By Sally Guyoncourt Local government minister Ruth Kelly has left taxpayers to foot a £300,000 bill, after scrapping the sustainable communities conference. This is on top of losses, still to be revealed, which have been incurred by Manchester City Council, due to host the February 2007 event at its G-MEX centre. In a bid to make her mark on the newly-formed Department for Communities and Local Government (DCLG), Ms Kelly cancelled Deputy Prime Minister John Prescott’s plans in May for the conference. And it has now emerged the cost of the cancellation has run into hundreds of thousands of pounds. Figures released under the Freedom of Information Act, show the department had spent £180,500 on consultancy fees, £108,618 on contractors, £21,522 on printing and other cost. A further £55,000 was spent on cancellation fees. A DCLG spokeswoman said: ‘We decided not to run the event. We are hoping someone from the private sector will be interested in staging it in future, and the money already spent could be useful to them.’ Manchester City Council, which owns G-MEX, is expected to be dealt an equally massive financial blow from the move. It was hoping to boost the city’s economy, as conference host, with delegates flooding in and spending. When news of the cancellation broke, the council’s opposition leader Cllr Simon Ashley said: ‘Conferences do get cancelled, but this won’t help the local economy. ‘This is bad news and to try and pretend it’s not is wrong.’ Since then the local authority has remained tight-lipped about what its actual losses are. mjnews@hgluk.com
