TODAY: 60th Anniversary: BBC television NEWS

TODAY at 19:30 hrs, 60 years ago, the first ever British television news broadcast was aired. From a site inside our charitable trust, Alexandra Palace.

This milestone is part of the rationale for the restoration of the first- or studio- floor of the South East wing.

The main reason for this refurbishment is the beginning – 18 years earlier – of regular, scheduled broadcasts in "high-definition".

That was "HD" for the 1930s: 405 lines, versus the earlier transmission of the 1936 Berlin summer Olympics at 180 lines.

These compare with today's 1,080 lines and tomorrow's 2,160 lines (AKA 4K).

The first floor contained Studios A and B.

Studio A housed equipment supplied by Marconi-EMI. For a few short months, until February 1936, Studio B was known as The Baird Studio and it used John Logie Baird's hybrid Intermediate Film Technique.

Here is The Telegraph's article, BBC television news celebrates its 60th birthday

This morning, Michelle Husain interviewed newsreader Richard Baker on the Today programme (Radio 4).

A little over two years ago, our Trust Board formally adopted the goal of UNESCO World Heritage for our South East wing, which is an important part of Haringey Council's (successful) Heritage Lottery Fund bid. This should see the whole east side of our building – including the Victorian Theatre – dramatically improved.

APTS video on the Heritage Lottery Fund support

THE Alexandra Palace Television Society has produced a four and a half minute video following the announcement of Heritage Lottery Fund support for fixing up the east side of Alexandra Palace:

APTS video on the HLF announcement

Good news for AP from the Heritage Lottery Fund

OUR TRUST has been successful – to the tune of nearly £900K – with its Heritage Lottery Fund bid to begin revitalising the east wing of Alexandra Palace: the TV studios, the Victorian Theatre and the eastern entrance.

This development stage will lead to a full submission next year. It's to the credit of the council and especially its team led by CEO Duncan Wilson.

2013—May—9

1938 colour film of an Outside Broadcast - alongside the Alexandra Palace studios

AN OUTSIDE broadcast – right outside the Studios in fact – is a demonstration of an anti-aircraft gun battery. This is in 1938, nearly 18 months after the television service had begun and nearly 18 months before the declaration of war. Leslie Mitchell is there partly to describe "television at work". Note the cameras, the big lights, the microphone boom and the thick cables on the ground – all doubtless brought down from the Studios above ...

Click above for video stream. It's posted on YouTube [here: 1938 Outside Broadcast of Anti-aircraft display (colour film)] by the Alexandra Palace Television Society, with the following notes:

Major television outside broadcast showing viewers the workings of an anti-aircraft battery and the defence of London in the advent of war.
The original film footage was silent but a sound recording of the actual television programme has been included in certain sections. The presenter of the programme was Leslie Mitchell (the senior male announcer).
Transmission: 18th Apr 1938, 3.30 – 4 pm & 9.30 – 10 pm
This film footage is from the Desmond Campbell Archive Collection held and administered by the Alexandra Palace Television Society.

http://www.apts.org.uk

ALLY PALLY: five years on ...

ON TUESDAY night (6th November) the Alexandra Palace Trust Board formally approved the big bid to the Heritage Lottery Fund in respect of most of the east side of Alexandra Palace.

If successful, this proposal would see the refurbishment of two historic spaces: the 1936 BBC television studio complex in the south east wing together with the huge Victorian Theatre with original stage equipment, in the north east wing.


The Save Ally Pally campaign group sincerely wishes this bid the best of luck.

What a change! It is almost exactly five years since Save Ally Pally had to appeal to the High Court to ask for the Charity Commission's approval for a sale of the People's Palace to a developer (a former slum landlord, according to the Evening Standard) to be quashed. This would almost certainly have led to the destruction of the original BBC studios and probably the Victorian Theatre. Fortunately we were successful and 5 October 2007 marked the date of the turning of the tide in the fortunes of our Charity's main asset.

Now the scene is utterly transformed. The management who masterminded the sale attempt are long gone: the General Manager who supervised the sale plans retired in disgrace; a former Board Chairman was found to have brought the Council into disrepute and was suspended. Recently and finally, the former trust solicitor was let go after 22 years of expensive "advice" whose quality was, at best, indifferent.

Where a developer saw only real estate, citizens saw history. For the south east wing – once earmarked by the property developer for "Offices" - the Mayor of London has endorsed the proposal for a UN World Heritage site in respect of the  BBC TV studios - the world birthplace of television.

