economic policy review committee - tynwald chris corlett, former chief executive, mr david ronan,...

Published by the Office of the Clerk of Tynwald, Legislative Buildings,

Finch Road, Douglas, Isle of Man, IM1 3PW. © High Court of Tynwald, 2017

S T A N D I N G C O M M I T T E E

O F

T Y N W A L D C O U R T

O F F I C I A L R E P O R T

R E C O R T Y S O I K O I L

B I N G V E A Y N T I N V A A L

P R O C E E D I N G S

D A A L T Y N

ECONOMIC POLICY REVIEW COMMITTEE

VISION NINE

HANSARD

Douglas, Wednesday, 3rd May 2017

PP2017/0088 EPRC-VN No. 3/16-17

All published Official Reports can be found on the Tynwald website:

www.tynwald.org.im/business/hansard

http://www.tynwald.org.im/business/hansard

STANDING COMMITTEE, WEDNESDAY, 3rd MAY 2017

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Members Present:

Chairman: Mr M R Coleman MLC Mr T Baker MHK

Mr J Moorhouse MHK

Clerk:

Mr J D C King

Assistant Clerk: Ms N Lowney

Contents Procedural ...................................................................................................................................... 53

EVIDENCE OF Hon. Laurence Skelly MHK, Minister, Mr Mark Lewin, Acting Chief Executive, Mr Chris Corlett, former Chief Executive, Mr David Ronan, former Deputy Chief Executive, and Mr Paul Phillips, TT and Motorsport Development Manager, Department of Economic Development ........................................................................................ 53

The Committee sat in private at 3.48 p.m. and resumed its public sitting at 4.45 p.m. ................ 72

Procedural ...................................................................................................................................... 72

EVIDENCE OF Mr Trevor Hussey, former Head of Motorsport, Department of Economic Development ........................................................................................ 73

The Committee adjourned at 6.13 p.m. ......................................................................................... 88


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Standing Committee of Tynwald on Economic Policy Review

Vision Nine

The Committee sat in public at 2.30 p.m. in the Legislative Council Chamber,

Legislative Buildings, Douglas

[MR COLEMAN in the Chair]

Procedural

The Chairman (Mr Coleman): Welcome to this public meeting of the Economic Policy Review Committee, a Standing Committee of Tynwald. I am Mike Coleman MLC and I chair this Committee; with me are Mr Tim Baker MHK and Mr Jason Moorhouse MHK.

Please ensure that your mobile phone is off or on silent so that we do not have any interruptions. For the purposes of Hansard, I will be ensuring that we do not have two people 5

speaking at once. On 19th April 2016 Tynwald approved the appointment of Vision Nine as TT Promoter for a

period of up to 10 years with an option for a further five years. On 28th November 2016 the Department of Economic Development stated in a media release that it had decided to discontinue the independent promoter tender process for the TT Races and Classic TT Races. On 10

the same day, 28th November 2016, the Minister for Economic Development, Mr Laurence Skelly MHK, referred this matter to us. On 6th December 2016 we announced in a media release that we had decided to investigate.

In our media release we invited written submissions from members of the public. We are grateful to everyone who wrote to us and we have heard oral evidence from some of them. 15

Today is the turn of the Department of Economic Development. We begin with a panel of representatives of the Department. With this panel, we are going to start in public and then go into private. We will resume in public for the evidence of another witness later on.

EVIDENCE OF Hon. Laurence Skelly MHK, Minister,

Mr Mark Lewin, Acting Chief Executive, Mr Chris Corlett, former Chief Executive,

Mr David Ronan, former Deputy Chief Executive, and Mr Paul Phillips, TT and Motorsport Development Manager,

Department of Economic Development

Q182. The Chairman: Welcome. Can I ask you, for the record, if you would each state your name and the position you hold or have held in the DED or its predecessor departments 20

concerned with motorsport?


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The Minister (Mr Skelly): Yes, thank you, Caairliagh, Hon. Members. My name is Laurence Skelly, Minister for Economic Development.

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Mr Lewin: Good afternoon – Mark Lewin. I am the Acting Chief Executive of the Department of Economic Development.

Mr Corlett: Good afternoon. I am Chris Corlett. I am the former Chief Executive of the

Department of Economic Development. I left at the end of December last year. 30

Mr Phillips: I am Paul Phillips, TT Business Development Manager for Economic

Development. Mr Ronan: Hello, I am David Ronan, former Deputy Chief Executive Officer for DED, now 35

retired. I left the Department on 14th October 2016. Q183. The Chairman: Fine, thank you. Would any of you like to make an opening statement to us? 40

The Minister: No, just thank you to the Committee, first of all, for the opportunity to be here to present, hopefully, some helpful evidence.

Q184. The Chairman: The questions we will be asking in the public session all emanate from

the information that you have provided us with previously. None of them have been created by 45

the evidence that you provided us with most recently, which is commercially sensitive. Okay, we will get started.

Is there anything you want to say about the evidence that has been provided by Mr Bowers, Harvey Garton, John McBride or Barry Baxter? Do you have any comment about their evidence to us? 50

The Minister: Nothing in particular. We obviously listened with great interest. Clearly the

Manx Motor Cycle Club and Barry Baxter have a great deal of interest in motorsport here on the Isle of Man, so we are very interested to hear what their feedback is.

In some respects, I was perhaps a little surprised at some of the comments that were actually 55

made – some of the questions you have already outlined about consultation – because we had consulted with the Manx Motor Cycle Club and actually had a considerable amount of feedback, to the point where we did actually have an official statement from them stating they would be supportive of Vision Nine if they were awarded the promoter contract for TT and Classic TT. So a little surprised, certainly interested, and we hope that we may be able to unravel some of the 60

questions as we go through it. Q185. Mr Baker: Okay, thank you. I am going to take the first few questions, initially focusing

on the background and obviously the World Series feasibility study which went in advance of the matter we are really here to focus on but which is pertinent to a certain extent. 65

In that feasibility study, the formal document explicitly acknowledged at 5.8.3 on page 31 that, ‘the constraints of the island geographically … and accommodation’ would limit how much further the TT can expand in its current format.

To what extent was that point subsequently recognised in the proposals for the TT, particularly given that document was dated May 2012, some five years ago? Without prejudging 70

where we end up here, it feels as though a lot of those issues are what have subsequently emerged in that five-year period as being limitations on the feasibility of actually delivering what was proposed.


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The Minister: Yes, thank you very much for that question and picking up that point in the 75

feasibility study. For me, that is very much the starting point of this journey, shall we say. The feasibility study was conducted prior to me becoming Minister, but prior to me becoming Minister I also was political Member with responsibility for the tourism and TT and motorsports in the Department.

The feasibility study, to me, had really created the scene for the TT Series, and it is well worth 80

recognising that the feasibility there into the TT Series was all about actually building awareness and opportunity for economic development to come into the Isle of Man. So the TT Series was always to be a driver to bring economic benefit into the Isle of Man and not necessarily growing the actually home event right here.

That was the starting point, and the reason why that was undertaken in the first instance was 85

because of the Scope of Government Report 2006, and then of course 2011, where it did actually challenge each Department to review options for the Scope of Government. This was one of those options that was investigated, and that is why we arrived at that particular point.

The feasibility study clearly identified there were geographical issues, there were limitations. We were very much conscious of that and the process here of looking into an independent 90

company to help us in terms of the promotion and the executing of these events was taken into account, but it was not just the TT World Series; it was the TT and also the Classic TT as well, which of course came later in the process.

Q186. The Chairman: Was any attempt made at this point to try and set the limitations into 95

metrics? In other words, to say, ‘Okay, how many people could we manage? How much will the sewerage need to be updated by? How much capital will we have to spend?’

The Minister: As far as I am aware there were no discussions with any other entities at that

particular juncture; however, I think it was generally accepted that the Isle of Man had 100

capabilities around the numbers that visited for the famous Centenary in 2007. I think that was always at the back of everyone’s mind: that the capability and infrastructure were able to take those particular visitor numbers.

Q187. The Chairman: If my memory serves me right, that was an additional 20,000, was it 105

not? Mr Ronan: Sixty thousand, approximately, yes. Q188. Mr Baker: Sixty thousand in total? 110

Mr Ronan: Yes. Q189. The Chairman: So it was an additional 20,000 capacity. But that was quoted only by

Infrastructure; I do not think it was quoted by any other Department, was it? 115

The Minister: In terms of what they are capable of? Q190. The Chairman: No, I think that figure came from Infrastructure. 120

The Minister: No, I mean the visitor numbers for 2007 were 60,000 at that particular time. The feasibility study, as you say, goes back probably five years now, so the numbers of

visitors at that particular juncture were probably in the mid-30s. I do not know whether any of the other officers might be able to help me.

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Mr Ronan: In 2007?


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The Minister: No, when the feasibility study was conducted. Mr Phillips: High 30s, I think, at that stage. 130

The Minister: I think so. Mr Lewin: It is probably worth bearing in mind … because one of the goals, from my reading

of that exercise, was absolutely looking at the visitor numbers, but it was not necessarily growing the peak. It was looking at where there was already capacity – capacity in terms of 135

travel, capacity in terms of accommodation – and making use of what was already there by way of infrastructure, clearly at a peak. That was also going to have an additional burden, but a lot of the focus was on going outside of that and looking at, for example, the Festival of Motorcycling as well.

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Mr Ronan: I think discussions had taken place with the Steam Packet about their capacity, and there are only a small number of sailings during the TT period which are at total capacity. There is still flexibility to bring further passengers over, but as Mark has said not to increase the peak necessarily but to spread the numbers over the festival period, over the two-week period. 145

Q191. The Chairman: If I may, just one more. The Scope of Government made the recommendation. Firstly, did you agree with the

recommendation? Secondly, it seemed to go dormant until something came out saying, ‘How are you getting on 150

with the Scope of Government?’ Then you seemed to get moving again. Would you like to comment on that? The Minister: I think all of Government could probably say that; they were dormant for quite

some time, which is why the last administration did the update in 2011. The original report was 155

in 2006. The new administration that came in said they challenged it and there was an updated report in 2011.

From my point of view, personally, as I said earlier, when I became Minister it was clear that the feasibility study had been completed. There was a considerable amount of money that had been spent. From my point of view, I believed that the question needed to be answered and that 160

we needed to test the market: is there a suitable operator there that we could partner with as a Government to actually try and increase the economic benefit to the Isle of Man?

With the feasibility study complete and the question being asked, we wanted to complete the process and that is why we went into the procurement at that particular juncture.

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Q192. Mr Baker: For the World Series? The Minister: It was, but do bear in mind that it was not just the World Series; it was also for

the TT event as well at the same time: the World Series and the TT event, because there was a lot of focus around taking the TT around the world, but we were still looking for a private 170

operator to promote the local event here as well. Of course, what came afterwards was Classic TT.

Q193. Mr Baker: Just to be really clear, within the World Series proposition there were two

elements, i.e. the true World Series, plus the Isle of Man element, and then where we ended up 175

was the international aspects dropping and effectively continuing with the residual.


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The Minister: That is it, yes – very well picked up. Absolutely, as I say, that is where the journey took us: to a second procurement on that particular basis.

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Q194. Mr Baker: And it was effectively saying, ‘Okay, we are not going to do the international aspect, but we will carry on with the local’?

The Minister: Yes, indeed. We wanted to focus in on the local on the basis that it was felt

through the process that there was significant opportunity still to be created. By that time there 185

was also the Classic TT which had been launched and was obviously gaining momentum, and we identified that there were significant opportunities around that event too.

Mr Baker: Thank you. 190

Q195. The Chairman: At this stage, how much did the Attorney General’s Chambers get involved?

The Minister: Well, I should probably go back to ask the officers here. It did not at this

particular juncture, but I think it was The Sports Consultancy who were contracted with regard 195

to the feasibility study and had started the process. I think it was felt that it would be appropriate, given their expertise, to continue with that, with the consent of not just the Department but with CoMin.

I do not know if any of the officers want to add … 200

Mr Ronan: Yes, that is correct. Yes, the Attorney General’s Chambers were approached and they were content. They consented to a suitably qualified legal adviser picking that particular exercise up, so The Sports Consultancy were engaged to run the procurement and to prepare the documents for the TT Series, the first procurement.

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Q196. The Chairman: And did you get an aggregation, as well, from the process that normally goes on with the Attorney General’s Office?

Mr Ronan: Yes, correct, yes. 210

Q197. The Chairman: They said that was okay for you to go ahead and do the procurement? Mr Ronan: It would take place with Procurement, which would have been part of Treasury at

the time. 215

Q198. Mr Baker: Thank you. Obviously this was quite a complex proposition, or from the outside it looks pretty complex,

and it went on over a long period of time. What, if any, project management arrangements were in place through the process of outsourcing the World Series and subsequently the TT?

