Don’t panic, this isn’t about US politics. Following information received it’s an update to something I wrote back in 2020.
As you will understand, I’m sure, what I’d promised for Monday, ‘Things Are Never So Bad That They Can’t Get Worse’, will now be delayed. (And anyway, I’d forgotten that Monday is a Bank Holiday.)
◊
RECAP
In December 2020 I put out Lucky Gwynedd – More ‘Investors’! Scroll down to ‘The Phoenix Hotel, Abersoch’ and you’ll get the background to what you’re going to read.
In a nutshell, chancers from N W England had bought the old White Hall Hotel in Abersoch and had big plans, expensive plans. I wrote in that earlier piece:
This establishment closed in 2004 or 2005, inevitably fell into disrepair, and was eventually demolished in the early part of 2016. In the report I’ve linked to we read, “A 40-bedroom hotel and spa will now be built in its place and is set to open in 2018”.
Well, 2018 came and went. It’s now 2026, and it’s still not finished.
Two of the principals behind the project were: Charles Marshall Openshaw and Anthony John Hayton. Each had a string of failed companies to their name. I mentioned one of Openshaw’s companies, Rooftop Solutions Ltd, going bust in 2012 and owing almost half a million quid.
And yet, it seemed that Messrs Openshaw and Hayton were welcomed by Cyngor Gwynedd and certain agencies in Corruption Bay as bona fide investors with a string of glittering successes to their names.
Let’s start the update proper with a piece that appeared last July in Boutique Hotelier. The property is now known as Tŷ Gwyn. The article mentions a series of delays, and suggests that the original plan may have been to lease or sell the individual rooms.
This of course is a model we’ve encountered before, perhaps most notably with con man Gavin Lee Woodhouse, from Yorkshire. He bought run-down hotels from Llandudno to Tenby, and was the inspiration behind the Afan Valley Adventure Resort which now employs thousands. Or maybe not.
To jog your memories, here’s something I put out around the time I was writing about Woodhouse.
Labour got hammered earlier this month in the Senedd elections, but you’ll be delighted to hear that Skates and Irranca-Davies were both re-elected. No doubt Plaid’s new team will be seeking advice from these financial whizz-kids.
In the Boutique Hotelier article, you’ll see that the sooper-dooper new “hotel and apartment complex” at Abersoch will be run by Bespoke Hotels of Warrington.
The first two loans came from an outfit in Preston called E3C Solutions Ltd, 14.07.2022. Since renamed Quarry Rock Solutions Ltd. Another two from Gemini Finance Ltd, 23.08.2022, another back-street lender, this time in Liverpool.
All four loans, against the White House Hotel in Abersoch, were settled 05.04.2023. Then four more loans were taken out. Let’s look at the new loans.
The first, 14.03.2023 – three weeks before the first four loans were paid off – was with Crossbaron Ltd of Bolton. A company owned by – Anil Pitalia! Always nice when you can lend yourself money. Was this used to pay off the earlier loans?
I can only assume the FoI request went to the self-styled ‘Welsh Government’ rather than to the DBW. In which case, the response is, strictly speaking, true, even though the DBW is controlled by the ‘Welsh Government’.
Was it a bit naughty not referring the inquirer to the DBW? Anyway . . .
Anil Pitalia has also branched out into charity work. Which always warms the cockles of my cynical old heart. His particular charity is The Pitalia Charitable Trust – previously The Visionary Charitable Trust – bringing succour to those in distress in the mythic Englandandwales . . . also India.
At the risk of sounding unkind, the objectives look a bit, well, pro forma; like they were downloaded from the internet. Or found in a solicitor’s drawer.
Turning to the finances, for the period ended 05.10.2022 we see a huge leap in the charity’s income.
This is accounted for in the accounts filed with the Charity Commission as you see below. Wasn’t that nice of him! Though I suppose it might be reasonable to ask, why so much in one dollop? Why so little before or since?
And perhaps, where did it come from?
So, I got to wondering what might explain this outpouring of charitable zeal. And the timeframe is interesting: Pitalia paid over four million pounds into his charity around the time he paid off loans and took on new ones.
He was a busy boy in 2022/23.
Whatever, and moving on . . . I couldn’t find a website for this charity, but the accounts filed with the Charity Commission for the years following the arrival of that huge sum tell us this:
Little seems to be going out to worthy causes; the charity could even be mistaken for an investment vehicle. But if so, then what might it be investing in?
◊
THE DEVELOPMENT BANK OF WALES
However we got here, the fact is that Anil Pitalia, through his company Abersoch Development Ltd, has obtained loans from the Development Bank of Wales, a body owned by the ‘Welsh Government’.
