MG Rover: Ex-director accused of £100,000 "bribe"
The 2004 Longbridge land sale left MG Rover facing a £3.5 million annual rent bill. The £42.5 million paid for the land was described as a bargain at the time – working out at around £185,000 per acre.
One Birmingham property developer said some land in the city was valued as high as £300,000 an acre at the time. If MG Rover had secured that price, it would have netted more than £68 million.
Nick Matthews, of the Warwick Manufacturing Group think-tank, had claimed that MG Rover made a mistake by selling the land too cheaply.
‘‘As development land this site would be worth a lot more money than what it was sold for,’’ he said at the time.
‘‘St Modwen have got this land cheap, especially if they can get planning permission on it. The top end of Longbridge is only three miles from the city centre and the pressure for land in Birmingham is intense.
‘‘Another company might have paid much more for this site.’’
Another property developer said: ‘‘Land is selling for around £300,000 per acre elsewhere in the city of Birmingham.
‘‘The value of Longbridge will increase if MG Rover no longer builds cars there and St Modwen can get planning permission. There is a lack of land in the south-west Birmingham corridor.’’
Publicly-funded Advantage West Midlands later teamed up with SMP for a £750 million redevelopment of the former Longbridge site and surrounding area.
The ambitious plans are set to create 10,000 new jobs with the construction of a new village centre, a technical college, new industry, offices and 1,450 houses.
As part of the partnership deal with St Modwen, AWM was billed by the property developer for the £100,000 payment to Mr Parker.
A spokesman for the Government agency told the Sunday Mercury: ‘‘We had no knowledge of this issue.
“These matters were bound by confidentiality agreements between the parties involved and pre-date our acquisition of the land by two years.’’
Mr Parker was unavailable for comment last night but he did earlier give evidence to investigators about the MG Rover collapse.
The report said that under cross-examination he had claimed the £100,00 payment was “nothing to do with MG Rover” and was “between [himself] and St Modwen. He added that it was an ’introductory’ fee.’’
When he resigned his directorship in 2000, Mr Parker claimed he was walking away for the good of MG Rover and its workers.
‘‘I thought it unfair of me to take a seat on the board that somebody else could have to take the company forward,’’ he said.
Mr Parker also spoke of his pride at helping secure the BMW sale.
‘‘I had done my job which was to make sure that they (Phoenix Four) had the money and all the finances were in place. Without verification of the finance, BMW would not have spoken to us.
‘Everybody had a role to play and I played my role. Now I want to concentrate on my own business.’’
