<div>Chamber of Architects: The Judicial Palace lacked preparation and competition</div>

Prague - The construction of the Judicial Palace in Brno was accompanied by a number of errors, starting from the very beginning of the project, representatives of the Czech Chamber of Architects stated at a press conference today. According to the chamber, the project lacked adequate preparation, the construction program was too vague, there was no architectural competition, the law was violated in the case of the contract assignment, and the initial funding estimate was said to be completely unrealistic.
    "We do not want to hold architectural competitions to look for beautiful architecture, but to ensure that the entire process of creating a new public building is measured, legal, functional, and that everything is in order," said the chairman of the Czech Chamber of Architects Jan Vrana. The chamber's vice-chairman Jan Sapák added that according to the chamber, there were illegalities right from the very beginning of the project assignment, which was also confirmed by the court.
    The authors of the study for the Judicial Palace, Aleš Burian, Gustav Křivinka, and Petr Stojan, demanded compensation in court because the investor did not pay them the corresponding fee. The court awarded the architects a fee of 14.3 million crowns.
    In 2005, it was estimated that the construction would cost 805 million, but the total costs eventually reached 1.938 billion. The financial office ordered the Brno Regional Court to return two billion to the state for the construction of the complex. The former head of the investment department of the court, Jan Lippert, stated that this was due to the inconsistency between the established funding conditions for the project and three contracts. According to an earlier statement from the Ministry of Justice, there may be difficulties with any potential payment of the penalty, as the ministry would need to request an increase in the budget. In any case, this involves money that will remain with the state, whether the court will have to pay the penalty or not.
    The Ministry of Justice has been aware of the rising costs of the construction all along. However, it stated that the fine is not related to the increased construction costs.
    The Czech Chamber of Architects today recalled that it had repeatedly pointed out the poor conduct of the contracting authority since March 2005, not only to the Regional Court in Brno, the investor of the construction, but also to the Ministry of Justice, the Ministry of Finance, the Supreme Audit Office, and the Office for the Protection of Competition. "The Judicial Palace in Brno is a textbook example showing all the wrongdoings and poor practices in the procurement of public buildings," said chamber representatives. Sapák reminded that initial underestimating of total construction costs happens very often. "The investor does this to get things moving, perhaps to precede other public contracts within the state budget," he said.
    Among the mistakes highlighted by the chamber today was the overly vague construction program. This is a list of all the rooms in the planned building and their sizes; according to Sapák, every project should start with this. "The construction program for the new building was feigned. It was based only on the budgets and functioning of court buildings in Hodonín and Jihlava, which cannot be compared in size with the Brno building," the chamber states.
    According to the chamber, the contracting authority violated the law by using a restricted procedure for awarding the contract, which had discriminatory requirements and was non-transparent.