The owner of a Harrogate car wash has said customers are questioning whether he is involved in modern slavery crimes, despite being unrelated to a recent court case.

Mehmet Ula, who owns Woodlands Hand Car Wash and Valeting on Wetherby Road, contacted the Stray Ferret to say around three to five customers a day were asking if staff were being treated correctly or abused.

It has happened since Defrim Paci, a 42-year-old married father-of-four, was one of two men convicted at Carlisle Crown Court for modern slavery crimes this month.

Paci is sole director of Harrogate Hand Carwash on Sykes Grove but the crimes were committed against workers at a Carlisle car wash. The Sykes Grove business was not implicated.

Mr Ula said:

“I’m in a difficult situation. I’ve lived in Harrogate for 18 years. We’ve got absolutely nothing to do with these people.”

“Most of the lads I employ are local and we do everything properly.”

Read more:

• Call for modern slavery investigation into Harrogate car wash
• Harrogate car wash owner found guilty of modern slavery

Mr Ula bought the business, which was previously called Bubble Run, two years ago.

He said he pays staff properly and modern slavery was an “outrageous” practice.

He added:

“People have a right to ask questions, they should, but this is affecting my business.

“We 100% disagree with what’s happened.

“I hope they get the correct punishment. This is 2021 in England, modern slavery is not what we want.”

A liquidator has been appointed to wind-up Harrogate firm Airline Taxis, which has debts totalling £55,000.

Simon Weir, of DSI Business Recovery in Ossett, West Yorkshire, was appointed liquidator on Friday following a meeting of creditors.

Creditors include Tracey Lee, a former telephone operator at the company who won an employment tribunal against the taxi firm in January last year. A judge ordered the company to pay her £25,501.

She is yet to receive a penny and previously described to the Stray Ferret the “horrible” process of trying to get the sum awarded through the courts.

The company’s statement of affairs shows it also owes HSBC bank £20,000 for a bounce-back loan taken out last year.

Read more:

• Harrogate taxi firm refusing to pay £25,000 for unfair dismissal

• Mixed reaction to proposed Harrogate wheelchair taxi licence changes

A directors report to creditors, signed by Airline’s sole director Mohammad Suleman, said the company experienced a “significant decline” in turnover due to lack of travel during the first covid lockdown.

The report added “there is no prospect of a dividend to any class of creditor”.

It also said Airline employed three staff and the rest were self-employed drivers.

The Stray Ferret contacted Airline Taxis for comment but did not receive a reply by the time of publication.

A company called Parade Taxis Limited was created in July last year with the same registered address as Airline Taxis on East Parade. Its sole director is Areefa Naz Suleman, the daughter of Mohammad Suleman.

Campaigners for the closure of RAF Menwith Hill will resume their weekly protests this evening.

The protest first took place in 2000 but was halted in March last year due to the covid pandemic.

Supporters of the Menwith Hill Accountability Campaign will stand outside the main gates of the base from 6.00pm to 7.30pm.

Campaigner Sarah Swift said:

“This regular peaceful protest was started by the Campaign for the Accountability of American Bases in 2000.  As has been said before, ‘It’s time they went!'”.

Built in the 1950s on the edge of Nidderdale, Menwith Hill is the United States’ largest overseas surveillance base. Giant radomes, or ‘golf balls’, are a distinctive feature of the site.

Read more:

• Upset and anger at plans to remove MP’s memorial tree at Menwith Hill

• Menwith Hill to expand with new ‘golf ball’

Meanwhile, Harrogate Borough Council is expected to make a decision on the latest expansion at the base soon.

The Ministry of Defence, which owns the site, has submitted plans to add a new visitor centre, vehicle canopy and changes to the road junction on Menwith Hill Road.

However, the application has proved controversial because it would involve felling a memorial tree planted in memory of the late Bob Cryer MP in 1994.

Mr Cryer campaigned for transparency at Menwith Hill and secured a debate in parliament a few months before he died in 1994. He claimed the aim of the base was to “assert and retain United States supremacy”.

Mr Cryer’s widow, the former Keighley MP Ann Cryer, told the Stray Ferret she was “very upset” at the proposals.

Funding for Harrogate’s controversial Station Gateway scheme has been increased from £7.9m to over £10.9m.

The gateway project aims to create a more attractive entrance to the town around Station Parade and James Street and give greater priority for pedestrians and cyclists.

The West Yorkshire Combined Authority, which bid for the initial funding from the UK government, has now allocated an additional £2.6m to the scheme. It will come from the Department for Transport’s Transforming Cities Fund.

A West Yorkshire Combined Authority report said the overall delivery costs of the project have not increased but the extra money was needed for “risk and contingency”.

