Sponsors' payments fail to ease dome fears

It is, as the organisers never tire of telling us, on time and on budget. Yesterday the Millennium Dome at Greenwich, south-east London, passed two milestones: 300 days to go to opening night and another slab of sponsorship raised, taking the total to ?142 million, a whisker away - by corporate standards - from the target of ?150 million.

But as ever, the good news is not quite as good as it seems. The sponsorship total was buoyed by Ford's announcement that it would commit ?12 million as a headline sponsor of the Mobility Zone and a pledge of ?3 million from Walls ice cream.

But away from the hype and the glitz of yesterday's announcement, the first to be held inside the Dome, with a beaming Prime Minister beamed in from Glasgow, there are still concerns about the financial viability of the ?758 million year-long celebration.

Critics say that ?142 million has been pledged, not given. Of the total so far promised, six corporations have pledged ?12 million: Ford, Boots, BT, Tesco, Marks & Spencer and Manpower. Each company has the right to call one of the dome's 14 zones its own. Of the remaining eight zones, two have the requisite ?12 mil
lion through four "partner" sponsors, each contributing ?6 million. That leaves six zones - half of the original 12 zones - still seeking sponsorship.

In February 1998 the total sponsorship raised was half of the ?150 million target. By June it was ?87 million, and by November the total had reached ?120 million.

But even should the ?150 million target be reached, how will that money be spent? The New Millennium Experience Company, the dome's operating company, refuses to reveal the budget for each zone, so while, for example, the Communicate zone has received a pledge of ?12 million from BT, it could be that the zone will cost less than ?12 million. In which case, will the excess funding be used to offset a shortfall with the other zones? The NMEC refuses to answer.

Fears of a funding shortfall were articulated this week in a report from the Comptroller and Auditor General, Sir John Bourn, which should have been published last October. It noted that there was a possibility of a revenue shortfall during the year of the dome's operation.

While the show will undoubtedly start on time, there are concerns that with visitors peaking at the beginning, school holidays and the end, the flow of revenue may be too slow to pay the bills. Of the total budget of ?758 million, ?194 million is expected to come from commercial income, including ticket and merchandising sales.

Should this money not start to materialise until, the end of 2000, the Government may be forced to bail out the dome. Even if this is only a contingency, the political difficulties of making another payment will be almost insurmountable.

The Commons motion signed this week by 30 Labour MPs demanding assurances that "no further public funds will be made available" to the project, highlight the problems that could lie ahead.