Coventry Trust collapse: Grassroots groups seek legacy role

A consortium of organisations in Coventry are bidding for government money set aside for City of Culture legacy projects following the collapse of the trust that ran the programme, it has emerged.

Speaking in parliament during a debate about the collapse, which has prompted a number of investigations into the circumstances, Coventry North West MP Taiwo Owatemi said the consortium is called Coventry What’s Next.

It is made up of organisations including Coventry Cathedral, Coventry City Council, Talking Birds theatre company and the Albany Theatre.

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Administrators have previously estimated the trust’s total debt at just under £4.25m and have said only the trust’s former employees are likely to be paid their outstanding losses in full.

But Owatemi wants government to allocate any funding that was previously promised to the trust to the new organisation. 

"Will the government share the contents of the original bid with those stakeholders and ensure that money is automatically transferred to those organisations, so that the legacy project can continue?," she asked DCMS Minister Stuart Andrew.

In response, Andrew said DCMS officials are in regular discussions with Coventry City Council and are "working with local organisations on building up the legacy programme". 

"We are looking forward to receiving the proposal from Coventry City Council and as soon as we get it, we will of course consider what help and support the Government can give," he said.

'Left without a voice'

During the debate Owatemi also outlined a series of concerns about the way the City of Culture programme had been run, claiming local communities were "ignored" in the planning stages.

"Throughout the process, local communities were left without a voice," she said. 

"It is deeply worrying that a vast amount of local talent, advice and involvement was simply ignored, leaving many of my constituents with an uneasy feeling of alienation from an initiative that should have been rooted in the community. 

"Communication was poor. My constituents were not even informed what events were taking place on which dates until after the fact. 

"It is very clear that something went deeply wrong with the management of an organisation that time and again rebuffed and ignored local knowledge and offers for help, thinking instead that it knew better and bringing in so-called experts who knew nothing about our city."

She added that unless the lessons from Coventry’s experience are heeded "those issues will keep recurring, starting with Bradford in 2025".

"Government oversight is essential in order to avoid the shameful failures of governance that allowed the trust to implode so quickly," she said. 

"People in my community were beyond appalled to see big players walk away from the trust with honours galore, despite leaving in their wake a dismal record of failure and broken promises. 

"How on earth can it be justified that Martin Sutherland, the former trust chief executive officer, was granted an OBE for his work leading the organisation?"

Huge successes

Andrew said that despite the collapse of Coventry City of Culture Trust, as UK city of culture in 2021, Coventry enjoyed huge successes, securing more than £170m of investment which facilitated regeneration across the city valued at over £500m.

However he added that he "does not dispute that there are lessons to be learned by all parties" and said government will consider and apply the lessons learned from seperate investigations being conducted.

"We are actively working with Bradford Culture Company, Bradford Council and Arts Council England to ensure that robust governance and accountability for Bradford 2025, as well as, crucially, a sustainable legacy programme, are all there in the planning," he added.

An investigation by the National Audit Office into the collapse of Coventry City of Culture Trust will focus on how DCMS and Arts Council England kept tabs on how public funding was used.

The circumstances around the collapse are also subject to an investigation by the Charity Commission.