Meeting documents

To consider the attached report.

Note: Sally Reynolds (CEO, Silverstone Heritage) and Stuart Pringle (Sporting Director, Silverstone Circuits) will be attending the meeting to update Members and to answer questions.

Contact Officer:  Andrew Small (01296) 585507

On 14 September, 2016, Council agreed unanimously to provide loan funding of £2 million as part of a total £8 million package of loan support provided by the 4 county and district authorities and 2 LEPS which cover the Silverstone circuit in order to enable the Silverstone Heritage Experience to be constructed.  The combined facility of £8 million was required to secure Heritage Lottery Funding of £9.1 million.  It was intended that the loan support would only be required in full or in part if the anticipated private sector funding could not be attracted.

Sally Reynolds, CEO of Silverstone Heritage and Stuart Pringle, Sporting Director of Silverstone Circuits attended the meeting to update Members on scheme progress, including the progress on attracting sponsorship, the planned opening date and the construction budget.  An update was also provided in relation to the future of F1 at Silverstone.

The Committee received a presentation on the Silverstone Heritage Experience.  It had originally been planned to open in October 2018 on the 70th anniversary of the first Grand Prix being held at Silverstone, however due to legal and other issues this would now occur in early 2019.  The vision was to bring to life the extensive heritage of Silverstone and British motor racing life through the creation of a dynamic, interactive and educational visitor experience including:

·                    A permanent exhibition, at the entrance to the Circuit that would take visitors on an exciting two hour journey through motor racing at Silverstone set against the wider context of the sport and, in particular, the part that the Circuit, the British Racing Drivers’ Club (BRDC) and the region’s motor sport industry have played in its development worldwide.

·                    A Collections and Research Centre, offering museum and archive-accredited storage for the unique BRDC archive and other important motor sport collections.

·                    An extensive education programme focused on STEM learning which aimed to address the region’s shortage of engineers by inspiring the engineers of the future through its interactive teaching sessions, engineering teaching bursaries and awards programmes. This would help to ensure the region continued to be a focus of high performance engineering with a readily available qualified workforce.

The Silverstone Heritage Experience wouldserve as a catalyst, stimulating further development at Silverstone, for example, a new 197 room hotel and a Family Entertainment Centre.  Its marketing budget would also ensure that the attraction was promoted to a very large and diverse audience helping to strengthen Silverstone’s and the region’s standing nationally and internationally.

The scheme was supported by robust feasibility studies and a five year business plan which showed that the Silverstone Heritage Experience would deliver anticipated visitor numbers of 436,500 in its first full year of operation (2019).  Once open, it would be self-funding, generating a healthy annual surplus so it could service the loan of £8million paid back over a ten year period.  Nearly £11.5m Gross Visit Impact to the local and regional economy was projected for 2019 with an additional 87,000 bed nights generated in the region.  The total number of jobs created by the Project was 78.

By virtue of the additional visitors the Project would attract to Silverstone it would help to secure the future of the Silverstone Circuit and its ability to continue to host the British Grand Prix and other national and international events which were crucially important for the region’s visitor economy (and underpin the high performance engineering sector too). Silverstone remained the only Formula 1 venue in the world to operate without government or third party subsidies.

Members sought further information and were informed:-

(i)            that the Heritage Experience (HE) was anticipating have a reduced entry price for students attending with a local school.  However, the HE had debts that would need to be serviced so wouldn’t be able to consider free entry for students until such stages as borrowings had been repaid.

(ii)           that as a charity the HE had an aim to work with local education providers, including secondary schools and the Buckingham and Northampton Universities.

(iii)          that the information provided at the meeting in relation to a cycle route between Buckingham and Silverstone would be looked into.

(iv)         on the current financial position of Silverstone Circuits, in particular in response to reports that had recently appeared in the press regarding "material uncertainty" over its future.  Silverstone Circuits were confident that agreement of an appropriate facility would be reached to allow the group to continue to meeting its liabilities, including F1’s owner.  Members were further informed that the financial streams for HE and Silverstone Circuits were ring-fenced.

(v)          that legal and other issues had meant that the Heritage Experience would open at the beginning of 2019, rather than in October 2018 (70th anniversary of the Circuit).  However, the HE was confident that this new deadline would be met.

(vi)         that Silverstone Circuits had been developing a number of initiatives over the last few years and was confident that it could operate as a viable business without the British Grand Prix.  Likewise, the Heritage Experience business model was not dependent on Silverstone retaining the F1 Grand Prix.

(vii)        that the HE believed that 98% of its visitors would be British.  It was likely that translators would be organised for non-English speaking groups, rather than providing information in a number of languages.

(viii)       that the business plan for the HE and possible visitor numbers had been estimated based on number of people that lived within a 30 minutes, 1 or 2 hour drive.  The impact of more housing growth in the north of the Vale would likely mean that the HE would be within the ‘reach’ of more people.

(ix)         that Silverstone and the HE had an ambitious programme of future development that they hoped would be supported by AVDC’s Planning Department dealing with planning applications expeditiously.

(x)          on some aspects of the Communications and Marketing Strategy that had been developed to publicise the Heritage Experience, including for the opening in 2019 and for the British Grand Prix.

RESOLVED –

That the Silverstone Heritage CEO and the Sporting Director, Silverstone Circuits, be thanked for attending the meeting and updating Members on the positive progress made with the Silverstone Heritage Experience.