S
Spiderbee
Guest
AFC Bournemouth
AFCBISA can exclusively reveal how much Bournemouth owe BARR construction following last weeks revelations that money was still owed to the Scottish construction firm. BARR worked on phase one of Bournemouth's stadium development over the summer of 2001 and finished enough of the stadium to able it to host a game against Wrexham on November 10th. Three weeks later, a third side was completed, taking the capacity up to 9,600, but not without a high number of teething problems.
Thankfully, many of these problems have been fixed, but issues such as the leaking roof above the Cherry Tree pub still remain. BARR are extremely unlikely to carry out any more work onto the Fitness First Stadium whilst the debt remains and the warranty on the stadium prevents anybody else fixing the current problems.
AFCBISA contacted BARR construction yesterday in search of the information sought after by the fans of Bournemouth concerning the community stadium that many have helped to finance. The club refused to comment last week, but BARR agreed to go away to search the figures and call back.
To their credit, we received a call this morning outlining the current situation with the football club. They said that Barr were owed £450k as of the end of November and a further £300k for additional work they had carried out in November. That is a total of £750k. The only other thing they were prepared to say, was that talks were ongoing with the club to resolve payment.
Neither BARR or the football club have divulged any information about the nature of the ongoing talks, but Tony Swaisland has told AFCBISA that he hopes to reach a solution without resorting to a player sale. Things brings the situation around to the future of the Trust Fund and the debate amongst fans started on Monday.
With the recent revelations about non-payment of stadium bills and comments by Cllr Jim Courtney that AFCB’s status as a community-owned club needs to be looked at in the future, has the Community ideal failed and are the club and Trust Fund about to revert to a more traditional business structure? Do they want to drop some if not all of the community principles on which it was rescued five years ago?
The total debt caused by the re-development of Dean Court can only be guessed at, but the money owed to BARR is only a proportion of the total figure owed by the football club. The council and the football foundation both gave the club £250k loans . Adding to that is the existing debt to Lloyds and any other payments not known about, leaving the club in a position where something needs to be done sooner rather than later.
Thankfully, many of these problems have been fixed, but issues such as the leaking roof above the Cherry Tree pub still remain. BARR are extremely unlikely to carry out any more work onto the Fitness First Stadium whilst the debt remains and the warranty on the stadium prevents anybody else fixing the current problems.
AFCBISA contacted BARR construction yesterday in search of the information sought after by the fans of Bournemouth concerning the community stadium that many have helped to finance. The club refused to comment last week, but BARR agreed to go away to search the figures and call back.
To their credit, we received a call this morning outlining the current situation with the football club. They said that Barr were owed £450k as of the end of November and a further £300k for additional work they had carried out in November. That is a total of £750k. The only other thing they were prepared to say, was that talks were ongoing with the club to resolve payment.
Neither BARR or the football club have divulged any information about the nature of the ongoing talks, but Tony Swaisland has told AFCBISA that he hopes to reach a solution without resorting to a player sale. Things brings the situation around to the future of the Trust Fund and the debate amongst fans started on Monday.
With the recent revelations about non-payment of stadium bills and comments by Cllr Jim Courtney that AFCB’s status as a community-owned club needs to be looked at in the future, has the Community ideal failed and are the club and Trust Fund about to revert to a more traditional business structure? Do they want to drop some if not all of the community principles on which it was rescued five years ago?
The total debt caused by the re-development of Dean Court can only be guessed at, but the money owed to BARR is only a proportion of the total figure owed by the football club. The council and the football foundation both gave the club £250k loans . Adding to that is the existing debt to Lloyds and any other payments not known about, leaving the club in a position where something needs to be done sooner rather than later.
