A REPORT which concluded Glasgow’s oldest Italian restaurant had ‘excessive damp’ was out of date, it has emerged.
Djamel Benouari, who owns O Sole Mio on Bath Street, hit back at planners trying to demolish his building, after they said the problem was reason to replace it with a hotel.
Mr Benouari was horrified to find his basement listed in the case for demolition submitted to Glasgow City Council by multi-million pound investment fund George Capital, the building’s owners.
George Capital intends to replace O Sole Mio, which claims to be the oldest Italian in Glasgow, and other businesses with a hotel.
However, the inspection report referred to “a survey of the building” which actually took place in September 2014.
It claimed: “The basement within O’Sole Mio is suffering from excessive damp throughout. The space is not currently utilised by the tenant due to dampness/moisture content.”
Mr Benouari said he has never given surveyors access to the basement and does not have a damp problem.
There have been no issues with his basement since a drain flood in late 2014 that was quickly cleared, he said.
He plans to turn the basement into a jazz club or wine bar.
Last night, agents Savills revealed that they would have the building re-surveyed after pressure from Mr Benouari and the next-door pub, The Iron Horse.
The new survey will assess the basement and will be re-submitted to the council for consideration.
Mr Benouari said: “My concern was that the document singled out O Sole Mio for demolishing the building.
“It’s not good for my business or my customers to think that I have that in the basement when it is absolutely not true.”
“They’ve never done a survey of the basement . If a survey was done, I would have had to give them access.”
“The demolition makes business sense, but I object to the false information and accusation.”
A spokesman for Savills said: “The reference to damp in O Sole Mio is from the Purchase Survey report carried out by Colliers for George Capital when they bought the building in 2014. As part of the planning application process, we have instructed Colliers to conduct an update to the survey and the updated survey report will be added to the planning application.”
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