The Society of Merchant Venturers should not be allowed to keep spreading ‘untrue myths’ that they are the ‘saviours of the Downs’, say a group of residents and campaigners.
Campaign group Downs for People, which effectively won a huge legal dispute over the use of the Downs by Bristol Zoo last year, said the people of Bristol should not believe the Merchant Venturers’ version of their own history when it comes to the Downs, as a consultation is due to begin to determine the future governance of the popular public open space.
The Society of Merchant Venturers said it would not be responding to the letter from campaigners, which claimed the Master of the Merchants had made ‘misrepresentations and inaccuracies’ in a public meeting last month.
Read more: Bristol public will have say on Clifton and Durdham Downs decision-making
The pressure group Downs For People has written to the Master, property developer David Freed, asking him to correct what it described as a series of errors in a statement he made at a meeting of the Downs Committee in late January.
It was the first time the Society of Merchant Venturers had made such a lengthy public statement about the saga of the legal action over the way Bristol Zoo was allowed to use the Downs as an overflow car park every year.
The Merchants' statement came after a public call for the secretive Society to give Clifton Down to the council and months after the Downs Committee settled out of court and agreed to pay substantial costs to Downs for People - which had challenged the decision to grant the zoo another 20 years of parking at Ladies Mile on Clifton Down and taken all those involved to a Judicial Review.
Read more: Bristol Zoo to close in seven months
The legal wrangle opened up the Dickensian machinations of the way the Downs are run: Durdham Down is owned by the council, Clifton Down is owned by the Merchant Venturers. Both are managed together by the Downs Committee, which was set up by an Act of Parliament in 1861 stipulating that the numbers in the committee is split equally between the council and the Merchants.
But the legal challenge discovered what Downs for People described as a ‘coup’ of power going on, which saw Merchant Venturer members make decisions in sub-committees behind closed doors.
The decision to settle out of court last May may well have cost the taxpayers of Bristol hundreds of thousands of pounds. Although the exact total has not been revealed, Downs For People said it estimates it to be £420,000, most of which were the legal costs run up by the Downs Committee and the Merchant Venturers in continuing to fight the case. The money will initially come from cash that otherwise would be spent in the upkeep of the Downs.
At a meeting of the Downs Committee last month, Mr Freed made a staunch defence of the actions over centuries of the Society of Merchant Venturers, saying the Society had been ‘defenders’ of the Downs from being developed.
Now, Downs for People said that was ‘a myth’ that should be ‘busted’. “Myths have grown up around the ownership and management of our glorious Downs. Some people see the Merchant Venturers as the Downs’ main saviour and protector. In their view, transfer of the Merchants’ land on Clifton Down to the city council would risk its instant sale for housing, or worse,” said Downs For People’s spokesperson Susan Carter.
“This is not true. The Downs are protected from development by their status as common land and by the wonderful Downs Act of 1861. They must be kept ‘for ever open and unenclosed as a place of public resort and recreation’.
Read more: EXCLUSIVE: Bristol MPs call for Society of Merchant Venturers to disband
“It is Bristol City Council, not the Society of Merchant Venturers, that carries out the day-to-day management of the Downs and pays for their upkeep. Through their membership/dominance of the Downs Committee, Merchant Venturers can take financially reckless decisions without any penalty for the SMV,” she added.
Ms Carter said Mr Freed’s statement was peppered with misleading and false statements. “David Freed’s statement perpetuates the myth of the Society of Merchant Venturers as saviour,” she said.
“He wrongly gives the SMV credit for buying land to save it from development: they didn’t – Bristol Corporation did. The Merchants had owned Clifton Down for two centuries and, far from protecting it as Mr Freed claimed, they were using it as a quarry. The suggestion that the Merchants care deeply for the Downs is belied by the history of zoo parking where the interests of the zoo came first,” she added.
Read more: Staff challenge University of Bristol on links to Society of Merchant Venturers
One of the other claims made by Mr Freed, whose company is currently building a huge accommodation block development for 837 students as part of Bristol City Council’s big Bedminster Green regeneration project, is that the six-figure sums racked up by the Downs Committee’s decision to fight the Judicial Review until a week before it was due in court was down to the campaign group Downs For People themselves.
“Since we were advised throughout the proceedings that we were likely to win, we suspect that the Committee and Council were advised at an early stage that they were likely to lose,” said Ms Carter, who said they suspected the Merchant Venturers were trying to price Downs for People out of the legal battle.
What do you think? Sign in and join the conversations in the comments below
“If satisfactory undertakings had been given then, much money could have been saved. We are at a loss to understand why these undertakings were not given even when the zoo's closure was announced. We can only conclude that this was a deliberate decision to drive up costs in the expectation that this would force DfP to withdraw,” she added.
Now, Downs For People is calling on Mr Freed and the Society of Merchant Venturers to retract the claims in his speech to the Downs Committee, and its members said they wanted people in Bristol to know the 'correct' history, ahead of the consultation on the future of the Downs and the Downs Committee.
Read more: Merchant Venturer controversy prompts three Bristol pubs to stop serving Thatchers ciders
“The Society of Merchant Venturers appears overly reliant on an oral tradition of word-of-mouth briefing, even in relation to its own history.
“We were never convinced that they either read our public forum statements, nor listened to them. They did not heed our repeated warnings of the risk of legal challenge nor our explanations of the statutory nature of the Committee. Their lack of understanding has contributed to the lamentable performance of the Downs Committee. Change is needed and in the meantime Mr Freed should correct his statement,” she added.
The Society of Merchant Venturers told Bristol Live it would not be responding to the letter and press release from Downs For People.
Want our best stories with fewer ads and alerts when the biggest news stories drop? Download our app on iPhone or Android
