Fremantle Markets stall holders association

Fremantle Stallholders Association address to Fremantle Council March 25th 2009
(Colin Wright)

1 year ago many of us met here to listen to your decision on the Market Lease. We heard all the promises, had been given all the guarantees and that evening you were told by the Murdoch’s that: quote

“We don't want to lose any stallholders, we want all the stallholders we have to come along. We have 200 stallholders who are all fantastic people who we want to continue. We don't want to preclude any stallholders from anything.”

They also made a commitment in their pre-meeting presentation to council to continue to provide a:
a secure low cost trading environment despite capital expenditures and trading initiatives.
They also said “We subsidise rents to retain a low cost trading environment”.

Fast forward 12 months and I’d like to introduce to you my friends in the gallery …the sitting duck tenants.
….. Retail tenants at the end of their lease period.

We all want new 5 year agreements and the security of tenure we were promised but not with their conditions or ridiculously high rents attached. We have been left at the negotiating table with landlords who aren’t prepared to negotiate. They hold all the cards…They’re in a superior bargaining position and they are taking advantage of that.

They used stallholders to get support for their 18 year lease and now they turned their back on us.

Their idea of negotiation is……………. “ take it or leave it”
In some cases they take half your shop, that’s half you business.. with no compensation….. Or they relocate you into a shop considerably smaller than your current shop, charge higher rent and try to convince you it’s a good thing.

Can anybody please tell stallholders what ever happened to the Murdoch commitment of a “low cost environment” or how the Council intended to hold them to it.
Their rent goes up 12%. Ours goes up 50 – 100%.

Small businesses like ours have less capacity to pay high occupancy costs and our risk of failure is considerably greater….

Jamie told the Herald last week “we were happy to pay the higher rents”……just look around at all the smiling faces!

We are now asking you “ what can we do about this”.

If we followed Council’s previous advice … all we had to do, was to head off to the SAT and challenge it …incorrect… false information given to stallholders and councilors.
We have no negotiating powers through SAT at the commencement of a lease.

We are totally at the mercy of the landlord….and even though both you Peter and Glen guaranteed all stallholders would get an agreement you cannot follow through on this…they know it and you know it…..

We saw it coming!!!! The Association told you in our Business Plan submission. We made a recommendation for a “Transition Period” between leases to avoid this.

You had 2 1/2 years still to run on the old lease but you surrendered it early. During this time it would have been a good opportunity.…to fine tune the Working Group, plan for change, enact your conservation plan and prepare stallholders for the future. Now we have planning through stealth or forced attrition.

Our businesses are under threat and people will leave…

They are leaving…Bob, Mary, Steve, Alison, Subhi and Annupo, Chris, Nathan, Kung and Sue….and there will be more.

It’s up to the council now to have the will and desire to do something about it.

Or,………… we could take John Murdoch’s advice….
“You’ve had it too good for too long…if you don’t like it get out”

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