PLANS for a new £40 million council HQ at Hungate were variously described as a monstrosity, a carbuncle and “ugly and offensive”. They were scrapped without a brick being laid – but not before council bosses had already spent nearly £5 million of local taxpayers’ money.

At least £1 million of that, by council officials’ own admission, was money down the drain.

Now the council’s own inquiry into the ill-fated project has concluded that public expectations of the building were too high – forcing the price up. Consultation with statutory bodies was exemplary – but English Heritage’s views came too late.

Opposition councillors are predictably outraged. “The report does all it can to pin the blame everywhere other than where it should lie – with the executive who oversaw the planning for this project,” said Labour leader Coun David Scott.

To be fair to the council, the report does admit that there “could have been more attention to early consultation on the design”. And Liberal Democrat councillor Keith Aspden, chairman of committee which produced the report, admitted that lessons could be learned. He insisted, however, that overall the project had been well-managed.

There are many who might find that hard to accept.

It was not as though the council didn’t have plenty of warnings. The new building was virtually opposite Stonebow House – an object lesson in how not to do things.

The recent humiliation of Coppergate Riverside, in which a Government planning inspector roundly criticised a design for a shopping centre which the council had backed, should also have been fresh in council bosses’ minds.

To try to blame the public and English Heritage for this fiasco seems, in the circumstances, a bit rich.

At the very least the authority must now do what Coun Aspden said it should: learn the lessons from this costly mistake. Then at least perhaps something can be salvaged from the mess.