We are calling on councillors not to approve plans to borrow more money for the IKEA building and to sell it back to the private sector before costs spiral out of control.
The council should also grant planning permission for the building to be demolished which can help attract new developers to the site.
The main reason IKEA abandoned the building is because it was a retail experiment which turned out to be too expensive to maintain. Unfortunately, the council has found itself in a similar situation.
The council bought the building for £9m in 2021 and has also paid design fees of around £1.4m to turn it into a new cultural hub. In addition, the building costs around £1.25m a year to run before it has even opened.
The total cost of the project is expected to be around £55m. However, the council is set to borrow more undisclosed sums in 2024 to cover increased building costs.
We believe the council should invest in the old sports centre instead which is costing £400,000 a year to keep empty and proving difficult to sell because part of it is listed.
What’s more, 876 people signed our petition to turn it into a new arts and exhibition centre in 2020 before councillors decided to buy the IKEA building.
However, Conservatives claim there have been no ideas for the old sports centre since it closed while Labour claim there have been lots of ideas but no finances behind them.
Unfortunately, both parties were too arrogant to support our idea and now the council is stuck with both buildings costing Coventry citizens millions.