And to the extent there were such arrangements in place, how effective were they? 220

The Minister: Within the Department of Economic Development we have a Motorsport

Team, which of course you have representatives here. They then feed into the Motorsport Strategic Group which has the wider Government. I might leave one of the others to perhaps explain the remit and how that was managed. 225

Mr Ronan: Yes, certainly in terms of managing the project within the Department at that

time, the Head of Motorsport would have been looking after it from the Department’s perspective. But there were regular reports from The Sports Consultancy showing progress had


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been made, timelines, and of course there were reports which were taken to the Council of 230

Ministers, and various go/no-go positions for Council to make decisions on. It was project managed within the Department by the Head of Motorsport at the time, for

the original procurement. More latterly, Head of Motorsport retired at the end of 2015 and I picked up the project management along with The Sports Consultancy for the second procurement. 235

Q199. Mr Moorhouse: Why were The Sports Consultancy chosen for their part in this role? Mr Ronan: They had been engaged to undertake the feasibility study in the first instance;

they were suitably qualified; they went through a tender process for the feasibility study. It was 240

considered they had the expertise and the resources to run the procurement for us, with the consent of Treasury and the Attorney General’s Chambers.

Q200. Mr Baker: You mentioned the Motorsport Strategic Group. When was that first

established? What was its remit and how often did it meet? 245

Mr Ronan: The Motorsport Strategic Group in its current form was established towards the

end of 2012, the beginning of 2013, but it followed a previous group which was Gold Command Group, which effectively had similar representation.

In 2012, the then Chief Executive of Economic Development, recognising that perhaps the 250

Gold Command Group had lost a bit of focus and become a little unwieldy, restructured to refocus and to restrict the number of attendees to keep it strategic – it did tend to get a little operational at times.

In 2012-13, the current Motorsport Strategic Group was formed, which included representation from Economic Development in terms of myself as Deputy Chief Executive, the 255

Chief Executive of the Department of Infrastructure, the Chief Executive of the Department of Home Affairs, the Chief Constable, the Director of Highways, and the Head of Motorsport. The Chief Executive Officer of the Department of Health would be invited to the meetings immediately before the two major events, so just before TT, just before the Festival of Motorcycling. 260

The frequency of the meetings: there were scheduled to be a minimum of four a year. There was one in early May in preparation for the TT; there would be one in late June/early July which would be reviewing TT and preparing for Festival of Motorcycling; and there would be two other meetings which would take place between September and March each year.

The purpose or the remit was to provide strategic direction to the Motorsport Operational 265

Group on operational issues which have policy implications; to provide a cross-departmental forum for the discussion of strategic and policy issues arising from planned or existing motorsport events or activities; to consider matters of policy arising from serious incidents at motorsport events; and to appropriately brief politicians.

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Q201. Mr Baker: So quite a wide-ranging group, meeting not overly often but reasonably frequently?

Mr Ronan: Those are the minimum numbers. 275

Q202. Mr Baker: I am struggling to see, if we had that group formed, why we have ended up where we have ended up, to be perfectly honest, in terms of the issues around capacity and infrastructure and the sense that the Vision Nine proposition emerged without due consideration of some of the practicalities. Yet that group surely should have been capable of pushing those issues out. 280


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Mr Ronan: At each of the meetings, certainly during 2015-16, progress and update on the procurement exercise was discussed; it was an agenda item each time. The Departments were kept appraised of where the process was up to. I think the only concern I can recall during the course of those meetings was how the changes to Road Races legislation would impact on the 285

agreement with a promoter. But, yes, during the course of 2015-16, the group met more frequently. During 2015 there

were actually seven meetings and during 2016 there were eight – some specifically relating to the promoter procurement, others were the standard meetings in preparation for the motorsport events. 290

Q203. The Chairman: Can I just ask, at this time the Attorney General’s office is not involved

at this stage and the standard procurement procedure was not involved either? Mr Ronan: Not directly, no. 295

Q204. The Chairman: It is all being done in-house? Mr Ronan: Using legal advisers, The Sports Consultancy, who had been consented by the

Attorney General’s Chambers to act on our behalf. 300

Q205. Mr Baker: Within that forum, was there any dialogue where other Departments were

saying, ‘We are concerned about the ramifications; can the Island really cope? What about travel arrangements; what about hospitals, policing, sewerage, etc?’

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Mr Ronan: Not specifically. I think the first meeting which flushed out any of those issues – they were not specifically about visitor numbers – was the meeting on 9th May where there were a number of issues raised, and the subsequent meeting on 2nd June which addressed the majority of those issues.

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Q206. Mr Baker: That is 2016? Mr Ronan: 2016, sorry, yes. Q207. Mr Baker: So it has been going four years; everybody has known what the proposition 315

was, and yet it has taken until the end of … well … (Mr Ronan: 2016) to actually focus on these issues? (Mr Ronan: Correct.)

It obviously raises a lot of questions as to, with that amount of talent in the room, and expertise, why the issues took so long to come out?

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Mr Ronan: Well, we were advising on a regular basis as to progress with the procurement. At no point were any issues raised other than, as I said earlier, the implications for that particular procurement with the changes to the Road Races legislation which came in at the beginning of this year, 2017.

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Q208. The Chairman: Were the other Departments involved in this aware, all of you, what you were doing? In other words, what your expectations were.

Mr Ronan: I think there were other occasions where there were briefings: Chief Officers

Group with Council of Ministers, there was a briefing – I think that was the previous year. There 330

had been regular briefings to the Council of Ministers at various stages through both procurement exercises. There were other occasions where either political Members or officers


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were advised of what was going on; meetings were arranged with Vision Nine at one point for political Members to meet with Vision Nine.

There was certainly no attempt to try and hide anything from the other Departments; it was 335

all open and forward, but it was not until the meeting in May that some of the issues started to come through. But they were not regarding capacity; they were not regarding the number of visitors that the Island could accommodate.

Q209. Mr Baker: So if they were not regarding those, what were they? 340

Mr Ronan: Well, I think they were summarised in the minutes of the meeting which took

place on 2nd June, which was a follow-up to the one on 9th May. In reviewing the meeting that we had in May and the minutes from that meeting, there were six areas that we had identified which needed addressing, most of which had been addressed or were being addressed by the 345

time we got to the meeting on 2nd June. There was the issue of a side-agreement, an agreement which would bring the other

Departments into the contract; the implications of the Road Races legislation – changing the legislation; key personnel, and in particular reference to a safety adviser which had been mentioned in the agreement; there were some drafting terminology issues which were picked 350

up; there was a question raised over the ownership of the event; and then there is a question over liabilities and in particular whether other costs could actually have been transferred over to the promoter.

Q210. Mr Baker: In terms of the actual phases that this process went through, we identified 355

three phases and the first was, crudely, September 2006 to February 2014, in which the World Series idea evolved and to incorporate the domestic event as well.

How did the link arise between the idea of expanding the TT internationally and the idea of outsourcing, effectively, public services? The two things are not intrinsically linked, but they have obviously come together in this proposition. 360

The Minister: I would suggest that was part of the original procurement, as stated. Whilst

there is a focus on the TT Series going global, but it was also about outsourcing the promotion aspect of the local event. Through that process coming to a conclusion, it was decided that we would focus on the domestic event. Again, we felt that maintained the principle of the Scope of 365

Government. Q211. Mr Baker: Just a precise question around the Motorsport Team: effectively we were

proposing to outsource a large chunk of the Motorsport Team’s activity, is how it seems. What was the rationale that the Department thought that was suitable for outsourcing? Is the 370

Department still of that view? The Minister: It is a fair question. Really, it comes back to the rationale with regard to why to go to procurement, and there is

the original feasibility study that took us to this particular juncture. 375

Yes, we have got the Scope of Government aspect there, but one of the other points that was recognised is the limitations that we were having with regard to resource – financially that was quite a strain. The event was growing organically; we had clearly tried to maximise the economic potential of it and we felt that we had reached the limits of that, given our constraints of working within a Government structure. That is why it demonstrated to us that going to an 380

outsourcing option made the very logical sense to test the market if there was suitable expertise available.


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Mr Lewin: If I can just add to that, maybe. Certainly from my perspective, it is really worth noting that it is a small team, the Motorsport Team. We have got Paul here today, but it is a 385

team of five and throughout the long period of uncertainly and instability they have remained loyal in terms of delivering successful events. But it has been a long-held view, going right back to 2006 and then to a series of discussions and public discussions since then, that some of the activities of the Motorsport Team, particular around commercial promotion, commercial contracts of the event itself, could sit better outside Government. Looking at what the exercises 390

were designed to do was to test that assumption. Recognising that it is a small team, there is a huge amount of breadth that they have to deal with, and at particular key times of the year a great deal of challenge.

On one hand you have got Government and Tynwald, through its various different guises, saying there was a need to test whether some things can sit better with the private sector or in a 395

different environment, but also you have got the challenge to run an event of this scale, particularly when it hits a peak, it needs additional resource, it needs additional assistance. As the Minister said, there may well be opportunities we were unaware of.

I think it has been a really challenging time, going through that period of uncertainty, through multiple procurements, and throughout that the Team has remained loyal and has delivered 400

successful events. I think it is really worthwhile recording that. Q212. The Chairman: You mentioned scale, but you did not really know what the scale was,

because you did not know how many visitors you were going to be able to handle on the Island. You know you have got the 20,000 but you do not have a definitive figure in conjunction with 405

the other Departments involved to say, ‘This is your cap.’ So it is difficult going out to tender in that situation and it is difficult establishing, I suppose, your staffing as well.

Mr Lewin: I think we will have a conversation about some of the commercial aspects in a

private sitting, but when you distil what happens on an annual basis or organically – where in 410

some cases we are not directly in control, so this year or in the future – into a contractual form is a real challenge. And the actual raw number itself may not have a consequence on infrastructure. It is about the shape of it; it is about what happens within. You are absolutely right: it is very difficult to accurately predict that with any degree of certainty.

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Q213. The Chairman: Yes, but it is also difficult, I suppose, to assess. When you go out to tender, the people do not necessarily know what they are tendering for as far as numbers. You just say, ‘Okay, what we will do is …’ – and this is all from this documentation we have already had, okay. That we will just extrapolate and say, ‘Right, well one guy says we are going to get 85,000 in’ – again, in the documentation. Another guy says, ‘We are going to get less than that.’ 420

What are you looking for? You do not appear to have known. Mr Corlett: If I might add: I think the visitor number question is a particularly good one for us

to focus on. It is very difficult to come up with a definitive figure because of course the number of people who come to a TT – let’s say there are 45,000, I think, came this year – some will come 425

for a day, some will come for the fortnight, so many of those people will not be on the Island simultaneously. Some will be in the north of the Island; some in the south; some in the Douglas area. Are they day visitors? Are they short visitors? Are they fortnight visitors? Are they on motorbikes? Are they in other forms of transport? Are they foot passengers? All of that means it is a very rich and complex situation to try and definitively state how many visitors we can 430

support at any one moment in various parts of the Island. What we said, as part of the procurement process … we asked the bidders to show that they

had done their due diligence and done their analysis to think how might we support further growth. We know that Vision Nine, for example, spoke, as part of preparing their bid, extensively to the Steam Packet, to key hotel operators, to other accommodation operators, to airlines, to 435


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think through some of those issues and think through ideas, from providing more glamping facilities to deliberately trying to provide entertainment at certain times in the fortnight where there was less demand, to try to create a smooth level of demand.

There is a very real danger if we get focused on just a headline figure of x-thousand visitors came this year that that misses all of that complexity out. It misses all that richness out, that 440

some may have come for a day, some may have come for three days, some may have been here for two weeks, some have been all over the Island.

We were asking the bidders to show that they had consciously thought through that, that they had consciously done their homework. Vision Nine demonstrated quite a lot of evidence that they had thought about precisely that: about the potential for more day visitors, the 445

potential for more visitors who were not bikers. There was even talk about potential for cruise ships to be used to provide additional accommodation, more glamping – a host of facilities that could, over time, increase the capacity that the Island could support.

It is very difficult to condense that down when working with the other Departments. They have legitimate concerns about the ability of the Police or the ambulances to navigate around 450

the Island safely as numbers grow – we absolutely understand that. It is a particularly complex question, so the Committee is right to give it due attention.

Q214. Mr Baker: Equally, in terms of remunerating whoever was going to be the promoter,

you needed to be able to condense that complexity down in order to remunerate the promoter 455

in an appropriate manner, so that complexity needed to be reflected in the commercial negotiations with Vision Nine or whoever else. How did you see that playing out?