Over the years, I’ve been critical of the DBW, and ‘Welsh Government’ funding in general. Getting good publicity often seems to be more important than acting wisely; or of doing background checks on the companies and individuals seeking funding.
This approach has led to so many mistakes over the years. Earlier I mentioned Gavin Lee Woodhouse, con man and instigator of the Afan Valley Adventure Resort. One of the properties he bought was Caer Rhun.
And the ‘Welsh Government’ agreed a tourism grant of £500,000. That’s a grant, not a loan. Nothing to be repaid. (Though it was later insisted that no money was ever handed over.)
I’m convinced that the word is out among a certain class of ‘investor’ that Wales is a soft touch for getting your hands on public money. All you have to do is buy some old pile, send a press release to the media, promise investment/jobs/visitors, have your photo taken with a politician or two, and wait for the money to roll in.
Such people will inevitably be attracted when they hear of organisations desperate to get money out the door as proof they’re doing their job, coupled with an almost total absence of serious checks.
With the result that Welsh public funding that could have been better used will be wasted.
As for the Development Bank of Wales itself, I went to the accounts, to see what I could turn up. Not easy because what’s filed with Companies House (or certainly what appears on the CH website) is a sometimes messy photocopy.
But if I’m reading it right, then profit for the last financial year was half of the previous year. (Full accounts available here in pdf format.)
I believe the Development Bank of Wales is a dysfunctional body. I also believe that description extends to the grant-awarding system throughout the administration.
◊
CONCLUSION
My belief is that a competent and legitimate businessman or businesswoman coming to Wales with a viable project should be able to find funding from the usual commercial sources.
Too many of those who’ve been awarded loans or grants, or been given publicly-owned land, and other forms of help over the years, have been out-and-out crooks.
But even when the recipients of funding are genuine, there’s always the danger that money given to be spent on a project in Wales will be lost through some intra-group dealing and end up somewhere else.
The ‘Welsh Government’ and the Development Bank of Wales should therefore focus on funding identifiably Welsh businesses and Welsh entrepreneurs, especially young entrepreneurs, operating solely within Wales.
Because building up an indigenous Welsh economy must be a priority. Also, building on what we already have, such as agriculture. Will the new Plaid Cymru administration do better than its Labour predecessor in this regard? Not a hope.
Because Plaid’s SMs know little and care even less about business. And anyway, when you’re saving a planet, while simultaneously fighting fascism and defending women with penises from genocide, you don’t want distractions like the economy, and jobs.
PLEASE APPRECIATE THAT I GET SENT MORE INFORMATION AND LEADS THAN I CAN USE. I TRY TO RESPOND TO EVERYONE WHO CONTACTS ME BUT I CANNOT POSSIBLY USE EVERY BIT OF INFORMATION I’M SENT. DIOLCH YN FAWR
♦
I had planned another piece on May’s Senedd elections, but my plans changed when I learned of a big investment promised for the capital of the Cheshire Riviera . . . which the indigenes insist on calling Abersoch.
To accompany this new story I have a big update on Llanbedr International Airport complemented by reports from Gwynfryn, and Bryn Llys (aka ‘Snowdon Summit View’).
Verily, our cup runneth over!
♦
FLY BOYS
I’ve written about Llanbedr Airfield a few times before. Try ‘Come fly with me‘, from January.
The Llanbedr site was bought by the Welsh Development Agency 31 March, 2006 from the Ministry of Defence, for £700,000. Here’s the title document. It was then leased, 31 May, 2012, for 125 years, for £887,000 plus VAT, to Llanbedr Airfield Estates LLP (since renamed Snowdonia Aerospace LLP). Here’s the title document.
Now that might seem like a good bit of business, but it’s not. In fact, it’s one of those deals that makes a mockery of devolution.
Those clowns in Corruption Bay were forced to buy a site they didn’t want, and for which they had no use. They then had to pay for repairs and maintenance, keeping the place spruce until their masters in London produced favoured tenants.
Llanbedr Airfield. Click to enlarge. Click X top right to return to blog
As for the lease, it was paid for by the Ministry of Defence and The Welsh Ministers. Though for some reason only the MoD is shown on the title document. We need to go to the Companies House entry for Snowdonia Aerospace to learn of our generosity.
So we’ve paid twice for a white elephant. But it gets worse!
Snowdonia National Park has approved a by-pass for the village of Llanbedr, which will of course run close to the airfield. We read in this Cambrian News report: “Llanbedr, which lies between Barmouth and Harlech, suffers severe tailbacks during the height of summer with people visiting Shell Island.”
