Latest news with #BobMurray
The Independent
7 days ago
- Politics
- The Independent
Premier League club in row with council over proposed housing near stadium
Premier League newcomers Sunderland have opposed plans to build houses near their Stadium of Light ground, saying development could have 'catastrophic consequences'. Chairman Kyril Louis-Dreyfus said the club will make formal objections to the city council's plans to allow for homes to be built in what had been a buffer zone around the stadium. Sunderland City Council has proposed that 600 homes, including maisonettes, townhouses and family homes, should be built south of the stadium, as part of a wider redevelopment of the city centre. Sunderland City Council chief executive Patrick Melia has insisted that the stadium was a 'key asset for the city' and the redevelopment plans would enhance fans' experience. Former chairman Sir Bob Murray, who oversaw the move from Roker Park to the 49,000-seat ground in 1997, called the change a 'disgrace'. He said the local authority had previously agreed protections which would prevent development near the stadium, thus allowing the club to increase capacity if needed, but that the city council had 'torn them up'. Sir Bob said having houses up close to the Stadium of Light risked hemming it in, which was the cause of the move from Roker Park. Mr Louis-Dreyfus has now spoken out against the plans as well. He said: 'As the custodian of Sunderland AFC, it is my duty to safeguard the future of our club. 'This includes the Stadium of Light – the beating heart of our city. 'Unfortunately, Sunderland City Council has recently taken steps relating to the Sheepfolds development that could have catastrophic operational consequences on our club and, by extension, our community. 'We are under no illusion that the city needs a more appropriate housing provision and support those endeavours fully. 'However, later this week we will be submitting a formal objection against the proposals relating to the Sheepfolds and I encourage all city stakeholders to come together and join us in protecting the future of our football club and the City of Sunderland. 'Together, we have limitless potential, but it will only be realised through delivering on a shared purpose and vision.' There were fears that having homes close to the stadium could impact its ability to host major concerts as well as block any future expansion plans. The Stadium of Light has hosted England games and was built on the site of the former Monkwearmouth Colliery. In response to the objections, council chief Mr Melia said: 'We are very much invested in the future of the Stadium of Light and recognise it as a key asset for the city. 'It is our view that the proposals set out for the Sheepfolds neighbourhoods will improve operations and fan experience in terms of match days and other events and we remain committed to working with SAFC in relation to their plans for the expansion of the Stadium of Light – we have held many discussions with Mr Louis-Dreyfus and his team to this effect. 'This consultation process provides a real opportunity for the public and stakeholders to share their thoughts with us as the local planning authority and we will consider all views and comments prior to determination of the application.'
The Guardian
12-08-2025
- Business
- The Guardian
Sunderland to object over council's housing plans at Stadium of Light
Sunderland are preparing a formal objection over council plans to build housing within 23 metres of the Stadium of Light. The club fear the scheme would leave the stadium landlocked, preventing any future capacity increase. Sunderland city council is expected to submit plans this week for 600 apartments and townhouses to be built behind the South Stand of the 49,000-seat stadium, on a former industrial estate. The club recently submitted a pre-planning application for a redevelopment of the South Stand and believe the project would erase an agreed buffer zone. The stadium is vital to the local economy, hosts regular music concerts and has staged England senior football internationals. The former club chair Sir Bob Murray, who oversaw the stadium's construction, said: 'This is not just poor planning, it's a disgrace. You don't strangle your greatest asset and call it progress.' The council says there would still be room for stadium expansion. Murray recognises the need for new housing in the area but believes the current plans are sited too close to the stadium. 'I helped shape protections,' said Murray of the buffer zone. 'The council agreed them and now they've torn them up. I'm aware the club will formally object and I fully support their position. The council's plans are shameful, shortsighted and completely unacceptable. 'There's been no real consultation, no transparency and no accountability. The council is trying to rewrite its own rules behind closed doors – and in doing so it risks sabotaging a major driver of jobs, pride and regeneration for ever.' Murray is demanding the council withdraw the applications. 'This isn't just about football, it's about Sunderland's identity, investment and ambition,' he said. 'If this plan goes ahead the city will regret it for decades.' Patrick Melia, the council's chief executive, said: 'We have held extensive discussions with Sir Bob Murray in relation to this development and have acknowledged his comments. 'Robust assurances have been given that the proposed Sheepfolds development will not impact on any planned future expansion of the Stadium of Light or its ability to host matches, concerts or other events. The council has sought specialist expertise in developing the proposals that are currently out for consultation.'
