North Somerset council leader hits back about the restoration of Birnbeck Pier
It's following doubts on social media.
Last updated 13th Jun 2025
The leader of North Somerset Council has hit out at people “trying to stir doubt and confusion” about the restoration of Birnbeck Pier.
The council and the RNLI are working on a major restoration of the derelict Victorian pier. The once popular tourist attraction has stood crumbling since the 1990s, but the plans will see it restored and a new lifeboat station built on the island.
In a post on Facebook, council leader Mike Bell (Weston-super-Mare Central, Liberal Democrat) said: “This is a once-in-a-generation opportunity to save a vital part of our heritage, bring the RNLI back to its historic home, and turn a crumbling structure into something we can all be proud of.” He added: “I know there are those now trying to stir doubt and confusion. That’s politics. But what matters is facts and outcomes – not social media noise.”
Although he did not reference them directly, his post on June 6 came a week after the Weston-super-Mare branch of Reform UK shared a post on Facebook accusing North Somerset of wasting taxes on the project. The right wing political party had submitted a freedom of information request for how the council was spending the funding it had received from the government’s Levelling Up Fund on the project.
The Reform UK post highlighted the spending of £14,100 on food and beverage advice, £5,700 on a noise assessment, £165,923 on an outsourced project manager, and £4,015 on signage which it claimed was “nowhere to be seen.” It listed the costs under a heading of: “North Somerset Council wastes your taxes.”
The post by the party said: “Despite having a council-employed project manager, significant public money is being spent on external project management. That’s duplicated costs, with little justification — raising serious questions about oversight and value for money.”
But Mr Bell said: “This is a complex, nationally significant restoration. It involves coastal engineering, heritage protection, legal ownership issues, environmental concerns — and yes, rigorous financial oversight. That’s why we’ve brought in the right expertise to do the job properly.”
While the project is not funded by council tax, just over £5m of government funding from the Levelling Up Fund has been allocated for the project. The rest of the £25m funding for the project has come from a variety of backers including the National Lottery Heritage Fund, RNLI, and National Heritage Memorial Fund.
Mr Bell insisted: “Every pound spent is accounted for. The funding from government is ring-fenced, closely monitored, and subject to detailed reporting requirements. We are working with funders, the RNLI, and technical specialists to deliver a credible, long-term plan – not a rushed fix that fails.”
He said: “We won’t let this project be derailed by short-term point scoring. It’s too important.”
The Victorian pier was designed by Eugenius Birch and is the only pier in the country to connect to an island. The RNLI gave North Somerset Council the £400k to finally buy back the pier off its previous owners in 2023 after a long running battle.
The charity is turning the ruined pavilion at the heart of the island into a new lifeboat station. Weston-super-Mare is the RNLI’s busiest lifeboat station on the English side of the Bristol Channel but since 2014, when it became too unsafe to use the pier, it has been based out of temporary storage containers next to the Marine Lake. The new station will allow lifeboats to be launched from the island again at all tides.