Which means that a great deal of public money is to be spent causing environmental damage in order to encourage more traffic to a foreign-owned campsite! What happened to environmentally conscious Wales?
I’ve got a better idea – let’s get rid of ‘Shell Island’. It caters for campers and caravans, providing everything they need, including a shop and a bar. It contributes little to the wider area other than petrol and diesel fumes.
Alternatively, seeing as the Workman family, owners of ‘Shell Island’, will be the main beneficiaries of this by-pass, shall we ask them to make a financial contribution?
But it’not just ‘Shell Island’. (Correct name, Mochras.) There are also locally-owned caravan sites marring the littoral. Many granted consent in the days of Merioneth County Council, when men of a ‘fraternal’ bent would shake hands and grant each other planning permission.
In this BBC piece we read, “Supporters of the 1.5km (one mile) bypass have claimed it will slash journey times by an hour, and boost investment by improving access to the Snowdonia Aerospace Centre, a drone-testing facility at the former RAF Llanbedr airfield.”
The implication has to be that motorists experience one-hour traffic hold-ups in tiny Llanbedr, which is utter bollocks. I suggest the ‘supporters’ saying that may have inhaled too much traffic fumes, or something.
The second part hints at another reason for the by-pass. Though maybe I’m wrong to call it a by-pass, for a recent comment to an earlier piece of mine about Llanbedr airfield says: “And yes the Welsh Government is funding the Llanbedr bypass, which legally can’t be called a bypass as it has to be an access road to the airfield to qualify for grants. And no it doesn’t go to the airfield!”.
Which suggests that a lot of people are being misled, even screwed, over Llanbedr airfield.
This source also wrote (of the blog): “Just come across this article – excellent stuff. No mention though of RAF Brawdy in Pembrokeshire which the same people as at Llanbedr ran for a while before dissolving the company with outstanding charges against the Welsh Government.”
The company was Brawdy Business Park Ltd (Co No 3431529). And again, it took over a redundant military installation, promised lots of jobs, received grants and loans, created few jobs, folded the company and buggered off.
Will the same thing happen at Llanbedr?
Brawdy Business Park. Google image from Aug, 2011. Click to enlarge and click on X in top right to return to blog
Though ‘buggered off’ is not strictly true. For while the company, Brawdy Business Park Ltd, was certainly struck off in April 2013, the presence of those involved lingered on. Indeed, it lingers still.
And as Brawdy Business Park sank, lead director Lee John Paul transferred to Ocean Park Investments.
The Brawdy site is now owned by Compass Point Estates LLP. Here’s the title document and plan. And guess who we find as Compass Point Estates directors? – Lee John Paul and Ocean Park Investments. Also, Putney Investments of Queensland, Australia, operating out of the Isle of Man.
‘Now you see us, now you don’t – but we’re still here under different names!’
And that’s what we see at Llanbedr. Where we have Snowdonia Aerospace LLP, which you’ll remember received the loan from the ‘Welsh Government’ to, er, take out a lease with the ‘Welsh Government’; and since October 2019 we’ve also had Snowdonia Aerospace Estates LLP.
And who do we find as directors of the new company? Who else? – Lee John Paul, Ocean Park Investments, and Putney Investments.
Compass Point Estates has made two loans to Snowdonia Aerospace Estates. But why should that be necessary with the same people controlling both? (Because on October 1 Lee John Paul and Putney Investments took control of the two LLPs.)
My concerns are due to the fact that LLPs can be tricky beasts. “Partners in an LLP are not personally liable when the business cannot pay its debts; instead, their liability is limited to the capital they have invested into the LLP.”
So, if there’s no capital left in the LLP to which the loan was made then, when it folds, and everything is claimed by the new LLP, the clowns of Corruption Bay might struggle to get our money back.
Shall we see a repeat of Brawdy Business Park at Llanbedr, where the same people end up owning everything but under different labels?
Watch this space.
♦
THE PHOENIX HOTEL, ABERSOCH
I’ve written about Abersoch more than once. I wish I didn’t have to. I wish it was still the sleepy Llŷn fishing village it once was, but it has been ‘discovered’.
By the ‘Cheshire Set’. Which includes those who’ve made a few bob in Liverpool or Manchester and want to flaunt it with a big house and a Range Rover in the drive in an upmarket Cheshire village. One of those communities where new developments are discouraged to the point of being almost forbidden.
Which in turn results in houses being built in north east Wales and along the A55 to accommodate those who can’t afford the entrance fee to the Cheshire Set.
But we are going to focus on the site of the former White House Hotel.
