunderland. So, of course we’re paying a bit more for window cleaning at the moment, with such large-scale regeneration taking place on our doorstep.
“If the Tories are genuine about helping improve Sunderland’s fortunes, then Cllr Mullen should consider heeding the advice of his Prime Minister and take some extra maths lessons to prevent him from wasting our time by asking us to compare apples and oranges while we have a modern, vibrant city to run.”
A spokesperson for Sunderland City Council added: "The multi-award winning City Hall is a large, modern and hi-tech building arranged over seven storeys which has been designed to reflect modern health and wellbeing standards and promote open democracy.
"It therefore contains large amounts of glazing including glazed facades, internal glass doors, walls and partitions to utilise as much natural light as possible and maximise views into and out of the building.
The building is home to several public sector organisations and the annual window cleaning costs reflect the scale and nature of the building.
"The costs include specialist cleaning works such as those to the high level internal atrium. Contractors have been procured in accordance with public sector procurement requirements to ensure value for money."
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