To: Helen Stephenson, CEO, Charity Commission
Copies to: Susanna McGibbon, Permanent Secretary, Government Legal Department
Sarah Healey, Permanent Secretary, Department for Digital, Culture, Media and Sport
Dear Helen Stephenson,
We the undersigned all urge you to help in saving the Hulme Hippodrome, a 120-year-old Variety Theatre and Grade 2 listed building in Manchester, saving it for future community benefit and well-being, and at no cost to the public purse.
In 2003 the disgraced charity Gilbert Deya Ministries purchased the Hulme Hippodrome for religious meetings. The building has been shuttered since 2018, and on 11 January 2021 a minority of the charity trustees attempted to transfer the building to a disgraced property developer. Other trustees have given statements that they did not know of nor consent to this attempted transfer and that the requirements of charity and property law were not followed. The Land Registry has also refused to allow the transfer to the property developer. The property developer is based in south London and is a disqualified director until 2025, he was described officially as "a confidence trickster" by a government investigator in June 2014 after the High Court closed 14 of his companies, and in February 2021 he showed his hand by advertising the Hulme Hippodrome site as suitable for residential apartments.
Now, on Friday 14 October 2022 we understand that the Charity Commission has invoked its powers under Section 69 of the Charities Act 2011 and has taken legal control of the 120-year-old Hulme Hippodrome building, removing control from all of the Gilbert Deya Ministries trustees.
We are concerned that Charity Commission staff might be about to override the legal objections of the Land Registrar and use the Section 69 powers to complete the stalled transfer to the disgraced property developer, even though a fully-funded community alternative is on the table.
Time is of the essence.
An angel investor of good reputation is working with Save Hulme Hippodrome Ltd to return the building to community use, and the most recent full-price offer letter is dated 6 October 2022. We understand that their solicitors are standing by to complete the conveyancing for community benefit as soon as the Charity Commission is ready to proceed. A sheet of technical details is available on request.
Yours sincerely,
Tony Baldwinson, Director Save Hulme Hippodrome
Mike Bath, Director Save Hulme Hippodrome
Catalina Guian-Illanes, Director Save Hulme Hippodrome
Paul Gardner, Director Save Hulme Hippodrome
Oli Wilson, Director Save Hulme Hippodrome
Tom Lyall, Director Save Hulme Hippodrome
Paul Baker, Director Save Hulme Hippodrome
On behalf of Save Hulme Hippodrome
DETAILS
1. The Charity Commission are using their powers under Section 69 of the Charities Act 2011. We know this from an automatic alert sent to us by the Land Registry.
2. Due to a legal complications and alleged irregularities or fraud, the money offered by the property developer has already been banked by the charity (probably around November 2020) and spent by the trustees before the Charity Commission's interim managers became more closely involved (March 2021), even though the property developer didn't get ownership of the building as a result, only gaining a Unilateral Notice in the land register. It would be legal and proper for the Charity Commission to receive the funds from the angel and to reimburse the property developer, which is exactly what the Unilateral Notice provides for and why it was added as a backstop.
3. The Charity Commission have placed Gilbert Deya Ministries under formal investigation twice: from 20 September 2004 to c.2006; and again from 28 July 2016 to date, with Interim Managers appointed on 22 March 2021. No findings from either investigation have yet been published to the best of our knowledge.
4. On 4 June 2014 the High Court ordered that a multi-million pound network of 14 property firms in south London to forced into liquidation following an investigation by the Insolvency Service. Commenting on the Court’s winding up decisions in 2014, Chris Mayhew, Company Investigations Supervisor at the Insolvency Service, was quoted on their official website as follows: “The prolonged and systematic abuse of both the insolvency and the corporate regime enabled [this property developer] to facilitate his personal business interests ... Nobody should be left in any doubt that we will act whenever we discover there are serious failings, as here, in particular by confidence tricksters such as [this person].”
5. We have further legal details on the reasons given by the Land Registry for their rejection of the TR1 dated 11 January 2021, including that it was signed by only one of the three named property trustees in their attempt to transfer the Hulme Hippodrome to the property developer. The other charity trustees and property trustees have subsequently recorded their non-consent to the attempted transfer. It was non-compliant in charity law as well as in property law.
6. The rich social history of the Hulme Hippodrome is summarised on its Wikipedia page.