The appointment of Duncan Wilson as Chief Executive of the Palace and Park, having had (unlike all the his predecessors at AP) extensive experience of managing historic sites, including the Greenwich world heritage site, was a huge stride forward in AP fortunes.

Today, much of the hopes and ambitions of those crazed SAP loons that historic Ally Pally could rise from the ashes of neglect and disrepair to once again become a top visitor attraction for London, are actually reflected in the bid that will be put together by a new and positive AP management team.

ALLY PALLY SAVED – 5 OCT 2007

At a local public house last Sunday, SAP marked the fifth anniversary of the vital High Court ruling with a cake and celebration.

The HLF bid is not just a vindication of the efforts of the SAP group, but collectively it's a victory for the Trust Beneficiaries of north London. It's also a victory for the public of London as a whole and indeed, nationally. In respect of BBC Studios A and B, it may yet transpire as a benefit for the citizens of the world.

SAP would encourage any members of the public who, like us, support the regeneration proposal and HLF bid, to write to Duncan Wilson, the Chief Executive of Alexandra Palace.

Save Ally Pally

AFTER 20 years of false starts, the master plan for regeneration at AP now looks to a new dawn …

THERE's been 20 years of wasted tax money. In the last 15 years, this largely comprised misconceived attempts at sale and some of which were unlawful, downright bloody-minded and worse.

In recent times, there was an attempt to re-brand the entire seven acre building for live music, even though this has always been only a part of our Charitable Trust.

Now we have a more realistic prospect of a collection of attractions, which is what the Victorians envisaged.

Under the leadership of the new CEO, Duncan Wilson OBE, there is now a master plan worthy of serious consideration. It contains most of the elements suggested in the past but in a way that is the most realistic, credible sound and lawful way that has been proposed to date.

There's currently a public consultation that deserves public interest and support. A PDF of the master plan put out for public consultation appears on the left, under the yellow lightning flash logo.

If you'd like to download the 7 MB file to your computer: Mac: Option-Click, Windows: Right-Click. The same-sized Conservation Management Plan (Donald Insall Associates) is just below it.

UN World Heritage Proposal now accepted as strategic goal

IT IS pleasing to report that the Alexandra Palace Trust Board has adopted, as a strategic goal, the UN World Heritage site Proposal that is referred to earlier in this blog.

A copy of the final Proposal can be found here (PDF of 800kb).

Here (PDF, 195kb) is a copy of the new Chief Executive's Report on the Proposal.

Here (PDF, 60kb) is a copy of the presentation made to the Trust Board meeting on 16 February 2012.

.

The Transmitter Hall

ON 2nd November 2011, a small party was held to mark the exact afternoon of the 75th anniversary of the birth of television at Alexandra Palace. Before a cake was cut in Studio A upstairs, celebrations began in a room downstairs.

In recent years, that large, ground-floor room has been referred to as the ‘old boxing club’. It would have been big enough to accommodate a boxing ring to which the description refers.


But in that room, 75 years ago, something more constructive and important than men punching each other, happened …

For that room would have been humming with the sound of electronics. Because that was where the Marconi transmitter was housed. The transmitter had the job of encoding (or modulating) the signal, from the studio above, onto a sine wave (carrier). From there, it was sent upwards to the high antenna (mast) above – still there, still used – and broadcast (or radiated) as radio waves.

The Palace authorities have recently agreed that this room shall, once again, be known as The Transmitter Hall. A small amount of progress, but progress nonetheless.


The Alexandra Palace Trust Board occasionally meets there; one Councillor-Board member said she prefers that room to the grandiose Londesborough Room; it seems possible that in future, all Board meetings will be in The Transmitter Hall.

Television at 75

THiS November (2nd) marks the 75th anniversary of the advent of regular public broadcasting from Alexandra Palace.


Former Senior Curator of Television at the National Museum of Photography, Film and Television, Bradford – John Trenouth – has written a piece for the Royal Television Society:


Television at 75


Click above to load the PDF (c. 500 kb) or to Download, Control-click (Mac), Right-click (Windows)

The PMI Report (1991)

20 YEARS ago and following a secret inquiry they had commissioned, Haringey Council received a report into the massive re-building cost over-runs at Alexandra Palace.

