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Pitch Fee Tribunal (May update)

By James (Secretary) Dunton Park Residents' Association

Thursday, 16 May 2024

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Dunton Park Residents' Association Contributor

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We're sorry to the 100 or so residents waiting for a conclusion to the pitch fee dispute. It's still rumbling on.

We appreciate everyone's frustrations at how long this is taking but it's out of our hands.

We had hoped for some goodwill from the new owner of the site in terms of negotiating an end to this. However, it seems they'd rather keep throwing money at solicitors than come to a reasonable and fair agreement with residents.

Here's where we're at.

Because Regency now run the site, the legal applicant (Royale Life), no longer exists. The solicitor asked if we'd mind changing names on the paperwork from Royale to Regency but we said we can't support that. So, he's made a formal application to the court to substitute names.

The judge asked us to provide any objections in writing which we did about 4 weeks ago.

In a nutshell we said how can a company be allowed to take over a case that applies to a period in time they didn't exist. The solicitor responded by saying some old Royale staff remain in the company but we've countered that by saying none of those people were key players in our site so can't be said to be credible witnesses. We have offered to expand on this at any hearing, including evidence.

We're just waiting for the judge to make a decision as to whether the paperwork can be amended. If he grants that then we expect the case to be heard in the next 5/6 weeks.

All this is a stark contrast to our friends at Sandy Bay. They were run by Royale Life but, like us, are now managed by a new company (a different one to ours). Their new management wrote to waive their new pitch fee completely and promised anyone who paid it would get a refund.

It seems clear to us that although we were promised a new era and a new ethos post-Royale, it's just more of the same. We suspect this is due to the fact that a lot of Royale's senior management have been re-employed by Regency. Sandy Bay's new management are lucky not to have ex-Royale head office staff and the differnace in attitdes is huge.

There's growing unrest about all this across a lots of ex-Royale sites and residents associations are getting together to coordinate a response. We all want to sit down and talk to the new owner himself. The reason for Royale's downfall was not just about money, it was to do with the attitude and ethos of head office, and that needs to change if Regency are to be a success.

We'll keep you posted.

Contact Information

James (Secretary)

Find Dunton Park Residents' Association

Dunton Park, Lower Dunton Road, Brentwood, Essex, CM13 3GE

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