The Palace of Westminster has a case for being one of the world’s most remarkable buildings. The high point of Victorian Gothic architecture, most of the complex was built by Charles Barry and Augustus Pugin following the devastating fire of 1834 which destroyed almost all earlier structures. One of the few surviving elements of the medieval Palace is Westminster Hall, built in 1097 by William II (son of the Conqueror). It is, perhaps, the finest secular room in the land – a huge stone and timber space with an uplifting fourteenth-century hammerbeam roof. I never enter the Hall without feeling awestruck – and when the Commons is sitting I go out of my way to walk through it at least once a day. For anyone who cares about English history, it can’t but remind you that this is the mother of all Parliaments.
Wonderfully, the Palace of Westminster (which contains the Hall, the Commons, the Lords, the Committee Rooms and a myriad of offices, libraries, dining rooms, bars and the like) is very accessible to the public. I can help organise tours for any constituents who fancy it – be they couples, friends, WI Groups, schools, scouts, churches or whoever. The tours are led by experienced guides who know all the intricacies of the buildings – their stories and their inhabitants. Children from the Ursuline Prep School in Brentwood visited on a Friday last term and gave me an impressively detailed account of all they had seen and heard.
If you would like to come round, I’d suggest you apply to visit soon. At the moment Westminster is becoming increasingly clad in scaffolding. Experts have warned that there is a real possibility of a complete and sudden failure of the building's mechanical and electrical services. The site is old and was built before electricity, let alone mobile phones and wifi. This will mean that large parts of the Palace may be off limits for years (there is a good chance that even we MPs will need to move out). So do come and see it soon.
If you’d like to visit, do get in touch at www.alexburghart.org.uk