Mr Corlett: It was for them to come forward with business models. They believed that we

could generate more revenue per visitor and that they could make money from that. 460

By offering a richer experience for the visitor – from potentially better seating facilities around the course, better food and beverage, better entertainment – they believed they could generate additional revenue streams from those visitors that were coming, and that would then remunerate them. Of course, the Isle of Man would benefit from the greater economic benefits of those additional visitors spending in our wider economy. 465

It was for them to come forward, as the bidders, with their proposals as to how to make money from the event. So some of it is about television revenues; some of it might be other marketing; some of it might be the revenues from the visitors coming, but it was for each of the bidders to come forward with how they saw revenue streams could be generated to help grow the economic benefit, grow the return to the taxpayer, and ensure that the event was 470

sustainably successful. Q215. Mr Baker: Are you satisfied that in evaluating the bids there was that clarity of what

the benefit to the Isle of Man was going to be from the proposition that Vision Nine and the other bidders had put together? 475

Mr Corlett: From my part – I am not an expert in the TT, but – a lot of work had been done

with Economic Affairs and the other Departments to analyse both the costs and the benefits of the TT historically. They have to be estimated because it is very hard to definitively understand the benefit of what a TT visitor might be, but work had been done to make those estimates; 480

therefore, we were working with the bidders with their best views of how much more money we could gain from growing the visitor numbers, but also growing how much each visitor spends by maybe attracting a different mix of visitors; for example, attracting more corporate visitors who might be prepared to pay potentially hundreds, if not thousands, of pounds for a corporate hospitality package that would generate much more revenue for both the operator and for the 485

wider economy. There may be another visitor who might not spend so much per day.


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We were looking for them to show they had consciously thought that through; how might the Island make money from the growth and how might that business make money; and how might the taxpayer, who ultimately underwrites all of this, gain a reasonable return as well?

That is what each of the bidders did in their bids. We had TSC evaluate the financial bids. We 490

also had a corporate financier with expertise in analysing and comparing such bids. We had a panel of officers, which included two accountants, including one from the Treasurer. So we put their assumptions to as much rigorous financial scrutiny as we could. Inevitably, these are projections based on some assumptions, but we gave it as much scrutiny as we possibly could as part of the bidding process. 495

Q216. Mr Baker: In order to turn that into a legal contract between some elements of Isle of

Man Government and a successful bidder, that is a hugely complex task to actually put risk and reward and return. Did you feel you had got to that point or was that still a work in progress?

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Mr Corlett: You are absolutely right: a very difficult thing to do. We drew up a draft contract as part of the tendering process. We said, ‘Here is our template

as to how we would like to see it operate’ and we said to the bidders, ‘Please respond to that. Do you feel you can fully comply with that? Do you feel you can make that contract better? Do you feel there are elements of that you are unable to comply with because we are being 505

unreasonable? Please tell us what your best bid is and tell us how you would amend that contract.’ Then we could negotiate with them to ultimately arrive at what was the best value for the taxpayer.

David, if you want to add … 510

Mr Ronan: That is absolutely correct; you have explained it very eloquently. It is only in terms of the visitors … Vision Nine were very clear in their thinking about the type

of visitor they were going to attract. I think there are various documents within the paperwork you will have seen where it was not necessarily the case that they would be growing the traditional bike fan: someone coming over on a motorcycle. They would be looking to attract 515

other sports fans, so people who had just come for the experience of being on the Isle of Man for the TT fortnight; corporate, as Chris has mentioned; and to spread those people out over the fortnight rather than increase the peak.

I think in some of the work that they did, Vision Nine, they identified that actually the model that we currently experience here is different to most sporting events where there are 520

significantly more people coming to the Isle of Man TT who are true enthusiasts. I forget the exact percentage; it is something like 60%. What Vision Nine saw was not to reduce the absolute number of bike fans coming but to reduce that as an overall percentage of the people coming. You would have people that were not necessarily interested in the racing; they had come for the experience of the event. You have people coming along as family and friends of people who 525

were bike fans. They were looking at a whole package of different offers that would grow the numbers – not to grow the peak but to grow the numbers over the extended period.

Q217. Mr Baker: So the bidders had a clear vision of what they were trying to achieve.

Translating that into a legal contract that both parties could sign up to and go through all the 530

due diligence and the stakeholder approvals that were required: did you get to that point? Did you nearly get to that point? Did you not get anywhere near that point?

And, as a supplementary, my interpretation is The Sports Consultancy had drafted the draft document, the draft contract – is that right?

535

Mr Ronan: TSC had produced the draft contract that went out with the ITT – correct – with input from officers within the Department. The original contract which would have gone out with the TT Series was put together with input from officers. The contract which went out for


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the second procurement was an adaptation, a modification, of the first agreement, so it was not starting from scratch in that respect. But, yes, it was put together by The Sports Consultancy 540

with input from officers from the Department. Q218. The Chairman: Did the Attorney General’s office have sight of that? Mr Ronan: No, because, as has been mentioned earlier, they had given their consent to The 545

Sports Consultancy being suitably qualified legal advisers to carry that out on our behalf. Q219. The Chairman: Even to the extent of drafting the contract? Mr Ronan: Absolutely, yes. That is correct. 550

Mr Corlett: If I might add, the AG’s Chambers did highlight that if, say, another legal party

were to give legal advice such as prepare contracts, and if the AG’s Chambers were then to subsequently amend those documents, then the professional responsibility for those documents would cease with the original preparer. In other words, if TSC prepared a document and then 555

the AG’s or other parties subsequently changed that, we could not hold them to account for their legal responsibilities and acting as our legal adviser. That is why the AG’s Chambers, having accepted that TSC were going to act as the party handling our legal advice on that particular contract, it was important it remained with TSC throughout the process.

560

The Chairman: I understand that – Mr Corlett: That was my understanding. The Chairman: I understand, but maybe the AG should have actually done the contract. 565

Q220. Mr Baker: Just to be really clear, a draft contract went out for the parties to tender

against. Their vision and their proposal came back. To what extent was that draft contract then updated to reflect what they were proposing to do, because there must have been elements of their proposition that were perhaps new or were not anticipated when you put the contract 570

out? I would have thought you would go through an iterative process before you got to a final … Mr Lewin: It is worth saying that, as you said before, it is very complex trying to bring all this

into one place that all parties agree to. That process was live, at which point the Department in November decided to terminate that process. It had not reached a settled form by that point, 575

but that was very much a live activity. Q221. Mr Baker: Okay, so we are talking November 2016; how long had that legal process

been going on at that point, Mark? 580

Mr Lewin: A number of months; probably back five or six months. The Minister: Yes, I would probably say, thinking back to the Motorsport Strategic Group,

May then into June and then following right the way through the summer; of course the General Election; then new Department and decision made. 585

Q222. Mr Baker: It is not unusual in a complex commercial situation to have various drafts

going backwards and forwards between the parties and the issues being narrowed over time. How much gap was still remaining between the parties at the time when the process stopped in November 2016? 590


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Mr Lewin: I think that is one of the questions … There are a number of points around this that the Department, under advice, would like to take in private setting, and the final position arrived at, for a variety of points, we would prefer to discuss in private.

Mr Baker: Okay, that is fine. We will pick it up. 595

Q223. Mr Moorhouse: Okay, moving on to Phase 2 – the dates February 2014 to November

2015. The key aspects are linking into the procurement process for the World Series and the domestic events.

The first aspect I would just like to go back over is the workings in terms of the expression of 600

interest and the invitation to tender documents. Even though they were so significant, was there no input at all from the Attorney General’s office? Looking at those it was just …

Mr Corlett: Same answer. Exactly the same answer applies. 605

Q224. Mr Moorhouse: Same involvement. Was there a heads of contract document produced? Mr Ronan: A heads of contract? Well, there was a draft agreement, but there was no

document called ‘heads of contract’, no. 610

Q225. Mr Moorhouse: Right, okay. In terms of the consultation mentioned and meetings that were taking place in 2015-16, was

there actually any involvement at this stage with the Ministers or Chief Executives from the key Departments? 615

The Minister: I think there were a number of regular meetings. We talked about the

Motorsport Strategic Group which obviously had executives. There were updates from within the Department; there were updates with regard to Council of Ministers, formal and informal.

There were regular updates, and as we led up to the final phases there was a presentation to 620

Tynwald Members. There was also an invite, I think, to the political Members of each of the Departments in Motorsport Strategic Group to engage. So there were a series of different engagements with different stakeholders, both political and executive.

Q226. Mr Moorhouse: Just to clarify, the Ministers for the DHSC, the DHA and DOI were all 625

actively involved and could all have stated their case at this point in the process? The Minister: Their updates predominantly would be via Council of Ministers, but of course

their Chief Executives would be involved with the Motorsport Strategic Group. (Mr Moorhouse: Okay.) And I think there might have been a Chief Officer Group (COG) meeting – Chief Executive 630

Officers. Q227. Mr Moorhouse: At this stage, what consultation was done with the MMC and the

IOMTT Marshals’ Association and other voluntary organisations involved in motorcycling, about the implications that would be involved for them? 635

The Minister: As I said earlier, there was considerable engagement with a whole host of

different stakeholders – that were ongoing, I might add. TTMA: there had been official meetings with and discussions with them. The MMC: there was a meeting with them with Vision Nine; there were also separate meetings with them, to the point there that we did get, as I stated in 640

the opening statement … Particularly the MMC were very conscious about the potential integration there with the Festival of Motorcycling and the Classic TT, but we did get an official


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communique from the Manx Motor Cycle Club, Ned Bowers, who stated that they were in agreement; they would be supportive of Vision Nine being awarded the promoter contract.

645

Q228. Mr Moorhouse: Okay. What due diligence checks were done on the bidders to assess if they had sufficient

experience to take up the contract? Mr Ronan: In terms of relevant experience, neither bidder had dealt with an event such as 650

the TT, by its very nature; however, both had indicated that they would be using existing resources in terms of the organiser, so the ACU Events would be engaged, the volunteer organisations.

In terms of running the racing, it was business as usual. It would be the same group of people who would be responsible for providing the Clerk of the Course and marshals and everything 655

else that is required to put the event on. Both bidders had skills and expertise in putting events on in different areas, quite

successfully, and also in dealing with local authorities, so Government in particular areas. In terms of the due diligence regarding delivery of the event, we were satisfied because both

had suggested that they would be engaging the same group of people and that was satisfactory. 660

Q229. Mr Moorhouse: Thank you. In terms of the risks, was the actual impact of DED staff being transferred assessed, or was it

just a simple assumption it would work and that you could transfer staff across? 665

Mr Ronan: I think it was identified at an early stage in the process that there was potential conflict with certain members of the staff, because any organiser, any promoter, would naturally want to engage the current staff – small group as they are – because they have all the expertise. There was a decision taken to exclude certain members of the Motorsport Team from any part of the procurement process. An instruction was given to The Sports Consultancy not to provide 670

any information to those members of staff. Yes, I think anybody coming along to pick up an event such as the TT would want to at least

talk to the staff and offer them the opportunity to transfer should they chose to. Mr Phillips: Can I just add something to that, because in some of the evidence there has been 675

previously I have been mentioned on that point and there have been some comments. It is important to point out, like Dave has just mentioned, for myself and some of my colleagues that were impacted by this, we were specifically removed from the process and we were not involved in it at all.

There have been some comments around job offers being made and an ability to negotiate 680

around future employment, but none of that ever took place. Nobody in the Motorsport Team was ever afforded a job offer from any tenderer in this process because the contract was never resolved. The only thing that did happen was that myself and two colleagues were put on notice in April of last year. That was extended at some point in the summer, I believe, and then eventually removed. That is really the only thing that has ever happened so far as our own 685

employment was concerned. Q230. Mr Baker: Just to be clear, when you say ‘on notice’ you were put at risk of

redundancy? 690

Mr Phillips: We were added to the internal redeployment list, but it was quite unclear as to what the final outcome would be at that point – potentially, yes. There was no certainty for myself and my two colleagues in that situation at the time.


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Q231. The Chairman: Why was the World Series abandoned? We have seen a minute which 695

basically says, ‘We are discontinuing this project.’ There are no reasons for that decision in what we have been given because it is a cut out of the minutes – and I have already expressed that you are far away from the Wednesbury rules with reference to minutes.

The Minister: The Wednesbury rules! 700

Okay, in terms of why: it was not abandoned; it was merely shelved and the process was discontinued on the basis that we had felt – and I say ‘we’; it was a political decision – there was a clear process followed; there was a recommendation made and politically we determined, as a Department, that we would stop that process and we would focus on just the local home event of the TT. We felt that if we were to do that we would have to start again in terms of a process 705

and begin a new procurement. We determined that on the very simple basis that through this process it was clearly

identified there was significant opportunity still to build on in terms of the economic benefit that the TT may derived right here locally. That was the number one focus, in the first instance, to generate income coming into the Island. 710

We started a new procurement process to focus in on the domestic events. Q232. The Chairman: In the documentation it stated that The Sports Consultancy had

advised that a number of big-name promoters – the sort of people you were looking for – were interested before we went to the second stage and the extra spend with them; yet later on it 715

says that there was a disappointment within the Department, as reflected in the minutes, that no big-name bidders came along and said, ‘We would wish to do this’, because they regarded it as being too dangerous a thing to be connected with.