The loss of control over spending on re-building had followed the devastating fire of 1980, soon after Haringey assumed control.

[one click on above title will load PDF file; or download file to local drive: Mac: Control-Click, Windows: Right-Click ]

As can be seen, it is stamped 'STRICTLY CONFIDENTIAL'.

One might suppose that this was a private matter, rather than involving a Charitable Trust and millions of pounds of tax payer's money. This reflects the 100% control by politicians.

Like other mistakes at our Charitable Trust, this one was kept kept under wraps for as long as possible. It was Haringey's uncontrolled spending on re-building that laid the foundations for the Alexandra Palace bogus debt that the council has generated.

Supposedly, it now stands at more than £40,000,000. And despite the fact that the local council is the Trustee; that it was taxpayers' money it was spending; and not least, that the re-building was a council-controlled project – Haringey nonetheless tried to disclaim responsibility for the cost overruns and sought indemnification from our Charity's funds (!?) It could define chutzpah.

The Independent newspaper published this article mentioning the PMI report.

The Report is now in the public domain as a 92-page Pdf file, together with comments by Dr. Peter Smith, a Haringey Council employee and the subject of some comment in the Report. To read the 1991 report by Project Management International Plc, click on the title at the top.

Probably the most telling – and timeless – phrase in the report is

The fundamental issue that arises from an examination of the Project documentation is the classic conflict of interest that arises when a client and a design team are one and the same.

The Conclusion says inter alia,

It is clear from those items [project documentation] that we have highlighted in this report that the disastrous outcome of the development was inevitable. The manner in which the project was set up, the inexperience of the Development Team, the lack of Project leadership in an economic sense, the poor performance of the Design and Construction Teams were all significant factors in contributing to the enormous cost overruns.

We have concluded that the prime responsibility for this situation lies with the Alexandra Palace Development Team, the Management Team and the Committee must also share some responsibility for allowing this situation to develop when all the warning signs were being flagged for some considerable time.

We have pointed out that the lack of continuity within the Committee was an important factor in the effectiveness of the decision-making process and allowed the project to continue without proper accountability of the key participants.

We have also tried to point out lessons that can be derived from these events. These can be summarised in the requirement of establishing an independent client monitoring facility which would retain continuity through the duration of a lengthy development (10 years) and make recommendations with no vested interest in the design and construction process.

...

“Securing the future”  The conflict of interest observed in 1991 never abated. The London Borough of Haringey retains full control as the Trustee of our Charity. The 1991 PMI Report marked the first great milestone (tax tombstone?) in the local council's history of stewardship of our Charity

