Review into all major 08 outdoor events ordered

Aug 15 2007 Liverpool Daily Post

Jessica Shaughnessy speaks to Liverpool council leader Warren Bradley in the third part of our special report into the Liverpool Culture Company

A REVIEW into all the major outdoor events in Liverpool’s 2008 culture year has been ordered by council leader Warren Bradley, he revealed last night.

The move is to ensure highlights of the crucial culture celebration will not be dogged by the same problems as the Mathew Street Festival, which was cancelled with three weeks notice on health and safety grounds.

The fiasco has led to an inquiry being launched into the actions of the event organisers, the Culture Company, and left many in the city wondering whether it could be trusted to deliver its promises for 2008.

Cllr Bradley’s order means plans for as many as 78 open-air events included in the Capital of Culture programme will be carefully examined.

They will include next year’s Mathew Street Festival, the Tall Ships Race, which is expected to draw a crowd of up to 1m, and the ambitious Liverpool Sound concert. And last night, there appeared to be no guarantee that the waterfront Liverpool Sound concert, where the Salthouse Dock would be drained for a spectacular music show, would definitely go ahead.

Sources close to the project have told the Daily Post of wor- ryingly high cost estimates for the event which was described in the 2008 Highlights brochure launched last November as “the one highlight in the calendar that will reverberate around the world with the greatest pop music of our times”.

Cllr Bradley denied rumours that plans for the Liverpool Sound were now in jeopardy because of escalating costs but said the plans were still being put in place and had not yet been fin- alised. If it goes ahead, the dock could be drained to create the city’s biggest concert venue for the year, seating 25,000 people, twice the capacity of the new Liverpool Arena.

The preparations are thought to include fish in the dock being stunned and then moved to a temporary location.

Cllr Bradley said: “I am expecting a report on this in the next couple of days and a final decision will be made after that. If it comes off, this event will be fantastic, simply amazing.

“I want us to be ambitious next year. I don’t want us to shy away from making big plans just in case they don’t come off and we would be criticised.

“We are being imaginative.”

Returning to the Mathew Street fiasco, Cllr Bradley added: “This cannot happen again. If somebody comes in to look at everything closely, there can be no excuses.”

The council leader himself has faced criticism over his handling of the Mathew Street Festival. On a family holiday at the time of the announcement, he reacted with outrage and sent a message to the city that he would save the festival on his return.

But that wasn’t to be, and though the event will go ahead, it will be in a diminished form with no outdoor stages.

Cllr Bradley’s critics have attacked him for making “empty promises” and questioned his claims that he knew nothing of the difficulties facing the event.

Under his powers as leader of the council, the decision to cancel the Mathew Street Festival ultimately rested with him. He has been accused of dodging blame by focusing instead on the failures of Culture Company officers.

Cllr Bradley said: “I am not culpable. I will not be blamed for what happened with Mathew Street in any way shape or form but I will make sure it will not happen again.

“If 2008 is not a success then I will take full responsibility for that. There are still fundamental concerns about the Culture Com- pany, but we will find the root of them with the investigation.

“The inquiry will be independent and transparent. I will not be on the panel, because I want to give evidence myself.”

He continued: “People say that I should have had my finger on the pulse. But as leader of the council you have to wear a lot of hats and you need to be able to place your trust in people to a certain extent.

“If people who are being paid big salaries are telling you that everything is OK, what are you supposed to think? While I was on holiday, Cllr Storey, the executive member for 2007 celebrations, was assured everything was going according to plan. Why was he told that? I was told about the problems the night before the announcement was made. I refused to endorse the decision by putting my name or the name of any other politician on the press release.

“At the end of the day, if I had said no, I would have been overruled by the chief safety officer and the police. When you are told you could have another Hillsborough on your hands, you don’t have any choice. Lessons have been learnt from this and the lesson I have learnt is not to trust people as much. From now on, I will be watching over everything.”

Cllr Bradley says he is confident the results of the investigation will reassure the people of Liverpool that the problems will not recur. He claimed the council does not deserve much of the criticism it has received about perceived Capital of Culture failures.

Critics say many of the promises made during the bid for the title have not been kept.

He said: “Our track record shows that we deliver and we have done in the run-up to Capital of Culture.

“When things have failed, it has been largely down to contributory factors.

“When the Fourth Grace Cloud fell through, it was because of problems within the private sector.

“The Kings Dock plans failed because the business plan didn’t stack up. Then there was the trams.

“How is it our fault that the Government decided to put the money elsewhere? Six schemes across the country failed, not just ours.”

Cllr Bradley added: “I can point the finger left, right and centre, but we shouldn’t play blame games any more. We need to move on.”

• * We'll silence the sceptics with an amazing programme of events, pledge Capital of Culture leaders