A catalogue of errors and a "cavalier attitude" by key players led to the Wembley fiasco, MPs have been told.

Members of the Commons culture, media and sport committee also heard that Birmingham has effectively been kicked out of the bidding game - even if the Wembley national stadium project does not meet its targets.

Management consultants brought in to audit the project said the process for selecting a builder of the new stadium did not follow normal commercial practice.

David Hudson, chairman and managing director of consultants Tropus, told the committee that preferential treatment had been given to Bovis-Multiplex.

Bovis later dropped out of the project, leaving Multiplex to take over.

Though he had found no evidence of corruption, Hudson said that the "competition that was put in place was clearly not fair in our opinion".

Committee chairman Gerald Kaufman questioned whether best practice had been followed."Absolutely not. I believe there was preferential treatment given to one of the bidders," said Hudson.

He concluded that many of the mistakes had been due to a "cavalier attitude" by the Football Association and New Wembley Stadium Ltd, the stand-alone company set up by the FA.

Hudson alleged that in some cases the FA was presented with decisions that were effectively a "fait accompli" were only one outcome could be reached.

MPs were also told that the £106 million paid by Sport England included £40 million for buildings that would be demolished and £250,000 for rights that the Football Association already owned.

It also paid substantially more than the market value for the land on which Wembley stands.

If the FA had decided to take its business elsewhere, Wembley would have been worthless with little chance of getting back the public money paid out to buy it, MPs were told.

During a morning of startling revelations, the committee learned that Birmingham stood "a cat in Hell's chance" of getting the national stadium.

Nic Coward, the Football Association's company secretary, admitted it had agreed to stage the cup final at Wembley for 20 years - effectively ruling out Britain's second city as a venue.

"We have always made it clear that as far as the FA is concerned, we have an open process Adam Crozier has made with Birmingham. I cannot however tell you that the FA would be free to take its events to Birmingham.''

The FA had "considerable reservations'' about the Birmingham bid. "It would be wrong for anyone to think that there is a viable project at Birmingham at this stage," he said.

Roger Maslin of Wembley National Stadium Ltd said there were no guarantees that Sport England would get its money back if the deal to build Wembley fell through.

If the plans had failed the FA would have simply re-opened the old stadium and continued using it as a way of paying back creditors.

The Football Association told shocked MPs that until April 2001 no one from the department for Culture, Media and Sport had attended board meetings at which key decisions were made.

The committee was told by the new chairman of WNSL, Michael Jeffries, that a deal to finally get the project underway was "weeks rather than months away".

While Downing Street insists that "significant progress" has been made recently, a further Commons statement is expected from Tessa Jowell on Thursday.

The culture secretary will say that the FA needs "a little more time" before a final deal can be agreed.

Liberal Democrat culture spokesman, Nick Harvey, claimed that if the report was so critical, the Wembley project would have to be aborted in favour of a development in East London.

"Government cash is conspicuously lacking, the National Lottery has already paid for the Wembley site and the FA's economic modelling has shown London to be the only financially viable option," he said.

"If the Wembley project is now doomed it is time to find a sticking plaster solution."