Bridging company administrators try to sell off remand centre

Administrators of a bridging company that collapsed a year ago are trying to keep the business alive by trying to sell the site of a notorious former remand centre.

In what looks like a last-ditch attempt to raise finances and pay off creditors, Scott Marriott of KPMG is attempting to sell the plot in Upperton, Lanarkshire.

In a severe lesson to other bridging lenders, Munro took over the site after borrowers defaulted. Munro had lent to a third party, with the loan secured against the 8.5 acres of land.

The decision to lend proved disastrous, triggering Munro’s own collapse into administration.

However, the sale looks a hopeless case and Marriott has not been able to say how much he hopes to raise from a sale, which could be valued as either a wild goose sanctuary or as a housing development – depending on the local council.

Before the Longriggend remand centre was closed in 2000, it housed youths awaiting trial.

Conditions were so poor that the Scottish Prison Inspectorate branded it “grossly unsatisfactory”, a “power keg of frustration” and “a breeding ground for criminals”. The report pointed out that many of those held there had never been convicted of a previous offence.

In 1988, prisoners held a rooftop riot to draw attention to the filthy and inhumane conditions they were kept in.

The site is in a very rural location where street lighting and other facilities are non-existent.

It also had 80 flats and houses, built in the sixties by the Scottish Prison Service for prison wardens and their families.

After the centre closed, the building was empty for five years, attracting arsonists and drug addicts, and was finally knocked down in 2005.

It has since attracted only one developer to ask for planning permission. St Andrew’s Homes Scotland wanted to build 241 homes and seven commercial units on the site, and would have improved the infrastructure.

But the application was refused, despite support from local residents, because North Lanarkshire council was concerned about effects on the habitat of rare Bean geese.

The refusal looks as though it may come back to haunt the council, which is now complaining about the derelict site.

Local councillor Sophia Coyle said: “The way the site has been left to rot for umpteen years has been devastating to the local people and to me as a councillor.

“I hope whoever eventually buys the land will build houses and a community facility, because Upperton desperately needs it.”

The administrators for Monro have also recently filed for the shelf life of another planning permission to be extended.