The major £100 million project may now have to be pushed back by a year
Construction work on the ADMC site pictured in September 2025 (Image: Lindum Group)
Work has resumed on a Nottinghamshire project that could create more than 1,000 jobs after contractors were forced off site due to a council breaking its own rules.
The £100 million innovation and technology park was set to be complete by the end of 2026, but the rule-breaking means the project may now end up being pushed back until late 2027.
The Automated Distribution and Manufacturing Centre (ADMC) is part of wider plans for the £100 million Kirkby-in-Ashfield technology park and Ashfield District Council confirmed in late March that work on the project had been suspended.
The issues mainly surrounded work on the project beginning before contracts had been finalised, as well as the fact that the proper approvals were not obtained when costs ballooned by millions of pounds.
A report says there is no evidence that anyone at Ashfield District Council ‘deliberately’ sought to avoid the rules, but £5 million worth of work was carried out which breaches them.
Theresa Hodgkinson, the chief executive of Ashfield District Council, originally said the intention was for contractors to be back on site in early May and the council boss confirmed in an update: “Contractors are now back on site at the ADMC on Low Moor Road as planned.”
An independent review has already been carried out into the rule breaking, which found factors contributing to it included a “number of changes in senior officers over the period of the project”.
The time senior officers had to spend on the project was also ‘diluted’ by the need to focus on preparing for Local Government Reorganisation (LGR) and the overall resources available for the project “were not, in hindsight, adequate”.
The council’s boss says that an additional £500,000 has now been set aside to make sure enough resources are deployed to dealing with LGR, whilst a further improvement plan will be considered by the council’s cabinet in June.
