The reopening of a community centre which closed almost two years ago is being delayed by rent negotiations.
The Ledward Centre closed in the spring of 2025 for refurbishment of its premises in Jubilee Street, Brighton.
However, while renovations were underway it emerged it had been given an undisclosed £225,000 grant by the Brighton Rainbow Fund, which sparked an investigation by the Charity Commission.
The Brighton Rainbow Fund was set up to distribute charitable money raised by Brighton Pride – but had failed to honour grants it had pledged to local LGBTQ+ charities.
One of its trustees Christopher Gull – who was also a director of the Ledward Centre – stood down over the grant, plus an unsecured £48,000 loan to Scene Magazine, of which he was a director, saying he had made “bad decisions”.
The Pride Community Foundation CIC (PCF) has now taken on the role of distributing Pride charity money, and running Scene Magazine. The Charity Commission’s investigation is still ongoing.
On December 31 last year, a statement was published on the centre’s Facebook page from Billy Lewis and Ellie Matthews, saying they were hoping to reopen the centre as soon as possible.
The freeholder of the Jubilee Street premises is Brighton and Hove City Council, which granted an 150-year lease to NUPP(GP) Limited and NUPP Nominees Limited upon trust for Norwich Union Public/Private Partnership Fund in April 2005.
Brighton and Hove News understands NUPP has been holding weekly meetings with the new centre management and is now trying to finalise an appropriate rent.
In their December Facebook post, Mr Lewis and Ms Matthews said: “Our aim is to reopen the centre and for it to be fully operational as soon as possible.
“The only remaining barrier is securing our lease from the building’s landlord. Despite eight months of discussions and assurances, we are still awaiting the formal documentation needed to complete the transfer and reopen the doors.
“Nevertheless, we are determined to reopen, and we are working at pace to make this happen.”
The centre’s website now has a logo on it which says TLC, and two companies, TLC Brighton CIC and TLC Jubilee Street CIC, were set up in April and July last year with Elena Matthews and Billie Craig Lewis as directors and co-owners.
Mr Lewis was previously a director of The Ledward Centre CIC from September 2021 to August 2022 and from April to May 2024.
The Ledward Centre CIC, whose sole director is now Mr Gull, was renamed this month and is now called Sagunto CIC. Its registered office was changed to a business forwarding address last September.
TLC Brighton was also initially co-owned by Rosalyn Thomas, who was also a director alongside Herbe Guyat and Besmir Dema, but all three resigned in on 17 July last year – a couple of weeks before TLC Jubilee Street CIC was set up.
The Ledward Centre did not respond to requests for comment.
Was always empty anyway
Looking forward to the centre reopening, nice to meet up with friends for a coffee and catch up. Hopefully soon
The murky depths of the funding seem a little bit unusual to say the least. I hope they manage to get things sorted.
Would you entrust your money to a Mr C Gull?