Telford & Wrekin Council's £1.3m bill over Newport supermarkets plans
More than £1.35 million of taxpayers' money has been spent on supermarket plans in Newport, the Shropshire Star can reveal.
A Freedom of Information request shows that Telford & Wrekin Council, either as landowner or planning authority, spent £1,356,620 on applications for supermarkets at Mere Park, Audley Avenue and Station Road – and has nothing to show for it.
Today Councillor Bill McClements, the authority's cabinet member for finance and enterprise, stopped short of apologising for how the council had handled the situation and said in several cases money needed to be spent to "protect the public purse".
Conservative leader on the borough council, Councillor Andrew Eade, said: "In part I am relieved that at long last the truth has come out."
Sadly it shows £1.4 million has been spent on nothing at all when we could have spent them on frontline services.
"The council should really have held its hands up, said it was a huge mistake and those responsible for authorising this expenditure, including the leader of the council (Councillor Kuldip Sahota) should consider their positions and stand down."
Wrekin MP Mark Pritchard – whose constituency covers Newport – described it as a "fiasco" and said taxpayers would be "angry".
Meanwhile, David Parker of the Save Newport Campaign, said: "I think they owe Newport one huge apology."
Authority leaders claim money needed to be spent to "protect the public purse".
He said the opposition to the controversial Sainsbury's Station Road application – which was pulled last month – was "more political than practical and attempted to damage the finances of Telford & Wrekin".
A breakdown of the figures shows a 2009 application for a Lidl at Mere Park, which has recently been resubmitted, incurred legal costs for the council of £103,510.
Telford & Wrekin spent £359,680 on legal and other costs associated with the Audley Avenue supermarket application – for which permission was originally granted for a Morrisons but no supermarket is now lined up to move in.
The costs were incurred because the authority decided in October 2011 it wanted to consider the application together with the one for a Sainsbury's at Station Road.
The Audley Avenue applicants appealed, leading to a public inquiry costing the council £245,412.
The other costs came about because the council challenged a decision by the planning inspector not to force the applicants to pay a highway contribution. The council spent £114,268 unsuccessfully challenging that decision, claiming it could set a precedent which could see less money spent on roads in Newport.
Figures show costs incurred by the failed Station Road application were £893,430.
Fresh calls have been made for the leader of Telford & Wrekin Council to resign after it was revealed the authority spent more than £1.35 million on supermarket applications in Newport.
The council spent nearly £1 million of that money on the failed Station Road application to build a Sainsbury's at the site – which was pulled last month.
Leaked figures showed the council hoped to sell the land for £21 million but now do not expect to be able to sell it for that much. Telford & Wrekin is now looking to sell the site to build 120 houses.