Times
01-08-2025
- Entertainment
- Times
The Michelin star chef who is raising the game at Sunderland
'I'll be back in 20 seconds, I need to get changed,' says Tommy Banks before he charges through double doors in the Jimmy Montgomery Stand at the Stadium of Light, and slides across an empty dance floor — his white Adidas trainers having already been discarded. He is wearing a T-shirt and black jeans before the transformation takes place into his cooking attire and this Sunderland-supporting TV chef, now plotting award-winning food at the stadium, will reveal much more of a fondness for Super Kev than Superman. There are curious ways for that lifelong bond of heartache, pain and the occasional moment of out-of-this-world exhilaration to start between supporter and club, and York-born Banks, Britain's youngest-ever winner of a coveted Michelin star, has a pretty unique reason for Sunderland being his footballing love. 'My next door neighbour was Bob Murray's butcher,' he says. 'Bob was the Sunderland chairman and he would give tickets to my neighbour. My neighbour took us up to my first game in 2000. It was a League Cup tie on a Tuesday night, Sunderland versus Man United. 'I was in the top-right corner, a noisy part of the stadium. It was great, for me as a ten-year-old. My framing point was that Man United had won the Treble, Dwight Yorke got sent off, Julio Arca scored in the first half and then Kevin Phillips scored the winner. 'I just remember the ground was rocking and everyone was singing 'Sunderland til I die'. I loved it. I'd never seen anything like it. It was electric and, yeah, I was hooked.' Home was York, where Banks, who is now 36, would begin working at The Black Swan at Oldstead, from where he would earn that Michelin star. 'At school, me and my mate were the only two Sunderland fans,' he adds. 'Everyone else was mainly Leeds or there was the odd Man United fan and some liked York City. 'What was it like being a Sunderland fan? Up and down! I remember getting really upset when Chris Makin was sold to Ipswich Town. My favourite-ever kit was 2002 and it was almost like Inter Milan colours, dark blue and light blue stripes. I think the new Hummel away kit is the nicest kit we've had since. 'When I started working after I left school I didn't come up [to matches] as much because as a chef I was always working weekends. To my whole brigade's annoyance, I would always stream every match. But then it was rubbish going down to League One, just rubbish.' It was not rubbish in 2013, when Banks, now a regular on BBC's Great British Menu and Family Cooking Showdown, picked up that first Michelin star. He was at the two games that feel like they have sent electric currents through Wearside, the last-gasp play-off wins against Coventry City and Sheffield United. It raises the question of which was better, getting his two Michelin star or either winning goal at the Stadium of Light or Wembley? 'You know what, it's difficult because it's not the same emotion, is it?' he says. 'When a goal goes in, it's pure ecstasy. The Coventry game at the Stadium of Light was like nothing I'd ever seen. You saw the atmosphere, it was just nuts. 'The game was on a knife-edge. I'd lost my voice the next day and I had meetings and I went, 'I'm really sorry, I'm a Sunderland fan', and they were all going, 'Good on ya!'. 'You don't get that moment with a Michelin star. It's more a slow burner. It's quite hard to compare. At the time [of his first one], they just published the book and you would have to try and find it on a PDF online, which was quite anticlimactic. 'Now they do a big ceremony and you get invited to go on stage, but I never got that because the second time I won a Michelin star for my second restaurant was during Covid so it was on Zoom. I've never actually experienced that, going on stage to this great applause.' So you're trying to say the Sunderland goals are better? 'Yeah, but don't write that the Sunderland goals were better than a Michelin star! 'The thing is for me with those two goals [Dan Ballard in minute 32 of extra time against Coventry and Tommy Watson in minute five of added time at Wembley] we were at the stage where we were really involved with the club for what we are going to do. We had already decided we were going to do 'Banks on the Wear.' ' As the club returns to the Premier League for the first time in nine seasons, in the kitchen on every match day at Sunderland's home ground will be a chef with two Michelin stars. That feels pretty unique. 'When the guys I knew at [hospitality company] Delaware said, 'We might be doing a deal at Sunderland, you're a fan, do you want to be involved?', I was like 'absa bloody lutely' but you never know if these things will come off. 'I was with David Bruce [Sunderland's chief business officer] for the West Brom game and he told me his vision of what they are trying to do and I was like, 'Wow!' I really like this guy and I feel the club is in good hands and going in a good direction. 'You wouldn't know this unless you're a chef, but there is a league table for the boardroom food. There is a league table for the best restaurant. I want to win both of them.' He will walk through that restaurant at the Stadium of Light with about 50 Sunderland fans after our chat. He will talk through his love of the club. There will be a refurb of the Black Cats Bar, called 'Tommy's Pie Shop' as well as the star of the show, his restaurant, Banks on the Wear, that will include a directors' box seat at the game for those enjoying his food. 'It's a huge honour,' he says. 'The pressure I feel is that this has not been done before, it's a very new thing. We will be in from first thing in the morning and there will be a team of ten of us. 'I want it to be the best restaurant in the Premier League. It's trail-blazing. It will be fever pitch by the time that first game of the season against West Ham comes around. It'll be off the charts.' Places are available seasonally and match-to-match in Banks on the Wear, visit to book a table for 2025-26. Premier LeagueAugust 16, 3pm