This establishment closed in 2004 or 2005, inevitably fell into disrepair, and was eventually demolished in the early part of 2016. In the report I’ve linked to we read, “A 40-bedroom hotel and spa will now be built in its place and is set to open in 2018”.
Image: NorthWalesLive. Click to enlarge. Click on X at top right to return to blog.
The owner was named as Broomco, of Surrey. At 31 December, 2019 the unaudited Broomco accounts show that money owed by debtors was exceeded by money owed to creditors to the tune of some £250,000.
Broomco’s major asset would appear to be ‘freehold property’ valued at £1,236,224. Which is presumably the site of the former White House Hotel.
The promised hotel and spa did not materialise, but now other exciting plans have emerged for the site. Well, obviously, I’m not excited, but some people seem to be getting worked up over the proposal. Here’s a report from the Daily Post website.
There’s a lot of information in the report; yet despite that, or maybe because of it, it still raises many questions. Or maybe it’s just me.
Anyway, some dude called Charlie Openshaw has rocked up, and we read: “Mr Openshaw says his firms are both contractors and developers. He says the developer is Providence Gate and the contractor is CL Projects.”
What can we learn of these companies?
Let’s start with Providence Gate. There are five companies of that name, all formed between August and November this year. All with the same three directors; Charles Marshall Openshaw, Anthony John Hayton, and William James Abram. Being so new there’s obviously little information available, though Providence Gate Developments Ltd has already taken out loans with Crowd Property Ltd.
Turning to the other company mentioned by Charlie Openshaw, C L Projects Facilities Management Ltd, we see that this company has a long and glorious history, stretching back to its formation in July 2017, when it was known as C L Chorley Ltd.
The name changed in April this year when the three musketeers climbed aboard. Until then it was filing as a dormant company. Openshaw, Hayton and Abram are joined around the mahogany boardroom table by Robert Wood, also recruited in April.
So, to all intents and purposes, C L Projects Facilities Management Ltd is another company formed in 2020.
Which seems straightforward enough – a group of property investors spot an opening and come up with an imaginative plan. But it’s not that simple. Is it ever?
To begin with, and according to the Land Registry, the site is still owned by Broomco. So either Charlie Openshaw and his mates are working with Broomco, or else they are yet to buy the site from that company. Here’s the title document and plan.
The shareholders in Providence Gate Group Holdings Ltd are shown in the panel below, information that comes from the Confirmation Statement made to Companies House on 30 November. Just days before the big publicity splash.
Providence Gate Group Holdings Ltd shareholders. Click to enlarge. Click X in top right to return to blog
Clearly, Openshaw and Hayton have other companies, in their own names. While Marbauk Ltd is William Abram’s new company. So it’s the three amigos again.
Openshaw Group Holdings Ltd began life April 9 as Lockside Investments Ltd, with Openshaw’s partner Anthony John Hayton as director. Openshaw took over April 14. Hayton obviously relinquished control to set up Hayton Group Holdings Ltd April 15.
Which leaves the final name we see in the panel above, Bahadvr Group Holdings Ltd. This is the company of Ismael Bahadur, formed in August 2018, and it files as a dormant company.
These new creations of the three principals own all the shares in CLProjectsUK Limited. Which began life in August 2016 as Clifford Lewis Aluminium Limited. The name changed April 28, 2018.
This company is in the business of metal doors and windows.
Let’s recap. We have a host of new companies set up by or taken over by Openshaw, Hayton and Abram. But little or nothing further back than 2016. So what were our bonny boys doing before then?
The winding up process for Rooftop Solutions began in Bolton County Court in July 2012. There were three outstanding charges at the death. The decision to wind up Rooftop Solutions and Consultancy Services Ltd was taken in August 2009, when the company owed £485,922.00.
Click to enlarge. Click on X in top right to return to blog.
Other companies Openshaw was involved with around that time, which also went belly-up owing lots of money, were RBC (Manchester) Ltd and Rooftop Group Ltd.
None of these companies seemed to last more than two or three years. And there seems to be a gap of five or six years between these earlier companies and the recent rash of new companies.
To sum up, the ‘saviours’ of the White House Hotel – or at least the site – seem to come from a background of replacement doors and windows, or roofing. More recently, they appear to have aligned with people from a finance background. But do they have what it takes to complete a prestige project in Wilmslow-sur-Mer?
Charles Marshal Openshaw makes it sound so simple – his companies are going to build an ‘international landmark’ hotel on the site of the White House Hotel.
But, for a start, he doesn’t even own the site. And once we start looking into his companies we find other companies behind them . . . and other companies behind the companies behind them . . . and companies behind the companies behind the companies behind . . .
