At today's Westmorland and Furness Council Full Council meeting, the council's Cabinet member for Communities, Customer Services, Culture and Communications, Councillor Helen Chaffey, gave a statement update on the closure of Barrow Market and the future of the market and Forum.
Councillor Chaffey's statement in full:
"Further to a meeting on Monday this week with members of Furness Locality Board, I felt it was important to take this opportunity today to update all members regarding the action taken in the last week to close the Barrow market building, resulting in market tenants having to vacate units in the Mall area.
"This is a desperately unfortunate situation and I want to provide further details about the decision, as well as providing reassurances about the support being offered to market traders and some of the proposals moving forward.
"The facts are that recent heavy rainfall has exacerbated leaks in the market hall roof, resulting in water ingress in some parts of the building.
"As the building is known to contain asbestos, officers acted immediately to safely contain the issue and commissioned specialist surveys from an independent assessor.
"A full risk assessment was undertaken to understand the scale of any risk and any action we should take as a council.
"In addition, sample tests of the water ingress were undertaken. One of those samples confirmed the presence of asbestos.
"This was not in an occupied area of the building, however it stressed the risk of exposure if there were any further roof leaks that could potentially start to affect units in the Mall occupied by market tenants.
"For these reasons the specialist contractor recommended a full closure of the Mall units to prevent any potential risk to market tenants, their customers and our staff still working in those areas of the market building.
"The risk assessment was clear that the council has had proper management and monitoring processes in place, but the deteriorating condition of the structure, the prospect of further wet weather and leaking roof meant it would be increasingly difficult to safely manage the risks.
"I wanted to highlight the concluding paragraph in the final ‘Professional Opinion’ section.
"It says: 'Due to the building's condition seemingly worsening (as deduced from our experience and conversations with Westmorland and Furness Council), with the roof structure continually failing and the ability to cause further structural breaches, along with the widespread presence of high-risk asbestos-containing materials throughout the building, it would be prudent to cease trading in the market hall and units contained within.
We do not believe all the risks the building poses regarding asbestos can be adequately managed in its current condition without significant improvements to the building.'
"Keeping our tenants, their customers and our staff safe was our overriding priority. Once in possession of this professional opinion, we moved decisively and quickly to act on the risk assessment recommendations, closing the market and moving tenants out of the building.
"While this was undoubtedly the right thing to do, we recognize this has understandably caused a great deal of shock and upset.
"We also appreciate that people have lots of questions and concerns. We know this has been a difficult time and that traders have suffered a significant blow.
"We have been supporting traders since last week, our staff have been working alongside the likes of the BID and volunteers to help move stock out of the Mall units, arranging immediate compassionate payments and inviting traders to provide information to assist in understanding and assessing the financial impact.
"We are continuing to work closely with local traders as plans progress for temporary market accommodation on council-owned land at the rear of the market hall.
"This will be on site within 4-6 weeks and is the quickest way of helping these businesses get back to trading.
"In terms of what happens beyond that point, I believe it would also be helpful to provide a brief update on the options for the future of the Forum and market hall buildings, due to be discussed at Cabinet in March, including possible demolition.
"Market traders, Forum user groups and other key stakeholders, including members of the Team Barrow partnership, the local MP and local councillors on Furness Locality Board, had already been briefed about the demolition proposals before the roof leaks were discovered.
"In the event demolition emerged as the preferred option in March, the original intention was for market traders to stay in the units in the Mall until around September this year, following which the demolition works could begin.
"The council had proposed to use those six months to establish a new town centre ‘market village’, ready for traders to move into before any demolition commenced.
"We are still working to set up the market village to provide market traders with improved accommodation as part of the ‘meanwhile’ offer in the town centre, as part of the Heart of Barrow programme.
"We already know from our early Community Conversation engagement with local residents and stakeholders that people are excited by the prospect of the long-term Heart of Barrow transformation - but they want to see something start to happen, they want us to ‘get on with it’.
"The council understands and recognises the importance of the Forum and market, as cultural, entertainment, retail and community spaces. This important role has been clearly reinforced through feedback in the Community Conversation engagement.
"The early work being done on the Heart of Barrow vision recognizes culture as a catalyst for a revitalised town centre, with a diverse mix of buildings, housing, public spaces, and community assets. We will be consulting with the community as these plans are refined and I see cultural venues very much being part of these ambitions.
"I can assure Councillor Burns, who raised this concern at Monday’s Locality Board meeting, that I too want to ensure young people have somewhere in Barrow where they can perform their dance and theatre shows.
"While all these long-term plans are being developed, it will be important to ensure Barrow’s town centre has a meaningful ‘meanwhile offer’, that appeals to all generations, to bridge the gap between now and the completion of the full plan.
"Options being explored, alongside the new ‘market village’, include an enhanced programme of events and activities in the town centre, grant funding to improve existing facilities and performance spaces to support many of the groups that have previously used the Forum.
"If demolition of the Forum/market buildings is agreed, there could also be the option to use the cleared site for a new cultural/entertainment/food and drink facility for Barrow.
"Examples of similar concepts have been successfully established at places like Salt and Tar at Bootle, STACK at Seaburn or Plazagarden at Gateshead. These are designed to be temporary installations, but capable of hosting entertainment, events, markets and music concerts.
"Such a facility could be designed around Barrow’s immediate needs and could potentially be enjoyed for several years while the longer-term transformation of the town centre is delivered. Following any demolition and clearing of the site, something like this would be relatively quick to establish.
"While decisions on demolition and the expanded meanwhile offer won’t be made until next month, I wanted to share this update today to reassure that this is the sort of approach Heart of Barrow is exploring - that the programme recognises the vital importance of integrating both a market and cultural venues in the future vision for Barrow and that the council is working hard to support market traders following the sudden closure of the Mall units last week.
"I also want to reassure that we will continue to provide regular updates on both the market traders’ support, and the wider Heart of Barrow work, as we move forward.''