A Southport Town Centre councillor is calling on Sefton Council to ‘come clean’ on the colossal losses spent on Southport Indoor Market – and further costs to come.
Councillor Tony Dawson, himself a Market user, has extracted from the Bootle bosses that the total net loss on the inoor market so far has been a staggering QUARTER OF A MILLION POUNDS. And a further recent splurge of spending on management consultants with no clear view on who is driving the project and where they think they are going has led to further uncertainty.
Councillor Dawson says:
“There appears to be very little if any joined up thinking going on.”
“The Council does not have the skill-set to run retail businesses ad it is wrong that struggling businesses in the town and the Council Tax payers too should have to pay hand over fist for the private entertainment of a few Council managers. Just think what vital services could have been provided for local people with that quarter of a million pounds.”
“Retail in Southport town centre is contracting and, with the continuing growth of the internet, is predicted to contract further. What is done in the Market needs to be done in a way which fits in to an overall strategy for the town centre of Southport. A strategy for our town which must be ‘owned’ by the people of Southport and their elected representatives, not a handful of Sefton managers.:
“In times when Council funds, needed for priorities such as children’s services and social services for the elderly are at a premium, we cannot afford to permit many thousands more to be pored down a directionless drain.”