If I was Cyngor Gwynedd, I’d sit Charles Marshall Openshaw down in a comfy chair, give him tea and biccies, pat his knee and say, ‘Now, Charlie, tell us who’s really behind this project’.
And I wouldn’t give planning permission until I had satisfactory answers.
♦
‘CASTLE’ GWYNFRYN
Regular readers will be familiar with that name. It refers to an old gentry mansion near Llanystumdwy, which served a number of purposes after its glory days until, as a hotel, it catched afire in 1982.
This update is in three parts. First, Philip Andrew Bush seems to have been a naughty boy, travelling up to Gwynfryn from Kent during lockdown. Second, the planning application for 25 residential units in what’s left of the mansion has now been submitted. Third, the young developers we met earlier have started a raft of new companies.
Gwynfryn. Click to enlarge and click X in top right to return to blog
Maybe I should explain that until fairly recently Bush owned both the house and the land around, but he sold the ruin to his pal Aaron Hill, who’s also an associate of the Bryn Llys gang, a crew we’ll meet in the next section.
Bush is now pestering neighbours over a non-existent right of way, and making a nuisance of himself. It’s rumoured he wants to make some money by building something in the Bryn Llys grounds.
Access will be a big issue for any project of Hill’s, and for the residential units. Which explains his desire to knock down walls and find another route onto his land. He’s getting desperate, for the clock is ticking . . .
Let’s turn to the planning application. Which is dated 03/12/2020. A passer-by kindly sent me a photo of the public notice affixed to some railings.
Click to enlarge and click X in top right to return to blog.
Though what I find strange is that the planning application itself is dated 14/02/2020. with a ‘validation’ date of 20/11/2020. Read it for yourself.
There’s something very amateurish about this planning application. To begin with, it keeps referring to “the castle”. Has whoever compiled this document been reading too much Kafka, or has he never seen the building? Because it’s a 19th century house with a bit of crenellation for effect.
I’m sure the natives could get a bit stroppy back then but I’m equally sure the squire didn’t need a castle.
Then, in the Design and Access Statement, Section 6, the writer quotes English Heritage! Has it escaped him that Gwynfryn is in Wales?
Click to enlarge and click X in top right to return to blog
Something else that caught my eye was in the planning application document itself (21), where it seems to suggest that there are currently 5 full-time and 3 part-time employees at the Gwynfryn ruin.
Are they including the Bryn Llys gang, who have helped out? Or are they counting the bunny-wunnies?
Gwynfryn is another of those projects where there are many fingers in the pie. And among these digits are those belonging to James Armstrong and Anthony Wilmott.
As I wrote back in October, ” . . . the developers’ in this instance are Anthony John Wilmott and James Edward Armstrong. The latter has a company called Acquérir Ltd; Wilmott has a few companies of his own; but they get together in Armstrong Wilmott Ltd.”
Now doubt it’s only a matter of time before we’re in another maze of companies at Gwynfryn in which council planners will get lost . . . if they even venture in.
♦
BRYN LLYS AKA ‘SNOWDON SUMMIT VIEW’
We left off with the Bryn Llys saga when capo di tutti capi Jon Duggan appeared before the bench in Caernarfon. His dogs had got out – again – and attacked a neighbour’s chickens.
Despite being victimised – the poor man always is – he had to cough up £1,002.00.
As it was given to me: “He complained that he was before the same magistrates who heard the Shane Baker excavator driving, criminal damage case (Baker is one of Duggan’s ‘soldiers’) but was told that this was an entirely separate case. Mr. Duggan likes to imply that he will not get a fair hearing and is picked upon by police, council officials and others. He also accused the neighbours of filming his children, another one of his tactics is making unfounded, malicious allegations about anyone who does not give in to him.”
But he could be facing another court appearance in the near future.
Here we see Duggan, on the day of the court appearance, with his wife at his side, his half-brother Scott Smith facing him, while the fourth man is Andrew Battye, who we are asked to believe owns Bryn Llys aka ‘Snowdon Summit View’.
Nobody does believe it, and certainly not Battye.
Click to enlarge, click on X at the top right to return to blog
In one of the more bizarre deals I have covered on this blog, Duggan bought land from Aaron Hill (who got a mention just now at Gwynfryn). But because Duggan is supposedly without assets, Hill loaned him the money to buy the land!
After buying the land Duggan laid an unauthorised road, and he was instructed to remove it and undertake remedial work. The deadline for compliance was 20 November. Of course, Duggan has not complied.
Gwynedd planners have been informed of Duggan’s non-compliance. Now it’s up to them to do their job. No more, no less.
Don’t panic, this isn’t about US politics. Following information received it’s an update to something I wrote back in 2020.
