Feasible Yes, But Will It Happen?

Nestled at the entrance to the Hythe end of Dymchurch sits New Beach Caravan Park. The site is owned by Park Holidays UK Ltd. To get to the ultimate UK company who owns Park Holidays UK Ltd we have run through seven companies. The finally company in the UK is TIGER TOPCO 1 LIMITED The two companies share 3 common directors. They are Jeff Sills (CEO)(pictured)  Tony Clish(pictured) and Alisdair Loch.

  

The three gentlemen named above are joined in the final UK company by Gareth Knight (pictured above) who is the Managing Director in ICG’s UK investment team and describes himself as an Investment Banker (pictured) and Simon Roddis who also works for ICG.

Back in Dec 2016 Kentonline  announced that:

• Park Holidays, the UK’s third largest holiday park operator, has been sold in a deal valuing the firm at £362 million. Tiger Bidco, owned by asset manager Intermediate Capital Group (ICG), is to buy the vacation company, which has six sites in Kent.

 After Tiger Topco 1 Ltd, we move offshore. In fact the ownership of all 28 sites around the coast of the UK end up in a company called Eurydome S.A.R.L (see page 6) registered in the Grand Duchy of Luxembourg according to their equivalent of Companies House.  Luxembourg for the uninitiated is deemed to be an offshore tax haven.

Now the Signatories for the company in Luxembourg are Stéphane Lachance (pictured) and Constanze Schmidt (pictured) according to Luxembourg’s equivalent of Companies House.

 

A Mrs Sofia AFONSO-DA CHAO CONDE, – L-4030 Esch/Alzette, 5, rue Zénon Bernard Luxembourg – “prenamed, acts in her capacity as duly authorized attorney in fact of the Sole Shareholder.“

Anyway we didn’t write because all 28 Holiday Parks are owned offshore. No, we wrote this article because a growing number of local Dymchurch Residents have written to us, flagging up the potential/possible/feasible development of the New Beach Caravan Park.

The owners wish to demolish the old 1936 clubhouse – the oldest holiday park clubhouse in the country – and replace it with a more modern building. The concerned residents have written to us with what they believe may be in the pipeline regarding the re-development at New Beach Caravan Park.

 

So recently we set off to talk to some of these concerned people. At this meeting, they expressed to us that the replacement clubhouse is of such poor design as a holiday park building, it could be easily converted into something else such as a community centre, medical centre, old people’s home etc – the sort of building developers use all too often as bait to sweeten any deal in order to gain planning permission for hundreds of houses to be built.

There are those amongst this growing group who believe there is a different end game in play. The group pointed out that all of the ‘investment’ on the park in recent years has been of a ‘temporary nature’. The swimming pool needed a new heating system – and ended up being housed in a shipping container outside. The maintenance workshop was demolished and relocated at the edge of the park in – yes another shipping container.

Now for planning purposes the site sits on a flood plain; which could cause problems for any potential housing development. However, less than a mile a way is Martello Lakes, where houses have been built on raised ground to lessen the impact of any river or sea flooding. So it can be done thus making the concerned residents ideas of development feasible.

Now ICG have very deep pockets and could throw very substantial resources at any potential development of the site.

The concerned residents also informed us that previously two managers houses have been demolished, making it appear to them that a potential site clearance is happening. The group believe that what may happen in a few years down the line is that ICG will say the park is unprofitable and nobody can say they haven’t invested as they’ve spent £2 million on a new clubhouse.

They then believe that the new clubhouse will be offered as bait for development and the owners will either sell or get to develop the 60 acre site for housing. Now there were some in the group who believed there may be people in the Council who already know and approve of the plan to develop the site.

Now development of the site it is not that far fetched and as we said it is feasible. We have no evidence that it will be developed, just the residents concerns for now. Nor have any of our sources flagged the site up to us. So what we’d say to to these concerned residents is to contact Jeff Sills (pictured) – CEO Park Holidays UK Ltd and ask him what the owners intentions are. Mr Sills can be contacted by email: jsills@parkholidaysuk.com

The Shepwayvox Team

There are legitimate uses for offshore companies and trusts. We do not intend to suggest or imply that any persons, companies or other entities included in this blog post have broken the law or otherwise acted improperly