St Johns Market will not reopen to stall holders

National World - LocalTV

Liverpool Council has confirmed St Johns Market will not reopen to stall holders. The local authority has said it will look to other options for the site.

Transcript

00:00Liverpool council has confirmed St John's market will not reopen to

00:05stallholders. Twelve months on from the shuttering of the hall the left dozens

00:10of traders standing outside the location. The local authority said it will look to

00:15other options for the site that stood vacant ever since.

00:18Councillor Nick Small, cabinet member for growth and economy, has said while he

00:22recognized people would be disappointed over the decision to not to reopen the

00:26market. He said the best days lay ahead for the hall. It's thought following an

00:32options appraisal which began following the closure, two potential uses for the

00:36site have been earmarked for further investigation. The site could become a

00:40training facility to deliver social value projects or a food and drinks hall

00:45similar to that of the Baltic market. The local authority said in 2023 it would

00:49seek to recover three years worth of debt from the traders that occupied the

00:53market. After a breakthrough couldn't be found officers moved to shut down the

00:58site in March 2024. Councillor Small has said that work would now begin in

01:04earnest to pursue those debts around 2.1 million pounds beginning with those who

01:10owe the most. In 2016 two and a half million pounds was spent to renovate the

01:14site but proved unpopular even with then-mayor Joe Anderson who initially

01:19offered traders three then six months free rent as an incentive to stay and

01:24increase footfall. Around a million pounds a year was being spent to

01:28subsidize the market by the City Council. Further investigations by officers found

01:32arrears incurred by dozens of businesses had risen from an initially established

01:371.7 million to 2.1 million pounds.

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