• 1980  Haringey Council pays £1 for our Palace and becomes Trustee; Haringey receives from the GLC a dowry of £8,500,000 for repairs; Palace is fully insured. Building burns down – except for the historic east wing
• 1981  Insurance settlement of £18,500,000 is paid to the local council for re-building. In the next few years, these receipts would generate large interest payments for Haringey. All of it will be spent ... and much more (check current values of these sums with converter on right). 
• 1982  A Public Enquiry is held at the Palace (February to May). The outcome was not released until August 1983
• 1983  (and following) Haringey loses control of spending. The £32,000,000 reconstruction grows to about £67,000,000. Much of the overspend is 'loaned' to our Trust
• 1988  Haringey Council commissions Project Management International (PMI) to investigate how & why Haringey Council overspends on re-building, including on unauthorised contracts
• 1989  (July) Mr I. Harris is appointed official Trust Solicitor and secures his future. The lucrative account is kept through switches of firm; currently with Howard Kennedy
• 1991  The landmark PMI Report (above, link in title). Parts of it were leaked to the press at the time; after FoI request, it is now officially in the public domain
• 1991  Powerhouse consortium wins contract to manage Palace. After 12 months it withdraws, citing: uncertainties about ownership of asset; difficulties in dealing with the Council, Trust & General Manager; servicing the alleged debt of £2m p.a.
• 1993  Alexandra Palace Ski Centre Ltd. v Haringey London Borough Council – Trustees are encouraged to defend a weak, losing case in the High and Appeal Court, to the point of failure. Was the main motivation, removal of a viable business and popular facility (and their lease) in order to clear the way for an attempt to sell the Palace and secure the future?
• 1994  The Anne Cardash/Axon Holdings Affair – the council holds secret negotiations with certain investors whose plans included a casino; the council believes the redevelopment deal could be worth £25m and will secure the future
• 1995  £100,000 bid to Millennium Commission falters, despite £58,000 paid to Shandwick Consultants, which sends David Mellor MP to help prepare bid
• 1996  To secure the future, the Trustees select a developer for our Charity's premises – who quickly turns out to be a bankrupt. See The Independent
• 1996  In a damning indictment, the Letter of the Treasury Solicitor refuses most Trustee claims for indemnification – despite the local council claiming it was not liable for the full alleged debt (?!). Haringey picks up a £50m bill
• 1999  District Auditor Report – an investigation into Objections about items of account that are "contrary to law"
• 2000  The Millennium Bid – £95,000 worth of unauthorised and unbudgeted expenditure by the local council on the “millennium bid”. The Auditors and Treasury Solicitor are concerned about this – confirm that this cost should not be the responsibility of our Charity and accordingly is excluded
• 2003  Debate in Parliament on AP; one MP claims that £100m of public funds have gone into AP. How much has gone to lawyers, managers and consultants?
• 2004  The Trustee's get an Order of Parliament that allows them to sell the entire building on a 125 year lease. Total sale was dubbed an "holistic" approach and was seen as the final solution to secure the future
• 2005  A wealthy former slum landlord, with a passion for a casino and a reputation honed on the asset-stripping of Oxford United Football Club, begins to circle our palace, jaws snapping
• 2006  after an exhaustive process, the Trustees select The Developer-of-Last-Resort and proceed to negotiate the sale of our Palace on a 125-year lease for a rumoured £1.5m, to secure the future
• 2007  In the High Court Charity Commission's permission for sale is quashed. Due to their conduct over sale of the Palace, costs are awarded against the Trustees – Justice Sullivan says the Trustees are the authors of their own misfortune
• 2007  Eight weeks after the court case and only following intervention by the District Auditor, the council committee known as the "Trust Board" serves an eviction notice on their Development Partner
• 2008  The local council's Preferred Partner (Firoka) withdraws from purchase of Palace, later begins to sue our Charity for £6,200,000. The council launches The Walklate investigation (first of three)
• 2009  The council launches a second Walklate enquiry – see The Walklate Reports, left (or upper left); this one quantiifies the loss due to the Licence to Firoka (£1.5m to £2m) and assesses possible liability of the disgraced former General Manager. On 20 July, council formally refuses to discharge any part of the bogus debt (£40,000,000) that council claims our Charity owes to the Trustee (the Council) (!?)
• 2010  Walklate 3 – a third investigation by Martin Walklate into the Licence-to-Firoka. This time, a Complaint against the Trust Board Chairman at the time of the Licence
• 2011  Former Alexandra Palace Trust Board Chairman, Cllr. Charles Adje – also a former Council Leader – is suspended for four months due to misconduct over sale of Palace

• Current: municipal plans are developing to sell up to two-thirds of the Palace to a music operator to secure the future – can anyone see where this is going?

Plus ça change, plus c’est la même chose

It is possible that one day, someone in authority (unlikely the Charity Commission) may begin to notice a pattern emerging.
The above list of events – known to the public – is surely unequalled as a record of incompetence in the London Borough for 30 years. Is there anywhere else that matches this list for consistency of waste, failure or poor advice? Has there been a greater want of strategy, imagination, leadership and conceptual thinking?

AP UN Heritage Proposal

This link will take you to a downloadable PDF file, the latest version the proposal,

That the APPTB, with support from London Borough of Haringey, should apply for UNESCO World Heritage Site recognition for the South-East wing of Alexandra Palace. To include the BBC television studios, control rooms, dressing & transmitter rooms, telecine area, tower offices & transmission tower

The endorsements*:

• The International Committee for the Conservation of the Industrial Heritage TICCIH, Secretary: Stuart Smith OBE
• UN World Heritage site, the 1924 Varberg Radio Station, Sweden CEO: Dr. Lars Johansson
• IET – Institution of Engineering and Technology, formerly the Institution of Electrical Engineers (contact: Alan Berry)
• The Mayor of London (Boris Johnson)
• The MP for Hornsey & Wood Green, Government Minister Lynne Featherstone
• The MP for Tottenham and ex-Minister for Heritage, David Lammy
• Former BBC Chairman, Gavyn Davies
• Former BBC Chairman, Lord Michael Grade
• Former BBC Director General, Greg Dyke
• Broadcaster and author, Lord Melvyn Bragg
• Culture, Media & Sport spokesman, Lord Tim-Clement Jones
• Media Historian, Iain Logie Baird
• AP Television Group Chair: John Thompson
• British Heritage Television group Chair: Martin Allen
• AP Television Society Chair: Simon Vaughan
• Hornsey Historical Society Chair: Keith Fawkes

Please click on the link (top) for more information. Contact information contained in the pdf.


