Restaurant shuts down in wrangle over lease

Sep 27 2008 by Dave Black, The Journal

A FLAGSHIP country restaurant which strongly promoted locally-produced food has closed down after just 14 months, following a legal dispute between its operators and their landlord.

Comfort@Meldon Park was opened by Tom and Emily Sillar on the Meldon Park Estate, near Morpeth, Northumberland in July last year.

Now legal proceedings launched following a dispute over the lease – coupled with a recent downturn in trade caused by severe flooding in the area – has led to the couple deciding to pull out.

They are now concentrating on running their Comfort Food Co restaurant in Pudding Chare, Newcastle after closing the doors of the Northumberland venture in the last two weeks.

Mr and Mrs Sillar were tenants of businessman James Cookson, who owns the Meldon Park Estate. They believed they had signed a lease on the restaurant premises in June last year but were later told by Mr Cookson that the lease was incomplete. A series of meetings failed to find a solution, and in March Mr Cookson began legal proceedings to evict them from the restaurant. At first the couple fought the move but they have now decided to pull the plug and shut down.

Yesterday Mr Sillar said: “The slowdown in the economy and the recent flooding in Morpeth meant we lost a couple of weeks’ trade completely. Combined with the stress of the legal proceedings, that was the final straw and we decided to shut the restaurant.

“We faced being evicted from the premises on the grounds that we didn’t have a lease, and now we have reached an agreement whereby we have parted company with Mr Cookson. We have lost all of the investment in time and money which we have put into the restaurant.

“It is a huge disappointment and very sad in terms of what all of us were trying to achieve here.”

Last night Mr Cookson, who has decided to shut his Meldon Park Kitchen Garden Shop because of a lack of trade, confirmed there had been unsuccessful negotiations over the Sillars’ lease. He plans to reopen the restaurant early next year.

“All parties are very disappointed because we all put a lot of effort into this, and it is desperately sad that it has ended up this way. It is a bit like a messy divorce and I wish the Sillars very well with whatever they do next. In the meantime, the restaurant unit will be available to hire as a venue for functions... and we will continue to sell produce from the garden.”