Lowick Group, the public relations firm for the controversial Plassy Road development in Catford have released details of further plans for the site on the south circular road in London. They have dubbed the site ‘Catford Island’ in their leaflet. They say that the area has been identified by both Lewisham Council and the GLA as appropriate for tall buildings proposing an increase in the height of the tallest building from twenty to twenty three floors to create a ‘memorable’ skyline.
Local residents have been invited to an exhibition and event on Saturday September 24th at the Corbett Community Library Torridon Rd, London SE6 1RQ from 10AM-2PM.
Lewisham Council’s Catford Town Centre Framework states that schemes will need to demonstrate how building height, massing, form and detailed design of proposals has mitigated development impacts. The maximum height in the document is twenty storeys.
Lewisham Homes – Lewisham Council’s Arms Length Management Organisation – faces the axe as consultations were agreed at a Mayor and Cabinet meeting held on Wednesday, 6th July 2022.
At that meeting Councillors made the case for bringing Lewisham Homes back in house as there is a break clause in the Management Agreement between the Council and the ALMO imminently. The ALMO is wholly owned by Lewisham Council and manages 20,000 homes.
Former cabinet member for customer service and current Lewisham Homes Board member, Cllr Susan Wise explained the long history of fragmentation of Lewisham Council’s housing stock. She explained how council homes were transferred to a PFI in Brockley and thousands of council owned homes were transferred to L&Q Housing Trust in Forest Hill, Rushey Green and Sydenham.
Cllr Susan Wise said: “I am one of the very few members and officers in this council that can recall how poor this Council’s housing management was. Because Lewisham [Council] knew its housing management was so poor, in 1998 the Council set up the Lewisham Housing Commission to look at options for the future of housing in our borough. This independent commission presented a number of recommendations….”
This prompted a Freedom of Information request for the release of the Lewisham Housing Commission’s report and appendices. The LHC was chaired by Labour peer, Lord Filkin with professionals and representatives of policy areas outside housing.
Interestingly, in a Guradian article, 9th November 2000, Jean Kysow, chair of the Federation of Lewisham Tenants’ and Residents’ Associations (Feltra) said: “We had to argue and fight before the commission would take evidence from us and from the private tenants. There were no tenants on the panel, except for one from the citizens’ panel. The housing commission has not come up with any new thinking – except that the council should talk with its tenants.”
In a statement, Lewisham Council says: “Following the Grenfell fire tragedy, new regulations will also come into force later this year, which will give landlords extra responsibilities which must be carried out by the Council.”
If the Grenfell fire and best practice in housing management has taught us anything, it is that tenants and leaseholders must have a real voice in decisions that affect them and their homes.
The full report of the Lewisham Housing Commission can be read below:
Lewisham Council’s Director of Planning, Emma Talbot has refused the application for the Bell Green Neighbourhood Area after a statutory consultation on the creation of a local Bell Green planning neighbourhood held between 26th May and 7th July 2022.
— Bell Green Neighbourhood Forum (@BGNF_Lewisham) June 21, 2022
Consultation in the local area
A Neighbourhood Forum is an organisation or group empowered by the local authority to lead the neighbourhood planning process in a neighbourhood area. The Bell Green Neighbourhood Forum submitted its application to Lewisham Council in a document on the 7th April 2022.
The BGNF submitted a map defining the neighbourhood area that they cover. This is an area defined by the forum that they wish to create a neighbourhood development plan for. The process for establishing a local neighbourhood forum are set out in legislation. At the time, the Government said thatthe Localism Act 2011 introduced new powers for people to make neighbourhood plans and neighbourhood planning orders, with reduced interference from central government. These new powers are in addition to existing opportunities for community involvement, which are already part of the planning system.
The members of the Bell Green Neighbourhood Forum have been told that Lewisham Council has rejected their proposals following the statutory consultation and that the Director of Planning has drafted a new reduced forum boundary.
This has shocked and surprised local volunteers and they have asked local residents and organisations to write to Lewisham Council to express concerns. They say that the larger area has been extensively consulted upon for the past few years, and this has been supported widely. They maintain that the Council’s actions are unlawful and referred the matter to the Council’s Monitoring Officer, Jeremy Chambers who has a legal duty to ensure that Lewisham Council obeys the law.
The two Bell Green Neighbourhood planning boundaries are shown
Lewisham Council’s website says: “Neighbourhood planning is a method of planning led by the local community rather than by us or the Government.”
Full text of a letter send by former Bellingham Councillor Alan Hall:
Monitoring Officer Lewisham Council
Dear Jeremy Chambers,
I am writing to request that you intervene following Lewisham Council’s totally unexpected rejection of the Bell Green Neighbourhood Area. I have attached a map of the two areas. The larger area has been extensively consulted upon for the past few years, and this has been supported in the recent formal public consultation, which closed on the 7th July. The second is a counter proposal from Lewisham Council.
Like many other residents, local workers and businesses, I participated in the formal process, and was looking forward to getting involved in the neighbourhood’s future development.
The Bell Green Neighbourhood Forum has been advised by expert opinion at Locality, (the government-funded body that oversees Neighbourhood Planning) that this decision exceeds Lewisham’s legal power, is unlawful and therefore cannot stand. This opinion concurs with my understanding of the current law.