* [last updated 5 December 2011]

Transcript of Haringey Council Standards Committee Determination Panel Hearing 2011 March 30-31

THE link (above, title) will produce a saveable, searchable, PDF file of >600kb and 100 pages and is a Transcript of the Hearing of Haringey Council Standards Committee Determination Panel Hearing 2011 March 30-31.

Councillor Charles Adje, Chairman of the Alexandra Palace Trust Board, was Found to have Breached the Member's Code of Conduct. He brought the council into disrepute, by failing to share a crucial piece of professional advice with his fellow Trustees:

This Briefing Note strongly advised against any [further] inducement to a developer, Firoka, and argued that no action need be taken in response to threats of withdrawal by Firoka. This document was suppressed and the then General Manager was pressured into producing a document – containing wholly contrary advice – that did go before the Trust Board.

This led to the extraordinarily generous Licence-to-Firoka, including huge subsidy from the taxpayer and a direct loss to our charity of between £1,500,000 and £2,000,000 (probably more).

Ex-Trustee Adje was suspended as councillor for four months by the Standards Hearing and he is required to undergo training on his return to Haringey Council. (Can any amount of training substitute for integrity and character?)

The transcript has only become available in late June 2011.

Haringey Council's attempt to sell our Charity's asset to Firoka: the final chapter?

Haringey Council : Standards Committee

Determination Hearing into Complaint about a Member

Civic Centre – probably committee rooms 1& 2

10:00 AM 30th & 31st March 2011

Hearing into Complaint SC002/0910:

• former leader of Haringey Council for two years

• former chairman of Alexandra Palace Board of Trustees

• former Executive Cabinet Member for Finance

• current Councillor (and Trustee, like all Haringey Councillors)

• Key officer advice against licence (briefing note to chairman), withheld from other Trustees

• Promotion of premature licence to property developer (Firoka, i.e. Firoz Kassam);

• Premature occupation of our Charity's premises;

• Huge public subsidy to a private company;

• High Court ruling of 5 October 2007, quashed Charity Commission Order & stalled sale;

• Firoka later evicted by council in early 2008;

• Loss to our Charitable Trust estimated at £1.5m to £2m;

• Conflicts of interest abound

Haringey Council Standards Committee will be convening a Hearing on 30 March at the Civic Centre after an investigation lasting nearly 12 months, following Complaint against a Member while acting as a Trustee on the Alexandra Palace Trust Board. The Complaint follows two council investigations ("the Walklate Reports") into the 'development' of the Licence-to-Firoka.

Firoka were given premature permission to run Alexandra Palace and were eventually evicted by the council, well after the High Court quashed the Charity Commission's Order, and stalled the 125 year Lease.

During the Firoka occupation, under the Licence, not only did all our charity's trading profits go to Firoka, but on top and as financial inducement to the property developer, the council contributed a huge subsidy to the private company by way of seconded staff and a long list expenses – all met by Haringey taxpayers.

Losses to our charity as a result of the Licence were calculated in the "Walklate 2" investigation to amount to between £1.5m and £2m.

The Hearing is likely to be open to the public but a decision will be taken about that on the morning of the first day. The report ("Walklate 3") by independent investigator, Martin Walklate, is likely to be made public.

• Ally Pally fireworks cancelled

THE November Fireworks display at Alexandra Palace is probably the biggest in north London. I enjoy it as do tens of thousands of others. The Ally Pally Trust Board meeting last week took the decision to suspend it, in order to save c.£100,000. This was the right and necessary decision, however the suspension does raise other aspects.

The trust is instead to write begging letters to see if funds for fireworks can come from somewhere else (other than trust funds/council tax). If some commercial sponsor is happy to see their cash go up in smoke in the name of publicity, then good luck to them. But it would be wrong for our Charity to seek funds from any kind of public purse when restraint in tax spending is the order of the day and front-line services are endangered.

To justify the difficult decision, reference was made to the fact that to continue the fireworks would cause a loss to the Charity.

