Following on from the previous post about plans to build 250 homes on part of the Carmarthen West development site, a couple of readers have expressed surprise that the developer is not one of the usual suspects - Taylor Woodrow, Redrow, etc. - but a company which nobody in Carmarthen has ever heard of.
Carmarthen Promotions Limited was incorporated in November 2014 and has no track record. Its directors are an interesting mix of agri-business types and City bigshots from the east of England.
They include Mr Robert Edward Quintin Gurney, Mr Richard Barrington Stanton, Mr John Russell Lawrence and Mr Patrick Vavasseur Fisher, aka the fourth Baron Fisher of Kilverstone Hall in Norfolk.
It turns out that Messrs Gurney and Lawrence have other interests in Carmarthen in the shape of a company called Carmarthen Estates Limited (buying and selling own real estate) which for each of the three years to 31 October has reported assets of £45,000 and total liabilities fluctuating between £152,000 and £159,000. Shareholders' funds have been stubbornly negative at between -£114,000 and -£107,000.
Despite its name, Carmarthen Estates has its head offices in Ashford, Kent.
Quite what their connection is with Carmarthen and what they are doing to promote the town is not clear, but we can be sure that Meryl
will be delighted at this evidence that Carmarthenshire is open for
business, even if it's just for the squirearchy of Norfolk to make a quick buck.
5 comments:
For me the question is, what or who was their introduction to Carmarthen, so far from home?
Indeed, although their presence goes back a few years in the shape of Carmarthen Estates. There is a long trail of companies featuring different combinations of these people, and none that I have come across seems to be making money.
We have a similar situation in our part of the world. A shady group buys a cheap planning site, gets planning permission, sells it to another company featuring the same people or their relatives, for an inflated or deflated price, then sells it on again ... sometimes one of the companies is wound up and another with a similar name reappears ... in our case though, our connection is to a former Russian satellite country!
It has been reported to council and police, but no action appears to have been taken in the (at least) 8 years it has been known to have gone on. The council simply says the ownership of a site is not a planning isdue.
Carmarthen Estates Limited is headquartered at 35-41 Station Road, Ashford in Kent.
http://www.ukaddressbook.uk/a/stourside-place-35-41-station-road-ashford-kent-united-kingdom-tn23-1pp?
This is an accommodation/registration address for a total of 73 small ‘start-ups’. Jac asks a very good question. Many of these 73 are budding new enterprises from Kent, however the others appear to be into property, land equity, buildings maintenance, social housing, and a couple of private nursing care agencies. Interestingly, the address is right next door to the AMF bowling alley.
I seem to remember that a few years ago (quite coincidentally of course) a gang from Boston, Lincs submitted a development proposal for somewhere in the west Carmarthen area which, after concerted objection, was refused. This was during the period that Simons, another gang from the Boston area, were doing the town centre development. Need I say more?
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