Bristol Zoo auctions off Victorian benches despite legal threats

Bristol Zoo bosses have ignored a second lawyers’ letter threatening legal action and gone ahead with another auction of items from the Clifton Zoo Gardens site - this time all the Victorian benches created especially for the zoo up to 150 years ago.

A total of 45 cast-iron benches were placed around the Bristol Zoo site in the 1880s, and have been there ever since. Today (Monday, November 25), they were auctioned off in 45 different lots in a timed auction, with bidders trying to get the highest price before the end at 8pm.

It is the third auction of items from the Bristol Zoo site, which closed more than two years ago. Ten days ago, a gala dinner was held as a fundraiser for the expansion of the Bristol Zoo Project site on the edge of the city. And last Friday, an online auction of 300 items - from sculptures and signs to door handles and crockery - netted an astonishing £160,000 as bidders from across the world snapped up the zoo-related memorabilia.

The third and final auction went ahead on Monday despite a group of shareholders writing to the Zoological Society bosses warning that the sale - especially of items that they regard as integral to the setting of the Zoo Gardens - is premature, given the future of the zoo site is still the subject of a legal challenge.

That challenge is the judicial review being brought against Bristol City Council by the Save Bristol Gardens Alliance group, which is challenging in the courts the awarding of planning permission to the zoo to redevelop the Clifton Zoo site and build almost 200 new homes there. The Save Bristol Gardens Alliance group is a separate campaign group to the group of shareholders led by Tom Jones. The judicial review is expected to take place in the New Year.

The letter - the second one sent by the group of shareholders led by Save Bristol Zoo founder Tom Jones - warned the zoo society that the bosses could be financially liable if a future court rules that the zoo should not have sold off all its zoo memorabilia.

“We continue to consider the issues and potential claims that the sales give rise to as against both the charity and the trustees,” the letter said. “Any sales which are found to be in breach of the trustees’ statutory and/or fiduciary duties have the potential to give rise to claims against the trustees personally. We therefore request that the auctions are put on hold whilst we, and your client, take stock of the position,” it added.

Bristol Zoological Society have dismissed the legal letters, and condemned the ‘small well-funded group of campaigners’ for challenging the sales.

Save Bristol Zoo Gardens founder and Bristol Zoo shareholder Tom Jones, said on behalf of the group of shareholders: “We were disappointed but not surprised that trustees chose to ignore our concerns and go ahead with the gala dinner, where several irreplaceable items from Bristol Zoo Gardens were sold to the highest bidder at an exclusive private event. Consequently, our lawyers have once again written to the board to very reasonably ask that all future auctions of irreplaceable Bristol Zoo assets are postponed, until the outcome of multiple legal challenges, including the forthcoming Judicial Review, are known.

“However, to cover all bases, if the auctions can’t be stopped in time, we strongly urge the public to bid on these items with a view to one day donating them back to Bristol Zoo Gardens, once a better future has been secured for the site,” he added.

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Speaking before Friday’s auction, a spokesperson for Bristol Zoological Society said they would continue with the auctions, which she said were raising vital thousands of the zoo’s work to expand the Bristol Zoo Project site at Easter Compton, near Cribbs Causeway.

“The ongoing efforts of a small group of Clifton residents to stop a conservation and education charity from progressing with its future plans, are not only wasting vital funds, but they are preventing us from saving wildlife and building a new conservation zoo, which will provide bigger habitats and higher standards of animal welfare," she said.

“Instead of investing vital charitable funds where they are needed, in saving and protecting the world’s most threatened species, we find ourselves once again being forced to spend thousands of pounds in legal fees, defending further claims. This is extremely frustrating for all our staff and volunteers, who work so hard. We want a zoo which is financially resilient, can meet the needs of animals over the long-term and prioritises conservation. Our decision to close Bristol Zoo Gardens and focus our efforts on Bristol Zoo Project was based on a thorough analysis and a desire to create a new type of conservation zoo.

“We do not believe the current 12-acre site in Clifton is fit for purpose as a modern, conservation zoo. We won’t give in to pressure from a small well-funded group of campaigners - who are not zoo experts and don’t understand animal welfare," she added.

That sparked fury from campaigners. “Stating that opposition to Bristol Zoological Society’s plans to turn the world’s 5th oldest Zoo into luxury housing is only from ‘a small number of Clifton residents’ is highly disrespectful to the 12,000 people who have signed the petition calling for Bristol Zoo Gardens not to be sold off for luxury housing and also to the half a million visitors from all over Bristol and beyond who used to visit Bristol Zoo Gardens every year but who are no longer choosing to visit Bristol Zoo Project, formerly Wild Place Project, in South Gloucestershire,” said Mr Jones.

“The people currently running Bristol Zoological Society appear to see the world in very black and white terms of winners and losers. If you oppose plans to sell Bristol Zoo then apparently, you automatically oppose the Zoo’s conservation work as well. However, life isn’t a zero-sum game and Bristol Zoological Society needs to start taking responsibility for the consequences of its actions, rather than blaming others when it is challenged,” he added.

“Between 2019-2022, Bristol Zoological Society spent £3.252 million on governance and £1 million renovating an office building which was already an office building, so to now claim that issuing a couple of letters from solicitors is diverting valuable resources away from ‘vital charitable funds and saving threatened species’, is to put it mildly, a little bit rich. Once again, look beyond the spin and it’s another public statement from the Society which doesn’t stand up to serious scrutiny,” he added.

“By choosing to auction off hundreds of historic, irreplaceable artefacts, the people currently in charge of Bristol Zoological Society are intentionally vandalising something over which they are only custodians,” he said.