It was pleasing to hear this status recognized.

Every north Londoner reading this is, in law, a beneficiary of the Alexandra Palace Charitable Trust (NB: not necessarily a resident of Haringey Borough).

Haringey Council-Trustee has run our Charity – as a semi-autonomous municipal department – since 1980. In truth, our Trust has not been in a financial position to host the fireworks for some years. Any cost overruns have been and would be added to the overall deficit held by the council.

The deficit – much of it bogus – is now more than £40,000,000: this is money that the Trustee (Haringey Council) claim that our Trust owes to Haringey Council (the Trustee). This is accountancy, but not as we know it. A full Council meeting last year decided not to discharge this 'debt' (?!).

The Board chaired by Pat Egan has acted in the interests of our Charity, but some of his Board colleagues have sought to score political points and somehow blame the Coalition government for this particular 'cut'. How little some of them know about the 30-year history of council-control and management of our heritage. When the newbies speak, believing our charity is a party-political extension of the council debating chamber, they demonstrate how unfit politicians are to be running a major Charitable Trust.

Conflict-of-interest underlies everything that the Trust Board does, but for once, the Trust Board has made a big decision exclusively in the interests of the Charity.

A nod to the charitable status may represent a genuine change of heart by the council. It may just be coincidence that, when a decision is made that is high-profile and likely to be unpopular with the public, it is linked to the word Charity.

But the decision also illustrates how the board/council is able to pick and choose when to invoke the 'charitable' status, depending on circumstances.

Charitable legal status is an inconvenient truth for Haringey. In the past, little mention was made of it. When the council tried to sell the whole building to their "preferred development partner" (the rapacious developer Firoka) for £1.5m., this status was largely ignored. The sale of our Charity’s main asset (Ally Pally) for purely commercial purposes, was most likely unlawful.

Charity was little mentioned in a classic example of conflict-of-interest, when the council first applied to itself for a gambling licence in our charity's premises, and then awarded itself a gambling premises licence at Alexandra Palace in April 2008.

Two years earlier the Trust Solicitor tried to square this circle in an attempt to get gambling into our Charity. He wrote to the Charity Commission: "Casino use does fall within the objects of the Charity as a recreational activity” (on this basis, another licensed activity, lap dancing, should also qualify. (Lap dancing could also be seen as recreational, if not wholly charitable). The background was, that the council had secretly promised permission for a casino to Firoka in the Lease and the lawyer's representation was an attempt to justify that clause. The Charity Commission went along with it but were later pole axed in the High Court over their farcical consultation.

As long as our Charity is controlled by conflicted local councillors, it will be impossible for the Trust Board to make good decisions consistently or even most of the time. The best way to deal with conflicts-of-interest is not to have them in the first place. The only viable, sustainable future for Ally Pally has to be governance by expert, undivided, independent Trustees.

Alexandra Palace Charitable Trust Board: drifting rudderless, on a tide of consultants

THE chronically dysfunctional Alexandra Palace Trust Board is in danger of squandering the goodwill it generated at the time of the Stakeholder workshop last October.

Then, the momentum was towards some form of long-overdue independence for governance (many aspects of existing governance arrangements were thoroughly criticised in the two Walklate Reports).

But in the next five months there has been little except drift. We hear the same lame mantra repeated "nothing is ruled in or out." Well, it is high time that the ultimate, independent board option was ruled in and continuing malign council-control ruled out!

Part of the drift can be explained by the fact the members of our Trust's Board – all politicians – are in election-mode. This by itself is an indictment of Charity Trustees and no way to run a railroad, let alone a major Charity of historical importance. The Chairman of the Statutory Advisory committee (David Liebeck) is angry at the time being wasted and recently remarked that it's long overdue that the politicians walked down the hill, away from AP and back to the Civic Centre!

And the time lost is not just since the Stakeholder Workshop. After the humiliating slap-down in 2007 by the High Court, it took two and half years before the policy of "holistic" sale for property development was finally formally abandoned.

That 15 year-old policy of flog-it-off, was the only strategy the Board ever came up with which enjoyed *continuity*. It was the only major strategy pursued with will and vigour.

But it also represented despair, a bankruptcy of ideas; was vandalism, an abrogation of responsibility and was an unmitigated disaster, burning millions of our money. And every last aspect of that sale attempt was consulted upon, heavily.