Was that a part of the decision? 720

The Minister: I do not know the exact reasons for why certain people or certain companies did not apply or follow through. What we do know is that I think there were 10 that were returned. That then ended up with three going to the final stage, and we ended up with two, with some merging to get to the final point.

I think you raise a valid point. We would all recognise a treasure, the TT, and understand its 725

value to the Isle of Man historically and economically, but clearly when you are an external body looking at this as a rare commercial opportunity, which is obviously part and parcel of the process, you would need to take reputation into consideration, and we suspect that may have been a rationale for why those so-called big names did not come forward.

730

Q233. Mr Baker: Can I just ask on that, The Sports Consultancy fall into a similar category to some of those big-name bidders in the sense that they were external and not Isle of Man based. Do you think they understood the treasure that the Isle of Man is, and the history and the heritage that it has, adequately?

735

The Minister: Having been with them through this journey, yes, I would, personally. They have had a phenomenal amount of engagement with pretty much all the stakeholders around TT, and there are so many of them. That was, I think, the understanding of how unique this event is and also, as demonstrated, how complex this event is, and in our case here as a Government of how that complexity is intertwined with regard to the informal nature of a lot of 740

agreements that make the TT actually happen year in, year out. We have a very small team, as already identified: five individuals doing the job here for DED,

but of course there are a lot more other Government agencies that do buy into it and the army of volunteers that we all know about.

Did they understand that? Yes, I do believe they did – going through this process that we did 745

finally conclude at this point.


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Q234. The Chairman: When you announced the appointment of Vision Nine, it was stated that over the last five years visitors had grown by 43% and the economic value and Government income both by 63% from this event. It seems to me that is not doing too badly; why did you want to change the model? 750

The Minister: Indeed, good question. It was growing organically, there is no doubt about it. I think what we felt is that it also had

the potential of plateauing giving the resources that we had; we had, as highlighted, finite resources. To continue with the development and growth of TT, which was happening 755

organically, we felt that we needed not just resources, we needed investment to go forward in order to maximise that economic return. That is why we felt that partnering with an external professional body would be most appropriate.

Mr Corlett: Certainly we had also approached Treasury to see would additional public funds 760

be a possibility and we were informed that was not an option that Treasury could support at that time given the spending pressures, of course, on Government; therefore, if we were to ensure that not only could we sustainably grow the TT but also sustain it and ensure it continued to attract a significant number of visitors, we would need to seek private partners who were prepared to invest and bring money to bear. 765

That is why we felt the team had done an excellent job, when we look at the growth we have achieved. I think that is easily overlooked in all of this. The growth we have achieved makes it one of the most successful motorsport events in the British Isles in recent years in terms of growth delivery, and the team has done that through the excellent TV coverage that we commissioned; through the excellent marketing we do at the NSC Bike Show and others; the 770

social media coverage; the other marketing that we do. We had really successfully grown the event, and the team were telling us, ‘There is only so much we can do inside the constraints that we have; if we want to take it to the next level, we are going to need to find investment and support from others with the money and the expertise to help us do that.’

775

Q235. The Chairman: I am assuming – I do not know why, but I will assume – that at this stage, when you went out for the second tendering process, the Attorney General and Procurement were not involved; it was all in-house again.

Mr Corlett: Correct, yes. 780

Q236. The Chairman: We have been told in previous evidence sessions that the bidders were

marked on a matrix, and one of those items on the matrix which seemed to have quite a high priority was basically the number of people they think that they could attract.

Now, if you do not have a figure to work as a basepoint … If you say, ‘Right we can manage 785

20,000 extra people’ and someone comes along and says, ‘Okay, we can raise it by 40,000’, which is unrealistic from the infrastructure point of view, then are we not in danger, by not having a figure to go by, of being accused of perhaps not managing the process very well?

Mr Corlett: I understand that we do have a figure. Each year, we do produce an estimate 790

based on data we gather each year, so we do have estimates of how many visitors we have, both at TT and at the Festival, and we had shared those figures with the bidders.

The scoring mechanism was quite complex. It was prepared well in advance of the tenders being released and it was made plain to the bidders. We said we will be assessing them on a whole range of factors: upon their capacity to do the work; upon the benefits they will bring the 795

Isle of Man – a whole host of factors. We made plain what the weighting was for each of the scores and the evidence they would need to be providing in order that we could assess their bids.


__________________________________________________________________ 69 EPRC-VN/16-17

The Chairman: That does not answer my question! 800

Mr Corlett: Then we went through a lengthy process to score both the bidders on a whole host of factors.

Q237. The Chairman: That does not answer my question. (Mr Corlett: Right.) If you do not

have a maximum that you can have coming to the Island, then someone can put 65,000 down, 805

which could never, ever be achieved, and get marked higher than someone who says, ‘I will bring 20,000 to the Island because it is what I think the Island can manage.’

Is that a fair process, if you do not actually have a number? Mr Corlett: It would be ideal to have a finite number. I think what we said was we were 810

expecting them to show evidence that they had thought about the constraints on accommodation, on travel, etc. and for them to show they had thought through how they could reasonably overcome those and what growth they could reasonably achieve. That was for the bidders to do.

In an ideal world, we would have a very sophisticated model of exactly what the Island could 815

sustain, but unfortunately across Government we do not have such a model. Q238. The Chairman: I think the point I am trying to make is that there was a physical

constraint on the number of people we could manage. I am sure the other Departments would have told you if they had been consulted – which they do not appear to have been consulted 820

that much, from what I am gathering – and therefore it would be unreasonable to mark someone higher because they say they can bring 65,000 people to the Island – that is a figure out of the air – when someone actually uses a more realistic figure which perhaps we should have provided to them. 825

Mr Corlett: David, do you want to …? Mr Ronan: I think there was some sensitivity analysis done on the figures, I guess, to look at

reasonableness. As we have said before, the absolute numbers that were being quoted were not 830

a rise in the peak; it was the spread of the visitors over a longer period. I do not recall just what the weighting was or how important that particular element of the

matrix would be, but we would be able to base a recommendation on the information that had been provided to both or all the bidders.

There was some sensitivity analysis done on it in discussions with the bidders of how to 835

satisfy ourselves that they had investigated the options in terms of transport, in terms of accommodation, and be satisfied that the numbers they were quoting were not over the top.

Mr Lewin: I think the matrix and the scoring you now have access to and, as David said, that

was one of the considerations, but it was only one of a much broader pallet of considerations. 840

Also, my reading of it is there is an expectation in some of those aspects that if the market is successful the market will react, so in terms of either accommodation or travel over a very long period, i.e. 10 years – and some of those growth projections were actually less than what historically had happened organically – then there is an ability to react and the market to raise itself. 845

Number one, it was only part of a much broader set of considerations; and number two, on a longer period of time, my reading of it is that the Department took the view that there would be an opportunity to anticipate and react should some of those be successful.


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Q239. The Chairman: I am testing some evidence that we were given by another person 850

where they basically said they felt that by being realistic they were perhaps downgraded to another organisation that could be over the top with their estimates of how many people they could bring to the Island.

Mr Lewin: On a ten-year basis the scoring between the two finals, in terms of some of those 855

numbers, were relatively close, and again you have got access to that. Mr Corlett: We did do sensitivity analysis as well on both bids, both in terms of minimum

levels of growth they believed they could achieve and maximum levels of growth. We did stress-test the bids, as it were, to try and make sure that we were assessing them as best we could. 860

MSG, of course, was the forum that discussed issues such as was there a finite limit on visitor numbers? David, in terms of MSG, had there been much discussion historically that they were constrained or reaching constraint?

Mr Ronan: Not relating to this particular exercise. At the meetings after the events, there 865

would be discussion about what the issues had been and the recognition that in certain areas in particular there were some concerns.

In terms of the growth of numbers, as has been said, we were talking about growth over an extended period and the phrase was ‘evolution not revolution’, so it would be small, incremental growth over the course of an extended period and the opportunity for the 870

infrastructure to accommodate it as the event grew. But there was no absolute number discussed at MSG as to what the cap should be for this particular exercise.

Mr Corlett: If I remember rightly, with the Vision Nine bid, I believe it was year seven or eight

before the visitor numbers reached the numbers that we had in 2007 – which would show that 875

the Isle of Man therefore could accommodate. Plus, as I think I said earlier, what Vision Nine were trying to do was broaden the base, so it was not just about having a peak number of people here in one particular weekend; it was providing a smooth number of visitors over a fortnight and a different profile of visors: more day-trippers, more corporate hospitality, more non-bikers who would therefore place less of a burden upon the infrastructure and help us 880

maximise the capacity. Therefore, over time, it would give the Island the opportunity to accommodate that additional demand, because of course if we can generate greater economic benefit from that over time, it would be logical that the Isle of Man would invest in the additional infrastructure to enable us to fulfil that potential.

885

Q240. Mr Baker: Well, without opening up a different debate, it would depend on the cost and the severity of the infrastructure issues that were the constraints. (Mr Corlett: Yes.)

You mention there the MSG, the Motorsport Strategic Group. We have talked previously about the meeting on 2nd June, but if we go back to the 9th May meeting there are a whole host of issues raised in the minutes from that. Surely they should have been raised at a much 890

earlier stage in the process. That, it seems to me, has been the key event that led us to where we got to in November, if I am reading the situation correctly.

The Minister: Yes, I agree; there were certainly a lot of issues that were raised there, but

these would be, I think, contract issues and logistical issues. As Dave has mentioned, they got 895

narrowed down to about six, if I remember rightly, of which they were being dealt with through a process. There were a number of areas that did need to be reviewed.

I think it just highlights once more the complexity of the event and the informal nature by which Government operates between Departments. This is where the question has arisen with regard to potential side-agreements, to ensure that there was delivery of certain aspects, to 900


__________________________________________________________________ 71 EPRC-VN/16-17

make sure that TT did actually happen. But there were a good few … I will leave it to Dave to answer the rest.

Mr Ronan: You are right. The meeting on 9th May did raise quite a number of issues. At the

start of the meeting on 2nd June we summarised the issues down into six groups. In the 905

intervening time during 9th May and 2nd June we had made pretty good progress in terms of addressing the majority of those.

One of the issues was the other Departments not being party to the contract, and at the request of the other Departments we discussed that matter with the Acting Attorney General who agreed at that time that some sort of side-agreement, side-deed, or service level 910

agreement would be possible, so the work was starting at that time to put that in place. The second issue was relating to the implications of the forthcoming Road Races Act and

further discussions took place with the Director of Highways. We resolved each of those issues such that he was satisfied that the agreement recognised the fact that things were changing or were likely to change on 1st January 2017. 915

The third issue was regarding key personnel and in particular a reference to a safety adviser. A number of people at the meeting on 9th May wanted to know who that person would be, so we had discussions with Vision Nine and they named the person they had in mind. It was a very experienced person who had been involved with British Superbikes, so came with relevant safety experience. 920

There were some issues relating to descriptions, to small typos, that sort of thing, which were all tidied up – no issue.

Ownership of the event was raised and we had discussions with the Acting Attorney General who gave his opinion in writing that that was not an issue; that the event was owned by the Department, so that closed that one off. 925

The final one was relating to liabilities and, as I recall, the Departments felt we had missed the opportunity to include some of their costs in the agreement. Now, the agreement that was being considered was always DED responsibilities being passed over to a new promoter, so suggesting that some of the costs of other Departments could have been passed over just was not going to happen. 930

Those were the six issues, most of which had been closed off by 2nd June, and certainly there was nothing that we considered to be insurmountable at that stage; we could have addressed them.

Going back to your point, I think with hindsight it would have been better to have dealt with those at an earlier stage. 935

Q241. Mr Baker: You mentioned at least twice there the Acting Attorney General. Was that

the first involvement that the Attorney General’s Chambers had, because it had obviously been driven by The Sports Consultancy?

940

Mr Ronan: I think there was involvement earlier; the Government Advocate was involved in March/April time, I think.

Q242. Mr Baker: But round about that phase of the … 945

Mr Ronan: Yes. Mr Corlett: I think it was when the papers were going forward to Council of Ministers. TSC

helped us prepare all the contract, etc. so when the paperwork was going to Council of Ministers then of course the AG became involved to advise Council and to assist Council in understanding 950

what was being placed before them.


