London Dome's new chief wonders why it was ever built

The company due to buy London's Millennium Dome at the end of this year plans to review a 105-million-pound ($152 million) deal in response to lowered projected visitor numbers

LONDON (Reuters) -- The man charged with saving Britain's Millennium Dome from disaster said on Wednesday that the attraction should probably never have been built.

Speaking to reporters in the vast tent-like structure on London's Greenwich peninsula, David James, chairman of the Dome's operating company since Tuesday, said if he had been asked, he would have advised against building the attraction.

"Standing here in September... I would say it clearly was perhaps not a wise decision," James said.

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Pressed on whether he would have given the go-ahead for the 758 million pound (US $1.1 billion) Dome, which has drained tens of millions from Britain's national lottery funds ever since it opened last New Year's Eve, he said:

"I am a sweeper up of problems, I'm not a creator of businesses so... nobody would have asked for my opinion.

"But if they had, it might have been an interesting input," he added with a wry smile.

James, a trouble-shooting company director with a career record for sorting out companies in financial difficulties, is the third man to take on the chairmanship of the Dome.

He took over on Tuesday as the government's Millennium Commission threw a 47-million-pound ($68-million) lifeline to the struggling Dome, adding to previous handouts of 60 million pounds ($87 million) in February, 29 million ($42 million) in May and 43 million ($63 million) only last month.

Projections for visitor numbers, originally estimated at 12 million for the year, were revised down to just 4.5 million.

The news prompted the company due to buy the Dome at the end of this year to say it would have to review a deal it struck with the government to pay 105 million pounds ($152 million) for the structure and its related lands.

A spokesman for the Dome Europe consortium led by Japan's Nomura International told Reuters the group needed more information about why the emergency cash was needed.

"We need to know why and we need to review our own projections, which will clearly be impacted," he said.

The spokesman also pointed out that while the deal had been agreed, no contract had been signed between Nomura and the government on the sale of the Dome in Greenwich, east London.

William Hague, leader of Britain's opposition Conservative party, slammed the Dome as "an empty, pointless tent in the middle of nowhere" and said Prime Minister Tony Blair should close the attraction, sack the minister in charge, open a full public inquiry and transfer all the wasted money to good causes.

"The time has come to pull the plug on Domefoolery and spend the nation's money sensibly for once," Hague said.

British media joined the attack. "Close it today" demanded the Express, while the Sun said the latest cash bailout handout was "scandalous."

The Independent printed a front-page picture of the mushroom-topped dome with dark clouds gathering about the orange antennae that spike its roof and dubbed it a "Disaster Zone."

But Lord Falconer, the government minister in charge of the Dome, defended the decision to keep it open.

"You could not run a business of this innovation, of this newness, of this complexity without going through difficulties in the first year, like other operators," he told BBC radio.

"We now are receiving more paying visitors than any other visitor attraction in the country," he said.

Copyright 2000 Reuters. All rights reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten, or redistributed.

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