The recent drift also reflects abiding themes of this Board which are (a) a general inability to make coherent, effective decisions and (b) when a significant or strategic decision is made, it is often wrong spectacularly. Most notably, the decision to sell our Charity's asset (the Palace) to a former slum landlord.

Habitual delegation of responsibility

THE Board normally delegates its powers and functions to others; the Board would say that is practical and necessary. But it is also due to political fractures, a short-term outlook, a lack of ability, the infrequency of meetings and general inattention.

Powers and functions devolve to consultants or to council employees. In practice, this has meant our London landmark (which could be a prime tourist attraction) is run as a local municipal department. This has led to trouble, with palace management in the past operating in the shadows as a quasi-autonomous fiefdom, mainly for the benefit of its managers, their cronies and legions of consultants. The public, who pay for this charade, is often treated with contempt.

Due to lack of time and lack of on-board expertise, this Charity Trust Board is probably more dependent on external advisers and consultants than any other comparable Board. The many hangers-on often have an agenda separate from the officially stated one, and they are keen to maintain the status quo. The Board has been poorly advised in the past and there needs to be a clear-out of the hangers-on.

Alexandra Palace has been a gold-mine for lawyers and other consultants. During the sale-to-Firoka, much of the official flannel – and attempts to defend against criticism – was delegated to an expensive PR company (Lexington Communications, supposedly expert in crisis management).

The Board avoids addressing it own fundamental flaws and spends too much time considering half-baked ideas. In order to avoid responsibility and taking decisions, the board delegated studies about its own governance to an outside accounting firm. This is another indictment and demonstrates paralysis. Down the years, consultants have grown rich while the building deteriorates. And still the over-consulting goes on.

The Board's eagerness to delegate and its reluctance to take responsibility has been costly, confusing and corrosive.

Mixing up trading with governance

THE Board is slipping back into its well-known, old bad habits. It now intends to delegate not only much of its strategic role to its wholly-owned trading company, but even the Charitable Functions. And this with the blessing of the Charity Commission, itself heavily criticised by Justice Sir Jeremy Sullivan for its unlawful role in the attempt to sell our heritage.

The proper role for the trading company is managing trading operations and generating funds for our Charity. Mixing this up with governance is a recipe for more trouble.

Board members often make sense on an individual basis. But in the presence of Haringey Council bureaucrats, they tend to fall prey to the Jedi Mind Trick: "the palace is best kept under full council control". Trustee: "yes, the palace is best under council control". Jedi Master: "the council always knows best" Trustee: "yes, the council knows best!"

Most observers recognise that the fundamental conflict of interest between the roles of councillor and trustee is irreconcilable. For a while, everyone was repeating that governance needed reform. But nothing changes. This is a cast-iron guarantee of continuing strife.

The current Roadshow in the Borough's libraries is no substitute for reform of governance. Unless that nettle is grasped with both hands by the Board/Council, an opportunity will have been missed and we can expect more drift.

Some of the individual members of the trust board are well-meaning and well-intentioned. Collectively, they lack expertise, competence, professional qualifications and Charitable Trust experience. Most of all, they lack vision and leadership. It has been this way for 30 years and the results are plain to see: little except neglect and decay.

The public and beneficiaries deserve more for their money.

Official: Haringey Council stops flogging Alexandra Palace on eBay

THE COUNCIL has decided not to sell Alexandra Palace. I, and I'm sure many others, will welcome this decision. But it's worth pausing to reflect on its meaning. This volte face is not just a signal to would-be property-developers and it's not only something that's been called for, for a long time.

The writing has been on the wall for Haringey Council's sale policy since October 2007, when the High Court quashed the last sell-off attempt.

The council-controlled Board isn't exactly nimble in adjusting to changed circumstances. That it took the Trust Board two and a quarter years to come to this decision, is further evidence of the unsuitability of the current governance regime. After 15-odd years of the Flog-it policy, the climb-down shows how misguided was the previous politicians' policy. The Board has been dull, unwieldy and cumbersome. Anyone would think the local authority were running our Charity as a council department. Oh, hang on, they are!

The fitting failure for the "Flog-it" formula, followed the fiasco of Firoka's final flight. But that was in August 2008 – nearly 18 months ago.

