Scottish Parliament Building - Project History

Project History

Before 1707, the Kingdom of Scotland was a sovereign independent state which had its own legislature—the Parliament of Scotland—which met, latterly, at Parliament House on the Royal Mile in Edinburgh. The Act of Union, passed in 1707, created an incorporating political union between the Kingdoms of Scotland and England. The Union merged the Parliament of Scotland and the Parliament of England into the Parliament of Great Britain which was housed in the Palace of Westminster in London. As a consequence, Scotland was directly governed from London for the next 292 years without a legislature or a Parliament building of its own.

Pressure for an independent parliament grew in the 1970s with the growth of the Scottish National Party and monies were invested into the conversion of the former Royal High School on Calton Hill into an official parliament. Whilst much of this conversion was completed (including creation of the main debating hall) and the building was renamed New Parliament House it was determined that the facility was too small for its stated purpose (as and when that purpose arose). Failure to create an independent parliament, following the rather onerous conditions of the 1979 devolution referendum, led a campaign group to set up adjacent to the Royal High School at the foot of the access road to Calton Hill. Starting informally this became a permanently manned "vigil" to keep the concept in the public mind. This led to the Royal High School being the "popular" choice of site in the public (and particularly SNP) mindset.

A referendum of the Scottish electorate, held on 11 September 1997, approved the establishment of a directly-elected Scottish Parliament to legislate on most domestic affairs. Following this, the Scottish Office, led by the then Secretary of State for Scotland, Donald Dewar, decided that a new purpose-built facility would be constructed in Edinburgh, to house the Scottish Parliament.

Initially, three sites in and around Edinburgh were considered as possible locations for the building, including St Andrew's House/New Parliament House (better known as the imposing former Royal High School on Calton Hill) St Andrews House being the home of the Scottish Office—later the Scottish Government; Victoria Quay at Leith docks (adjacent to the major Scottish Office building there) and Haymarket on the vacant railway goods yard, in the west end of the city. The Holyrood site was not entered into the picture until after the official closure date of the competition between the three sites. The date for announcing the winner overran and on the date of the expected announcement instead it was announced that they were going to "rethink their decision" (inferring that indeed a decision had been made) and add the Holyrood Brewery site into the running (which had only just closed). However negotiations with the brewing company Scottish and Newcastle, who owned the land, resulted in the company indicating that they would be able to vacate the site in early 1999. As a consequence, the Secretary of State for Scotland agreed that the Holyrood site merited inclusion on the shortlist of proposed locations. The Scottish Office commissioned feasibility studies of the specified areas in late 1997 and in January 1998, the Holyrood site was selected from the shortlist.

Following on from the site selection, the Scottish Office announced that an international competition would be held to find a designer for a new building to house the Parliament. A design committee was appointed under the chairmanship of Dewar, and was tasked with choosing from a shortlist of designs. Proposals were submitted from internationally renowned architects such as Rafael Viñoly, Michael Wilford and Richard Meier. Twelve designs were selected in March 1998, which were whittled down to five by the following May. The five final designs were put on public display throughout Scotland in June 1998. Feedback from the public displays showed that the designs of the Catalan architect Enric Miralles were amongst the most popular. The design team took account of public opinion on the designs and invited all five shortlisted entrants to make presentations on their proposed designs before announcing a winner.

On 6 July 1998, it was declared that the design of Enric Miralles was chosen, with work being awarded to EMBT/RMJM (Scotland) Ltd, a Spanish-Scottish joint venture design company, specifically created for the project. Construction, which was undertaken by Bovis, commenced in June 1999, with the demolition of the Scottish and Newcastle brewery and the beginning of foundation work to support the structure of the building. MSPs began to move into the building complex in the Summer of 2004, with the official opening by the Queen taking place in October of the same year.