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Security measures are expected to add as much as $8 million to the Beehive refit, a select committee report says.
Anti-terrorism security features will push the refit - originally budgeted at $43 million - past the $50 million mark.
The Beehive houses senior cabinet ministers and their staff, is a major transit
route for many Opposition MPs, and contains dining facilities used by all MPs.
A new single entrance to Parliament House and the Beehive and a mailroom security upgrade were part of the new measures, MPs on the government administration select committee reported.
Fears an explosive device could be delivered to Parliament will see the mail-sorting area moved from the centre of Parliament House.
Added screening devices and X-ray equipment are to be installed.
The $43m refit was unveiled more than a year before the September 11 terrorist attacks on New York in 2001.
Since those attacks, at least four letters initially feared to contain powdered anthrax have been sent to MPs.
Speaker Jonathan Hunt told the MPs the original refit was on-budget and ahead of schedule.
He expected the changes to result in a $7 to $8 million cost increase, the report said.
The refit was expected to be finished by mid-2006.
- NZPA
