‘We got it wrong’ – Council reveals concerns were raised before Christmas Market opened

The decision to give the go-ahead to Nottingham’s ill-fated Christmas Market this year was taken despite warnings given that the risk of Covid-19 transmission could be increased at the event.

Reports by the BBC suggest that concerns surrounding crowding at the Market were raised by the Nottingham multi-agency Nottingham Events Safety Advisory Group (SAGe) two days before it opened on Saturday 5 December, but the decision was made to go ahead after SAGe failed to advise that it shouldn’t take place, despite recommending that “the risk of Covid transmission cannot be eliminated entirely and may be unnecessarily increased”.

The BBC report adds that Public Health officials said the Market would comply with Covid guidance, but that this would be “entirely dependent upon the responsible behaviour of public visitors to Old Market Square”.

It appears that the Market, organised by Nottingham City Council and the Mellors Group, was delayed by two days from December 3 to give the council time to monitor footfall.

However, the council said it “misjudged” just how many people would be in the city centre of Saturday 5 December.

Nottingham City Council’s leader, councillor David Mellen, told the BBC: “Mellors Group and the City Council discussed initial proposals for a potential Christmas Market months ago and, in the usual way, these plans were considered by SAGe within the context of the current pandemic.”

It emerged that during this planning process concerns were aired by the council’s Public Health and Environmental Health teams.

Mellen added: “The advice from SAGe was that additional arrangements would need to be in place for the Market to go ahead safely. Mellors agreed to address these concerns, some of which related to the potential for large crowds and how this would be managed. The council’s senior officers and councillors gave the go-ahead on this basis and Mellors took the decision to proceed.

“It is absolutely clear that this event could not handle the sheer volume of people who came into Nottingham city centre on Saturday. This should have been anticipated and we got it wrong.

“It quickly became evident as more visitors arrived into the early evening that the market was becoming too busy. Our intention had always been to try and provide a festive event for Nottingham people and to support local traders, however the overriding factor is always people’s safety.

“We knew that after a month of national lockdown people would be keen to come into Nottingham in large numbers – we misjudged how many and we’re really sorry. We closed the market and will be reviewing our procedures to make sure this doesn’t happen again.”

Mellors Group is yet to respond to our requests for a statement on the events of last weekend.