Earl to sue for £100m over Bournemouth Airport car park land deal
09.11.06
Landowner the Earl of Malmesbury is seeking damages of £100 million in a suit against his former estate agents over their handling of a land lease deal with Bournemouth airport. In a High Court action to be heard early next year, the Earl is alleging that property agents Strutt and Parker mismanaged his estate by undervaluing the rent charged for 12 acres of former farmland now used by the airport for a very profitable car park.
The deal was brokered nearly six years ago when the then airport owners, National Express, needed the fields opposite the terminal building for additional car parking as part of a major expansion of the airfield. At that time Lord Malmesbury, on the advice of his agents, agreed a 25-year lease at an annual rent of just £9,000.
The airport was sold the following year to current owners Manchester Airport Group as part of a £241 million deal including East Midlands Airport. Since then, the boom in low-cost flights operated by Ryanair, Thomsonfly and easyJet has seen a four-fold increase in the number of people arriving, departing, and parking at Bournemouth airport, where passenger figures are predicted to approach one million this year.
In January of this year, James Carleton Harris, the seventh Earl of Malmesbury, and the trustees of his estate issued a writ against Strutt & Parker claiming that by failing to negotiate a rent based on car park turnover, the agents deprived the estate of a realistic income from the land.
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