QUESTIONS over the future ownership of Watchet Marina remained unanswered this week following a Free Press investigation into the sole director of the company which runs it.

Watchet Boat Owners Association members have been assured by Somerset Council interim head of operations Jonathan Stevens they would not be affected by the administration of the marina’s parent company The Marine and Property Group Ltd (MPG).

However, MPG administrators, Damian Webb and Christopher Lewis said they had started to sell the company and its assets, which included Watchet Marina and four other marinas in Wales.

Mr Webb and Mr Lewis have not responded to inquiries by the Free Press to clarify any legal powers they held to dispose of Watchet harbour.

Companies House records show that Watchet Marina Ltd along with eight other companies is 100 per cent owned by MPG.

And the Free Press discovered the existence of a ‘full cross guarantee and debenture structure between all of the companies in the group’, meaning that Watchet Marina assets could be seized to satisfy creditors of any of the other companies in the group.

This week, the Free Press put its findings directly to Somerset Council executive Cllr Federica Smith-Roberts, whose portfolio includes the marina.

Cllr Smith-Roberts is the former leader of the now-defunct Somerset West and Taunton Council, which began negotiating a 200-year lease with Watchet Marina director Christopher Odling-Smee despite the financial mire of a web of other companies he owns.

Cllr Smith-Roberts did not respond to the Free Press.

Meanwhile, Mr Stevens told boat owners he had been assured by Mr Odling-Smee that funding would be received before the end of August to clear all of MPG’s debt.

Mr Stevens said: “This, of course, needs to be understood in the wider context of the whole deal, including all marina subsidiaries and not just Watchet, but together with the proof of funding letter, gives the council confidence that funding is in place to address TMG’s financial issues.”He said he was meeting weekly with Mr Odling-Smee while the funding was being put in place.

Research through Companies House has found 27 different businesses where 52-year-old Danish-born Mr Odling-Smee, who now lives in Switzerland, has been appointed director.

For many of them, including Watchet Marina Ltd, he is now the sole director.

Of the 27 companies, nine were liquidated or compulsorily dissolved, four went into receivership, and six were in administration.

Eight were listed as ‘active’ companies, but only Watchet Marina and Cardiff Diesel Services were older than eight months and had not faced legal action to be dissolved, although accounts for the latter showed it traded at a loss for the past two financial years, losing a total of £244,000.

Of the five other ‘actively trading’ companies:

• One is overdue with registering its accounts at Companies House and is currently subject to a striking-off order which was suspended in May of this year pending an objection, and also faced a striking-off order in 2022

• A second was in receivership for a brief time in 2022 and previously was subject to a compulsory striking-off order in 2021

• A third is also overdue with registering its accounts and has faced striking-off orders four times, in 2013, 2017, 2021, and 2022

• A fourth was subject to a striking-off order in 2009 before it changed its name

Mr Odling-Smee told the Free Press: “There is much around which I cannot comment, given we are in a process, and I have previously explained what I am doing in terms of the capital financing deal.

“I am working closely with the administrators and the rehabilitation of Watchet will be proceeding.

“I am also personally moving to protect creditors and stakeholders.

“At this stage it is really a non-story.”