In London, the bongs of Big Ben have been silenced to make way for a controversial renovation plan. The world's most famous clock, which towers over the UK Houses of Parliament, has sounded for the final time until 2021. As Richard Bestic reports from London, it's the longest period of quiet in Big Ben's 157 years of keeping time, and hundreds turned out to mark the occasion.

 

RICHARD BESTIC LONDON "There it is the last of the bongs from Big Ben for what will be another four years we're told. Inevitably some people here say it's bong-kers."

 

The old clock and the tower in which its housed are in desperate need of major works a $38 million dollar upgrade. And while the tower is shrouded in scaffolding workmen on the site must be given protection from the noise. However silencing Big Ben for four long years has been given less than a ringing endorsement. Stephen Pound, the ringleader of a Parliamentary protest group, accusing the authorities of dropping clanger.

 

STEPHEN POUND UK MEMBER OF PARLIAMENT "Is it really beyond the wit of man or woman in the 21st century to work out a way we can protect quite rightly, defend the worker and still allow the chimes of freedom to roll out across Westminster and that glorious key of E to still be heard.  I want both."

 

Big Ben is the name given to the thirteen-and-a-half ton Bell at the heart of Parliament's clock tower. In a history of a century and a half, it has been silenced on a couple of occasions, briefly for routine maintenance. But not even a direct hit by the bombs of World War Two saw it go quiet for quite so long. For both Londoners and tourists a memorable day of note.

 

"A silenced Big Ben of course could chime with the UK Prime Minister Theresa May, who'll now have one less reminder that the clock is ticking on Brexit. In reality she's appalled as what's seen as the heartbeat of British democracy becomes the sound of silence. Rb CGTN London."