The following article has appeared in the Wirral Globe this week I will post the entire text as it is paywalled.
What i don't understand is that if the council had been prepared to inject a significant sum into the project for commercial operators Big Heritage why did they not offer this to the Merseyside Tramway Preservation Society? Surely a volunteer led organisation would have delivered more per £1 invested than a commercial operator?
"WIRRAL Council has apologised for accidentally sending out a “final” report that blows a hole in its argument for why £3m was pulled from a beloved museum.
The future of the Wirral Transport Museum remains very much in doubt as its current operators Big Heritage look to pull out completely, refusing an offer from the local authority of £1.5m. This is after councillors on March 12 pulled back £4.5m it had previously offered Big Heritage to plug funding gaps in other projects, something the museum company said left them stunned.
The council claimed in the March public report brought before councillors when they pulled funding from the museum that it was “unlikely that this project could be delivered by March 2027.” The local authority said this was based on consultant IMB Management’s conclusions about Big Heritage’s Plans.
However, the Local Democracy Reporting Service (LDRS) has now seen leaked documents produced by IMB, a firm which has previously worked with the council over its new offices in Birkenhead town centre. IMB was commissioned by the council to review all of its projects under the Pathfinder programme, a government trial that gives Wirral greater flexibility when it comes to spending regeneration grants.
Wirral Council has repeatedly claimed IMB’s assessment of Big Heritage’s plans were that they were undeliverable. According to their own minutes, officers at a February board meeting claimed IMB had said the finished project would be unlikely to be completed by March 2027.
This date is key as it is the current extension offered by the government for money to be spent. Councillors in March requested this extension for two council-run projects that are behind schedule in Woodside and New Ferry.
Seen by the LDRS, the two reports produced by IMB appear to directly contradict what the council had said. One was produced in January and the other was produced in April.
The January report said IMB thought at that point based on the information it had, June 2026 was “a more likely overall completion.” The document also lists at least seven other versions of the report over the course of January.
The second report produced in April following these revisions goes further and is labelled “IMB checked” and “FINAL.” It repeats the June 2026 finish date but adds: “In our view expenditure of the Pathfinder Funds by March 26 is unlikely for the reasons stated above. However, expenditure of funding by March 27 should be achievable.”
According to a disclaimer at the bottom of the document, these reports were based on the information provided to IMB by Wirral Council. However, both reports seen by the LDRS never made it to the board of councillors and local businesses overseeing the regeneration funds or councillors on the local authority’s regeneration committee.
Instead, another report was created 38 seconds after on April 9 different to the one seen by the LDRS using PDF processing software. This was one sent out.
Birkenhead councillor Pat Cleary is now calling for a full, thorough and independent investigation into the matter. He told the LDRS the council needed to explain how different versions of an independent report can exist, how inconsistent versions could have been created, and questioned whether councillors were provided with accurate, impartial advice when making their decisions.
He said: “Members of the Pathfinder Regeneration Board and the regeneration committee were clearly told that the Big Heritage proposals for the upgraded Transport Museum would not be achievable even if a time extension was granted. If, as it appears, the council is providing another version of the same report with materially different conclusions to Big Heritage, this raises serious questions for the council.”
He added: “Only Green councillors voted against making these decisions in private away from public scrutiny. We are now shocked to be told that no high-level in-person meetings between Big Heritage and the council’s Director of Regeneration took place until after the committee had taken its decision.
“We need all key stakeholders working constructively together building strong relationships that will stand the test of time and deliver for residents and business. That isn’t happening and it needs to change quickly.”
The LDRS understands the April report was sent to Big Heritage after they asked for it in order to help them with the company’s application for the reduced offer of £1.5m. Big Heritage said they had now declined Wirral Council’s funding offer of £1.5m arguing it represents a fraction of the £6.5m originally promised for a transport museum in Wirral.
A spokesperson for the company raised concerns around the loss of funding for Birkenhead Priory and the Woodside Ferry Terminal arguing they “have also quietly been diverted elsewhere, which suggests that preserving Birkenhead’s cultural and historical legacy ranks very low on Wirral Council’s list of priorities.”
The spokesperson added: “We were also unprepared for a number of additional and unreasonable conditions that Wirral Council had implied we’d have to accept for them to grant us the funding, including the responsibility of maintaining the infrastructure of the heritage tramway, which they had promised to restore when we agreed to take over the museum in 2023.
“We are already in discussions with alternative funders who share our vision and appreciation for the region’s rich transport heritage, and we are of course on target to open a brand-new Battle of the Atlantic Museum in Woodside in 2026.
“We remain open to fresh dialogue with Wirral Council in the future, should they reconsider their decision after a period of reflection.
“We extend our sincere gratitude to the council officers and members who have supported and contributed to the development of this project thus far, and despite this unforeseen delay, we remain committed to deliver real generation for Birkenhead’s future by unlocking its incredibly rich and diverse past.”
When Wirral Council handed over the museum to Big Heritage in 2023, it agreed to carry out maintenance, repairs, and insurance costs of the tramway tracks that run out of the museum through Woodside for up to ten years with costs estimated to be £5,500 a year.
A council report said doing this would allow Big Heritage time to recruit and train staff needed to run the trams. The local authority also promised it would carry out minor repair work on the tracks as well as surveying them every year.
The LDRS also understands Big Heritage is in dispute with the local authority over money it spent developing the plans before councillors pulled millions from the project. The council is claiming these costs cannot be claimed back because no grant funding agreement was signed.
However the council told Big Heritage in September 2024 any spending from July 16 when councillors gave Big Heritage £4.5m “is fine to be claimed back.”
A joint statement from Wirral Council and IMB Management said: “Wirral Council has been informed by Big Heritage, the leaseholder for the Transport Museum, that they will be declining the offer of £1.5m for the museum’s upgrade. While this is disappointing, we continue to offer support to ensure this popular museum is preserved for the people of the borough, as well as looking at how it can continue to complement the wide ranging and extensive regeneration taking place in and around nearby Woodside.
“The independent review of the Simplification Pathfinder Pilot programme was conducted to allow clear recommendations to be made to the Simplification Pathfinder board at its meeting on 25th February 2025, and subsequently the Economy, Regeneration and Housing committee on 12th March. The earlier versions of the report drafted in January were developed as more information was reviewed and received from key stakeholders as part of the project review which concluded in February.
“Regarding the independent report shared with Big Heritage in April, it has become clear an earlier draft report with the initial recommendations was accidentally tagged as the final version and then sent to Big Heritage, for which we sincerely apologise.”
The spokesperson claimed Pathfinder board members and councillors were provided with the final report findings when making a decision. However, this is untrue according to the council’s own minutes which said the report would be sent after the February meeting and did not happen until April, nearly a month after the regeneration committee decision.
The spokesperson added: “A planning application for the major £350,000 improvements to significantly improve accessibility of Birkenhead Priory is currently underway. Although an additional submission for a further £80,000 grant was unable to be progressed after match funding from Heritage Lottery Fund could not be secured by the deadline, the primary proposed improvements for the site are still on track.”
bigheritage.co.uk
