A CORNWALL Council cabinet member has blamed the previous Conservative administration for buying a former pub building in St Austell for £1-million, saying it was a “stupid thing to do”.

The council bought the General Wolfe building in 2020 with a view to using it to provide temporary accommodation for homeless people. However, it has stood empty and deteriorating since then.

The authority says the projected costs of undertaking work to convert the building have increased significantly, with estimates at more than £2.5-milllion.

Cllr Tim Dwelly, the Independent cabinet member for economic regeneration and investment, said that there are now moves for the building to be sold.

He was responding to a question about the future of building by Reform UK councillor Jack Yelland, who represents St Austell Central.

Cllr Yelland told a council meeting: “The position we are now in is the result of decisions made by Cornwall Council through Corserv (the authority’s public services company) when it purchased the building.

“Since then, it has continued to deteriorate, it has attracted anti-social behaviour, it’s generated ongoing holding and security costs not to mention an estimated reduction in value of around three-quarters of a million pounds.

“So, unless something changes, the building will continue to decline, continue to cost the taxpayers money and continue to stand as a reminder of the council’s failure to protect a historically significant asset of St Austell.”

He added: “With that in mind, could the portfolio holder please tell me what steps Cornwall Council will now take to require Corserv to bring forward clear, costed, time-bound options, including full remediation, partial demolition or disposal, and when can councillors and the community expect to see those options so we can finally make an informed decision and come to some kind of conclusion and way forward?”

Cllr Dwelly replied: “This was a decision in the last administration that I, personally, do not understand at all. I think it was a really stupid thing to do, to buy that building with all the risks attached to it.”

Cllr Dwelly added that he and the portfolio holder for housing, Cllr Peter La Broy, had attempted to find ways of bringing the building back into use.

“We have asked for expressions of interest, we’ve received some, but none of them look like viable solutions. We’re looking at putting the building up for sale and we hope that community groups may come forward, but they will clearly need to come up with their own funds to do so.

“I imagine it won’t go for very much money. Technically, this is a Corserv building and it’s for them to handle, but I would like to apologise to the people of St Austell that this is going on.

“We all would have liked to have seen housing in there but it didn’t stack up and we can’t plausibly, as a council, spend millions of pounds either knocking it down or trying to put even more money in. We just have to hope that people come forward and buy it.”