Calls have been made for an urgent probe into how a 250-year lease was agreed on Southend’s historic Kursaal... as the council was looking at possibly taking it over.

Conservative councillors recently called for the council to buy back the Kursaal lease to house the Prittlewell Prince artefacts.

However, it has emerged a Conservative administration only signed off a deal to extend the original 199-year lease in April 2018.

A peppercorn rent, which was also part of the sale of the lease on the Kursaal in 1997, was also scrapped under the new deal.

The lease extension makes it even less likely to get back into council hands.

Yesterday, former council leader Tony Cox said he was unaware of the deal.

He said: “I will be asking questions about when the 250-year lease was agreed.

“I will be raising this as a matter of urgency.”

Former Lib Dem councillor Graham Longley is widely credited with saving the Kursaal when he helped draw up the original deal which saw the building undergo a £15million revamp in return for the 199 year lease and peppercorn rent.

He said: “The Kursaal is one of the most important buildings in the town and we worked extremely hard to save it.

“I think we need an in depth investigation into how this has happened or we could see half of Southend sold off.

“It is important for Southend to retain control of the Kursaal.”

Ron Woodley, deputy leader of the council confirmed the new deal had been made.

Asked if it was a missed opportunity he said: “Everything is possible in hindsight.

“The current administration wasn’t involved.

“This happened under the Conservatives.”

“We would have to find between £6million and £8million and that is beyond the resources of this council at the moment.

“We also don’t know the state of the building so we would have to look at it and see if any repairs were needed so it is well beyond what we can do at the moment.”

The Kursaal went on the market in May 2018, a month after the new deal, for offers in excess of £8million with then existing tenants MFA Bowl and Tesco remaining.

It sold that year for £6million to AEW UK Core Property, an investment fund which also owns Southend’s Odeon cinema.