An additional £300,000 will be match-funded by local councils, taking the total cost of the project to £10.9m.

West Yorkshire Combined Authority has now agreed to proceed with the scheme towards drawing up a full business case.

The UK government has set a deadline of March 2023 for all schemes that received funds from the Transforming Cities Fund to be built.

Read More: 

• Decision to proceed with £7.9 million Station Gateway sparks anger
• Explainer: How the Harrogate Station Gateway survey paves the way for major change

The Harrogate gateway scheme is being done in partnership with Harrogate Borough Council and North Yorkshire County Council.

Similar projects are planned in Selby and Skipton but the Harrogate scheme has proved the most contentious.

Some businesses are worried about the impact on trade but many Harrogate residents and environmental groups have welcomed it.

Councillor Phil Ireland, Harrogate Borough Council’s cabinet member for carbon reduction and sustainability, has said the initiative “has the potential to create many more walking and cycling opportunities while transforming the look and feel of the station gateway area in Harrogate”.

The £1million replacement of Harrogate Theatre’s ageing roof is well underway in preparation for the hopeful return of live shows this year.

A temporary roof structure has been erected over the building to keep out water and protect against wind during re-roofing and external works.

The project is due to be completed by the end of September with performances returning soon after, subject to covid restrictions.

Harrogate Borough Council has released some images of the works, which you can see below:

Read More:

• Harrogate Theatre £1m roof replacement well underway
• Malcolm Neesam History: Harrogate’s once lively street theatre scene

Conservative councillor Graham Swift, deputy leader of the council and cabinet member for resources, enterprise and economic development, said:

“Our investment in this local asset will allow the fantastic performances to continue, promote cultural activity in the town, attract visitors and support the local economy at a time when it is needed the most.”

David Bown, chief executive of Harrogate Theatre (White Rose) Theatre Trust, added:

“Harrogate Theatre is a much loved local venue and we’d like to thank Harrogate Borough Council for investing in the building. This will allow us to put on performances, and connect with our audiences for many years to come.”

Harrogate Theatre is operating a summer season programme in various venues around the town while the theatre is out of use. Further details are available here.

Harrogate residents and businesses are being asked to submit ideas to help give Cambridge Place a colourful makeover.

Harrogate Business Improvement District is working in partnership with Oxford Street-based charity, Artizan International, to install mosaics in the nine, blocked-out windows, on the side of the Boots building.

Each window space will spell out Harrogate — and the two organisations are looking for inspiration on what might go on the individual backgrounds.

Harrogate BID manager Matthew Chapman said:

“Cambridge Place is an extremely popular pedestrian cut-through between Cambridge Street and Oxford Street, yet one of the drabbest in the town.

“Now, in partnership with Artizan International, we want to give this street a real lift by installing nine colourful and eye-catching mosaics in these nine blocked out windows.

“Whilst each one will feature an individual letter to spell out Harrogate, we are asking for suggestions to create the individual backgrounds. The only proviso being it must be representative of the town itself.

“This could be its spa heritage, iconic buildings, or famous names and businesses associated with the town. We will leave it up to individuals, then choose nine different ideas.

“These will then be turned into mosaics by the Artizan International team, giving this much used thoroughfare a real splash of colour.”

Read more:

• Harrogate BID launches new town centre app to help businesses
• Harrogate district bids for £432,000 post-Brexit boost to economy

Ideas can either be emailed to Harrogate BID at info@harrogatebid.co.uk, or left with Artizan International, at their shop located at 39 Oxford Street, Harrogate.

The closing date is Friday, July 2.

An unnamed housing company is in negotiations to buy a field in Bogs Lane in Harrogate with the intention of building new homes, the Stray Ferret understands.

The Kingsley area is already one of Harrogate’s main pressure points for housing – and could see more than 650 new homes eventually built. A local residents’ group said the area has reached a “saturation point” for new homes.

The field is between Henshaws College and Long Lands Common, where thousands of local people raised £375,000 to purchase 30 acres of land to plant trees and protect it from development.

Local estate agent Lister Haigh is marketing the land as a “rare opportunity” to buy a greenfield site that could be used for a potential residential or commercial development.

The Stray Ferret has seen an email sent by the estate agent to a person who enquired about the land. The person asked not to be named, but the email confirms that negotiations are already under way with a housing developer.

The email says:

“Currently negotiations are ongoing with a commercial housing development company who want to build houses on the site.”

Read more:

• Harrogate residents: ‘Act before someone is killed’
• Harrogate residents disappointed at 95-home Granby Farm approval

The site, which is 1.4 hectares, is not allocated for development in Harrogate Borough Council’s Local Plan. This is a guide for where commercial or residential development can take place in the district until 2035.

