And if necessary, Government should look at taking a financial stake in a deal to have the hotel replaced with an upscale cottage colony or health spa, Mr.

Spurling said.

"I consider it a sort of eyesore on the horizon,'' Mr. Spurling said of Club Med. "It is so derelict it will cost millions to put that into the pristine condition that we expect of our hotels in Bermuda.

"This hotel has failed three times,'' he said. "I think it should be razed to the ground.'' Although the lawyer and Government MP helped to build what was then the Holiday Inn while working as a summer student, Mr. Spurling felt the "box-like '60s hotel'' was poorly designed and constructed.

"It's got long corridors and smallish rooms,'' he said. And its scale was all wrong for the St. George's site on which it stood.

Instead, a high-quality cottage colony similar to Lantana Colony Club or Cambridge Beaches could be very successful at the Club Med site, Mr. Spurling said.

A central two-storey facility on the site of the present building could make use of the existing golf course, tennis courts, swimming pools, "and everything else,'' he said.

Surrounded by old forts, the site had an ambience that would lend itself to a high-quality cottage colony or health spa, he said.

"People love history, and to live right in it would be very attractive.'' The beach at Club Med was a sensitive issue, Mr. Spurling said. But he felt if a private beach was needed to make a hotel deal go ahead, it should be allowed.

The fact that Clearwater Beach at the former US Naval Air Station was expected to be open to the public next summer would ease the possible loss of the Club Med beach, he said.

Mr. Spurling said he supported Government's court action, which seeks to have the Government land which Club Med leases returned. Government argues the hotelier has failed to live up to the terms of the lease.

Although Club Med has said it wants to reopen about 100 rooms in the 400-plus room hotel, Government should be wary of making any deals with the company, Mr. Spurling said.

"What about the rest of the hotel? What other renovations are needed? Are they possible at all within the confines of that structure?'' Asked whether Government should pay to demolish the hotel once the land is returned, Mr. Spurling said: "I would seriously consider Government getting involved in a financial way.

"To get that site working again you may have to sort of branch out from the normal course of operations and be a little extravagant in your thinking,'' he said.