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Q243. The Chairman: Okay. This will be the last question before we go into closed session. What do you think the

financial and reputational implications of the two bidding processes have been to the Isle of 955

Man’s credibility in that fraternity that are interested in motorcycling? The Minister: Yes, undoubtedly there are reputational issues and we would absolutely accept

that 100%, but what we have to do again, of course … It comes back to the Scope of Government. We have just been talking about the Programme for Government with this 960

administration, and a word that is used an awful lot is ‘innovation’. If we do not test, if we do not try, we will never know, and clearly when you have got something as emotional as the TT that is a very important point.

You raised the question earlier with regard to why the big names did not come forward. That could possibly be reputational the other way, and that is something we find hard to put a value 965

on. Yes, I would accept that this is not our finest hour, but we are tasked, certainly politically and

with the executive to hand to, to attempt to try these particular issues, and we have, I believe, explored this to its fullest.

970

Q244. Mr Baker: We have had two goes and not succeeded. What is the way forward? The Minister: Oh, we have had … I did not realise! We continually try to find a way forward and that is exactly where we are at. Coming back

after the General Election, I was fortunate to come back as a Minister in this Department, having 975

seen through the entire journey, to try and find what we believe is the appropriate way forward. We now have, I believe, a structure in place that puts certainty in place, because we must not forget – as cited, going through this these last few years, especially when you are talking about commercial contracts – it has been very difficult.

Those who turn up and watch the TT, participate in the TT, and are involved with the TT see 980

very little difference and that is the way we want to keep it; however, what we want to do, while it stays in Economic Development, is that we will be looking at new opportunities. We have not stopped that and we have already started that process, particularly with regard to the TV and media rights, which we are now looking to put some certainty on for the next five years.

We are exploring all those options and we have learned from this exercise. We have now got, 985

I believe, a structure in place that will ensure that we will not fall foul of such an experience we have just gone through.

The Chairman: Fine. I think I am going to move to a closed session now, so if we could go off air, gentlemen. 990

The Committee sat in private at 3.48 p.m. and resumed its public sitting at 4.45 p.m.

Procedural

The Chairman (Mr Coleman): Welcome to this public meeting of the Economic Policy Review Committee, a Standing Committee of Tynwald. I am Mike Coleman MLC and I chair the Committee; with me are Mr Tim Baker MHK and Mr Jason Moorhouse MHK.

Please ensure that your mobile phone is off or on silent so that we do not have any 995

interruptions. For the purposes of Hansard, I will be ensuring that we do not have two people speaking at once. I think that applies to this side of the table.


__________________________________________________________________ 73 EPRC-VN/16-17

The Economic Policy Review Committee is one of three Standing Committees of Tynwald Court established in October 2011 with a wide scrutiny remit. We have three Departments to cover: the Cabinet Office, Treasury and DED. 1000

On 19th April 2016 Tynwald approved the appointment of Vision Nine as TT Promoter for a period of up to 10 years with an option for a further five years. On 28th November 2016 the Department of Economic Development stated in a media release that it had decided to discontinue the independent promoter tender process for the TT Races and Classic TT Races. On the same day, 28th November 2016, the Minister for Economic Development, Mr Laurence 1005

Skelly MHK, referred this matter to us. On 6th December 2016 we announced in a media release that we had decided to investigate.

In our media release we invited written submissions from members of the public. We are grateful to everyone who wrote to us and we have heard oral evidence from some of them.

EVIDENCE OF Mr Trevor Hussey, former Head of Motorsport,

Department of Economic Development

The Chairman: Today it is the turn of Mr Hussey (Mr Hussey: That’s right!) who would like to 1010

clarify some issues regarding oral evidence that we have received. Mr Hussey: That is correct, yes. Q245. The Chairman: So could you just formally state your name and – 1015

Mr Hussey: Yes, my name is Trevor Hussey. Up until, officially, the start of April 2016 I was an

employee of DED as Head of Motorsport. I effectively left the post at Christmas 2015, so my involvement in this particular initiative was up to the end of December 2015 and not thereafter. I think there was a period of about three or four months after where decisions were made that 1020

obviously I was not involved in. I am well aware of the whole background behind this particular initiative. I was one of the

people who was closely involved in it when it started, before it started, and in some of the policy that led to the decision to go for the World Series. So I had close involvement and I would imagine that some of the documents which you have been provided with were authored by me 1025

with input from my Chief Executive and Deputy Chief Executive, so I am fairly well briefed on these issues.

My memory is not fantastic on detail, and I am sure that you will have heard a lot of detail from my ex-DED colleagues this afternoon anyway, so if I repeat them – and I know it has been a long afternoon for you – please stop me. There is no point in labouring points which have been 1030

made adequately already. I should say that when this inquiry was announced my attitude towards it was rather that,

okay … but I was not really minded to contribute to it because I thought other people would, and the decision not to proceed with the Vision Nine contract was not entirely unexpected for me. And some of the things which were said afterwards about Vision Nine in particular … mainly by 1035

people who were not involved in the process, had not seen any of the Vision Nine bids or tenders and had not been involved in any of the decisions that were made about that particular company. Some of the things that were said about them made me believe that here was an opportunity that had been effectively lost and would never repeat itself again, because our credibility as a commercial partner for any going-concern interest in the TT was gone. 1040

I feel very strongly that some of the things that have been said in evidence so far, particularly by members of the Manx Motorcycle Club who came here, were just conjecture and


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assumptions built on no knowledge. I am very keen that the Committee is given a bit of background to let them make their own judgement about it. It is not up to me to tell you what to think; all I can do is help give you a bit of background and clarity on some of those issues. 1045

As some of you may know I spent 26 years before being at DED in the Prison Service. The two things were entirely different in many respects, but in one particular respect they are entirely the same in that what I used to say to people when I was in the Prison Service was that everybody has an opinion about how prisons should be run, but very few people know anything about it, so often those opinions are based on nothing or are just assumptions or inaccurate 1050

views about what actually happens. In that respect, the TT is exactly the same. There is a great feeling, particularly on the Isle of Man, that everybody has an attitude about

the TT or an opinion about it, but there are very few people who actually know any of the issues that underlie it, or the stresses or irritations or problems that are associated with it. Therefore, I have to say that – and I recognise everyone's right to have an opinion, but – a lot of the things 1055

you read and a lot of the things that people say are just based on prejudice and often a lack of understanding of the real issues.

I feel that one of the big issues that we have with this – and this is no criticism of anybody in politics in particular – is that the issues are very rarely properly explained; particularly, with all due respect, politicians like to be the people who explain things when they go wrong, or issue 1060

statements, but by and large they are often not very well qualified to deal with the detail or understand the major issues. So I think when we have had issues with the TT, particularly over the nearly six years I was involved, it was very rarely that I felt the issues were adequately explained to the population and people really got a thorough understanding of what had gone on or what needed to be done. As I say, that is not a criticism of any particular politician; it is just 1065

the way the system works and just the way that politics works. Having had 18 years of exposure to it here on the Isle of Man, I have seen this time and time again, whether it is in the Prison or within the TT.

Hopefully, I can give you a bit of context in which you can make your own judgements and, having heard what has been said and heard some of your questions that you have asked, I think 1070

you have displayed a fairly good eye for the wheat and the chaff, so hopefully I can help you do that further.

Going back on a bit of background, I joined DED in June, I think it was, of 2010, and I joined it having applied for the job because I was interested in it and I thought it would be an interesting logistical and commercial, and whatever else, challenge. I was interested in the TT, like most 1075

people on the Island. I rode a motorcycle and I think a lot of people thought that I joined the job because I was a motorcyclist, which is a fairly shallow appreciation of why I should do so. But when I joined the job I found that the job was quite different from what I thought it would be. A lot of the things that I thought I knew about the TT and the way it ran were just plain wrong, and it was a steep learning curve for me, particularly in the first year to 18 months. 1080

What I encountered was a group of people within the newly formed DED who were working extremely hard in very difficult circumstances to deliver an event which they basically were very passionate about. Some of the issues around it were that there had been a real low point for the TT, I think, in my view … Other people may say that it was other times, and I have heard it suggested 2003 was a low point with the death of David Jefferies, but I think the real low point 1085

of it was what should have been a fantastic occasion, and that was 2007 with the Centenary. We were still in a period of trying to recover from that, I found.

In 2007 we had the 26th Milestone incident where – and you do not need to be told this, but – two spectators and a rider were killed. There was a subsequent inquiry by Mr Moyle and his report was a fairly damning indictment of the way the TT had been run. I think he found 1090

inconsistencies, a lack of accountability, a pretty shambolic attitude towards risk management, and that the event was frankly run in a very amateurish way, particularly in the way the risk was being assessed and managed. The response to that had been to create something which was known as TTFMAG – do not ask me now what those initials stand for, I cannot remember. I


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became Head of Motorsport at DED with the remnants of what used to be TTFMAG, which had 1095

transformed itself, by name at least, into the Motorsport Group. I think there were some real issues there in that people were pulling in different directions

and it was not a particularly cohesive team. There was the commercial agenda which was driving the show itself, the TT, and then there was the safety agenda which was often pulling in a different direction and had taken priority, probably quite rightly, post-2007, when a lot of work 1100

needed to be done with the safety aspect of the event. Surprisingly enough, I have to say, I had found there were no written risk assessments for the

event in any formal sense. There was no evidence of there being any formal risk assessment procedure; for example, there was no way of determining where the course equipment, which is essential to the risk management of an event, should be. It was all in the heads of Kissack Bros. 1105

and one or two other people. There was no manual saying where it went, and in fact there was not even a contract for the course contractor. Many aspects of the Financial Regulations were not being properly adhered to because there was a lack of contracts around for some really big value pieces of work.

There was in fact a fantastic piece of work which was authored by Jon Callister in 2009 called 1110

the ‘Motorsport Policy’. I am not sure whether you have even been given a copy of it. It was a motorsport policy which was written by DED. It might have been written in the days of DTL, and in fact it was approved by Council in late 2009, perhaps early 2010. It was the driver of the activity that we were taking in relation to motorsport.

It set priorities and it covered most of the aspects of what we would be doing. Central in that, 1115

as well as managing the risk parts of it adequately, was the commercial agenda about making the TT more commercially successful and to increase the benefit to the economy of the Isle of Man. That was really the policy document that we took to heart and we were working to. I find it very curious that it was never referred to. I would guess … I do not know whether you even have a copy of it, but it still exists; it has never been rescinded. 1120

I was encouraged at one point to try and rewrite it, but to be frank l could not think of a way that I could write it better. I did actually ask for a copy of it yesterday, just to refresh my mind, but I discovered that it is not available to members of the public. It was described to me as being a Council document which now, as a member of the public, I was not even allowed to have a copy of again – which is fine, I understand that; I do not need it, but one does wonder, doesn’t 1125

one, what is the point of well-paid people, sitting in offices, writing policy statements, which are then submitted to Council and approved by Council, when they are never referred to subsequently and not even available to anyone to explain or to see? I think this is where some of the misunderstandings about what DED have been trying to do with the TT arise from, because of that lack of openness about what our agenda really was. 1130

I think one of the things I discovered when I started the role was that there was almost a feeling amongst a lot of people that DED was going to be involved in the TT and the Manx Grand Prix because we enjoyed watching motorcycles go around the TT course. There was not much of an understanding of what the priorities were in terms of investing in something which would support the visitor economy and bring income into the Island. I think, even to this day, when you 1135

talk to people they do not really understand what the DED is trying to achieve with this. In my whole time as Head of Motorsport, I very rarely got to talk about motorcycles. I did not have much, if any, interaction with teams or riders. Paul Phillips did, of course; he was the main person for that.

Most of my time was spent thinking about the risk aspects of it, which were considerable, 1140

and how we actually paid for the whole thing. I used to have many conversations with many people involved in motorsport on the Island, which always started off as friendly, cordial conversation, but it never took long for them to come round to the vulgarities of cash and money, because everybody wants money for motorsport; it all costs a great deal. And trying to get that money, and justifying the money that we were spending, and thinking about how we 1145


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were going to pay for these events really dominated much of my work. It was a real pressure – a pressure that never went away, I have to say, in the whole time I was doing it.

There were some comments earlier about … and no doubt this has been explained to you by DED ex-colleagues before me. There was some talk – I think Mr Baxter referred to it – about ‘stopping the bleed’, as if the TT was bleeding money and losing money. If you put this in 1150

context, as no doubt has been explained to you, currently – well, it was until late 2015 and I doubt whether it has changed dramatically – the TT is about 50% funded by the taxpayer and 50% by commercial income. It is curious to talk in emotive terms about stopping the bleed when before the commercial agenda started with the TT it was 100% funded by the taxpayer.

