It was supposed to be a shining monument to the wonders of British government. Tony Blair said it would “the greatest show on earth.” Instead the $1.45 billion Millenium Dome is an enormous flop that the British government is trying to unload cheap.
It almost had a sucker, I mean buyer, in Japanese investment bank Nomura. Unfortunately Nomrua pulled out of the sale at the last minute after saying it had been lied to about the terms of the sale.
It’s a sign of how valuable this government creation is that although it cost $1.45 billion to build, Nomura backed out of a deal to buy the dome for only $145 million!
The amusing thing is that although the dome is a flop, until recently Blair and other Labour ministers pretended as if it were a success. Last week for the first time the British International Development Secretary Clare Short finally broke ranks saying, “I never liked it. It was nearly a billion [pounds] and it was disaster.”
How did Great Britain ever survive without such government largesse?
Source:
UK Minister Says Millenium Dome A ‘Disaster’. CNN, September 22, 2000.