Candys accused of having “extreme disregard” for Qatari interests

Christian and Nick Candy have been accused of having “extreme disregard” for the interests of Qatari Diar Real Estate (QD) over the withdrawal of the planning application for the Chelsea Barracks scheme. During the fourth day of Christian Candy’s cross-examination, Joe Smouha QC, counsel for QD, focused on communications between the Candys and the CPC team in May 2009, just weeks before the application was withdrawn. Smouha read out an e-mail from Christian Candy in which he had said that “when the Emir was in the UK and spoke to the Prince of Wales, the prince pissed in his ear about how awful the scheme was”. Christian’s brother, Nick, replied by e-mail: “This is great news. They will pay us £81m, it is just a game and to them this is not a huge amount of money. They have just wasted £30m and two years on planning. “If it was not for the Prince of Wales they would have got planning. The prince spoke out some five months after we signed the deal with QD!! This is why they have to pay. It is not our problem.” Smouha put it to Candy that the e-mails showed a “complete absence of concern…and an extreme disregard for PBGL [the development company] and QD interests”. Candy responded “No. It shows the facts of the situation.” Smouha then moved on to press coverage at the time of the possible withdrawal. Referring to a Sunday Times article, dated 24 May 2009, in which “a source close to the developer” said the scheme “is now dead in the water and will be withdrawn next month”. Smouha accused Candy of using a public relations “ploy” where “comments are made to papers pretending to be from a source in the opposite camp”. “Is that something that CPC does?” Smouha asked. “No,” Candy replied. Smouha then accused Candy of running CPC “as though it were a private fiefdom where you can make things happen even though you hold no formal position”.  “No,” Candy replied. Smouha is defending QD against CPC’s £81m compensation claim resulting from the decision by QD, in June 2009, to withdraw the parties’ joint planning application for a £3bn Lord Rogers-designed luxury residential redevelopment of the 12.5-acre former Ministry of Defence site in London SW3. CPC claims that QD had said that the plans had been withdrawn and the contract annulled after London mayor Boris Johnson had said that he would use planning powers to veto the proposals. CPC alleges that the proposals were instead unilaterally and wrongfully withdrawn by QD despite its objections after the intervention of Prince Charles, who preferred an alternative design by architect Quinlan Terry. Relying on internal CPC e-mails from Candy, QD has counter-claimed, alleging that CPC had secretly wanted the application to be withdrawn so that it could claim breach of contract and obtain its money immediately. The case continues.