Kingsbarn Equestrian Centre to close by end of May
Kingsbarn Equestrian Centre near Glasgow will close by the end of the month, staff learned today (Friday15 May).
The riding school, livery and competition centre has been in administration since February, but it was hoped a buyer would be found.
Now H&H has learned administrators Tenon Recovery are set to wind up the business and sell all the assets, including 38 horses and ponies, over the next two weeks.
“I feel completely raw,” said centre manager Debbie McCormack. She said 14 members of staff would lose their jobs.
Kingsbarn cost entrepreneur Stuart Aitken £10million to build and opened in 2007. But it has been dogged with problems.
In May 2008 there was a strangles outbreak at the centre.
And former manager Ernest Dillon won a claim of unfair dismissal earlier this year (news, 23 April) after he was sacked in spring 2008.
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Muriel Colquhoun, chief executive of the Scottish Equestrian Association commented: “It’s very sad that we have lost a riding centre but there are other venues across Scotland and we hope that they will pick up business as a result.”
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A self-confessed newshound, farmer’s daughter and journalist of many years' experience, Charlotte worked on regional papers before joining H&H in 2007. A regular rider, she visited Ireland in 2010 to investigate the fate of Irish horses through the recession, to much acclaim, and reported from the FEI General Assembly in Rio de Janeiro in 2011. She left Horse & Hound in March 2013.