Mandelson: Milliennuim Experience will be "unmissable and unforgetable"

Mandelson: "the rest of the world will be looking to Britian"

Government Launches the Millennium Experience

Unveiling revamped plans for the exhibition underneath the controversial dome in south east London, Peter Mandelson hailed it as an "unmissable and unforgettable" chance to inspire the nation.

Heritage Secretary Chris Smith said he was seeking a public holiday on December 31 1999 to enable people to welcome the new millennium in style. Former Channel 4 boss Michael Grade and theatre impresario Sir Cameron Mackintosh are joining the team to ensure the Greenwich celebrations live up to expectations.

The total cost of the Greenwich show is now being pegged at £750 million, with fundraiser Mark McCormack being drafted in to raise more than £150 million of business sponsorship.

Mr Mandelson said the event was so momentous that it warranted the huge sums involved. "Greenwich is the home of time," he said. "The meridian line runs through the exhibition site."

"That is why the rest of the world will be looking to Britain - the new millennium will literally start here. It is a chance for Britain to make a big statement about itself and the rest of the world."

BBC correspondent Torin Douglas samples the Millennium Experience - Dur 3' 18"

Until now the project had been misnamed. "It is more, much more than an exhibition," he said. "We are today rechristening it as the Millennium Experience, the biggest, most thrilling, most entertaining, most thought provoking experience anywhere on the planet in the year 2000."

To mark what he hailed as a "fresh beginning" after controversy over the fate of the scheme, he said the company set up to organise the exhibition was being renamed The New Millennium Experience Company.

The Prime Minister on site in Greenwich

Last week Prime Minister Tony Blair ended months of speculation and gave the controversial dome the go-ahead after criticisms that it was a waste of money. Mr Mandelson, appointed to oversee operations set out how he would meet the five targets laid down by Tony Blair to ensure the exhibition would be successful.

He pledged the dome would not require any money from the public purse and said he was confident that Mark McCormack of IMG Associates would be able to raise at least £150 million in business sponsorship. He said contributions from the Millennium Commission using Lottery money would total £450 million, which included the £200 million already committed and other funds which had been earmarked for the project.

He said ticket sales were expected to raise a further £135 million, although that was a conservative estimate. To meet the target of a permanent legacy, Mr Mandelson said the Experience would regenerate a wasted and derelict part of London.

It would create thousands of jobs and Deputy Prime Minister John Prescott was examining ways of regenerating the River Thames alongside the site as "an artery for travel" with new piers from Battersea to Greenwich served by a new river bus.

Greenwich at the moment . . .

He added the Government wanted Greenwich to become the hub of "a new national digital network for education and learning" long after the exhibition closes. Mr Mandelson said he was planning a thrilling and spectacular exhibition within the dome to satisfy Mr Blair's insistence that the show pass the "Euan test" - that it is so exciting the Prime Minister's teenage son demands to be taken.

Although much of the Dome's content is still being worked on Mr Mandelson said "I want to see, for example, technological thrills and spills, perhaps even a big Millennium ride, as well as sport and music, included in the programme." Mr Mandelson said the theme of the Experience would be time - but concentrating on the future, with multi-media displays showing how we will live, work and what our environment will be like in the years to come.

Chris Smith on the year 2000 - Dur 3' 9"

The Heritage Secretary said a religious and spiritual dimension was important in all the events marking the Millennium. It was important to remember the dome exhibition was only one part of planned national festivities.

. . . and in the year 2000?

School children let BBC correspondent Tim Maby know what they think of the Prime Minister's plans for the year 2000 - Dur 2' 07"

It represented only a quarter of the Millennium Commission's overall commitment of more than £1.6 billion of National Lottery money. Along with £944 million in capital projects across the land, £200 million would be given to individuals in a Millennium Awards Scheme to help them fulfil personal goals and put something back into the community. The two ministers were joined by Bob Ayling, the British Airways chief and chairman of the newly named New Millennium Experience Company, who insisted money would now start rolling in for the project from the private sector. He said: "£150 million is a benchmark, but it's not a ceiling. It's been impossible up to now to move ahead to secure commitments finally. But we hope we can do that now we know the exhibition is going ahead."

He said estimates that 12 million people would visit the site were probably vastly understated, bearing in mind that six million people visited the Munich Beer Festival each year over the course of only three weeks. The estimated value of the exhibition in terms of tourism generated by it was put at £500 million.