Interview with Bill Clewett
Bill Clewett was a Milton Keynes resident; he looked out for the first jobs in the new town. He was recruited in 1970 by Kenneth Wren, the first finance director and came to do financial appraisals, to turn the Masterplan ‘into financial speak’: the cost of building Milton Keynes between 1970 and 2000 to a population of 250,000: ‘a moving feast’ with a lot of assumptions. He says: ‘the biggest unknown factor turned out to be the rate of inflation’ and increase in interest rates to 15%.
In 1970, Bill was drafted onto the CMK Sub-committee of Executive Management Committee (EMC) and began appraisal of the city centre based on the Masterplan. The Board agreed to their recommendation of a two grid square (low-rise) centre extended into the City Park and ‘it became known as the ‘development with nothing higher than the highest tree’. The next step was a ‘6/1’ planning document for the Government, which was again approved. Bill comments that the Government reacted favourably to many CMK concepts; this was greatly aided by the commitment of organisations such as Lloyds Bank, Post Office Pension Fund and John Lewis to the projects. Bill discusses why he thinks the team succeeded in persuading the Board to accept their proposal. For example, John Lewis paid for their own land, store and car park; however he says: ‘we weren’t able to attract a lot of the small traders …a few initially, but once it was up and running, market forces took over’.
Once building started, Bill monitored project costs with quantity surveyors, and Doug Burcham joined him; Doug eventually took over from Bill in CMK when he left to market MK. Bill rejoined the team for the CBX project. He comments: ‘I think the most exciting thing was actually getting the (funding for the) Shopping Building off the ground … and getting a contract, with John Laing’. Commenting on CMK and MK overall, he says: ‘Well, I think it’s worked very well’ but he is concerned about closing off roads. He says: ‘…each job you do is a challenge. … of the jobs I’ve done which one can I actually go back to and look at something concrete?.. Then, obviously, Central Milton Keynes or Milton Keynes … I live here, you see, and I’ve always lived here’.
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