Grant awarded to buy land in Odell - but councillor voices concerns parish council is being "ripped off"

An Odell landowner is exploiting the “opportunity value” of the land they’re willing to sell to a parish council, a borough councillor officer has said.

On Wednesday (April 24) Bedford Borough Council’s Rural Affairs Committee was asked to approve a grant towards the cost towards buying the land.

Lee Phanco, the council’s interim monitoring officer, said: “The first application is from Odell Parish Council, and it’s a request for £12,500 towards the cost of acquiring two parcels of land.

“This is open green space in the village, one is by the river and I understand it is part of the floodplain, and the other one is some amenity space in the village.

“But the organisation that’s proposing to sell them to them wants to sell the land as a bundle.

“I think this would be positive for the village, it would ensure that the land is available for the community to use.

“The request is for 50 per cent of the total costs, there are contributions from other sources,” he said.

The report to the committee said the sale price of £20,000 was the result of negotiation between the vendor and Odell Parish Council.

A land agent valuation of £10,000 contrasted with the original vendor asking price of £30,000 before the agreed sale price was established.

Councillor Jane Walker (Conservative, Clapham & Oakley) said: “I’m not sure why it’s valued at £10,000 but they’re actually paying £20,000. It just seems that somebody is ripping the parish council off there.

“I don’t know about land sales and things but that just sounds as if they’re ripping them off,” she said.

Mr Phanco said: “This was a concern and we did have some discussions around it. As I understand it, because of the type of land, which is on the floodplain, the open market arable value of the land for grazing or whatever would be approximately half the price that the vendor is looking for.

“To keep it within the community and use for that purpose there is some opportunity value which they are exploiting.

“So that’s the reason and that was a concern and I think it’s important to note that the contribution from the council is only 50 per cent of the overall cost of the purchase.

“The risk,of course, is if they aren’t able to raise the funds and can’t buy it for the price that’s been asked then it may be sold on the open market.

“Yes, the parish council may wish to bid for it, but they wouldn’t have the specific funding.

“So it’s not a straightforward process unfortunately in this particular case,” he said.

Committee chair, mayor Tom Wootton (Conservative) asked officers to put some conditions on the grant.

“So that it doesn’t get sold to a developer for some house on stilts or something,” he said.

Mr Phanco said: “Effectively [what we are] saying is that the grant would be repayable if the land ceased to be used for public benefit.”

The committee voted to approve the grant.