Save Victoria Hall from Bradford Council

15/12/2023

Final media article and one of the best ones 😁

Hopes of saving a much-loved community centre in Queensbury were kept alive on Tuesday evening when Bradford Council agreed to further talks.  Queensbury resident Rob Hargreaves presented a petition on the Grade II listed Victoria Hall to a packed meeting of the full council. The petition reques...

15/12/2023

More media coverage of the fight to save Victoria Hall.

At the moment things look really positive for us, let's hope that continues into the new year.

Poor communication over the planned closure of a Queensbury hall was “disrespectful to the campaign of Queensbury” – a Councillor has claimed.

14/12/2023

We have further updates!

Thank you Luke Majkowski Queensbury Ward Councillor for keeping your promise and keeping the community updated. The progress of this whole thing has been outstanding.

On we march!

📣 Victoria Hall Update - 14th Dec 2023 🗣️
Keeping the community updated as promised
✅ Council open to increasing the closure date

⬛️ Today (14th Dec) I met with Council Officers to continue talks regarding the closure of Victoria Hall

▪️ Council have confirmed that the Community Asset Transfer (CAT) has NOT been rejected only stalled due to contractual talks and is still interested in progressing this.

▪️ The Council are due to meet QCP in January where I have requested to attend.

▪️ The council have advised that should plans go well in the new year they would be open to moving the end date from the 31st March to allow the transfer to go across the line if more time was needed. ✅✅✅
This is great news!

▪️ Council acknowledged that little Capital expenditure has been given to Victoria Hall for atleast the last decade. Well before QCP took over the management of the building ❌

▪️ Council acknowledged that they had responded to “most” of the issues

🟩 Tuesday (12th Dec) I spoke in Full Council regarding the miss management of the CAT process and lack communication from the council.
I asked to stop the closure of Victoria Hall or allow a 12 to 18 month extension

🟩 I requested that this was passed to the executive.
No date has yet been set but will keep everyone update.

🟦 Wednesday (20th Dec) Ward Councillors will meet with QCP

🟧 January 2024 Council, QCP and ward Councillors will meet to progress matters
I have today chased for a date to be arranged.

14/12/2023

The BBC have declared VICTORY!!!

We've all done so well as a community to get so far but it's not over yet.

Residents want more time to put together a business plan to take over the running of Victoria Hall.

13/12/2023

Here is the full petition and debate from the meeting of Full Council.

The speakers are;

Robert Hargreaves - Lead Petitioner
Luke Majkowski - Councillor
Alex Ross-Shaw - Labour Portfolio Holder
Rebecca Poulsen - Conservative group Leader
Hazel Johnson - Councillor
Alex Mitchell - Councillor

12/12/2023

The petition has been presented to Full Council!

We will now move on to speaking directly to the Council Executive (political leadership).

Thank you to Cllr Luke Majkowski for moving that the petition be heard by the Executive. This was then supported unanimously. All 3 of our councillors spoke in support with Cllr Mitchell unfortunately running out of time.

The feeling from the speeches given in response is positive. Cllr Ross-Shaw who is the executive portfolio holder spoke towards finding a positive outcome for a community led Victoria Hall whilst acknowledging council issues with communication in the past. The warning is still there though, the community must come together to make this viable.

It is great news for us all that egos are not ruling in this and failures are being accepted. That is the quickest and most effective way to a meaningful and successful outcome 😁

A huge thank you to everyone for everything so far.

On we march!

07/12/2023

Thank you to everyone who attended the meeting.

It is great to see so much emotion and energy coming from the community.

An unofficial count was 98 but more arrived during the meeting.

Together, we can stop the council closing that door.

07/12/2023

WE ARE IN!!! 💪

On Tuesday 12th we will be in city hall presenting the petition to full council at 16:00😁

We will be holding a peaceful demonstration outside city hall on the same day at 14:00 so please join us if you can.

Also, the public meeting in Victoria Hall is tonight at 19:00!

06/12/2023

Some great news just in!

🚨THE WAR IS NOT WON🚨

This extension is a huge relief and will allow for further discussion around the transfer of the building. Thank you everyone for supporting this first battle in the war to save Victoria Hall.

However, we still have to keep moving forwards as planned. This continues with the public meeting at Victoria Hall, 7pm tomorrow (Thursday 7th). Then it is on to full council on the 12th December.

Isn't it fantastic when a councillor updates the community at the first given opportunity!

🏫Save Victoria Hall 🏫
Eviction notice extended! 31st March

✅ The council have extended their notice until 31st March to give more time to work with QCP regarding the Community asset transfer

📅 QCP will be invited to a meeting this month to discuss future plans

👊 I said I would fight to keep Victoria Hall open and I have.

🙏 Thank you to everyone that has so far signed the petition.

❗️I understand that this doesn’t fix the issue but it’s a great start. I will continue to fight to save Victoria Hall.

06/12/2023

Today we have people collecting in the paper petitions so they can be submitted to council tomorrow morning.

Please continue to sign both the paper petitions that are left behind and the online petition as we aim to increase the numbers to move beyond council.

Save Victoria Hall Queensbury

01/12/2023

🚨PLEASE COMPLETE YOUR FULL POSTCODE

Having submitted some of the signatures to the council's legal team, we have been informed that unless the FULL POSTCODE, NAME and LOCATION are present they will consider the entry to be invalid.

At the moment, the number of invalid entries is in the 000s so please, if you have signed and didn't complete the full information - sign again

If you're signing for the first time, please complete all sections.

Save Victoria Hall Queensbury

30/11/2023

🎉🍾 We've reached the required number of signatures to be heard in the chamber at Bradford City Hall!

🚨⚠️However, we still need signatures to push this issue even further. If we're really ambitious, we might reach enough to get to Parliament! At the current rate, we'll hit that target in the next 28 days!

Please continue to sign and share the petition ✍️😁

Save Victoria Hall Queensbury