I think there is a lack of understanding and appreciation about how commercial income is 1155

really important to the event. Without commercial income, the event could not take place. We could not afford it. Well, you could afford it: Tynwald could decide that they were going to spend another £2.5 million minimum of taxpayers’ money on the event and get rid of the commercial agenda. But, whilst we have a commercial agenda and whilst that is important to run the event, it simply has to be done properly. 1160

At the start of the year we would start off with a budget where projections about commercial income … largely made by Paul Phillips, who put himself under an increasing amount of pressure to produce increases in commercial revenue. We would start off with that at the start of the year and balance the budget on an assumption that those commercial revenue targets would be achieved. If we did not achieve them, we would simply overspend because we would not have 1165

the money. So commercial activity was incredibly important, and I have to say that Paul put himself

under this pressure by producing those targets and then having to work almost day and night sometimes to achieve them – and this was a man who was being paid at HEO rates. I often found that he was being accused, or we were being accused, of being almost freeloaders on 1170

huge salaries. If anybody in the motorsport industry outside of the TT actually understood how little Paul, in particular, got paid for the considerable effort he put in when up to … I do not know what his current terms and conditions are, but when I was in charge of Paul he did not get any commission; he did not get paid by results. He did it because of his love for the TT and because he wanted to do the best job. That is a commendable attitude and effort. 1175

I was extremely disappointed to hear remarks made about Paul in previous evidence which almost questioned … I think Mr McBride made some comments about whether Paul and the other two people, Sophie and Bruce, in the DED team had the experience necessary to run a commercial event, and he said he did not. What? Really? This from a man who has not spent a day trying to organise a professional motorsport event! I find that kind of attitude … It really just 1180

amazes me that Paul Phillips, in particular, gets slated by so many people for the effort that he has put in.

And here is a big problem for the TT … When the Vision Nine contract failed, we had statements being made that, ‘It is okay; it is all back to normal; the same people will be doing it’, as if that should give us comfort. Paul Phillips is the most important person around the TT event. 1185

It was Paul who came into the TT – not me, not anybody else – sometime in the mid-2000s and started putting what was wrong right. It was Paul's ambition, it was Paul's motivation, it was Paul's vision which did that – nobody else's. A lot of people have taken credit for this, but … I think David Cretney started the right steps and got Paul in place, for which he deserves some praise, but after that it is largely Paul Phillips who has made this event what it is, and we have 1190

seen year-on-year growth. For people to criticise him, I think is totally out of order. But he remains a key-person risk. The big advantage, in my view, about having a contract

with somebody is that we would have a least a 10-year contract, which would give us that kind of certainty about having the expertise and the people in place to run the event which is so important to the visitor economy of the Isle of Man. At the moment, say something happened to 1195

Paul; say that Paul decided – particularly after listening to some of the unfair criticism that he gets – that he has really had enough of it. Paul is the person who has all the contacts, who has all


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the relationships with teams and riders, who has been setting the commercial agenda and has most of the commercial relationships with our biggest commercial partners. If he walked, we would be in a real mess. 1200

So we have got ourselves into a position where we are hugely reliant on one or two people to deliver this event – for which the whole visitor economy of the Isle of Man is reliant, and some of our biggest hotel groups are also reliant, which brings £25 million or £30 million, or whatever it is now, worth of revenue into the Island – and it is hinging on one person, mainly, with the considerable help he gets from Sophie and Bruce. 1205

The Chairman: Can I just stop there for a second? Mr Hussey: That cannot be a good position for us to be in. 1210

The Chairman: Do you need to go? Mr Moorhouse: I would prefer to be a bit longer. The Chairman: Sorry, Mr Moorhouse has another appointment. 1215

Mr Hussey: Well, I will not drag this on any longer than it really has to. If you want to ask me any questions as I am going along … I am conscious that I might be

rambling on and you might have heard some of this before, but some of it you might not. That remains a big problem for us, and I think for the Island generally, that we are becoming 1220

reliant on key people. A contract would have sorted that out. However, let us go back to Vision Nine and where we were with that. To look at the Vision

Nine contract you have to go back further than this and think about the TT World Series and where that came, because the two things … one followed the other. The Motorsport Policy and our desire within DED to make the most of the considerable asset which the TT is, led us to start 1225

thinking about how we could move it on to the next level. The commercial agenda that we were following and the commercial targets that we were agreeing to were bringing it on nicely in incremental steps, but we had a bigger ambition. I think we were buoyed up and feeling that we could deal with some of the major issues.

During Colin Kniveton’s time as Chief Executive – a man who, I have to say, can speak for 1230

himself, but he was a man of very robust opinion and could push his opinions and his wishes quite well – I think we had started to make some of those difficult choices around motorsport which had not been made for many years. Our first target was reducing some funding to events which we did not feel were making an adequate return on investment. We made a considerable grant, for example, to Rally Isle of Man which was withdrawn. To their great credit they have 1235

carried on that and found other ways to finance it, having lost a six-figure sum from the taxpayer, and they have done a fantastic job, I have to say, and they deserve all credit for that.

We then started looking at the other events which were underperforming in terms of return on investment. The one that – if I recall correctly, and I am sure I do – had the lowest return on investment was the Manx Grand Prix. We wanted to address that; we did and I think you have 1240

heard from the Manx Motorcycle Club, who continue, in my view, to behave like spoilt children who had their best toys taken away from them and can never quite get over it.

We introduced proposals around the Classic TT which have been proven to be a huge success – and do not take DED's word for it; if you do not believe that, we have produced surveys which show the increase in visitors and the increase in income. If you want evidence of 1245

the success that the Classic TT has been and can continue to be, ask the hoteliers, ask the carriers, ask the people who sell burgers, ask the people who sell merchandise. They are all reporting a huge increase. We had taken that decision, and it was not easy because of the resistance to those changes, mainly from the club and their supporters.


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Then we were starting to think about other bigger initiatives, and this idea of a TT World 1250

Series had been around for a while. One of our commercial partners had brought it back to our attention by talking about it. We had some ambitions about this, but the ambition was not just to do it; it was to examine whether it was feasible or not, to see whether there was anything in this.

That led to us seeking someone who could examine it and produce the provisional feasibility 1255

study, and there was a competitive tendering process, as no doubt you have heard. The Sports Consultancy were one of the major players in sports consultancy, as their name might suggest. They, with others, submitted a tender. They produced a very good tender at a fairly competitive price and we were delighted to have them on board.

There has been some mention of the fact that their previous experience was not motorsport-1260

related. It is a complete red herring in my view. Consultants, they consult. They consulted people who were. They had a lot of experience in being involved in major sporting events, including the Olympics. These were not people that we chose because we were desperate to get somebody and they were the only people that were available; they were the best people for the job at the time. 1265

There has been some suggestion that the outcome of that feasibility study was driven by The Sports Consultancy or our ambition to do the TT World Series come what may. That is completely untrue. I can well recall conversations we had with The Sports Consultancy before they even started the feasibility study where we made it quite clear to them that this was a feasibility study. We wanted to know whether it was feasible. If they did not think it was, tell us. 1270

That was the message that they were given. Of course they were aware that DED had ambitions to expand the reach of the TT, to make more money from it, to get more exposure for the Isle of Man. Of course they were aware of that and they wanted to help us achieve those ambitions, but at no point were we being mugged by The Sports Consultancy to do something we did not want to do, or we simply went along with what they said. It was examined very critically. 1275

When the feasibility study was received, it indicated that there was at least something to look at; that there was some potential there. We did not think, contrary to some people’s opinion, ‘Oh great, let’s just rush into this! It will be great, and don’t worry about it!’ We looked at it very critically, right from the very start. There was no rush to do it. There was no feeling that we were going to do it come what may. 1280

The Sports Consultancy took on that work, because it was a natural progression from doing the feasibility study: the work of seeking a commercial promoter to undertake a TT World Series. Again, there has been some suggestion that we were just rubber-stamping their proposals as they came along. I think the timeline information which you have got – which I have had a fairly cursory look at, I have to say, from the documents that have been given to you – demonstrates 1285

that there was no rubbing-stamping of this at all. At each stage, each milestone along this route towards a TT World Series, there were go/no-go opportunities; there were reports written; things were taken by Council; Council decided to go forward to the next step. We made recommendations in fairly good faith about what we were being told. We did not take everything that The Sports Consultancy said for granted. We listened very carefully. 1290

Personally, I was never convinced that the TT World Series was an absolute solid gold opportunity. I was always fairly … I would not say sceptical, but I looked at it with a fairly critical eye, and I have to say that this is from someone who was actually fielding enquiries from people around the world who were interested in it. Some of them were very credible people, I have to say, in different jurisdictions, who had thought about this and were prepared to commit a lot of 1295

investment into running TT-branded events in different countries. But I still was quite critical about it because I just did not always see how we were going to make it work or how we were going to get money from it.

But I looked at all the stuff that came back from The Sports Consultancy with my colleagues and we thought about it. There was no rubbing-stamping; there was no accepting; there was no 1300

being mugged off by The Sports Consultancy about anything at all. At each stage, the decision


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that we were making was basically, ‘Well, this could work. This might work. Let’s proceed to the next step. Let’s see where this takes us.’ We were conscious of course that we were spending money, but on a venture that produces £25 million or £30 million of economic benefit to the Island, I think we took the view that the money that was going to be expended on this – I think 1305

in the end it was a bill of about £300,000 – was worth it. It could lead to some real gains. So we kept on with that process and we looked at it at each stage, as I say, critically.

It has been suggested that The Sports Consultancy and Vision Nine had some kind of connection and that we should have been aware of this and that we were not diligent enough in thinking about this. I can tell you categorically that the fact that The Sports Consultancy had 1310

previously worked with Vision Nine was never kept secret from us. The Sports Consultancy were absolutely upfront about their previous involvement with Vision Nine as a client. We were also absolutely sure in our own heads that we were working with a credible, professional outfit in The Sports Consultancy who relied on that credibility and professionalism for their future work. We never picked up, and I certainly never picked up, any predetermined favour towards V-Nine. 1315

They did not come to us and say … They never said that Vision Nine were the best contractor right until we got to the end scoring of the bids. They were always absolutely professional, honest and open about their analysis of each bid, and when we got to the end of the TT World Series tendering process, we were faced with two competing bids: one from Vision Nine and one from another bidder. I do not know whether you have been given details about the other 1320

bidder; it is not up to me to disclose that. They were both, in their way, interesting, challenging and credible bids, but there was a stark

contrast between them. The first bid was all about the TT World Series. It went really, really big and really ambitious about the TT World Series. They were going to rush in – on what I thought was an extremely short timetable given the complexity of organising this – into doing TT World 1325

Series events around the world. Their attitude towards the home TT on the Isle of Man was one of, ‘It is pretty good. It can keep going as it is, but we will do the TT World Series and it will drag the home TT along with it.’

On the other hand you had a Vision Nine bid which was, I would say, in my view, 90% about the home TT and how the home TT needed to be put on a solid commercial footing, making 1330

money for everybody, most importantly the Isle of Man, before it would move on to an incremental approach to the TT World Series. So you had two tenders which were entirely different and faced us with that difficult choice.

Through this whole process we had this issue that arose in my mind, for me mostly, where the TT World Series started off as being the really big driver for this, and then there was a 1335

realisation that DED could not possibly run a TT World Series itself; it would need to engage another body to do that and we would have to contract it out. Whereas the TT World Series was up here and the contracting out was down here as an issue, gradually as time went on they exchanged positions for me, and I could start to see that most of the issues that we faced and the stresses that we faced about trying to run the TT could actually be helped by taking it out of 1340

Government and putting it in a commercial partnership or contracting it out. I say that because we had done an awful lot of work to try and be compliant with Financial

Regulations. I think, during my time, we had just about got formal contracts with everybody who was a supplier or had gone through a formal quota, depending on the value of the work. We had a higher degree of Financial Regulation compliance than we probably had ever had, but God, 1345

was it difficult! Because the Financial Regulations, as you probably understand, are about controlling Government expenditure and accounting for Government expenditure. They are not about running a commercial motorsport event, and the TT and the Financial Regulations are an extremely awkward fit.

There are lots of aspects of the TT which were subject to negotiations with teams and riders, 1350

with sponsors, which simply do not fit into the Financial Regulations. These people work in the sports and motorsport industry; they do not know about our Financial Regulations. It is not the way they behave; it is not what they do; their relationships with people are purely commercial.


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For example, we were being told at one point – I think Treasury understood this in the end – that sponsorship should be subject to three bids or three quotes. It is not how sponsorship 1355

works! You do not go to someone and say, ‘Can we have three quotations for sponsorship?’ It does not fit into Financial Regulations. Sponsorship is extremely difficult to obtain and largely you go out there to the market and you ask for it and you take what you can get. I think people would be amazed to know how hard it is to come by commercial sponsorship. Then to be constrained by the Financial Regulations with sponsorship would just have made that task 1360

impossible, and sponsorship does now account for quite a large proportion of the commercial income.

