A publicly-funded building must be for the public

A week dominated by the Union Street fire has reached its logical next stage – debating what should be done with the burnt-out site. It is essential that debate does not descend to the level we have come to expect in Scotland. Whatever development is put in place, it must be a development for a purpose.

But when architect Professor Alan Dunlop calls for the Scottish Government to step in and build a new building using public money, it is worth looking at the policy background too. Why is there an assumption that a building built in an era of great wealth and burnt down during another period of great wealth cannot be built from wealth?

There are two answers to this. The first is that unlike Glasgow's Victorian peak, the wealth broadly isn't in city centres any more; the second is that the wealthy no longer invest in public architecture. Simply looking at Union Street and its array of vape shops, fast food outlets and bargain stores shows that this is not a place that generates significant returns on investment.

But that appears not to be the only problem. Another is the way that legal and insurance services have created a complex web which makes every instance like this an equally complex mess. Buildings are often sub-divided, owned by multiple equity investors, themselves owned via chains of trusts and holding companies, insured in a patchwork of deals which can take years to untangle.

This is the point; there is no confusion when rents are due but when liabilities arrive they are passed around like a hot potato such that the time it takes insulates everyone involved from having to act. This means that if we wait for a private sector approach it will almost certainly be impossible to make a commercial business case for the investment and it will take years and years to sort out.

Meanwhile the people of Glasgow live with the blight of a burned-out gap site, reminding them daily of the poor state of the city. To remedy that and to make sure that Glasgow is not scarred with grand architecture being replaced by cheap commercial construction, Professor Dunlop suggests the public should pay to build a replacement.

Unfortunately, this seems inevitable. It is therefore important that three things happen. First, if this is to be publicly funded then it must be of a very high quality and be built to last. Whether a replica or a sensitive modern interpretation, it must respect its environment. It cannot be done on the cheap.

Second, the Scottish Government must be aggressive with owners. There must be very high planning conditions set on this site so if owners are unable to produce a plan capable of meeting those conditions or finding a buyer who is, the property must be valued accordingly – which is to say, its value should be slashed. Compensation should be minimised. A very short timescale should be placed on taking action.

This cannot be allowed to become a case of Scotland's governing elite bailing out the investments of Scotland's investor elites once again. They have to accept that a fire wiped out their investment and then take that up with their insurers.

Which means that whatever is built must be built for the public good. This cannot be a different form of subsidy to the wealthy investor class, taking the financial strain of the build and then effectively privatising it on the cheap and handing it over to business interests.

And public good cannot just mean 'another set of offices for rent'. The scale of public investment required must make this a publicly-significant building. Given the long-standing problems with the Egyptian Halls across the road and the general state of decline of Union Street, the best way to achieve that is probably through a proper development plan for the entire block.

Then, over the longer term, we must resolve the situation which is creating this. The legal trickery which got us to a point where ownership and liability are obscured should be ended. There should be an identifiable and responsible ultimate beneficial owner for every building in Scotland and they should be legally required to make sure that the building is fully and adequately insured.

Owning a building in a city centre (or anywhere else for that matter) should come to be seen as a responsibility as much as an opportunity. We must make landlords more responsible. And we must take public responsibility for repairing the damage on Union Street and for making sure that what public money builds is real and meaningful to Glasgow's public.