Canning Circus Creative Hub; The Next Radford Unity Complex?

Stumbled across a petition asking for support for the Canning Circus Creative Hub the other day, I'd recommend that you sign it.

The Hub is, in its own words

'... a hub for creative individuals and organisations, taking our name from the area of Nottingham in which we are based.

We are a collective of creative companies who work together to share resources and ideas. We represent a shared movement, intended to promote, inspire and create work we’re all proud to put our name to.'

They are based in buildings on Wollaton St which they rent from the City Council. The regular readers of this blog may already be able to guess the way this is going.

Yes, despite happily toiling away for nigh on 30 years, the council has asked them to leave. They have a press release which gives some background. As yet, NCC has just asked them to 'leave quietly' as opposed to serving a formal notice quit.

I've been in contact with a couple of people based at the Hub. Their feeling is that the situation has arisen due the City Council's failure to maintain the range of buildings it owns on Wollaton St, of which the Hub is only part, leaving them on the verge of being condemned. They have an 'amusing' story of NCC contractors bungling the fitting of fire doors so badly they had to redo it themselves. Redevelopment is clearly on the agenda, almost certainly via the private sector, but the Hub's residents were apparently the last to be told.

Broadly speaking, the businesses at the Hub are very happy with how things are going as they are. None of them are interested in expanding and none of them want to move, particularly if it means being dispersed around the City. None of them receive any grant funding. The impression I get is that the Hub is more than just the sum of its parts but is very much an interdependent community. Such things are hard to translate into cold business language and, as such, tends to get ignored.

As a backdrop to this we have the Radford Unity Complex debacle where NCC wasted gobs of cash trying to hand the building for a cut-price to an arts organisation called Nottingham Studios, completely disregarding the needs, not to mention the legal tenancy rights, of the community groups who were already using it. When that fell apart NS were handed another set of buildings to become 'Primary', ironically just round the corner on Seely Rd. We also have the planned 'Creative Quarter' in the Lace Market, whose 'ambassador' has apparently cited CCCH as a major inspiration.

Unfortunately, the CQ doesn't reach as far as Canning Circus so CCCH cannot access any of the mountain of funding from the City Deal if they want to stay where they are. Some of the residents have looked into relocating to the CQ but feel the properties on offer aren't suitable. And of course, everyone wants to keep their artistic community together which may not be possible if they do move.

As sort of an aside, CQ has launched a loan scheme to assist companies with the costs of relocating there. Now CQ is a separate body to NCC but they are clearly working closely together. Seasoned council watchers therefore may not be over surprised that the company who got the gig managing the loan scheme is First Enterprise, one of whose directors is one of NCCLols' very old friends, former councillor Hassan Ahmed. They were also mentioned as benefiting from the dodgy Future Jobs Fund allocations that Ahmed presided over. So I'm sure that's all completely above board then.

So, with all this past and future money flying around it seems somewhat unfair that at the first sign of panic about the state of their building, NCC's first reaction is to ask them to leave. Since then Cllr Nick McDonald has been quoted in the Post saying that 'no decisions have been made'. However that isn't really very reassuring because, technically speaking, 'no decisions had been made' when Nottingham Studios were invited to buy the RUC building from under the feet of its tenants. At least CCCH seems to have got a bit more warning than the RUC groups did.

We'll be watching this one closely.

The Continuing Adventures of Councillor Hassan Ahmed

Councillor Hassan Ahmed does keep us busy here at NCCLols.

You will be aware of his difficulties in remembering who he worked for and which charities he was trustee of and the understanding and sympathetic attitude he received on this from Standards for England, something that shocked even the supremely supine Standards Committee at NCC.

Well, I've managed to get a bit more information about that in the form of the (heavily redacted) full report on the case against him from Standards for England. I am still trying to get as much of the redaction removed via the Information Commissioner but I'm not over hopeful. And it's more than I got from an identical request to NCC who refused to provide anything.

This document provides more insight into the thought processes behind SfE's decision making, I'll quote a few examples, see if you can spot a pattern emerging -

"...At the same meeting, the executive agreed to fund Nottingham Training and Enterprises Ltd [one of Ahmed's interests] for £50,000 per annum over three years. At the time of the council executive's decision, Councillor Ahmed was not a member of the executive. He did not attend the meeting or take part in the decision..." 

"...Forest Fields Advice and Neighbourhood Centre [another interest] received a grant of £3,092 during 2008-2009. The decision to approve funding to this organisation predated Councillor Ahmed's appointment as portfolio holder. I have seen no evidence that Councillor Ahmed was involved in the decision making process in relation to funding the Advice and Neighbourhood Centre..."

"...Nottingham Training and Enterprises Ltd and FEBA [both Ahmed Interests] also submitted bids to the European Regional Development Fund (ERDF). Bids for ERDF monies were decided by the East Midlands Development Agency (EMDA). The city council participates in a commissioning group, which assesses preliminary applications...At the time of Nottingham Training and Enterprises Ltd's ERDF bid in 2008, the group was chaired by Councillor Graham Chapman, the deputy leader of the council...

...FEBA was awarded two ERDF grants in July 2009 of £179,810 and £230,468...That decision predated Councillor Ahmed's appointment as portfolio holder..."

There seems to be quite a lot of reliance on the fact that Ahmed had not been appointed to the Executive at the time funding decisions were made. But he was Graham Chapman's Executive Assistant. Who jointly made the decision to cut CEHRNN's funding with him.

Then there's this -

"...I do not consider that Councillor Ahmed was required to declare an interest in Central Education and Training Ltd at the time he met with an officer from EMDA, as this was not a meeting of the council. At that time, no application had been made for ERDF funding..."

WTF? I can only assume that slipped through the redaction process because there's no mention of this meeting anywhere else. But essentially, SfE sees nothing dodgy in the fact that Ahmed was meeting EMDA officers when he was a director of two organisations that had not been declared on his register of interests, shortly before those organisations submitted funding bids to EMDA. Because it wasn't a City Council Meeting. Words fail me.

Anyway, it seems like Ahmed's forgetfulness in keeping his regulators up to date extends to Companies House and the Charity Commission. On 28 October this year he resigned as a director for 'Voice East Midlands' and yet the Commission don't seem to be aware as he is still listed as a trustee. Needless to say his NCC register of interests is yet to be updated. He also seems to have a habit of notifying Companies House about changes in his details with regard to one company but not with others; for example, in October 2008 he updates his address details for First Enterprise Business Agency, a local small business advice agency of which he is chair* but there is no corresponding notification for Nottingham Regeneration Ltd or Voice East Midlands. In April 2009 he does update address details for VEM but to a different address to the one notified earlier to FEBA. Again, no corresponding notification to FEBA nor to NRL, although he does deign to inform the latter that he is usually resident in the UK.

Let's hope that he advises FEBA's clients to act more appropriately.

*Or at least that's what he says in his annual report but I'm not sure what is real any more.