Many of our supporters have been questioning why the Church wants to close the Vaults & Garden cafe. We asked Will Pouget to explain. Here is his response…

Since the Church went public about their intention to evict the Vaults & Garden cafe from the Old Congregation House, people have been asking me why they want us out without taking the opportunity to explore ways of working together. Honestly, I don't fully understand why. However, I would like to shed some light on the history of a long-running dispute with the Vicar, the Revd William Lamb, which began during the Pandemic when I, the company, and our team were all in unprecedented difficulty.

On the 10th of August 2020, after twenty weeks of lockdown and social distancing, I received a letter from the Vicar claiming that an annual base rent of £60,000 was due to be paid for the year despite months of closure which caused me shock and anxiety. His demand was inexplicable to me due to the fact that there was a Government moratorium on enforcing rent demands during the Pandemic and landlords had been instructed to negotiate rent payment terms that were within the means of the tenant. Our agreement with the Church has always been to pay rent as a percentage of turnover at 7% subject to a base rate plus a service fee of about 2.5% which we had paid in full and up to date despite the Pandemic.

The Vaults & Garden cafe had been completely closed by lockdown, and reopening under social distancing constraints was incredibly difficult and further financially draining. It was a time of unprecedented difficulty for all our staff and particularly our senior management. I also suffered a particularly traumatic period of my life during the pandemic, with my mother going into intensive care following a fall and then a seizure from which she never recovered, and my wife and baby daughter being stranded in Colombia for eight months due to lockdown in that country.

Following the rent demand, I appealed to the Revd Lamb on compassionate grounds to find a positive solution to what I assumed was a misunderstanding. There followed a series of meetings in which I tried to save our working relationship and to offer solutions to the dispute of how much rent to pay during the Pandemic based on an agreement made the year before.

In spite of my efforts, the Vicar was unyielding and suggested that we should increase the percentage rent figure paid to 9% which I said was unacceptable in the circumstances. On October 29th 2020, days before the second lockdown, the Revd Lamb informed me that we were being evicted from our office above the cafe with only one month’s notice adding…

“The office move should take place at the end of November. I should add that if these issues are not resolved to our satisfaction or if confidential information is placed in the public domain without our permission, we will have no choice but to give you three months' notice to end these arrangements (and reserve the right for any other action in relation to those matters). Yours sincerely, Will Lamb”

This was the first of many threats of notice to quit the Old Congregation House. During the November lockdown, we repeatedly requested an extension to our office eviction due to the difficulties caused by the lockdown but these requests were all refused by the Revd Lamb. Our management was then forced to vacate the office under great personal stress during the lockdown. After this, I was given three limited options by the Revd Lamb for our company to continue operating the cafe in the Old Congregation House, all of which represented substantial increases in rent that would threaten the cafe's financial viability at a time of great uncertainty. 

Finally, I was informed on December 24th 2020, Christmas Eve, that I was required to immediately sign and return a legal agreement which took away all our existing legal rights to our occupation of the cafe premises and that if this was not signed we would be evicted in only seven days' time on New Year’s Day, 1st January. It happens that this just preceded the start of the third national lockdown on January 6th, 2021.

It was at about this time that we took legal advice and discovered that the Vicar’s threats of eviction did not reflect the true legal status of the parties and that we had a strong defence case to any attempts to evict us. I have been taught and learnt throughout my life to trust and respect ordained priests but the Revd Lamb’s actions in this case led me to question the morality of his conduct.

Despite all that has happened, I am ready to forgive and reconcile as I am certain that a mutually beneficial solution and agreement can still be found without recourse to the courts and I sincerely wish that we might one day resume the happy and successful relationship that we once enjoyed. 

Will Pouget

We are pleased to report that our petition has now gained more than 8,000 signatures and we thank you all for your support, especially the more than 300 people who have made a financial contribution to our campaign. Please email this update to your friends and colleagues and share on social media, including Facebook, Instagram, Whatsapp and Twitter.

team@savethevaultsandgarden.com