But What's All this Hush Hush about Corruption?
It is difficult to know what to be most angry about when discussing the regeneration of Liverpool. There are several layers of corruption, cynicism and incompetence, and it seems the sheer amount of bureaucratic jargon has subdued the level of protest.
We need to be clear about the overall picture and not be drawn by one body and another pointing at the rules they are working under. Social regeneration should mean dramatically improved housing, facilities and opportunities across the city. Liverpool's confidence and living conditions have been attacked for several decades now and to start to put this right requires not just money but the involvement of the community in deciding how this money needs to be spent. Many cities that have received European money would complain of mainly superficial changes, Liverpool couldn't even do that.
We are not poor solely by British standards, we are poor by European standards, and were allocated money to begin to remedy this. Instead we are dealing with levels of business and political corruption normally associated with 'third world' cities. The more you look around and the more you read it becomes obvious that Liverpool has been written off and its own council and press are chief conspirators.
It is easy to get lost in a blur of mind-boggling statistics when discussing the supposed regeneration of Liverpool, but the easiest way to judge the success of a regeneration scheme is to view for yourself how well their objectives have been met. Ropewalks attracted £17m of Objective 1 money, plus another £25m of public funds, which were designed to draw in further private money, bringing the total to £110m. Its purpose was to provide a complete social and cultural transformation in Duke St. and surrounding areas. Under European rules, all public funds had to be committed by December 1999, and spent by December 2001. A small walk around the area will reveal how successful they have been.
Having committed themselves to a number of far-reaching and glorious ideas, they have not only clearly failed to deliver, but seemed to have completely redefined what social and cultural regeneration means, in order to justify to the public and corruption investigators how this vast amount of money has been spent.
Collusion with the local press has meant that luxury flats and expensive office space has become the main focus of social change.
The Ropewalks fiasco may yet prove to be the main turning point, as they have almost certainly been the most stupid. The level of back scratching and fraud involved has led to an investigation by the European Commission fraud squad, OLAF, although even this may lead to more problems. What will be interesting about the corruption investigation taking place is how far our own council will be implicated in this case and how it is decided to punish those involved. It appears the main victim could well be the people of Liverpool, as the council refused to freeze funding to Ropewalks in view of the investigation; the money is now owed by the city. This will come out of council expenditure, not councillors' pockets. In a clear reflection of what has happened in the 'third world' we may lose out twice.
An indication that the council has not changed its policy following the Ropewalks' experience can be found in the criticisms of Liverpool Vision. Liverpool Vision was the flagship of the Urban Regeneration Commitee and was set up in a fanfare of publicity in 1999 with the aim of creating a hub of growth in the city centre. It was one of three pilot schemes, along with Manchester and Sheffield. Yet it never had a single local person on its committee, and like the colonialists and missionaries who entered Africa, they pretended they knew what was best for us, tried to tell us what was best for us, when all the time they have been serving their own interests. We closed our eyes and they had the land.
Professor Brian Robson, of Manchester University, a regeneration expert stated: "It's important to hear the voice of ordinary people, it would give Liverpool Vision better feedback and balance."
He continued: "Liverpool Vision ought to include community representatives. Manchester and Sheffield have community representatives on their boards, while Liverpool does not."
Mike Storey, leader of the council, in response to these criticisms stated that; "Myself and Gideon Ben-Tovim are on the board. Aren't councillors community representatives, elected by the people of Liverpool?"
This level of arrogance and bloody mindedness is reflective of the kind of dictatorial control we have been witnessing throughout the history of regeneration funding. An attempt to become the city of culture now seems destined to fail and the lack of community involvement is the stated reason. Fingers will be pointed amongst the press when we lose out, but the real reasons will be ignored, as anyone who has been involved with the proposals for the city of culture will tell you this has been another attempt to draw funding in for corporations looking to use Liverpool to feed its own interests.
Liverpool has now seen billions of pounds wasted, which means we are still living in some of the worst living conditions in Europe with little or no opportunity for anything other than low paid and unsustainable unemployment. It may be naïve to think there was ever a possibility that the money that was ours would all be spent on decent housing and decent work training, but the sheer lack of any worthwhile expenditure and the total lack of involvement of those living and working in the poorer communities, displays major corruption within the city, not just inefficiencies of the system. The most telling statistic is that Objective One funding is only available to those cities whose gross domestic product (GDP) means the majority of its people are living way below the poverty line. Somehow having received this massive injection of money we are still eligible and are uniquely the only city where GDP has actually fallen in this period.
It is time for the levels of protest to match the crimes committed, and for a proper positive programme of change to be put forward from grass roots level.