A LEADING Liverpool councillor has demanded the city council makes public the details of a settlement with controversial developer Bill Davies.

Earlier this month, the Daily Post exclusively revealed the fact the deal was costing the council £2m.

But the council has so far refused to discuss or confirm the settlement reached with Mr Davies’s Walton Group for a disputed option to develop Chavasse Park.

Former education supremo Cllr Paul Clein has added the matter to the agenda for the council’s Corporate Services Select Committee on Wednesday, which will now discuss the issue.

The council has refused to confirm the details of the settlement, claiming its hands are tied due to a confidentiality clause in the deal.

Last night, Charlie Adan, Liverpool city council solicitor, said: “I fully understand the public interest in this. I am taking legal advice on what information can be publicly disclosed without putting the council at risk of legal action or financial penalty.”

The disputed option to develop Chavasse Park was sold by the previous Labour administration in 1996 for £25,000.

“I can’t recall any other deal like this,” said Cllr Clein, a Liberal Democrat who represents the Greenbank ward.

“The people should have the information to make up their own minds whether the whole thing has been handled correctly, whether that’s by us or by the previous Labour administration.”

The deal finally brought to an end years of legal wrangles between Davies and the council.

Mr Davies had been seeking £100m compensation for profits he claimed his company had lost after council and government opposition derailed his company’s £400m shopping centre plan for the park.

After a legal battle with the city council in 2002, Mr Davies lost the right to develop the site, which is now the home of Grosvenor’s £1bn Liverpool One development.

The 1996 option was granted to the Walton Group should Liverpool’s National Discovery Centre project to celebrate the new millennium collapse.

It did collapse and Mr Davies exercised his right for the option.

In August last year, Mr Davies also sold his remaining interest in Liverpool’s Exchange Flags office complex.

UK Land and Property bought the building in a multi-million pound deal in a joint venture with construction group Pochin.

Exchange Flags had lain almost empty since being acquired by Mr Davies, the former owner of Aintree Racecourse, 20 years ago.

In 2002, he handed back £4.5m received as a City Challenge grant for the complex after an out-of-court settlement.

The businessman also owned the former post office site in Whitechapel, which was also left empty for several years, and is now occupied by the Metquarter shopping centre.

In the financial year to September, 2007, the Walton Group made a loss of £173,236, and its property portfolio lost £250,000 of its value. However, the company still had £11.8m cash in the bank.

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