My name is Sue Gowans and I am the only other female Feoffee on the Town Estate.

For a number of years, with help, I had tried to build up our local food businesses and this helped bring about the start of the East Midlands Food Festival.

I thought that joining the Town Estate in October 2005 would help us as they are meant to help the Town.
But I was not properly accepted and from the start my suggestions and requests for information were ignored. 

In 2006 eight weeks before our Country Fair was due to be held, I was asked to pay an extra £365 for use of the parks, they began to allege that our Fairs were commercial. I knew they weren’t, our budget was tight and I refused to pay the extra.

I was warned to ‘be careful about my actions’ by John Southerington, then the Junior Townwarden, when I asked if I could let local businesses know I needed sponsorship to cover this amount and he said he would pay the sum himself. The Charity Commission later confirmed to me that our charitable events are not ‘commercial’.

After the October 2006 annual Town Meeting, as Chairman/organiser of the Melton Mowbray Victorian Christmas Fayre I asked for a meeting with the new Senior Townwarden, John Southerington to discuss the terms for the Victorian Christmas Fayre due to be held 3rd December 2006. A date was set for 17th October and I took along an offer in writing to purchase stalls at the usual figure of £10.

This was the 10th fair which we had organised using Town Estate stalls and we had always previously said what we could afford and that had always been accepted. It had always been £10 per stall with one exception in 2004 where we had surplus monies and had offered to pay the commercial rate on a proportion of the stalls.  The meeting was attended by John Southerington, Richard Sage Junior Townwarden, Andrew Cooper (Bailiff) and Mick French (Deputy Bailiff).

The atmosphere was very peculiar and highly charged and there was some very unpleasant language used.
On behalf of the Victorian Fayre Committee I offered £10 a stall, the price I had usually paid before including for the 2006 Country Fair. This was both verbal and in writing and I left my offer on the table.

I left the meeting and never received a counter offer of a different stall price from anyone at the Town Estate before the event and indeed on the morning of the Christmas Fayre on Dec 3rd the Town Estate workforce turned out and erected the stalls. This was a confirmation of the acceptance of the offer of £10 per stall that I had made to the Town Estate on October 17th.

I was therefore horrified to receive an invoice on the 13th December 2006 for £ 2796 instead of the £1000 contracted.  On behalf of the Committee I refused to pay any more than the contracted amount of £1000.  I pointed out on several occasions that we had a valid contract to pay £10 per stall but if they were going to insist on £2796, I suggested that the Town Estate take the Victorian Fayre to court to let the Court decide.

We also reminded them that if they were to take us to Court they must sue the Victorian Fayre Committee and not me on a personal basis.

We gave them a Building Society cheque for £1000 which they refused to bank and they then sued me as an individual for £2796.  In May 2008 the case was heard in Leicester County Court before Judge Elsey who said the following to the Town Estate.

‘Why did you not bring the cheque for £1000 which they had paid you as it’s important evidence ?’ ( It was still with the Town Estate solicitor but luckily we had a photocopy and it included our treasurer’s name)   ‘From Day 1, it was obviously a corporate matter. You knew Mrs Gowans was acting on behalf of a committee and despite Mrs Gowans being named in the Claim as the defendant, the defendant must be the Victorian Fayre Committee – the officers of the Committee are all in agreement to that’.   ‘There was clearly a contract for £10 per stall and how could you think otherwise ? There was an offer, verbal and in writing for £10 per stall, you did not communicate a different price, and when the stalls were erected by the Town Estate, that was acceptance of the offer’.   ‘Why should they not have stalls for £10, they were doing the event for the benefit of Melton Mowbray’ .    ‘The behaviour of the Town Estate has been unconscionable – I do not understand how you could have behaved like that’.   ‘You could request permission to appeal but I do not believe there is a Judge in the country who would disagree with me’.

We had been completely and thoroughly vindicated but in the Leicester Mercury, the Town Estate chairman then described the verdict as ‘The judgement in favour of the Victorian Christmas Fayre was made on a technicality concerning contract law.’

At a recent Board of feoffees meeting the Chairman stated that I had, ‘rolled the Town Estate over’!  He also said, ‘People should know that nice Mrs Gowans is not so nice after all !’

None of them have apologised for the stress they have caused to me and others but they have reported me to the Charity Commission for a conflict of interest although they know well that I have always organised all these popular charitable events, with the help of other unpaid volunteers, for the good of Melton Mowbray and not for personal gain.

My view on all this is that over the years I have helped with other volunteers to provide income for many and to strengthen the food base here in the area. I have been happy to follow my vision for the fairs and all this demonstrates a need for change at the Town Estate.

August 2008