I should say that, when I used to speak to people about sponsorship, they used to regard sponsorship as being a gift. It is not a gift; it is a transaction. People do not give you sponsorship because they want to give you money; they want something in return. I can remember having an 1365

incredible amount of problems trying to deliver the Subaru sponsorship, which was worth six figures to us. Getting other people in Government sometimes to realise that we cannot just take their money and not deliver what they asked for; we had an obligation commercially and morally to give them what you said you would give them. If they said they wanted to do timed laps of the TT we had to work hard to make it happen. You could not say, ‘No, it is too difficult or too 1370

risky.’ You could not take their money and then not give it to them. We were struggling with all these issues all the time and it made a difficult job very tricky indeed at times, and it strained relationships between different Government Departments. My view, which evolved over time, was that there is only one way to sort this out and that is to remove it from direct Government involvement – the commercial aspects of it at least. 1375

Another popular misconception I keep encountering with this is that we were selling off the TT. We were never selling off the TT. We were contracting out the commercial elements of running the TT. When we think about the TT, we only own one thing with the TT and that is the intellectual property, and that is the trademarks and branding. It is the only thing we actually own about it. And I hear people come in front of this Committee and start using terms like … 1380

saying things like, ‘The TT belongs to the people.’ That is just silly sentiment. What does it actually mean? When we say the TT belongs to the people, what does that …? I would ask you to ask yourselves and ask them, ‘What do you mean when you say that?’ How does that kind of statement pay for anything or organise anything?

If the TT belongs to anyone, I would suggest, it belongs to the people who pay for it, and the 1385

people who are paying for it are the taxpayer and the commercial companies which partner us and pay into the event to make it possible, to make it happen. I would say to the people who say, ‘Oh, the TT belongs to the people’, do you really mean this? What would happen if we actually said, ‘Well, let’s be more specific: it belongs to the people who pay for it, so it belongs to the taxpayers’? Would they subject themselves to the discipline of saying, ‘Okay, we will ask 1390

each and every single taxpayer whether they are happy to continue to make their contributions, make the TT happen’? I suggest, if we did, we would end up with a shortfall, so silly little statements like saying, ‘The TT belongs to the people’ are just that: they are populist things which people like to say because it makes us all feel, ‘Oh, yes; it all belongs … We should not be doing this and we should not be letting other people have it.’ It is nonsense. The TT is a complex, 1395

costly motorsport event that can only be successful if it is properly funded and properly organised. I am sick of hearing this type of thing.

The other thing which I find quite difficult to get my head round, and always did, was this notion that the TT is run by volunteers. I would be the last person to do down the role of the volunteer at the TT; they are very important. But let me just say this, before a single volunteer 1400

gets to do his thing at the TT or on the side of the road, £4.5 million, or whatever, has been spent. A lot of people have grafted – who have been paid to do so, I have to say – all year to make it happen. If that money was not spent and that effort from people who are being paid to do that was not being made, there would be nothing to volunteer for.


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Also, a notion that volunteers are free: not many of them are free, I have to say. There is not 1405

much which comes for nothing, particularly at the TT. I can tell you, from six years of being responsible for the budget, there were not many small cheques; they are all big numbers. Everything associated with the TT has a cost attached to it. Marshals, for example: marshals are free – except for the six-figure sum we give to the TTMA every year to organise them. Oh, the medics are free – except for the x-number of thousands of pounds we have to pay towards 1410

medical expenses and the equipment. Oh, the control room staff are free – yes, largely they are, you know; they are pretty much free and they do a fantastic job, but they are sitting in a control room with a lot of very expensive equipment that has to be maintained, which is connected to a lot of very expensive hardware wired around the course which has to be maintained, over a radio system which is very extensive and has to have licences and be maintained and replaced. 1415

Liaising with helicopters, which costs a huge amount of money – hundreds of thousands of pounds.

The role of volunteers is very important and I used to get lots of conversations with the Marshals’ Association and marshals who are very fond of saying, ‘No marshals, no TT!’ My answer to this all the time was, the TT is an incredibly complex jigsaw of individual pieces where 1420

if you took one away you would not get the full picture. So, yes, no marshals, no TT; no DED, no TT; no Treasury, no TT; no DOI, no TT; no DHA and Police, no TT; oh, no hospital, no TT. We could go on and on and on. No helicopters, no TT. The whole thing is a big, complex jigsaw which needs to be put together with no one aspect of it having the dominant role. It is all a matter of getting on. 1425

The other thing that has been said to the Committee, and I have heard it said elsewhere, is, ‘If we commercialise the TT, marshals will want to get paid or they are not going to want to do it.’ Really? How many of you guys have marshalled? Am I the only one here? (Laughter) It does not matter. You are quite entitled not to marshal, but the few of us who have marshalled do it for a whole variety or reasons, and abstract concepts about who is making money out of the TT 1430

are fairly low down on that list. We marshal because we want to be involved in the event; we like the event; we want to be

at roadside; we want to give help to riders who we admire and who are exposing themselves to extreme danger. There are lots and lots of reasons, and somewhere along the line you might think, ‘Oh, they are making a bit of money out this and we are not getting paid.’ It is not the 1435

overriding issue, and people keep saying this. They keep saying, ‘Oh, if you commercialise it, the marshals will want paying and we cannot rely on marshals anymore.’ This is like a self-fulfilling prophecy and the more they say it, one day it might come true if we ever do commercialise it; then they will turn around and say, ‘We told you so!’ But it is nonsense really.

I tell you, there are things going on with marshals which will have a far more negative impact 1440

on marshals than who is being paid to promote it. There are lots of people currently who make money out of the TT – lots of them; a commercial promoter would just be one more. But there are far more negative things: we just passed the Road Races Act which requires all marshals to have photo ID on them. That one thing will have more negative impact on the number of marshals, I would suggest, than anything else, certainly more than the idea of having a 1445

commercial promoter. Lots of people who turn up on the day and thought, ‘Oh, I will sign on to marshal’ will now find they have to go and get their photograph. They would say, ‘Oh, no …’ No one is having an inquiry about that or thinking about this.

One day we may have to extend the one-way system to the Festival of Motorcycling, if it continues to be popular and more people come. That will have a negative impact on people 1450

wanting to marshal on the Mountain. Lots of things impact on marshals. This idea that commercialisation from the promoter is a

key issue is nonsense, in my view. Some marshals may pop up soon and say, ‘That is not the case; I am not doing it any more’, but I suggest that most people who marshal will marshal for the really good reasons they marshal now, regardless. And I am very grateful that they do, by 1455


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the way. I am not knocking marshals at all. I have been there, done it. I have spent many hours at the side of the road.

I just want to make some comments about the whole attitude that we had about the TT World Series again, because I sort of digressed. Having got to that position where we had these two very different bids, we had to score them and think about it and think about what kind of 1460

recommendation we would make. The Sports Consultancy provided an analysis of it; they did the scoring matrix; they presented it to DED. Those of us who were involved thought long and hard about what we made of it and what our preference was, but at the end of the day it was not the officials who would make the decision; it was the departmental Members and then on to Tynwald. 1465

At some point during the whole process, when then-Minister Skelly conceded that Tynwald would make the final decision, I thought to myself, ‘This is going to be difficult’ because you never know what is going to happen in Tynwald. There are lot of different opinions about this; not everybody … some people have preconceived ideas. We knew that there were some politicians who were very much for it and some people would be very much against. We thought 1470

he was going to have a bit of a fight on his hands. I have to say Minister Skelly’s attitude towards the TT World Series always slightly took me by

surprise. Right from the outset of becoming DED Minister, he was very ambitious about making the TT World Series happen, and he nailed his colours to that particular mast very early on, as well as his ideas about having a TT attraction – both of which I thought to myself were hugely 1475

risky things and very unlike a politician to commit themselves to risky, speculative ventures, but I had a lot of respect for that in that he was prepared to do that – and he drove this on with his enthusiasm.

We presented the Minister with the options and he listened to them every time and he was prepared to argue the case with his political Members in the Department. He might be criticised 1480

now by some people for being that ambitious, but I personally admire that in him, that he was prepared to do that and take that risk. It is a risk that ultimately probably has backfired a little bit on him – well more than a little bit – because people will want to associate him with failure now rather than success with it. But it is very difficult to criticise someone who comes along and says, ‘This has got potential for doing really well for the Island and we ought to risk it.’ He is not 1485

a fool. He knew that there was a chance of it not happening. When we had those two bids, he and Chris Corlett, who I would also say … not because he is

my ex-boss; he is my ex-boss; he has no hold on me now. Chris worked very hard on this and was very analytical in his role with looking at this and did his absolute best to try and make the TT World Series happen. He listened to all the issues; he tried to find ways round it. He 1490

encouraged us; he encouraged the Minister to keep on with it – again, another risky venture. Why did he do it? Because, as I understood it, he saw that there was the potential for huge benefit; there was a potential that it could lead to huge growth in the TT and he saw that there was a potential saving to the taxpayer: we could take that 50% and make it smaller. It would never go away, because we would always be responsible, like any motorsport venue, for 1495

providing the infrastructure to race on. You do not go to Silverstone to run a race there and expect to have to do the maintenance yourself. You are actually hiring the track and it should all be there for you.

So we would always have some of those expenses, but he saw the potential, very much, of reducing the liability to the taxpayer and also to decreasing the wholly disproportionate amount 1500

of funding given to the TT to support that fairly small section of the economy called ‘the visitor economy’ compared with the budget he had to support everything else. If we took the money which was spent on the TT and put it into other enterprises, I am sure we could achieve great results from them, but the TT is a very costly operation.

As an anecdote on that, one of the people I met at the TT who impressed me was and is a 1505

successful businessman in his own right, with his own wealth and money, who happens to run one of the teams that competes at the TT, BSB, and whatever. I had a lot of time for these


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people because they were interesting outside of motorsport; they had made money and they were successful people. In conversation with him once he said to me, ‘Trevor, do you know, motorcycle racing is the fastest method I have ever found of emptying my wallet!’ Try running a 1510

motorsport event! Everything, as I said to you earlier, has big numbers associated with it. I think I had the capacity to sign off expenses, at my level, on contracted expenditure of up to

£50,000. I did not sign many, most of them went to Dave Ronan and above because they were in excess of … So the proportion of my budget in motorsport and particularly in the TT which was discretionary, which I could decide to spend on this, that and the other as extra or whatever 1515

else, was actually very small. Most of it was contracted and committed expenditure, and big numbers.

I think Chris Corlett saw the potential to reduce that liability and to reduce the headcount as well, because he would be effectively taking three members of the Motorsport Team, if a contractor wanted to take them. It was never part of the contractual promise and there was 1520

nothing ever agreed that they would be employed by another contractor, but he saw the potential for doing that.

When it came to that decision, it was in a departmental meeting and I happened to be there, and the decision was made that a TT World Series bid was too ambitious and there were too many ifs and buts with it. The Vision Nine bid was okay, but it was not a TT World Series bid; 1525

therefore, we would have to start the process again and go for another tender which was about the home event only, perhaps with some bolt-on at a future time for a TT World Series.

A lot of people have said, ‘If they had asked us on the Island … there are loads of people on the Island who are experts who would tell you that the TT World Series would never work.’ Why would we have even bothered asking people to tell us that something would not work? Most 1530

things that are worth achieving in life are difficult; you have to have a can-do attitude about it, you have to find reasons to do rather than not to do, so we did not take too much notice of that.

But the TT World Series was never proven not to be viable; we just had a bid which we thought was a bit risky. It could work; it was coming from people who were prepared to commit a lot of their own money towards it, who were very ambitious about it and had lots of great 1535

ideas who may have made it work. We do not know now because we did not choose to pursue it. So talk about, ‘We could tell you it would never have happened …’ I think is premature; we do not actually know that it would not happen. For sure it was a risky venture.

But when it came to that decision, the politicians and the departmental Members could not decide, or would not decide, to go with any one of those two tenders. After that we started 1540

another tender process which I was not involved in. I have to say, I always felt fairly uneasy about the short timescale that was allocated to this process, but I think that was mostly driven not by the needs of the tendering process but by the political timeframe at that time – it was heading up towards an election later in that year and there was a feeling that if we were going to get this done it had to be done pretty quickly, so there was a short timescale. 1545

I think, when Mr Baxter gave his evidence, he alluded to that and the difficulties he had with that, and I can totally understand that part of his evidence and where he was coming from. I think it made it very difficult for another bidder to come in and put together a persuasive and detailed bid in the time that was available. But that was the task that was given to them and I understand that a few bids came forward. I did not see Mr Baxter’s bid and I did not see the TT-1550

specific bid from Vision Nine either. But I would say that the Vision Nine bid at the TT World Series stage, which was rejected for not being enough of the TT World Series, was very detailed and it was very persuasive; it was very carefully worked out and was also very ambitious, and of course DED was looking for ambition. We did not enter into this process because we were unambitious; we entered into it because we had ambitions for the TT. 1555

I know I am leaping about a bit here, and I apologise for that, but the Vision Nine team has been criticised for not having relevant motorsport experience and I think at certain times in this inquiry you have spent some time talking about this or had this suggested to you quite a bit. I would offer you this opinion on that: that is a complete red herring. Vision Nine at no point, to


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me or anybody else, in any of the conversations they had … they were always very open and 1560

very honest and very accepting that their experience was in events but not particularly motorsport events. They did not assume knowledge they did not have.

