Council to write off £51m debt from seafront tourist attraction to ensure sale
The council also agreed an independent inquiry would take place to make sure a ‘mistake of this magnitude’ cannot happen again.
A council has agreed to write off a £51 million debt owed by a seafront tourist attraction so that it can be sold and get back in business.
Brighton and Hove City Council leaders expressed their anger at the move, but accepted it was the best option for the city, and that an amount of revenue and business rates would help with the financial fallout.
Observation tower Brighton i360 filed for administration after it failed to find a buyer, just days before Christmas last year, closing with immediate effect and making 109 employees redundant.
It previously blamed escalating costs, bad summer weather and the cost-of-living crisis, as the reasons behind the decision to file for insolvency.
In 2014 the council, then led by the Green Party, loaned the project millions of pounds and remains the attraction’s biggest creditor.
At a cabinet meeting on Thursday, council deputy leader and finance chief Jacob Taylor told colleagues no sale would go through without the debt being written off.
The Labour chief said: “At that point all transactions would fall through, and sit on the seafront boarded up, decaying.
“We’ve heard very clearly from surrounding businesses that it would be disastrous for them.
“We all now need to effectively wipe the slate clean. There is no benefit to this attraction failing.”
He said the new operator was a “superb company” that would soon be announced as taking over the 162m viewing deck.
Councillors also agreed to an independent inquiry, to learn lessons from the “big mistake of capital financing”.
Mr Taylor added: “This city council cannot make a mistake of this magnitude again.”
Council leader Bella Sankey described the decision to finance a tourist attraction with public money as “absolutely scandalous” and one which would “cast a shadow” on the council for years to come.
The meeting heard how planning permission was first granted for the site in 2006, after broad support across the council and political parties to redevelop the seafront by the West Pier. Plans emerged for a viewing tower in 2014.
The landmark opened in 2016 and has attracted 200,000 to 300,000 visitors a year.
But Mr Taylor said opposition to financing the Brighton i360 at the time was that the business case was built on “ludicrously high traffic numbers” of 700,000 to 800,000 visitors a year.
Brighton and Hove City Council’s Green Party convenor Steve Davis previously said: “The i360’s history spans nearly two decades across both Green and Labour administrations.
“Alongside the i360 came a huge amount of regeneration for a long-neglected part of the city, the benefits of which are still being felt today, and there is collective responsibility for both the positives and downsides to this investment in our city.”
