Yorkshire Forward staff can buy their PCs as doomed agency prepares assets for sell-off

Major city redevelopment projects such as the Tower Works site in Leeds and the former Odeon site in Bradford would be passed over to new public sector trusts under the plans drawn up by the agency, which the Government is currently considering.

But the agency is proposing selling sites likely to be worth millions of pounds “where there is no longer a rationale for keeping them in the public sector” – including the Island Wharf site in Hull and land in Selby once earmarked for a science venture, with the Government pocketing the money.

The organisation’s Leeds headquarters in Victoria House will be returned to the Government and are likely to be used by another agency or department after Yorkshire Forward is abolished by April 2012.

Dozens of staff have already left, but remaining employees could be given a chance to buy £250,000 of computer equipment or thousands of items of office furniture as properties are emptied. Items could also be offered to voluntary groups.

MPs and councillors have been lobbying for the agency’s assets – valued at nearly £106m in total, of which land and buildings are a significant part – to be used to benefit the region amid fears of a “fire sale” to please the Treasury.

Bradford East MP David Ward said: “It’s time the assets should go back to the local authorities where possible.”

Yorkshire Forward has now released a copy of its Assets and Liabilities Plan – submitted to the Government – which sets out what it plans to do with the assets.

The published version has been heavily blacked out on grounds of confidentiality, but the Yorkshire Post has learned it suggests keeping the majority of land and buildings in public hands, although it rules out handing any over to new Local Enterprise Partnerships.

A small number of assets could be sold directly to councils at market rate, although the payment could be deferred in cases such as Barnsley’s Metropolitan Centre, part of the town’s markets redevelopment.

However, many are proposed to be put in a trust which would hold assets and liabilities. Some strategically important sites make a loss so it would not be viable for councils to take them on individually. A region-wide trust could be created, or individual ones based on local authority areas.

Sites likely to be handed to a trust include the iconic Tower Works in Leeds, which is due to be turned into offices; leisure facilities and apartments, Dinnington Colliery in South Yorkshire; and several vital regeneration sites in Bradford including the former Odeon, which has been awaiting development for more than a decade,

Sites which could be sold to private buyers include the Island Wharf site in Hull – which took two years to find a tenant after being developed into offices at considerable public expense – and land near Burn Airfield in Selby, which was once lined up for the European Spallation Source (ESS), a major scientific research and development facility.

Some coalfield sites would go to the Homes and Communities Agency, and some properties given to Whitehall departments.

Writing in the plan, Yorkshire Forward chief executive Thea Stein said: “Where these assets and liabilities are still strategically important for the economic growth of the region and it represents long term value for money it’s the desire of Yorkshire Forward and its partners to retain public control of these sites.”

A full report appears in Tuesday’s Yorkshire Post