Redevelopment Closer Than Ever?

[GrangeParkCobbler]

Look, does it matter where the 10.25m came from?? Whether it be Borough Council money, EU Money or a loan from the Queen.....it needs to be paid back!!

Having had a good read of a document I have come to be in posession of it appears that the Council are paying the interest on the loan....and it was the club who were meant to be paying the council so they could pay that interest until the loan matured in 2020.

Obviously the club are not paying the council, so the council is/will be paying a total of £1.2 million in interest on this loan....until 2020. Then the capital is due to be repaid.

The loan principle outstanding is 10.219 million as the club did in fact make £31,000 or repayments before defaulting three monthly payments in a row. Interest amounts to circa £275k per annum....so that meant that the club....and now the council are paying £23,000 a month.

Interesting too that the report states that the conditional land contract between NBC and CDNL was cancelled , the Council is no longer subject to the conditions in the contract and remains the freeholder of the land subject to 2 very restricted leases currently held by CDNL (in liquidation)

[Northamptonian]

NBC are not able to just say...."oh well, it wasn't our money"....they are liable for the debt. True, they may not have had the correct procedures in place and might not have carried out proper due diligence when loaning the club.....or 1st Land the money....but the fact remains that the Council are liable for the debt and if they are paying back without recovering anything then again, directly or indirectly it is the borough council tax payers of Northampton who will suffer.

I hope this explains why they haven’t cut the **** grass in months?

[GrangeParkCobbler]

I hope this explains why they haven’t cut the **** grass in months?

lol...who knows what effect the black hole has on things.....reintroducing car parking charges in town at the weekends, changing/cutting back the bin emptying schedule, not cutting the grass,  not cleaning out the drains in Far Cotton.......whatever.

You get less and less for your council tax every year it seems!!

[tcobb]

Isn't the grass cutting down to the outgoing company no bothering to do it.
New company starting and will "deep clean " the Town. Best of luck with that !!

[Teachers Pet]

I know James Averill can speak for himself on this but I have noticed a tweet from him today it reads as follows.

"Papers are out for the Cabinet meeting of Northampton Borough Council on Wednesday June 13. Discussions over loan to the Cobblers intended to be held in private due to 'sensitive information'. Same goes for Delapre Abbey restoration project. Agenda item called 'surrender of lease on land at Sixfields stadium' remains open to public as things stand, although no further documentation on that issue is available yet."


Interesting wording used.
   

[GrangeParkCobbler]

I know James Averill can speak for himself on this but I have noticed a tweet from him today it reads as follows.

"Papers are out for the Cabinet meeting of Northampton Borough Council on Wednesday June 13. Discussions over loan to the Cobblers intended to be held in private due to 'sensitive information'. Same goes for Delapre Abbey restoration project. Agenda item called 'surrender of lease on land at Sixfields stadium' remains open to public as things stand, although no further documentation on that issue is available yet."


Interesting wording used.
   

https://www.northamptonchron.co.uk/news/missing-10-25m-cobblers-loan-and-redevelopment-to-be-discussed-at-cabinet-in-private-1-8523986

[Zen Master]

Here it is.

Or isn’t

http://www.northamptonboroughcouncil.com/ieListDocuments.aspx?CId=528&MId=8512&Ver=4

[guest2539]

What moment would be right? After you've just made £100m 
The only way this deal should come off is KT and DB pay back the council the £10m, build the original Cardoza East Stand, same as the West and extend the South Stand with 12 rows of seating behind the existing 9 rows.
I sure there is still more than enough profit after that. To make it worth their while.

If there is SO much money to be made why did you not buy the club before KT put his money where his mouth is?

It is so easy preaching from behind a keyboard!
Action speak louder than words and KT got off his arse!

[JollyCobbler]

If there is SO much money to be made why did you not buy the club before KT put his money where his mouth is?

It is so easy preaching from behind a keyboard!
Action speak louder than words and KT got off his arse!

So, you believe it's okay to have agreed a deal with NBC, and then to go behind their backs to secure the land leases, even though the aforementioned agreement dealt with the fact these leases would be used by NBC to recover the lost (stolen) monies? That's okay, is it?

[Zen Master]

Wouldn’t the same option have been open to NBC to pursue or did the need for a gazillion focus groups, discussion meetings, planning forums, cabinet meetings prevent the likelihood from happening?

[DrillingCobbler]

I used the term 'Chancer' on here last week, to describe our front man. I totally stand by that view I have.

85% of this boards users were happy with the stewardship of the football club about 6 weeks ago, I think that percentage will come down as the story and the sub plots unravel.

At the end of the day (Village idiot), they promised 4 million quid ring fenced to sort the stand out and over 2 and a half years later, nothings happened. So profit from land shouldn't come into it. They showed proof of funding, that was part of how they got the football club and why the local consortium and the Trust backed them and why they got a clear run on goal to secure the 'deal'.

Im now speculating when I say that the cost base has grown so much that without player sales, an unexpected cup run or some other currently unknown bonus landing NTFC's way, we are looking at a circa 1 million quid loss next season. Wages for starters are massively higher than they were when we won the league. So this lease thing being sorted in their favour is their last chance of getting their money back without a fire sale. Or they get shot of the club now relatively unscathed financially. Thats why I believe they have put the club up for sale. PUBLICLY.

[Teachers Pet]

Wouldn’t the same option have been open to NBC to pursue or did the need for a gazillion focus groups, discussion meetings, planning forums, cabinet meetings prevent the likelihood from happening?

