Derby Playhouse’s survival to be battled out in court

Published Thursday 28 February 2008 at 14:00 by Lalayn Baluch

Derby Playhouse’s board of trustees has announced it will launch legal action against Arts Council England, in a bid to prevent the company being taken into liquidation.

According to Jonathan Powers, the Playhouse’s chairman, the consortium leading the battle to save the venue is preparing to challenge in court ACE’s claim to administrators to win back more than £1 million of funding.

The news follows the creditor’s meeting earlier this week, where a proposal by ACE to take the company into liquidation was agreed. However, if the board was to win its court case, Derby Playhouse Ltd could survive.

Powers told The Stagethat most of the creditors present at the meeting voted in favour of the board’s plan to take out a mortgage on the lease of the theatre. The proposal was ultimately rejected by ACE, which has the biggest financial claim and its vote therefore carried the most weight in making the decision.

He explained that the board is now “urgently” preparing its case against the funding body.

“We are consulting urgently on getting our case together. We have to take them [ACE] to court within 14 days, on publication of the administrators’ report. At the end of the 14-day period, if we haven’t lodged the claim in court, then Price Waterhouse Coppers [who have been appointed by ACE to act as liquidators] are brought in. The current administrators will be booted out and the liquidator will come in and put everything up for sale,” he said.

Powers also believes that if ACE had accepted the board’s proposal to take over the theatre, then it, along with all other creditors, would have received their money back. He accused the funding body of rejecting the plan in order to quash the trustees bid, thereby intentionally denying itself the cash.

He added: “We keep on being defeated, but curiously each time it happens we come out with our spirits raised, because we discover we’ve got more people supporting us and if we carry on like this we will win the last battle.”

ACE said Derby Playhouse Ltd had every right to “pursue any course of action they think appropriate” but added it would “robustly defend any claim” if the matter goes to court.

A spokesman said: “We have no reason to believe our decisions and processes around Derby Playhouse Ltd have been incorrect in any way.”

He also said ACE’s “problems with the governance and management of Derby Playhouse Ltd go back at least four years” and said that during that time ACE had lost confidence in the organisation’s “ability to make good on its stated intentions”.

The spokesman also said ACE was “committed to exciting produced theatre made in Derby for Derby” and added he hoped the Playhouse building can be part of that plan.

But he said: “At present no creditor knows how much will be returned to them. Any monies that are returned to the arts council will be reinvested in the arts. However, we cannot risk losing the theatre itself. We want the building to be part of the long-term sustainable future of produced theatre in Derby for Derby.”