Hope for arts venue at risk over £2.4m clawback

A new management team of a community-owned arts venue have claimed they can save it from closure after a council asked it to repay £2.4m in funding.

The Red Brick Building, in Glastonbury, hosts events and also rents workspaces to small businesses, charities and artists.

Last year, Somerset Council asked Red Brick Building Centre Ltd (RBBC) to pay back some of the funding it received for two other projects, after an audit of one of them highlighted concerns over governance and finances.

In December, the previous RBBC board said it could not pay and was "preparing for the very real possibility of insolvency", but the council has now said it will let the new board work on a recovery plan.

The arts venue is based in the former Morlands sheepskin factory that was left derelict for more than 30 years.

Locals saved the site in 2008, forming the RBBC as a community benefit society, and the Red Brick Building opened its doors in 2013.

In 2022, RBBC was awarded £2.89m government funding to turn another building into the Life Factory, a space for young people, as part of the Glastonbury Town Deal.

The RBBC leadership board at the time set up a subsidiary called Beckery Construction Company Ltd (BCC) to deliver the building works. Both organisations and the council were criticised in the independent audit report published in May 2025.

BCC was put into voluntary liquidation in November. Its statement of affairs showed, as of 3 November, it had assets of £4,800 and 26 creditors, to which it owed £686,259.

The council also received a statutory recommendation from the auditors to review its oversight of all projects it was accountable for.

In December, it was revealed that the council was seeking repayment of £2.29m paid to RBBC for the Life Factory and also £115,715 it received for the Glastonbury Food and Regenerative Farming Centre project.

Both projects had been terminated, but the council confirmed there were "no issues" with the farming centre project.

Avon and Somerset Police is also still reviewing the audit to establish whether there is any potential evidence that could warrant a formal criminal investigation to be carried out.

At the RBBC AGM last month, Indra Donfrancesco, who, with one other board member, had kept the society running since the end of last year, stepped down as chair of the board.

Donfrancesco said when she joined in September 2023, she had absolutely no idea that the Life Factory project was in trouble.

She said liquidation had felt like the only legal and responsible way forward after the council said it would seek repayment of the funding.

"With everything cascading financially, with tenants leaving as soon as the council started talking about clawback, but also the reputational damage, it looked like our finances could not pull up," she said.

She said she was "utterly relieved" that a new leadership team had come forward and she had "every confidence" their wide skill base would see them succeed.

Four tenants of the Red Brick Building and another new member were also appointed to the board at the AGM.

New chair, Dr Gregory Wilson, a governance and public sector management specialist, said he is "100% confident" that RBBC and the Red Brick Building can be saved.

In a statement, the new board said its "immediate focus" was "financial stabilisation, transparency, rebuilding trust, and developing a realistic long-term development plan for the Red Brick Building".

Wilson added that the new board is bigger than before, has people with a wide variety of skills and has "some support" from Somerset Council, who he said "seem prepared to want to encourage us to do the recovery".

Wilson said: "We're trying to get further tenants involved. We are paying off creditors slowly, but surely.

"We are reorganising the accounts. We are tidying up the place and improving administration, and, hopefully, with support from the community and hopefully Somerset Council, we will be well on the path to recovery."

Asked whether RBBC intends to pay back the government money back, he said: "There is no money to give back. The monies were spent.

"What we can give back is a reassurance that whatever damage the [Life Factory] project has done for the community, that we will repair, and we will repair our reputation."

He added that the current board members and management "have no connection" with the failed Life Factory project.

"My message to the people of Glastonbury is 'come back, help us'," he said.

Wilson said making the project's "building C" safe was also a priority and, wherever possible, safeguarding any works that were previously carried out.

"Maybe one day the future of building C will come back into the thinking", he said.

The new board is now focusing on re-letting the Red Brick Building's cafe/restaurant and organising new events, including an auction of artwork by former resident artist Paul Branson, gifted to RBBC after he died.

Newly-appointed board member Wendy Robinson, an artist and teacher who runs a successful business from the building, said it had helped her establish herself in the beginning.

"This place is so individual and unique for the area and broader area. There isn't anything like it that offers what it offers, so to lose it would be an absolute disaster", she explained.

She added that 17 tenants currently occupy the building and six new tenants had already been found.

In a statement, a council spokesperson said: "The council has lodged a claim to recover the funding provided for the Life Factory project, but has always been clear, it will not pursue that claim while Red Brick develops and delivers a viable recovery plan for the organisation.

"The Regenerative Farming Centre project is in the process of being separated from Red Brick Building Centre Ltd and will hopefully be able to restart in the near future."

The Ministry of Housing, Communities and Local Government (MHCLG) has confirmed it has no plans to seek the return of the Town Deal funding.

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