The time taken to acknowledge reality also illustrates key features of the Council-Board: inertia, bureaucracy, unapologetic, unresponsiveness and an unreadyness to be seen to be wrong. During the Firoka-era and its aftermath, approximately one third of Trust Board time was spent hiding its most recent horrors; another third was spent rectifying older wrong decisions that had surfaced – and only one third of their time was focused on formulating fresh muck-ups.

The Trust (in truth, the council majority group) alludes to their inviolable responsibility for spending precious public money carefully. Such duty and dedication might be praiseworthy and even credible, were it not for the evidence: under 100%-pure council-control, the Trust has been a furnace taxpayer's-cash for 30 years and stoked by politicians. Is the view of the council that its their sacred right to burn our money?

How much has the previous, long-held Flog-it policy cost us? I would have thought the waste of our taxes runs into many millions and not just in direct costs.

By way of direct sale costs, there have been surveyors, a PR company, hoards of legal advisers (with questionable 'advice') and various sundry consultant hangers-on. The ill-judged Licence-to-Firoka alone cost a minimum of £1.5m and probably nearer £3m (council tax-payers actually subsidised a private company to this tune). If only the millions burned up in 'sale' expenses could have been spent more wisely and usefully. Independent trustees could surely do no worse than the council – and in all probability, do a great deal better!

All along, there has been the contentious vicious-circle of the self-reinforcing council-subsidy.

But perhaps the greatest cost of all of the Flog-it policy has been the opportunity cost and the chances for a better future – squandered for 15 and more years. It was a self-imposed planning blight.

The woeful neglect of our Charity's main asset (the building) has meant not only that the Trustee has been in Breach of Trust, but that the eventual bill for repairs will be bigger thanks to council carelessness. Normally, Trustees have an onerous responsibility. In a perversion of real Charity governance, Haringey indemnifies Trustees (i.e. itself) so that no individual Trustee bears personal liability for poor collective decisions. Individual responsibility disappears and we end up with a diffuse and largely meaningless collective accountability. Apparently no one is responsible for the millions in cash burnt up so far.

Towards the end of the Firoka episode, the council was practically begging one of Britain's richest men to buy our heritage for a rumoured £1.5m. Even though the reckless sale was eventually thwarted, the council still managed to press a huge subsidy into the hands of the company he controlled. It always surprised me that a Labour council would – in effect – try to give the crown jewels of our Borough to a former slum-landlord and developer-of-last-resort.

Haringey's 'preferred partner' (Firoka) – most carefully selected after exhaustive advertising and tendering – now sues the Trust/council (that's us, folks) for £6.2 million. The council record of disaster over our Charity's asset is long, deep and consistent. It began in the 1980s when they lost all control over rebuilding costs after the 1980 fire. The long-term Flog-it policy wasted yet more. If Haringey remain in charge, it is likely there will be further poor decisions.

It has been proved time and again that municipal control of our Charity represents chronic, systemic, failure. There may now be some attempts to interest developers in bits of the palace – attempts that are likely to fail. The council seems not to understand that no one wants to touch the place while the bureaucrats and politicians remain in control and the future is uncertain.

The notion of a multi-story car-park at the back has apparently been dropped by the Trustees. This half-baked scheme was an example of the piecemeal approach from a dilatory Board lacking a credible, coherent and continuous plan for our great building. The key issue facing the Board is root-and-branch governance reform and this ought to come before all else.

A positive interpretation for the abandonment of the flog-it policy, is that the council sees that as a necessary step to having independent trustees. One can only hope that if and when the council finally brings itself to 'admit one' independent Trustee, that it will not be under conditions that are either impossible, that no one would wish to take up or that any genuine independent trustee would soon tire of.

Meaningful governance – that could lead to AP being everything it could be – has to be more than being expected to read half-inch thick council officer reports and turning up for board meetings. Will the inertia continue or can the current chairman break the mould? There seems to be some reason to hope. Our palace is currently pointed in the right direction, but progress is slow.

Possibly no significant decisions on AP will be made before the next council election in May. Which in itself is yet another reason why the governance model (of transitory local politicians) is chronically flawed. New board members – who will be rotating politicians – will blame the old ones and so may continue the lack of continuity.

The best decisions the council could make now are: (1) to discharge the £40,000,000 of largely bogus 'debt' (2) to agree an annual grant for park maintenance [circa £750,000] (3) to phase-out council cash/control and (4) to phase-in a hand-over to a *largely* independent board of trustees, comprised of expert and experienced, committed and competent, enthusiastic men and women.