Historical Factoids 15:

[Mal]

I’ve been asked about the Bedlingtonshire Development Trust and how it came about……so here goes. (Sorry this is going to be a long one…….)

As a member of the public I had started to take an interest in local politics, even just to see why the needs of Bedlington had been ignored for so many years, and had been told to look at forming a Development Trust if I wanted to be proactive.  I went around each of the 3 local councils in Bedlingtonshire asking if they would be supportive, thinking a partnership approach would be the best way to go.  Each said NO, not interested!  That didn’t put me off. 

I was doing the research when NCC closed our community centre in, as they claimed, a cost cutting exercise.  I knew a vehicle like a Development Trust could apply through the council’s asset transfer policy to take it over as other trusts had done with many other redundant buildings up and down the county.  I was given the criteria for such a bid and went about putting a Trust board together.  The main crux of what we needed to do was to submit a fully costed business plan so that’s what I did.  The Trust was the only group who held an inspection of the building to ascertain the cost of repairs it needed.  There had been no money spent of maintenance for years under Wansbeck District Council and even less under NCC, and when I saw the books they were even worse!    I used this to negotiate a sum of money that would come with the building to see to its much needed repairs.  Even the main electrical conduit into the building needed to be replaced, that should give some indication just how badly neglected it was. 

After quite some weeks of intense collaborative work I eventually produced a professional 21 page business plan which was submitted on the day all these bids had to be in. 

There were 3 interested parties and I had meetings with them asking if we could do this as a partnership.  One said no way, that was the Lib Dem controlled Town Council, and the other said yes because they just wanted a very limited use which I was happy to agree.

The bids were in and judged by the Lib Dem NCC Administration at County Hall.  The Lib Dem controlled Town Council were awarded the community centre.  Fair enough but as some of the details came out I was stunned!  They had settled on considerably less than what I had negotiated for, regarding repairs to the building and hadn’t even submitted a business plan?  It seems the Lib Dem Administration at County Hall, where the chair of our Town Council was secretary and so included in this meeting, had somehow judged the bids even though there had only been one joint one and awarded the centre to a group that hadn’t even taken part in the process? 

I was then summoned to a meeting with the Mayor and his deputy.  I asked a colleague to come along as a witness because by now I was weary to say the least!  The Mayor told me to hand over the business plan I had done because he had been told it was excellent.  I couldn’t believe my ears I could only look at my colleague as he looked at me aghast.  I quickly realised these people just didn’t have a clue; they had done no prep work, no research and had no costings for things like new heating systems etc.  We walked away shaking our heads after replying, “No, you roll your plans out now!”

So we had a fully functioning Trust with nothing to do might as well put it to work!

As I’ve already reported we worked with an NCC officer to get the sports pavilion down at Gallagher Park. 

Next up was some self-promotion and this one was entered into an award by a large European Bank and made the last 10 before I had to cut it for exceptional reasons! 

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=iqecpk6LpFk

We were also working on a sports hall at Meadowdale School area with Bedlington Forum.  We even got the feasibility money for it off a part of NCC, but just as we were about to pull the trigger and commission a national group to come in and pull it together we were told NCC would double to money but it had to include the whole of Bedlington, not just the Top End.  We agreed and that was commissioned, little did we know what effect the proposed new school at Bedlington Station would have.  A full professional report was produced after interviewing local sports groups, potential sports groups, councillors, NCC etc. and the conclusion……..”Whilst new sporting provision is needed in Bedlington we can’t ignore a £20M new school at Bedlington Station which will have a full range of up to date sporting provision.  The best outcome would be to make sure these facilities are available for the community to use”.  Course that £20M actually turned into nearly £10M and one of the first things to get the chop…….the big new multi-use sports centre and pitches!  A much reduced offer was eventually built which spectacularly failed to meet any of our expectations. 

The Trust worked closely with Leading Link and again the first thing was sporting facilities:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=C8qunOuVvCQ

We also successfully applied for a Heritage grant to demonstrate our rich history.  The project attracted a lot of praise off the Heritage people and we had to go down to Manchester and were applauded as one of the best projects of this kind in the country.  We built an interactive trailer which was then ‘decorated’ with images of Bedlington history as well as thigs to do and Leading Link took it around  the local schools explaining what each bit was about.  We held a ‘junior’ Bedlington Picnic Day as well as producing some excellent videos. 

 https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fz6A9NLArEI

What Bedlington’s about and where might it go………(We can dream!) 

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=DtUAN4UKRhU

Bedlington’s mining heritage:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-EZf2LS_vlc

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=i6i461yrGFA

The Development Trust was asked to intervene time and time again in various issues.  The Olympic Torch was coming to the county as part of the London 2012 Olympic games and guess where wasn’t listed as one of the Towns for it to go through, as per!  Some pretty heated exchanges followed! 

I was eventually allowed to make a presentation, at Blyth, to the UK Sports Association guys overseeing this and set to work with Lyn Horton from Leading Link and Richard Wearmouth from the Salvation Army putting together the necessary event/safety plans etc.  These national agency guys couldn’t have been more supportive and even squashed some of the stuff our local council raised!  The day wasn’t the best as far as the weather went but over 5000 people lined our Front Street to watch the Torch pass through our Town! 

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fF9ZP8jOcy4

I was then asked to help with a little project for some of our disabled seniors. 

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=S46ShD4M2wM

The Trust also put on some entertainment for our seniors in the Salvation Army as well as getting the funding to help Mind Active purchased a bit of expensive equipment they had been after for some time. 

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Ka-fhVgjXTs

The Trust was by now working closely with several local charitable groups in fact the only ones that wouldn’t work with us were the ones with some councillor members!  

Several more projects followed but then I decided to stand for council and as I could see a clear prejudicial interest I resigned my Trust board membership. 

I would like to thank past and serving officers of the Trust for the support they always give to our Town.  I was especially grateful when they gave so much to our struggling foodbanks, way before any group thought about doing that. 

Here is a radio snippet where I try and explain what the Development Trust is about. 

  https://bedlington.uk/.../malcolm-robinson.../

Funnily enough, just as a post script, East Bedlington Parish Council have formed their own Development Trust very recently.  Seems the circle has come right around…………….