Exactly, I remember listening to Mary Markham weeks after the takeover discussing the various options open and confirming that property developers had already come forward regarding developing the land, so why didn't they act quicker?

[JollyCobbler]

Wouldn’t the same option have been open to NBC to pursue or did the need for a gazillion focus groups, discussion meetings, planning forums, cabinet meetings prevent the likelihood from happening?

Yes it would have been safer if NBC had time to secure the leases. On the papers I viewed this week NBC did acknowledge there was a 'risk' posed by someone moving in and gazumping them on securing the CDNL leases held by the liquidators. But, and here's the thing, NTFC were only days away from HMRC's court petition, and the Thomas group wouldn't complete with the 10 million debt still overhanging the club. If the council had held out until everything was wrapped up nicely, NTFC faced going out of business.

This is why the council have remained tight lipped. Because, yet again, they allowed themselves to get mugged. But, and it is a big but, if NBC hadn't allowed the deal to go through the Cobblers may well have gone to the wall.
Northampton Borough Council gambléd because they were trying to preserve the status of NTFC. Unfortunately, they then got shafted by the very same people who shook hands with them and signed an MoU aimed at preserving the club and recovering lost monies.

Did NBC act with due diligence? Possibly not. But what they did do was to act in the best interests of Northampton Town Football Club. And then our saviors screwed them over.

And just to add, on the MoU the Thomas group stated it was their intention to complete the East Stand with funds available. That was in 2015. 'Nuff said!

[barnabas]

Yes it would have been safer if NBC had time to secure the leases. On the papers I viewed this week NBC did acknowledge there was a 'risk' posed by someone moving in and gazumping them on securing the CDNL leases held by the liquidators. But, and here's the thing, NTFC were only days away from HMRC's court petition, and the Thomas group wouldn't complete with the 10 million debt still overhanging the club. If the council had held out until everything was wrapped up nicely, NTFC faced going out of business.

This is why the council have remained tight lipped. Because, yet again, they allowed themselves to get mugged. But, and it is a big but, if NBC hadn't allowed the deal to go through the Cobblers may well have gone to the wall.
Northampton Borough Council gambléd because they were trying to preserve the status of NTFC. Unfortunately, they then got shafted by the very same people who shook hands with them and signed an MoU aimed at preserving the club and recovering lost monies.

Did NBC act with due diligence? Possibly not. But what they did do was to act in the best interests of Northampton Town Football Club. And then our saviors screwed them over.

And just to add, on the MoU the Thomas group stated it was their intention to complete the East Stand with funds available. That was in 2015. 'Nuff said!

But wasn't the issue of the leasehold covered in the CVA for CDNL, which proposed that if KT & Bower paid the £170k to get the CVA through then no further action would be taken to realise the leasehold?

[guest2487]

So many opinions and guess work it's pointless. There is a few facts knocking around from Manwork but even then without context it's impossible to provide anything other than an opinion.

[guest2539]

Life is no always fair and I like to think I am streetwise and realistic. I believe most of the critisism aimed at KT, by a few posters, stems from NBC's incompetance rather than actions by KT! Of course KT wants to financially benefit and if he does so legally then so be it, welcome to the real world. This goes back to my original point that anybody could have bought the club to make 'SO MUCH MONEY' but the queue was non existant.

All I ask is NBC make a dcision so we can find out what future NTFC has rather than having speculation.

[BackOfTheNet]

Life is no always fair and I like to think I am streetwise and realistic. I believe most of the critisism aimed at KT, by a few posters, stems from NBC's incompetance rather than actions by KT! Of course KT wants to financially benefit and if he does so legally then so be it, welcome to the real world. This goes back to my original point that anybody could have bought the club to make 'SO MUCH MONEY' but the queue was non existant.

All I ask is NBC make a dcision so we can find out what future NTFC has rather than having speculation.

I can't agree with that, I'm afraid. I'm pretty hard nosed about business and broadly back Thomas in what he's been trying to do; he clearly wasn't doing it out of the goodness of his heart but if he could save the club and make himself and his partners a few quid along the way then all to the good, everybody wins.

However, the end doesn't always justify the means. Screwing someone over because they are incompetent and you can doesn't mean you should, particularly when the well meaning idiot has just gone out of their way to help you. It's like being invited in out of the rain by a befuddled OAP and then scamming them out of their life savings.

[Vintage Cobbler]

I think our owners stand to make more than "a few quid" from the land they and not the club. hold.  The 2 leases should be merged and/or be placed in the ownership of NTFC and KT & DB will still stand to gain substantially from a sale of their 80%+ holding in the club through Ventures.  We are probably talking about significant sums of money that could be a watershed for our club.  If supporters want to continue to bump along the bottom then continue to make noises in favour of KT.  If he shafted the Council, which is the current theme of this thread, think who could be next.

[claretparrot]

Posters on both sides of the fence are still making leaps (admittedly the leaps are getting smaller). I still agree with AS among others that we don't have enough information to make an informed judgement.

However... If I were the council, and the current theory put forward by JC is accurate, I would have been responding to KT's second statement quickly and in the strongest terms. The fear of sounding like you ballsed up a bit is nothing compared to the need to defend yourself against false accusations of foul play, surely!?

[Monty]

Looks to me like Team KT have something the council wants, the council has the power over vetoing any development so at the moment the football club is the one that's getting shafted the most. There must be a deal to be worked out that benefits KT, Council and NTFC - why doesn't everyone try to go down that path rather than the current impasse where no-one is going to win?