There are of course many procedural problems to overcome before we can realise our wish to achieve a new stadium at Kings Dock. The main thing to remember is that our proposals are talented, viable and perfectly capable of being realised. What it now requires are staying power and determination to push it through.

For a variety of reasons it was always going to be a rocky ride. Anybody who thinks otherwise is either uninformed, foolish or engaged in malicious mischief. The latter behaviour may be safely ignored unless, as is perfectly obvious in some cases, there are attempts to sabotage the project through deliberate, misleading propaganda. In the circumstances there is next to no point in wittering on about personalities and/or macro or micro project management techniques when the main problems exist at a strategic and systemic level.

I am not one of those purblind Englishmen who says our culture is inherently anti-success. I believe that to be suitable for fourth form debate and nothing more. There are many examples which provide quite the opposite view. But there is no question, like in any other nation, there are some people more inclined to find reasons not to proceed than to make a determined effort to bring matters to a successful conclusion. Their reasons are a matter for them. They are not the kind of individuals I wish to share my spare time or space with, technical and professional considerations notwithstanding. In my view such people are curmudgeonly obstacles to success of any kind. They are part of the problem, not the cure.

In my case, all I want are two things:

(a) For our city, which I love passionately, a long overdue, world class multi-purpose facility of quality, one we can proudly present to the rest of the world during our business or personal travel. Realistic, non-chauvinist civic pride matters just as much as personal pride.

(b) For Everton Football Club, a state of the art stadium for my life long team, one which will give us a chance to restore our playing fortunes and place in the game. There are other options but none of them present us with this kind of opportunity.

It is as basic and simple as that. That is the driving force. I believe these two wishes coincide with the majority viewpoint in our city and amongst our fans.

Standing in our way is a bureaucratic system of secretive and unaccountable Byzantine proportions. This includes individuals of all political persuasions, some of them greedy, some of them altruistic, some talented and some utterly incapable. The project somehow has to weave its way through the individuals and the bureaucracy until it goes ahead or it implodes. The cultural disasters at Wembley, Picketts Lock and the Millenium Dome are all good examples of what happens when good intentions come up against a patently absurd system. We all know a camel is really a horse designed by committee.

I wish it were otherwise, that we could buy the entire site outright and get on with it. But we can't. Our city is a poor city. Fact. So are most other provincial cities. Fact. Private ownership of large enterprises is more and more untrustworthy. Fact. American experience of this kind of project has demonstrated that the present packaged proposal, though far from ideal, is considered superior to virtually every other alternative. Fact. Our club doesn't have sufficient finance to go it alone. Fact. These circumstances are unlikely to change any time soon. Fact.

If we want to live in the real world it is best to understand what we are faced with. Standing on the sidelines wringing our hands or jeering is not a serious option. It never is.

The main project problem remains funding to be put in place by the 51% public ownership elements of the consortium. That is not the task of Everton Football Club. The public has not been told precisely whose task it is. Which means there can be no valid surprise when questions are raised. We DO know that the 51% consists of English Partnerships (who own the site) 25%, North West Development Agency 13% and Liverpool City Council 13%. But that is ownership, not capital funding of the project.

We know the project will cost about £300 million, a figure still subject to accurate calculation. We know Everton's share of the capital is in place. We do not know where the rest is coming from or what is the time scale for revealing it. All we know is that our planning application is due to be submitted next March. Small wonder, then, that intelligent people exercise perfectly normal human curiosity and ask the obvious questions. It isn't too much to say that social and civic responsibility (let alone football loyalty) demands it. There really is such a thing as society ………despite the claims of Ayn Rand and her minority loony disciples.

Standing in the centre of the maelstrom are all of the ownership parties I have described above, plus government-appointed urban regeneration company Liverpool Vision. For all practical intents and purposes chairman Joe Dwyer IS Liverpool Vision. Without his input and that of his board and staff you can assume the project would be dead. The natural follow-on question is whether he can help obtain government financial support of one kind and another. In my opinion, if that isn't provided then the government have failed to back up the promises they made to entice him into the appointment. And if they do fail then they can add Kings Dock to the above list of three disasters.

(From their own data, here are the names of the Liverpool Vision board:

Joe Dwyer, chairman.
Mike Storey, vice chairman. (Leader, Liverpool City Council).
David Shelton, executive deputy chairman. (Development director, English Partnerships).
Mike Shields. (Chief executive, North West Development Agency).
James Ross. (Chairman, Littlewoods).
David Henshaw. (Chief execurive officer, Liverpool City Council).
Gideon Ben-Tovim. (Leader, Liverpool Labour Group).
Terry Leahy. (Chief executive officer, Tesco).
Mike Appleton. (Regeneration and planning director, English Partnerships).
Andrea Titterington. (Chief executive officer, Maritime Housing).
David Wade-Smith. (Director, Wade Smith retailers).

You can get more information at

http://www.liverpoolvision.co.uk/vision.htm.)

It is typical of the Byzantine system that we do not know what efforts the other ownership parties are making to further the project, even though all of them are represented on the Liverpool Vision board! Inquiries are brushed aside on the basis of something called "confidentiality," read: Secrecy. How can we have any trust in this kind of needless, time-wasting nonsense? Why should we trust a system which has already delivered little but cultural, economic and social disaster?

And trust is what it inevitably boils down to. Do you trust the non-Everton parties to have either the will or the ability to deliver? Since you pay their salaries through your taxes you are entitled to your questions and your doubts.

In conclusion, hereunder is an article taken from page 9 of the 2nd November edition of "Building Design." It shows the kind of bureaucratic nonsense which prevents the construction of a much-needed facility. It also pushes you to bang a lot of heads together until they acquire some common sense:

"BUILDING DESIGN. November 2, 2001.

URBAN WHITE PAPER.

Case Study: Liverpool Vision.

Liverpool Vision was the first urban regeneration company to be formed after the Urban White Paper, but has had personnel changes and bad publicity which has marred its successes.

Questions over consultants' fees and lack of action on the ground, and concerns about whether the original masterplan vision may not have been robust enough have surfaced.

Some critics have said the masterplan document drawn up by Skidmore, Owings & Merrill was not prescriptive enough in some cases. Whereas other cities' strategy documents have given an idea of how some areas might look when the projects were realised, SOM's plan concentrated on broader zoning and circulation issues rather than providing easier to consume perspectives.

Roger Whiteman, director of SOM, said, 'I don't believe that it is over-structured. It is a complex situation and it needs advice from all areas. One has to look at regeneration as a long-term benefit, and you need to draw up strategies for this.'

However, movement is taking place on a major scheme for the Kings Dock, where a developer has been chosen to build a major new stadium for Everton Football Club as well as a mixed use development adjoining it.

SOM's involvement has lessened since the completion of the framework strategy document, but it is now bidding to be on a list of consultants that will help Liverpool vision to deliver."

I like that bit, "…movement is taking place…" What a pity we have no idea just how much movement and by whom. (08/11/01)

What do you think? email BlueKipper kingsdock@bluekipper.com