Ben Houchen development corporation agrees to pay £19k for opponent's legal fees

Shortly before the hearing’s scheduled start, an agreement was reached via consent order between both parties, with STDC - a public body - agreeing to pay the legal costs of £19,000 incurred by PD Ports for the hearing that didn’t take place.

When asked by The Yorkshire Post how much money had been spent by STDC on commissioning expert witnesses to build their case, a spokesperson declined to comment, stating that it was “confidential”.

A High Court trial lasting a month is due to begin in October as STDC, which is chaired by Tees Valley Mayor Ben Houchen, seeks to establish whether PD Ports has access rights across land it acquired via compulsory purchase order (CPO) in April 2020.

The land acquired in the CPO mostly covers the former Redcar steelworks and is adjacent to land

holdings which belong to PD Ports, including Teesport docks and the quayside at Redcar Bulk Terminal.

As statutory port authority, PD Ports has to exercise duties by law such as managing marine traffic, and maintaining pilot vessels, channel depths, lighthouses and so on. Historically, PD Ports has had access across the land which STDC acquired in order to conduct their statutory operations.

Ben Houchen has said that the legal action brought by STDC and its subsidiary company South Tees Developments Ltd (STDL) is not about money, but to simply determine rights of access on the land it purchased. A spokesperson for STDC added: “There is no financial award as a result of the court action. Only a declaration of fact from the court to provide certainty as to what rights each party may, or may not, have.”

Speaking to The Yorkshire Post last month, PD Ports’ CEO Frans Calje said: “Irrespective of the outcome, PD Ports has no need to pay for any access.

“The best possible financial outcome for the STDC would be to revert to the position it was in before it chose to proceed with this litigation where we had provided a nil cost solution to its access and title problems, without substantial seven figure legal costs being incurred by the taxpayer.”

One of the first parcels of land to be redeveloped as part of the Teesworks project - which hopes to remediate 4,500 acres of heavily polluted land - is at South Bank Quay, however it can only presently be accessed via private roads on land that is owned by PD Ports.

Should the courts rule in favour of STDC, its spokesperson says that they would still build access routes for PD Ports to their landholdings, “but, as a public body we have a legal duty to achieve best value for what is the provision of an interest in land.”