COUNCIL bosses in Kirklees are “trying to rewrite history” after backtracking on an “explicit promise” to house the first National Rugby League Museum within Huddersfield’s iconic George Hotel.

That’s the charge levelled by leading sports academic Professor Tony Collins, who chaired the independent panel that selected Kirklees to host the museum 18 months ago, after plans for a proposed museum in Bradford City Hall fell through.

He has also suggested that the panel was “misled” by the thrust of the council’s bid in which the George Hotel was described as “the linchpin”.

Senior councillor Peter McBride has stated that there was “was no intent whatsoever of misleading anyone” and that creating a hybrid museum/hotel within the George – the birthplace of rugby league in 1895 – was “incompatible”.

And Council Leader Shabir Pandor has said Cabinet committed to buy the building to preserve it and to bring it back into use as a hotel.

He said the bid to secure the museum was “an intention of intent” but that the authority changed direction when it was revealed that delivering the project could cost £20m as well as year-on-year interest and debt charges.

Professor Collins’ attack comes just days after the chairman and chief executive of charity Rugby League Cares (RLC), which entered into a partnership with the council over the museum project, said they were “exploring all options”.

That could mean quitting Huddersfield altogether and reopening the bidding process to include other towns and cities that previously were approached or showed an interest including Leeds, Hull, Bradford, Salford, St Helen’s and Wigan.

After the Bradford plans collapsed, the Kirklees bid was selected on the basis of the George, with Wigan coming very closely in second place.

Professor Collins said: “The council unequivocally told the panel – verbally and in writing – that the museum would be in the George Hotel.

“Clr Pandor himself wrote to the panel that he was ‘delighted’ to ‘submit a proposal to create a National Museum for Rugby League here in Huddersfield in the very building the sport was born’.  “The panel was told unambiguously by the council’s bid team [that] their intention was ‘to have the museum in the hotel by 2023 to coincide with the delivery of our nearby new market project and completion of work for the Heritage Action Zone’.  “I can say categorically that Kirklees’ explicit promise to locate the museum in the iconic George Hotel was one of the most important factors in the panel’s decision.  “Sadly, the council is now trying to rewrite history. I can only conclude that its original bid for the museum was light-minded and unprofessional, or that it misled myself and the other members of the independent judging panel.  “The council’s refusal to deliver on its promises to the panel will do serious long-term reputational damage to the region, as well as casting doubt on its ability to preserve the wonderful heritage of the people of Kirklees.”