A notorious Bristol property owner has been fined more than £10,000 for leaving three of his many properties across the city to become overgrown, fly-tipped eyesores, and the council have warned him they’ll do it again in a month if he doesn’t sort the sites out.
Mushtaq Ahmed owns at least 19 properties and sites across Bristol and has been the subject of campaigns from local residents and previous council prosecutions for leaving many of them run-down, not-maintained, secure or cleared so they attract fly-tippers and graffiti-taggers.
Now, Bristol City Council has taken him to court for the second time in 13 months over the state of three of his properties - the abandoned, derelict and boarded up Gainsborough pub in Lockleaze, the empty and partially-derelict Kernow Building in St Werburghs, and a site in the heart of Knowle West at Leinster Avenue.
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Magistrates at Bristol Magistrates' Court were told Ahmed had failed to maintain or see to the upkeep of those three properties after being found guilty of doing the same in February 2022. That prosecution came after years of complaints about the landowner from local residents and attempts by Bristol City Council to see action taken to either redevelop the sites or sell them on.
Ahmed was fined £1,000 for failing to carry out works to maintain the properties in February 2022, and ordered to pay £2,703 and in costs with a £190 victim surcharge, and was ordered to complete necessary works to the buildings within 150 days.
But nothing substantial was done, so this week the council took him back to court. On March 20, magistrates fined him another £3,000 per site, with £1,327 in costs - a total of £10,327 for failing to comply with the Community Protection Notices and Remedial Orders issued before.
The Remedial Orders relate to the three buildings. At the Kernow Building in Mina Road, St Werburgh’s, Ahmed failed to remove graffiti and flyposting, improve the building condition and remove vegetation from the walls, roofs and elevations.
Local residents living next door or near the Kernow Building have long complained that it’s just been left empty and crumbling, with trees growing out of the roof and guttering. The former Kernow Audio and Sound store has been empty for at least 20 years, but is in a prominent location opposite Mina Park on the junction of Tyne Road and Mina Road.
Back in April 2021, the Bristol Cable reported a campaign had started by local residents to get the council to do something about the state of the building, which also involved Bristol West MP Thangam Debonnaire. The Cable also reported that Ahmed’s company Gracewell Limited at the time owned 19 properties across Bristol, mainly on high streets and prominent commercial buildings, but many of which are empty and run-down.
The latest accounts from Gracewell, which is based at Stapleton Road in Easton, showed Ahmed report that the value of the ‘fixed assets’ of investment properties rose from £2.66 million in 2021 to £3.38 million in 2022.
The second site Ahmed was fined by magistrates for was a site in the heart of Knowle West, on Leinster Avenue, close to the Broadbury Road junction. Magistrates heard Ahmed failed to remove graffiti and flyposting, remove the fly-tipped waste, install fencing to secure the land to prevent further fly-tipping and graffiti.
The third site is another prominent property in the heart of a community - the former Gainsborough pub in the middle of Lockleaze.
Magistrates were told Ahmed had again failed to remove graffiti and fly-tipped waste, install fencing to secure the land and implement a regular cleansing programme.
The Gainsborough Square pub - known locally as the Blue Boy - has long been the subject of a battle involving local residents, the council and the 64-year-old property investor. After the pub closed in 2010 it has gradually fallen into ruin. There had been petitions and campaigns to get it to be reopened, but the roof collapsed and the building left derelict following a devastating fire there in the summer of 2019.
Bristol City Council has multi-million pound plans to regenerate the centre of Lockleaze, but the derelict pub site is the only stumbling block remaining. Since 2019, the council has been trying to put a Compulsory Purchase Order in place to take over the site and the land behind, and build affordable housing and a new community space there.
The council said further updates on the ‘progress of this process are expected soon’. A CPO had been agreed by councillors in 2019, and then again in May last year, because the original decision had run out of time, and no sale had been agreed between the council and Ahmed.
The council chief in charge of housing and property, Cllr Tom Renhard, said the latest fines for Ahmed should send a message to all property owners who had left empty sites derelict and decaying.
“Property owners have a responsibility to maintain their properties and ensure they do not become a burden on the community,” he said. “Where owners don’t take their responsibilities seriously, we will step in, and this case is an example of the action we will take if no effort is made to correct issues.
“I thank the enforcement team for their persistence and diligence in bringing this case to court and securing a prosecution that should act as a warning to all rogue property owners. We’re moving ahead with our plans for the Gainsborough pub site to deliver much needed council homes and space for the community and I hope to be able to share more on this process soon,” he said, adding that Ahmed will now have another 28 days from March 20 to comply with the orders, or be prosecuted again.
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