North Yorkshire mayoral candidate Keane Duncan criticised for plan to purchase Grand Hotel

The bodies, known as MDCs, exist for the purpose of regeneration, and for attracting inward investment to defined areas but have proved controversial as they are essentially unaccountable, being largely made up of unelected individuals, and depending on the legislation used to set them up, they can be given a range of powers, including compulsory purchase and taking control of publicly-owned assets.

Planning decisions with MDC areas are made by unelected board members, appointed to expedite the planning process.

But the use of MDCs has drawn criticism elsewhere, particularly in Teesside, where Tees Valley’s Conservative mayor Ben Houchen has established three such public bodies to regenerate the former Redcar steelworks site, which was criticised in a government-commissioned review for lacking transparency and appropriate systems to evaluate whether value for money was being achieved after receiving £560m of taxpayers’ money.

Conservative councillor Mr Duncan, inset, who is standing to be the first mayor for the region on Thursday, said yesterday that “Scarborough’s future depends on the outcome” of the vote.

He said he would join with the private sector “to raise the finance required… meaning no big bill for taxpayers”.

Labour in North Yorkshire yesterday criticised plans to buy the Grand and a Labour Party spokesperson said: “Running a campaign based on pledges like buying a hotel with no considered plan of how to fund it is nothing more than a soundbite from a candidate who is treating this mayoral contest like a game of Monopoly.

“The people of North Yorkshire are not interested in white elephants and are telling us on the doorstep across the region that they do not buy his gimmicks.”

They refer to hotel renovation specialists Buildeo, who estimate refurbishment of a five-star hotel to cost an average of £19,000 per room. The party says renovation of the hotel’s 365 rooms alone would cost close to £7m, with a purchase cost adding even more.

Lib Dem candidate Felicity Cunliffe-Lister added: “Keane Duncan clearly has no experience of the hotel world or of raising finance. His first announcement was that he was going to buy The Grand, which was widely condemned. Now he claims to be able to raise private finance from investors who share his ‘positive vision’. In the real world, headlines such as this just aren’t enough. There is no strategy or business plan behind this – he doesn’t understand that investors need to see what the return will be on a project that will cost several hundred million pounds, and without this the mayoral fund will be squandered.”

But Mr Duncan told The Yorkshire Post, that working with the private sector is “absolutely key,” to Scarborough’s future.

“Tinkering around the edges is not going to deliver the progress that we need,” he said. “I want to deliver bold, wide-ranging action. That’s what the MDC represents. It will give us the powers that we need to transform eyesores, it will allow us to lever significant investment, and of course it will allow us to take control of the Grand which is damaging the town’s prospects.”

Mr Duncan’s plan includes taking control of the town hall and spa.

His move comes ahead of a tight race to become the region’s first mayor, with bookmakers making Labour’s David Skaith the narrow favourite to win the election, although a Labour source told The Sunday Times that they think Mr Duncan will clinch victory.