Council says firm owes £618,000

Martha Wainwright performed with her band at the Cambridge Folk Festival in 2008 (Photo: Bob Carter)

Cambridge City Council is taking legal action to recover £618,000 owed to it by a firm contracted to sell Cambridge Folk Festival tickets on the internet.

SecureTicket UK was appointed by the council in December 2007 to sell tickets online for the 2008 festival after a competitive tender process.

The sum of £618,000 from ticket sales was to be paid to the council in August 2008, but the money has not been paid.

The council has now announced it is taking legal action to recover the sum.

SecureTicket UK were unavailable for comment on Thursday night.

'Badly let down'

Leader of Cambridge City Council Ian Nimmo-Smith said: "We are taking this matter extremely seriously given the large sum of public money involved.

"This company sold folk festival tickets for us in 2007 and they did a satisfactory job.

"They were appointed again for last year's festival after a competitive process.

"They haven't paid up even though we have given them extra time to do so.

"Clearly we have been very badly let down and we are not going to wait any longer. That is why we are taking legal action."

Billy Bragg also performed at the 2008 festival (Photo:Bob Carter)

A council spokesman said in a statement: "Since August the council has made repeated attempts to get SecureTicket UK to pay.

"When payment had still not been received in early October the council initiated legal proceedings in the High Court for the return of the money. This court action will be heard in the High Court on 21 January."

The council is also commissioning an independent review to look at whether more could have been done to protect the council's money.

The review will also make recommendations on how the council can protect itself against similar risks in future.

A report by the council's internal auditors published on 20 November criticised some aspects of the procurement process used for suppliers of the folk festival toilets, showers and marquees. An action plan has been drawn up to address those recommendations.

Among the singers at the 2008 Cambridge Folk Festival were Billy Bragg, Martha Wainwright and Lisa Knapp.