Daily Mirror (Northern Ireland)
£70k for foodbank targeted by racists
£10k
VOLUNTEERS at a foodbank targeted in a racist arson attack have said they were overwhelmed after being handed a cheque for more than £70,000 raised in a crowdfunding appeal.
The Belfast Multicultural Association centre was badly damaged in last month’s blaze, with large sections of the roof of the historic listed building destroyed.
Police are treating the attack on the property in Donegall Pass in the south of the city as a hate crime.
In the wake of the fire, an online funding page was set up to help the association continue its work distributing food and clothes packages to vulnerable people during the Covid-19 pandemic.
Its initial £10,000 target was smashed within hours as donations flooded in from across Belfast, Northern Ireland and beyond.
A series of subsequent goals were also surpassed, with the total having reached almost £72,000 four weeks on from the fire.
Volunteers gathered outside the charred wreckage of their centre yesterday as the man who set up the Justgiving page – Amnesty International’s Northern Ireland director Patrick Corrigan – handed over a big cheque.
Association trustee Muhammad Atif said the fire had left everyone associated with the centre “heartbroken”.
But he said the resultant “outpouring of love” had reassured them that the city was behind them. Mr Atif added: “It’s really overwhelming, it’s heartwarming.”
Initial target set by fundraisers after arson attack
THE collapse of Sir Philip Green’s high street empire has triggered thousands of job losses, caused hundreds of store closures and left suppliers chasing money they are owed.
But when contacted by the Daily Mirror yesterday, the faded fashion tycoon showed no outward sign of compassion towards those who have been impacted.
Asked if he had a message for his workers, some now fearing how they will pay their mortgage and other bills, he replied: “I’m not getting involved in this conversation, you know that.”
There was an even blunter response when asked if he felt he should apologise to staff.
He launched into the sort of expletivepeppered attack I and other journalists have been accustomed to over the years.
“You are taking me for a complete idiot,” he fumed, before adding: “You are doing what the f ***** g Daily Mirror always does, OK.”
He had something more to say about this paper, which has fought so hard over the decades to speak up for millions of hard-working families.
Green, 68, said: “Thank goodness it is not a paper I have ever read and don’t plan to.”
It is the sort of reaction I have come to expect from the one time business titan, whose reputation was shattered by the controversial sale of BHS to a former bankrupt for £1 in 2015.
The department store chain collapsed in 2016 with 11,000 job losses.
Green, who counts Leonardo Dicaprio, Naomi Campbell and Simon Cowell among his celeb friends, has cut a low profile since his Arcadia empire went into administration in November.
Green, nicknamed Sir Philip Greed, was photographed at the time strolling in Monaco where he lives with his wife Lady Green and where his £100million superyacht the Lionheart is kept.
But while he seemingly still lives a life of luxury, others are not so lucky.
More than 12,000 Arcadia workers, some who had given many years of loyal service, now face the axe. At least 2,000 have already been made redundant, with the rest resigned to their fate after online fashion giants Boohoo and ASOS bought Arcadia’s brands – including Topshop, Topman, Wallis and Dorothy Perkins – between them.
Neither wanted any of the group’s 450 shops. The Mirror has spoken to staff left devastated by the firm’s collapse, hopeful until the last that administrator Deloitte would choose a buyer who would save most stores and jobs.
Some talked about going into their stores to pack up stock and dismantle the fittings, all unsure about when they would receive redundancy money.
Sources said Arcadia’s human resources team had been trying to help some find work.
The collapse also threatens jobs in the large number of Arcadia group suppliers who are now chasing debts.
Many of the firms are unsecured creditors and face a long wait to find out what they will get.
As a secured creditor, the Green family are likely to be repaid a £50m loan before funds are distributed to landlords and suppliers. The interest-free loan was made to the group in 2019 at the time of an emergency restructuring.
Arcadia supplier casualties include Lloyd Shoe Company, of East London, which has gone into administration.
Dozens of its staff have already been made redundant. In a sign of the knockon effect, it went under owing money to about 80 businesses and organisations.
You are taking me for an idiot – you’re doing what the f ***** g Mirror always does GREEN AFTER WE ASKED IF HE FEELS HE SHOULD APOLOGISE
THE closure of Arcadia’s stores comes just as 118 Debenhams branches are poised to shut. Ipswich is one of the many places that has both.
Around 14% of the shop fronts in the Suffolk town centre are empty. But once you include the empty space in the floors above, that soars to 50%.
The closure of Topshop and Topman in the Sailmakers shopping centre will make matters worse. But the loss of
Debenhams, the largest shop in Ipswich which also fronts onto the town square, is a bigger headache.
The former Footman’s department store used to be a flagship destination.
“No one is going to take a 55,000 square foot building that’s a 30-year old building,” says Paul Clement, who is chief executive of Ipswich Central, which is in charge of rejuvenating the area. He believes one option is to convert the ground floor into smaller shop units but use the rest potentially for offices or housing. “But it’s got to be led locally,” he adds. “That’s the really important point. If town centres like mine wait for the market we will be waiting a very long time.”
Paul believes converting shops into housing is key to many town centres.
“They will go back to where they were in the 1960s and 1950s where they was a combination of lots of independent retailers and lots of people living in them,” he predicts.
Despite the closures, he thinks the aftermath of the coronavirus crisis could be good for Ipswich.
“People would commute into London five days a week,” he says. “If in future they do so two or three days, Ipswich almost becomes a suburb. We think it is an opportunity for us.”