Similar sites in the Local Plan have been allocated for between 30 and 40 homes.

John Hansard from the Kingsley Ward Action Group was alarmed at the news that the Bogs Lane field could be sold for housing.

He told the Stray Ferret that residents will fight any potential planning application for the land.

He said:

“In any new development area, there has to come a time when you reach saturation point, beyond which the area cannot continue to function as neighbourhood community and simply becomes a soulless conurbation, an out-of-town sprawl of housing, lifeless, with no community spirit or indeed willingness to create such a spirit.

“I feel so sad and afraid that in this area we are already at that tipping point, if not beyond it and that unless this mindless devastation of our green spaces stops, we will be at the point of no return for our community.”

Northern is proposing to double the number of trains from Harrogate to York to two an hour.

The publically-owned rail operator has opened a consultation for a new timetable for May 2022 that it hopes to implement.

Currently, trains to York leave Harrogate Station at five minutes past the hour during the week. They stop at Starbeck, Knaresborough, Cattal, Hammerton and Poppleton.

A spokesperson for Northern said:

“We have plans to operate more frequent services in the future between York and Harrogate following recent infrastructure upgrades. We are consulting with stakeholders about these plans and more details will be released in the near future.”

Read more:

• Ripon student wins award for environmentally friendly rail app 
• Harrogate taxi firm begins insolvency proceedings

Meanwhile, LNER is planning significant changes to its Harrogate to London route.

It has also launched a consultation on a new timetable that would see trains leave Harrogate earlier in the morning but also leave London earlier.

The operator estimates that travel times between Harrogate and London would be about 10 minutes faster.

Hollywood star Michael Rennie, most famous for playing an alien in the 1951 sci-fi classic The Day the Earth Stood Still, died in Harrogate 50 years ago this month.

He suffered an aortic aneurysm on June 11 1971, aged 61, when he was visiting his mother’s home in the town. His ashes are interred at Harlow Hill cemetery.

The Bradford-born actor had a lively and diverse career, starting out with an uncredited role in Alfred Hitchcock’s Secret Agent.

He appeared in 20th Century Fox blockbusters alongside Orson Welles, Richard Burton and Clark Gable.

His most recognisable role was as the friendly alien Klaatu, which landed on a spaceship in Washington DC. It made famous the phrase “Klaatu barada nikto!”, which has left fans guessing its true meaning ever since.

He also made appearances in several hit TV shows during the 1960s, including opposite Adam West’s Batman as the dastardly villain the Sandman.

Film fans in Harrogate during Rennie’s era were spoiled for choice, with several cinemas showing the hits of the day, as Harrogate historian Malcolm Neesam wrote in a recent Stray Ferret article.

Read more:

• ‘Nerve wracking’ decisions for Harrogate International Festivals
• Malcolm Neesam History: the heyday of Harrogate’s cinemas

Mr Neesam told the Stray Ferret that whilst there are not many celebrities interred in Harrogate’s cemeteries, there are some notable names.

Also at Harlow Hill is the Royal Academy artist, Bernard Evans, RA, whose studio was on Park Parade.

Grove Road cemetery has Fridel Dalling-Hay, who was an immigrant from Nazi Germany and became the first person in the world to circumnavigate the island of Britain in a canoe.

Sergeant Major Robert Johnston, one of the gallant 600, who was in the charge of the Light Brigade during the Crimean War, is also buried at Grove Road.

Did you know that the Stray Ferret has teamed up with Malcolm to produce audio walking tours of Harrogate? The walks are sponsored by the Harrogate Business Improvement District (BID) and take you back to the Golden Age of the Harrogate Spa and a walk through the Commercial Heart of Harrogate.  

Why not take a walk back in time and learn about Harrogate’s glorious past.. They’re easy to do and a great day out. For more information click here. 

Another 21 cases of covid-19 have been reported in the Harrogate district.

According to Public Health England figures, it takes the total cases confirmed since the start of the pandemic to 8,012.

No further covid deaths have been reported at Harrogate District Hospital. The last death was recorded on April 11.

There are currently no covid patients being treated at the hospital, according to latest Public Health England statistics.

Read more:

• Killinghall cricket club keeps pub-less village spirit alive

• Great Yorkshire Showground vaccination site to close this weekend

The Harrogate district’s seven-day covid rate currently stands at 62.2 per 100,000 people. The North Yorkshire average is 56 and the England rate is 85.1.

Meanwhile, after six months in operation, Harrogate’s Great Yorkshire Showground vaccination centre will give its final jab today.