Times
01-08-2025
- Entertainment
- Times
The Michelin Star-winning chef who is raising the game at Sunderland
'I'll be back in 20 seconds, I need to get changed,' says Tommy Banks before he charges through double doors in the Jimmy Montgomery Stand at the Stadium of Light, and slides across an empty dance floor — his white Adidas trainers having already been discarded. He is wearing a T-shirt and black jeans before the transformation takes place into his cooking attire and this Sunderland-supporting TV chef, now plotting award-winning food at the stadium, will reveal much more of a fondness for Super Kev than Superman. There are curious ways for that lifelong bond of heartache, pain and the occasional moment of out-of-this-world exhilaration to start between supporter and club, and York-born Banks, Britain's youngest-ever winner of a coveted Michelin Star, has a pretty unique reason for Sunderland being his footballing love. 'My next door neighbour was Bob Murray's butcher,' he says. 'Bob was the Sunderland chairman and he would give tickets to my neighbour. My neighbour took us up to my first game in 2000. It was a League Cup tie on a Tuesday night, Sunderland versus Man United. 'I was in the top right corner, a noisy part of the stadium. It was great, for me as a ten-year-old. My framing point was that Man United had won the treble, Dwight Yorke got sent off, Julio Arca scored in the first half and then Kevin Phillips scored the winner. I just remember the ground was rocking and everyone was singing 'Sunderland til I die'. I loved it. I'd never seen anything like it. It was electric and, yeah, I was hooked.' Home was York, where Banks, who is now 36, would begin working at The Black Swan at Oldstead, from where he would win that Michelin Star. 'At school, me and my mate were the only two Sunderland fans,' he adds. 'Everyone else was mainly Leeds or there was the odd Man United fan and some liked York City. 'What was it like being a Sunderland fan? Up and down! I remember getting really upset when Chris Makin was sold to Ipswich Town. My favourite-ever kit was 2002 and it was almost like Inter Milan colours, dark blue and light blue stripes. I think the new Hummel away kit (now) is the nicest kit we've had since. 'When I started working after I left school I didn't come up (to matches) as much because as a chef I was always working weekends. To my whole brigade's annoyance, I would always stream every match. 'But then it was rubbish going down to League One, just rubbish.' It was not rubbish in 2013, when Banks, now a regular on BBC's Great British Menu and Family Cooking Showdown, picked up that first Michelin Star. He was at the two games that feel like they have sent electric currents through Wearside, the last-gasp play-off wins against Coventry and Sheffield United. It raises the question of which was better, getting either of his two Michelin Stars, or either winning goal at the Stadium of Light or Wembley. 'You know what, it's difficult because it's not the same emotion, is it?' he answers. 'When a goal goes in, it's pure ecstasy. The Coventry game at the Stadium of Light was like nothing I'd ever seen. You saw the atmosphere, it was just nuts. The game was on a knife-edge. I'd lost my voice the next day and I had meetings and I went, 'I'm really sorry, I'm a Sunderland fan', and they were all going, 'Good on ya!'. 'You don't get that moment with a Michelin Star. It's more a slow burner. It's quite hard to compare. 'At the time [of his first one], they just published the book and you would have to try and find it on a PDF online, which was quite anticlimactic. 'Now they do a big ceremony and you get invited to go on stage, but I never got that because the second time I won a Michelin Star for my second restaurant was during Covid so it was on Zoom. I've never actually experienced that, going on stage to this great applause.' So you're trying to say the Sunderland goals are better? 'Yeah, but don't write that the Sunderland goals were better than a Michelin Star!' Okay then. 'The thing is for me with those two goals [Dan Ballard in minute 32 of extra-time and Tommy Watson in minute five of injury-time] we were at the stage [him as chef Tommy and not fan] where we were really involved with the club for what we are going to do. We had already decided we were going to do 'Banks on the Wear'.' And here we come to the reason for the dance floor sliding and the energetic Superman (or Kev) changing into the work clothes that he and his team will bring to the Stadium of Light every matchday, as the club returns to the Premier League for the first time in nine seasons. In the kitchen on every matchday at Sunderland's home ground will be a chef with two Michelin stars. That feels pretty unique. 'When the guys I knew at [hospitality company] Delaware said, 'We might be doing a deal at Sunderland, you're a fan, do you want to be involved?', I was like 'absa bloody lutely' but you never know if these things will come off. 