A Liverpool landlady at the centre of a £1.2m rent dispute with her landlord has told of her 'ordeal'.
Maureen Bramwell, 69, who ran the bars inside Grand Central Hall, was locked out of the city centre venue on the morning of March 29. Landlords Nextdom, controlled by Liverpool businessman Gerry O'Brien, served official notice of forfeiture of the lease to Ms Bramwell's company Local Bar Four Limited.
Ms Bramwell, owes £1.2m in rent. Ms Bramwell, who founded the well known Smokie Mo's chain of city bars, has now told of her experience.
READ MORE: Liverpool city centre venue shuts doors over '£1.2m rent arrears'
She said: "I had been working inside the building on March 29 with some staff. I popped out to Greggs to buy the staff some breakfast. When I came back the locks had been changed."
Ms Bramwell, a veteran landlady, said that the rent she owed had built up during the lockdown period.
She said: "We owe around two years rent and this related to the lockdown period. Like all operators we were forced to close down due to covid and lost nearly two years' worth of trade.
"We opened when it was legal to do so but the lockdown was a massive interruption to our earnings. Why does the landlord not understand this."
A spokesman for the owners said that Ms Bramwell had started to build up rent arrears before the pandemic.
The spokesman said that Ms Bramwell chose not to seek help with her rental payments from the government and ignored the landlord's attempts to agree a repayment schedule.
Ms Bramwell, who signed a lease at Grand Central Hall in 2018, told the ECHO that she had repeatedly complained to the landlord about the condition of the building. Nextdom claimed some of her complaints were without foundation.
She said that a tree and other vegetation growing in the roof area of the building had riddled the building with water ingress and flooding.
She said: "There were so many issues over the years. "Bar Racine was forced to close due to flooding.
Nelly Foleys was leaking from multiple points from day one.
"We often had to close the bar when it started raining because of the water issue. When the rain was heavy there was a constant flow of water.
"Smokie Mo's was full of dry rot. The historic problems existed long before we took over possession. The floor and stairs on the first floor of Smokie Mo's has been eaten away by dry rot.
"The Liffey Bar also had leaks from day one."
Ms Bramwell said that she now planned to seek redress in the courts. Proceedings have not yet begun.
A spokesman for Nextdom said that the owners spent over £2m on refurbishing Grand Central hall. He said that under the terms of Local Bar Four's Limited lease the company was responsible for the building's upkeep.
A spokesman for NextDom properties said: "Ms Bramwell had accrued significant rent arrears prior to the pandemic. The government introduced a series of support schemes for businesses during the pandemic to help with their rental payments but Ms Bramwell chose not to avail of these and repeatedly ignored my client’s attempts to agree a repayment schedule for the arrears.
"Lockdown did not excuse Local Bar Four Limited from its rent liabilities. My client had made several attempts with Local Bar Four Limited to ease payment and had offered payment breaks and deferrals but the tenant failed substantially to maintain regular payments and occasionally broke arrangements, all in breach of its legal obligations.
"Further attempts to engage with the tenant to offer solutions to surrender part of its lease to reduce its ongoing liabilities and focus on its core business were also rejected."
