The capital investment firm behind a proposed multi-million pound development surrounding the Oasis Leisure Centre has been accused of breaching the terms of its agreement with Swindon Borough Council.
And now Labour opposition group leader, Jim Grant, is leading calls for the council to sever ties with the developer.
Moirai was awarded a 99-year-lease to develop the Oasis site at North Star in April 2013. However Labour group leader, Jim Grant, claims that the organisation breached the terms of the original development agreement with the council and a revised agreement had to be drawn up.
Cllr Grant claims that Moirai failed to obtain approval for a master plan of the development by the contractual deadline of March 2014 after Moirai’s shell company, MW Contract Services Ltd (formerly Oasis Operations Ltd), went in to liquidation, owing £850,000 to creditors, including Swindon small businesses such as Storm Recruitment.
Cllr Grant said: “After Moirai breached the terms of their 99-year lease with Swindon Council on two occasions, I believe the Council must withdraw the lease from the company. In my opinion this is long overdue.
“We already know that Moirai’s shell company owed near to a million pounds to its creditors before it went into liquidation. With the economy growing for the last few years, there is no excuse as to why they have done nothing to meet the terms of their development agreement. Make no mistake, the land the council is agreeing to give away to Moirai is worth millions of pounds so to give it away to a company whose record so far has been very disappointing, doesn’t make sense.
"The council should now be looking for a new private partner, which has a proven track record of delivering developments of this size, to take over the running of this development. After nearly 4 years of broken promises, I think the Swindon public will be desperate for the council to finally draw closure on this sorry affair.”
A Swindon Borough Council spokesman said: “We understand the frustrations over the delay to the North Star scheme, but this is a large and complicated regeneration project involving many partners, and it has inevitably taken time to get the finer details resolved.
“We have been in discussions with Moirai for the last two months in order to finalise the outstanding planning issues and we hope to make an announcement in the near future.”
Moirai's plans for the site include:
- Up to 50,000sqm of mixed leisure including a cinema, 5,000 seat entertainment arena, ski centre and other leisure uses which could potentially include a crazy golf centre, comedy club, laser tag and skate park;• Up to 12,000sqm of restaurants and cafes;
• Up to 12,000sqm retail space, with a minimum of 9,000sqm of sports retailing;
• Up to 9,000sqm for a hotel;
The remaining space would be made up of associated zones and services, such as a central plaza and internal walkways; up to 1,600 car parking spaces and motorcycle spaces; cycle parking spaces; drop off bays for disabled users, taxis and coaches; landscaping and access routes; improvements to existing highway junctions, and the replacement of existing sports pitches.
The investment value of the vast leisure scheme was calculated at £120 million and the proposal would be one of the largest mixed use projects of its type in the UK.
Councillor Grant says the current terms of the Oasis Development Agreement included Moirai being set the following targets:
- All remaining works to the Oasis Leisure Centre be completed by no later than 31 March 2015 and the works commence no later than 31 October 2015;
- A planning application with associated masterplan be submitted by no later than 31 May 2015;
- The backstop date for Moirai securing detailed planning consent for the scheme now is 31 January 2016;
- Repayment of rent owed to Swindon Council.
To date a detailed planning consent has been given to this application and the Labour Group has been told it is commercially sensitive as to whether Moirai have paid the rent they owed to Swindon Council.
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