Council Commits To “Take Into Account” Colonnade Relationships

Rother District Council has committed to “take into account” pre-existing relationships when it seeks to re-market business units within the Colonnade in Bexhill.

The commitment came in response to a petition debated by councillors on Monday (July 14), which called on the authority to guarantee “a right to return” for traders after the completion of renovation works due to begin later this year.

The council has previously said it has a “responsibility to demonstrate best value” and will need to “conduct a fair process for all prospective tenants rather than offering guarantees to any specific business.”

While the authority did not make the guarantee requested by petitioners, councillors also declined to ‘rule out’ such an arrangement in some form.

Before making their decision, councillors heard from lead petitioner Charlotte Arundell, a longtime Colonnade tenant through her shop The Bag Lady.

She had set up the petition in March alongside her fellow Colonnade tenant Sonia Valentini.

It had been signed by more than 4,500 people when it was formally submitted to the council in June.

Ms Arundell said:

“Rother say they have to demonstrate best value by remarketing after the refurb. Sadly, best value has been forgotten about at the Colonnade.

"Over the years, shops have been left empty for months on end, yet we know businesses who applied and never heard back.

“If Rother leaves the remarketing until after the refurb, the Colonnade will be left empty next summer, even if work starts and ends on time.

"Marketing could take months and from experience we know even renewing our leases takes six months.This would result yet again in a loss of income for Rother and would be a disaster for our businesses.

“Surely, best value would be to keep the Colonnade shops open as much as possible, to provide income for Rother and help small businesses and town regeneration as a whole.”

Ms Arundell went on to call for “fair terms”, saying the traders had been quoted rents “four-and-a-half times the going rate with a potential turnover rate on top.”

In her initial response to the petition, cabinet member for regeneration Christine Bayliss (Lab) reiterated how the council’s position was that it could not guarantee a right to return.

She said:

“The context that we are currently in is that we are currently asking officers to make 10 per cent savings in their budgets for 2026/27. That is the hard-nosed reality.

“The rents that we charge from our commercial tenants makes up 10 per cent of the income we receive and that … goes towards our bin collections, our housing services, our parks and gardens, so it is a really, really important element of our budget.

“We have roughly 400 commercial units that we rent across Rother District Council and we’ve got 300 tenants.

"This drive to increase our portfolio was one we inherited from the previous administration, who like us saw the importance of having this income stream to support funding of our service provision.

“So it is very unfortunate that we can’t guarantee a right to return.

"However, we can guarantee that we will take into account the good relationships and the excellent track record of existing tenants when we are assessing new applications.

“All our leases offer fair terms as standard and the council can demonstrate a long history of being a responsible and supportive landlord and partner to small businesses.”

Cllr Bayliss had tabled a motion, which was proposed to form the council’s official response to the petition.

It had initially included a line saying the council would be “unable to guarantee the right of return to the building once work has been completed.”

Other councillors questioned the accuracy of this statement, with several arguing that the council should be able to find some way to offer the current traders some form of “first refusal” on the refurbished units.

The line was removed from the motion in response to an amendment proposed by Cllr Paul Osborne (Con), who is chairman of the council’s overview and scrutiny committee.

Cllr Osborne said:

“To me, if you are there already and you want to come back that should be first dibs.

"If you want to accept the offer or not, then that is up to you, but you should get first look-in, if you like, on favourable terms.

“Why don’t we strike a line through the first one? The rest of it is fine, just strike a line through that.

“I feel that if people are good enough to want to want to rent and work in a place — and there is a refurbishment coming up — then you’ve got to give them first refusal, as far as I am concerned.

"That is just being a good landlord.”

Cllr Osborne’s amendment was accepted by Cllr Bayliss, meaning the line was dropped from the motion without a vote taking place.

Cllr Bayliss also accepted a further amendment from Cllr Elenanor Kirby-Green, which sought to amend the wording of the motion to reflect the removal of the line.

The amended motion, which was passed unanimously, read:

“Council notes the petition and public support for our retail and catering tenants at the Colonnade and agrees the following points.

“We can guarantee that we will take into account the good relationships and excellent track record of existing tenants when new applications are assessed.

“All our leases offer fair terms as standard and the council can demonstrate a long history of being a responsible and supportive landlord and partner to small businesses.

“The council can confirm that its intention to repair the Colonnade has been clearly communicated to Colonnade tenants and wider stakeholders.

"While timeframes have been subject to change, the council has taken steps to keep tenants updated of these changes”