Avocet's £200,000 Loch Lomond jetty sells for £22,500

DOUGLAS SHEPHERD reports on MORE INSOLVENCY WOES FOR AVOCET

A dilapidated pier on the shores of Loch Lomond which was purchased by the directors of Avocet Faculties PLC for £200,000 in 2017 has realised a tenth of that sum in a fire sale organised by the company's joint administrators.

News of the £22,500 price tag on the recently-sold clapped out landing stage at Port a Chaipuill, Arrochar is included in a final report by administrators appointed to Avocet Faculties before the insolvent business transfers from administration to a Creditors' Voluntary Liquidation (CVL).

It is the latest financial setback for the troubled Avocet Group of companies, formerly chaired by bankrupt businessman Martin Frost.

The jetty and a narrow strip of land was being been used as security for a loan Faculties had arranged with its former parent Avocet Infinite PLC (now called Omega Infinite and in compulsory liquidation). The administrators of Faculties and the liquidators of Omega are both employed by insolvency practitioners Begbies Traynor.

When shareholders discovered details of the £200,000 jetty purchase, which took place in October 2017, there was strong criticism of Faculties' management - Mr Frost who resigned as a director in 2020, and his colleague Dr Bob Jennings.

Faculties' joint administrator Jason Ainge writes in the latest report on inquiries into the company's failure: "The joint administrators previously identified unusual payments that required further investigation and time has been incurred liaising with the company's bank to obtain additional information.

"It would be prejudicial to the investigations to comment in any further detail at this stage. It is uncertain whether these investigations will provide a financial benefit to creditors".

The report also reveals that an offer in the sum of £280,000 was received and accepted for two Berwickshire farm cottages - the subject of a separate financial security arrangement with Omega which was owed a total of £807,000 when Faculties descended into administration.

Mr Ainge comments: "Advice was received as to the validity of the security granted to Omega".

It has also emerged that the company owed money on various fronts to HMRC. These debts comprised VAT, PAYE Income Tax, employee National Insurance contributions, student loan deductions and Construction Industry Scheme deductions. HMRC has a secondary preferential claim of £21,860 relating to outstanding PAYE for the period April 2018 to July 2019. Unsecured creditors have filed claims totalling £110,334.

Mr Ainge explains that administrators have a statutory duty to investigate the conduct of the directors and any person they consider to be or have been a shadow or de facto director during the period of three years before the date of their appointment, in relation to their management of the affairs of the company and the causes of its failure.

He states: "The joint administrators have undertaken a detailed investigation of the manner in which the business was conducted prior to administration and have submitted their report to the Department for Business, Energy & Industrial Strategy [BEIS] in this regard.

"The joint administrators have continued to liaise with and provide information and documentation to BEIS in relation to queries that have arisen relative to the report".

A shareholder who contacted us after reading Mr Ainge's report said: "We're no nearer to finding out why Frost and co splurged £200,000 of our cash on a low value ribbon of land and a rotting jetty hundreds of miles from where Avocet was supposed to be developing cutting edge fuel products and working on revolutionary agricultural processes. Surely we have a right to know".