Radical plans to change the way Bradford city centre is run have taken a step towards becoming reality.

Bradford Council is considering proposals to set up a private company which would tackle issues such as litter, maintenance and combating crime.

Officials from Coventry, which has been a pioneer in the field, visited Bradford to give a presentation on how their city centre is run by a private company.

Bradford Councillor Dave Green (Lab, Odsal), Executive member for regeneration, said: "It was a very positive meeting. It was constructive and there were about 100 people there from all different sectors - the Council, private sector and other public sector organisations."

Three representatives of the Coventry City Centre Company, which is now in its third year, were at the Business and Innovation Centre in Bradford for the presentation.

"There was a great deal of interest in what's happening in Coventry," said Coun Green.

"There's some concern about how the current structures and development of the city would be affected if we went down this road.

"But this was something that we can build on. Just because it works in Coventry, it doesn't mean to say that exactly the same model would be right for Bradford.

"If we're going to go down that road we need to adapt it to Bradford's situation."

The proposals will be discussed by the Council's Scrutiny Committee on Tuesday and is likely to be then referred to the Executive by the end of April.

Coun Green said that one of the problems in Coventry had been that the new company had not been given a long enough lead-in time.

He expected that any similar company established in Bradford would be given 12 months to set itself up properly.

Martin van Zeller, the Council's regeneration policy co-ordinator, said Coventry had been chosen because it had many similarities to Bradford.

"We picked Coventry because it's a similar size, they're overshadowed by more prosperous neighbours and have suffered from similar difficulties," he said.

Mr van Zeller said the visitors from the West Midlands had not done a 'PR job' on what it was like for a city centre to be run by a private company but had given a "warts and all" version of how things had gone.

He was delighted that so many people had attended the event.

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