'I was with David Bruce [Sunderland's chief business officer] for the West Brom game and he told me his vision of what they are trying to do and I was like, 'Wow!' I really like this guy and I feel the club is in good hands and going in a good direction. 'You wouldn't know this unless you're a chef, but there is a league table for the boardroom food. There is a league table for the best restaurant. I want to win both of them.' He will walk through that restaurant at the Stadium of Light with about 50 Sunderland fans after our chat. He will talk through his love of the club. There will be a refurb of the Black Cats Bar, called 'Tommy's Pie Shop' as well as the star of the show, his restaurant, 'Banks on the Wear' that will include a directors' box seat at the game for those dining on his food. 'It's a huge honour,' he says. 'The pressure I feel is that this has not been done before, it's a very new thing. We will be in from first thing in the morning and there will be a team of ten of us. 'I want it to be the best restaurant in the Premier League. It's trail-blazing. It will be fever pitch by the time that first game of the season against West Ham comes around. It'll be off the charts.' Sunderland v West Ham Premier League August 16, 3pm
BBC News
19-06-2025
- Business
- BBC News
Children are suffering due to lack of education decisions
New deputies will be decided, familiar faces will return and some will see their hopes of being elected slip the voters have decided who will make up the States of Guernsey, it will soon be the turn of the newly-elected deputies to make crucial choices for the island. There will be hundreds of decisions made by the next assembly; from education, social care and transport to housing immigration and finance. The BBC has been asking islanders what they think the big issues are likely to be. Finance The financial situation of the island will always be a priority for islanders and the States recently reported a £44m annual deficit in core services. Bob Murray, an outgoing deputy and former member of the Committee for Policy and Resources (P&R), said it was critical to understand the importance of being realistic when it comes to the island's said: "The new P&R will find that our financial situation is as critical as we have claimed."They will find themselves in exactly the same position of having to convince a new assembly to grasp the need for immediate action, and to disappoint many that their hoped-for manifesto promises are simply not deliverable." One of the biggest talking points of this term has been tax and, more specifically, Goods and Service Tax (GST). In November, plans for introducing a goods and services tax were set to be worked up as an income tax rise was rejected by the States. Fast forward to election results day and GST+, the amendment proposed by Deputy Peter Roffey, is still a big talking point. Housing Housing was brought up multiple times in the last has included the suspension of GP11, the planning policy that requires a portion of housing developments to be affordable or social housing. Other issues discussed have been islanders struggling to pay rent and the removal of medium term employment are issues that workers who have relocated to Guernsey hope are addressed by the next worker Emily Piki said: "There's not enough to accommodate everyone, all the people that are coming, because there's no doubt that there's many foreigners coming in from other places but it really is hard to find voter Chloe Presland told the BBC Guernsey Election Roadshow that the next States need to work hard to keep young islanders here, as house prices were giving them no choice but to leave. Education Outside the polling station at Beau Sejour the buzz word was voters felt the future for the island's children would be the making or breaking of the next Andy Wade said education and how the States would pay for for all the decisions were the most important issues. He said: "I just want to see them makes some decisions, they've been talking about it for years and years, meanwhile kids education has been suffering, just do something." Social care Social care has also been constantly raised as a challenge for the next deputy Peter Roffey wants new deputies to think about how best to fund the rapidly increasing amount of social care how much of that cost will fall on the care recipient themselves and how much on the whole community through the Long Term Care Insurance is not just social care that will be a challenge for the next assembly, questions have also been raised by voters about how those who may find themselves without a home will be cared for. The other issues There are more than four main decisions that will need to be made by the next states and the view of voters and outgoing deputies reflects that. Other topics that have been raised include transport, utility costs and Artificial Intelligence (AI).Outgoing deputy Andy Taylor believes AI will be the future for the island. However he said it was important to understand how it would work and how it could be used also raised the issue of what capital projects the states needed to prioritise. He said: "Between grants for vitally needed social housing provision, the hospital modernisation, a new dairy, Alderney Airport and so on there is not going to be enough cash to fund everything which could be deemed to be essential".