One of the great dangers in life is assuming knowledge you do have and then going to make a complete mess of something as result. They said, ‘We are not motorsport experts’, but they were going to take on people who were, and they were quite specific about this. If they were 1565

successful in the bid they would seek – not ‘would’, but ‘seek’ – to employ the people who were currently organising it and they would also seek to re-contract with ACU Events, who are the current organisers of the TT.

ACU Events would also have Gary Thompson, the current Clerk of the Course, who is probably one of the most qualified and well-respected officials in motorsport in the UK. So they 1570

were quite clear about this, ‘We are not a motorsport-specific events company; we understand marketing and running events and making a commercial success of events. We are not seeking to come in with a load of ideas about how to change the TT and we do not have experience in motorsport, but this is who we would bring into the team to make sure that we have that expertise.’ 1575

It seems to me, in some of the criticisms that have been made of them, it is a double-whammy of criticism here: they do not have motorsport experience, and then they get criticised again for taking on people who do! They cannot win!

Mr Moorhouse left the Committee. 1580

Mr Baker: We can distil that information – Mr Hussey: Yes, I am sure. I have picked up little bits of things you have said which made me

think you are thinking about this already. 1585

Q246. Mr Baker: Of course, we are thinking about the evidence that people are giving us;

that is the job of the Committee. (Mr Hussey: Yes, absolutely.) And we have heard a lot today that has been really helpful.

I think, just to be clear, your involvement was in the World Series proposal, (Mr Hussey: 1590

Absolutely, yes.) which led to an outcome that was effectively not to proceed because – Mr Hussey: In that particular aspect of it, but then to go forward with the TT-specific bid. Q247. Mr Baker: And it effectively moved into that second process where Vision Nine were in 1595

a lead position, because they had obviously been looking at one situation and their bid was quite strongly oriented towards that home proposition anyway?

Mr Hussey: I would say that Vision Nine had been involved in this and looking at it for quite

some time; they had had time to think about. They had visited the TT the year before, and I have 1600

to say that there were about four or five potential bidders who came to the TT and had the opportunity of observing and asking questions.

They were one of the ones that sought me out and asked me questions, and I was very impressed by the pertinence of the questions they posed and the difficulty in answering some of them that I had in giving them precise details. But they only ever got the information that 1605

everybody else had and they were not treated preferentially. The suggestion that there was some kind of overlap between the Motorsport Team and Vision Nine is completely erroneous. As soon as they said – and I am sure you have had this evidence already, but I will repeat it because it is worth repeating – ‘We would seek to take on people from the existing team’, anybody in that team who could potentially be taken on was totally excluded from the process. 1610


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Mr Baker: That was made clear to us by – Mr Hussey: Absolutely, so the suggestions that have come through by people who were not

involved in the process that there was an overlap there are erroneous and totally unfair. 1615

Mr Baker: Yes, I think it is fair to say that has been communicated to us. Mr Hussey: That was just inaccurate. 1620

Q248. Mr Baker: Was that why you were not involved in the second process? Mr Hussey: No, the reason I was not involved in the second process was that I simply was not

there. I had decided in April 2015 that I would take early retirement for my own personal … nothing to do with work and nothing to do with the TT World Series; I just decided that my 1625

work-life balance was going to become life, not work, and I made that clear from early in the year.

Q249. The Clerk: So would it be fair to say that Vision Nine, having produced a bid for the

combined process, which I think you described as being 80% TT and 20% World Series – 1630

Mr Hussey: I would say 90% TT. Q250. The Clerk: Okay, 90%-10%. The next thing that happened was a new invitation to

tender for the domestic events. Would it be fair to say that the second process was designed to 1635

suit Vision Nine? Mr Hussey: No, but I think it is a fair assumption if you are looking at it from the outside that

it was, but it is not actually correct. What actually happened was we had a tender that was home TT-orientated from Vision Nine 1640

which at departmental level was decided they could not go for because we had had a TT World Series tender process which included the home event but was not just about the home event. So it would not be fair and it would not be right to allocate it on the basis of a winning bid that did not actually fully meet the expectations of the tender process, which was a perfectly reasonable decision to make in November or December 2015 – or before, I cannot remember the precise 1645

date. There is no doubt – and it would be silly to try and pretend otherwise – that Vision Nine were

not in pole position for this, because they had been involved in this and their tender was mostly about the TT, and it was a very thorough and well-worked-out tender which was hugely ambitious. But they had spent a great deal of time talking to a lot of the people who would be 1650

responsible for making those ambitions come true and those targets achievable, and they could talk very well around the whole thing. I have no doubt that you have had explained to you that we have had this constant thing going on that said, ‘Well, 85,000 people, you would never get them here; there is nowhere to put them,’ but that totally presumes that the TT would not change. 1655

We had a 10-year timetable for achieving this. The TT was going to have to change to make those ambitions and those targets achievable and it would have to change because written into all this was an assumption that live TV would come along. I am sure that my ex-colleagues have said this to you before: if live TV was ever going to become a reality, the TT would have to change because you cannot go to all the expense and bother of having a live TV broadcast on 1660

Monday, Wednesday and Friday in a working week – there is no audience for it. So, if we ever go to live TV coverage for the TT, the event has to change. It would fundamentally become an event with racing over two weekends, with probably practice periods in between both.


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Now, that is a thing which has not been picked up by many people. They have looked at the targets and they have said, ‘Well, you cannot achieve that because we cannot get everybody 1665

here.’ But they were never talking about getting everybody here at once; they were saying, ‘Here is this peak at 40-odd thousand people on one weekend; I tell you what, we will have two weekends and change the nature of the event.’ Never have I seen anywhere written on a tablet of stone, ‘Thou shalt not change the TT’. It has been changing ever since the year dot, and if it had not changed it would not be here now. It has been constantly evolving and in order to make 1670

it bigger and better and achieve all those targets. That was the next stage in its evolution. And do you know what? At some point we have to say, as an Island, and as people involved

and who like the TT, and as politicians, are we going to be satisfied with the TT as it is with perhaps from now on small margins of increase, or do we want to be really ambitious? If we decide that we are going to be really ambitious, we will be having these decisions to make all 1675

over again because they do involve fundamental changes to the schedule and the programme of the event.

But Vision Nine had worked all that out. They had thought about that and they had already contained most of those elements, and I think they were in pole position. I think it was made more difficult for any other bidder to come along, simply because of the timescale that was 1680

available to actually produce a bid that would match that. But was there a pre-determination that Vision Nine would win the bid? I have to say I was not involved in it, and I am in danger of doing what other people have done: making assumptions on things I am not involved in. But I would say at the point where I left there was certainly not. There was, ‘That is interesting; that is probably the way to go; we need to re-tender’ – with an acceptance that Vision Nine would 1685

probably be in there again and we would end up looking at their bid all over again and at some point someone would have to make a decision about that.

They were, largely, very impressive in the way they behaved – and again I am sure it has been explained to you. I feel very sorry for Vision Nine because they entered into this process as credible, determined partners. They expended a great deal of effort, money and energy in 1690

producing a bid in good faith because they saw there was huge potential on the Island and in the TT. And no doubt they saw there was potential for earnings for themselves as well, but they are a commercial organisation so why would we have to apologise for that? That is what they do. They were successful in most of the other areas they had been involved in.

Since we decided not to go ahead with their involvement there has been a lot of comment 1695

about them, most of which has been entirely unfair. And I will say this, I was particularly disappointed to hear Mr Bowers talking about Vision Nine and talking about their financial situation and their structures when he obviously has absolutely no idea about how events companies work. I have got a feeling that one of you may have brought this up yourself when you said that there would be special-purpose companies set up which would be funded for a 1700

particular event; they would be adequately funded to run the event and they would receive the income from that event and as soon as that event finished that special-purpose company would be wound down and closed. That is how these companies work and that is how Vision Nine worked. For heaven’s sake, they employed 40 people or so in London!

1705

The Chairman: It is not only sports organisations that work that way. Mr Hussey: You know this and anyone who has been involved in … There are different

business structures for different business models, aren’t there? I think there was an attempt to analyse their performance and their credibility financially from Companies Registry data, or 1710

whatever, without an understanding of how those industries work. Vision Nine were a credible organisation and there was a fair amount of due diligence done on them, and investigating and trying to understand not only what they had in the bank and how their companies were structured but how the industry worked. And we had to work that out and determine that in our minds before we could actually say we had done the due diligence properly. 1715


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We decided that they were credible operators who could do what they said they were going to do; and everything they did, that I saw, reflected a professional, approachable, honest organisation. As I said, they never professed to have expertise that they did not have; they were straight up with everybody; they were very interested and fully understood the roles of volunteers and marshals. They wanted to be involved in improving things for marshals – that 1720

was part of their tender and part of their deliberations on this. They had a lot of these things worked out. In the end, we decided – not Vision Nine – that we were not going to proceed with it.

I would say this to the Committee, and I am sure you have worked this out for yourselves already, but one thing that keeps going round in my head with these things is that there will be 1725

some encouragement and some temptation to focus in on process issues here about the tender, and there is no doubt about this … I would say this, that everybody in DED – and people might say that I am bound to say this, but I am saying this as honestly as I possibly can – who was involved in this was trying to do the best thing. We tried to comply as much as we properly could with the proper, correct tender process, and I believe we did. 1730

Of course, there may be flaws in this here and there, and I think we know some of the flaws. I think there was a flaw here in the amount of time, for example, that was allowed for it. You may find there are some other kinds of process issues in there as well. Yes, there may be, but there are bigger issues here, I think, for the Island. I think earlier in this inquiry somebody mentioned Scope of Government and whether we were under pressure to do something about Scope of 1735

Government – no. I can honestly say that I had a great interest in Scope of Government. There was one of those reports that I read and I thought, ‘Wow, someone has nailed it here; they have understood what the issues are.’ But we were never put under pressure to do anything about the Scope of Government with the TT – never. That was never part of the thing. It would have fitted well with it but it was not a driver. 1740

The Chairman: Can I say, we are really getting close to our time limit now – Mr Hussey: Yes, and I am going to stop talking, you will be glad to know. But what I am going to say is that the bigger issue here for me are the issues which I do not 1745

actually know about – and I am sure that you will get round to it – which is what actually happened after Vision Nine’s tender was accepted again? What actually happened at the contract stage? Why did this flounder?

I suspect here – and this is a suspicion which I cannot substantiate – that what went on was there was a failure amongst the Departments to have a shared agenda with this and to realise 1750

the same ambitions and to come together and make this happen. As I said earlier, anybody can say ‘No, you cannot do it’, or ‘It is too difficult’, but the real thing here – and I kept seeing examples of this – was that I do not think the other Departments shared DED’s ambition at all with this.

If I am doing them a disservice in saying that, I apologise to my ex-colleagues. But I think we 1755

were dragging everybody else along unwillingly and they did not get it, basically. I think that is the major issue. If we cannot get things like this right, what is our credibility as a Government for contracting out anything? How can we deliver things if we cannot work together to do it?

Q251. The Chairman: I think that is one of the reasons that you have process, (Mr Hussey: 1760

Yes, absolutely.) to make sure that everyone is there. Mr Hussey: Yes, obviously I would say one of the DED’s failings is that we failed to get

everyone to get what we were trying to do. 1765

Q252. The Chairman: Well, thank you for the amount of time you have spent with us. It has been quite useful actually because it has given us a lot of background which I do not think we


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had in the way that we dealt in the questioning-type thing. So it has been quite interesting listening to you.

Again, we appreciate you coming along and taking your time and also trying to put the 1770

version of the record that we may have been given into a different perspective, so thank you for that.

Mr Hussey: I would say that one thing is precious to me, and that is my integrity; and when

people make comments or suggestions which reflect on my integrity – not personally but being 1775

involved in something that lacked integrity – I take exception to that, I really do. I would say my integrity is absolutely intact; and that, I think, is true of my colleagues too.

The Chairman: Okay. Well, thank you very much for coming. 1780

Mr Hussey: If you are done with me, thank you very much for listening. The Chairman: It has been very useful, thank you very much for coming.

The Committee adjourned at 6.13 p.m.

economic policy review committee - tynwald chris corlett, former chief executive, mr david ronan,...

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