I would welcome your support to help us overturn this decision, giving us the right to develop a Neighbourhood Plan which will guide the redevelopment of Bell Green for a better future.
Like all local authorities, the London Borough of Lewisham accounts must be audited. Parliament has decided that there should be an opportunity for any one interested to inspect and make copies of the accounts and all relevant documents, as stipulated in Section 25 of the Local Audit and Accountability Act 2014.
Lewisham Council’s draft accounts for 2021/22 will be available between 10am and 4pm weekdays from Monday 1st August 2022 to Friday 9th September 2022.
The Council have published an draft online and this is below.
It is only during this period, any local government elector, or their representative, may question the auditor about the accounts, or make an objection to the accounts as set out in sections 26 and 27 of the Local Audit and Accountability Act 2014. Any objection, and the grounds on which it is made, must be sent to the auditor in writing at the address below, with a copy to the London Borough of Lewisham. Any objection must state the grounds on which the objection is being made and particulars of:
i) any item of account which is alleged to be contrary to law
and
ii) any matter in respect of which it is proposed that the auditor could make a public interest report under section 24 of, and paragraph 1 of Schedule 7 to, the Local Audit and Accountability Act 2014.
The audit is being carried out by:
Paul Grady, Director, Grant Thornton UK LLP, 30 Finsbury Square, London, EC2A 1RR
The National Audit Office has published a helpful guide. This explains your rights information and it has further details on how to make formal Objections on page 13.
This is an important democratic right but it is a very short window of opportunity to ask detailed questions on how effective the local council spends public money on capital projects like the regeneration of Catford, Deptford and Lewisham, on council housing revenue accounts and day to day expenditure on everything from emptying the bins, parks, schools and social care.
The latest performance statistics for answering Freedom of Information requests has been released by Lewisham Council. Less than half of the requests were completed on time. The Council received 1,506 FOI requests and completed 701 on time and this equates to 47%.
Lewisham Council hit the headlines when a report by the Campaign for Freedom of Information found that responses to Freedom of Information requests fell to “only 61 per cent of freedom of information requests on time – the second worst rate in London.”
Reports at the time noted that Lewisham has been struggling to meet the limit for several years, with only 73 per cent of requests answered on time in 2016/17.
As a key part of his 2018 election campaign, Lewisham’s Mayor Damien Egan promised to launch a review that will make Lewisham ‘even more democratic, open and transparent’. The review has been completed however not all the recommendations have been implemented.
At the height of the Covid-19 pandemic Lewisham Council clarified that timescales had been extended for replying to complaints and enquiries, however FOI response times remained at 20 days.
Local councils including Lewisham are expected to respond to FOI requests within the statutory timescales and if they do not complaints can be made to the Information Commissioners Office directly. Further details are here.
Following the handing down of a High Court Judgment by Mr Justice Fordham on Monday, 11th June, in the long running, planning application by the City of London Corporation to Lewisham Council concerning a site on Sydenham Hill, London, Mais House, the Friends of Mais House have issued a statement. They say:
“The Friends of Mais House are naturally disappointed in the latest Judgment from the High Court. The Judgment is a complex and lengthy document that required careful consideration.”
“The Friends can now announce that the claimant has taken further legal advice and her lawyers are proceeding to Appeal this decision via the Court of Appeal.”
They go on to say:
“It recently came to our attention that the London Wildlife Trust had serious concerns about the application. These had been expressed not only in pre application correspondence with the Applicant’s agents but also in a formal letter of objection emailed by London Wildlife Trust to Lewisham Council’s Planning Department. Friends of Mais House were not aware of the existence of this correspondence.”
During the course of the second judicial review it was revealed that Lewisham Council admitted that it does not read any emails that have been carbon copied, cc’d, to its planning department’s advertised email address.
The Friends of Mais House call this “a staggering development” and that they will test the lawfulness of this in the Court of Appeal now.
It is the second judicial review into the scheme that will head to the Court of Appeal now. The first was successful where Mrs Justice Lang in R (Kinsey) v London Borough of Lewisham [2021] EWHC 1286 (Admin) quashed the Council’s decision declaring it was unlawful after a conservation officer’s advice was withheld from the planning committee when it approved the redevelopment.
A meeting lasting 2 hours 18 minutes of the strategic planning committee meeting at Lewisham Council subsequently granted permission for a second time on 29th June 2021, by five votes to one. The full papers, many released shortly before the meeting was held can be read here and the webcast is here
Lewisham Council describe the scheme as part of their own Building for Lewisham programme.
Following a hearing at the High Court in London that lasted a whole day on 9th June 2022, Mr Justice Fordham has dismissed a legal challenge against the decision of Lewisham Council to grant planning permission for the development of Mais House, a former sheltered housing block for the elderly on the top of Sydenham Hill, London.
Lewisham Council is quoted as saying that it is pleased with the outcome whilst the local residents are studying the lengthy and complex Judgment. The Judgment appeared on the website of Lewisham Council’s lawyers Saira Kabir Sheikh QC and Charles Merrett on Monday, 11 July, 2022.
It is interesting to note that this is the second judicial review into the scheme. The first was successful where Mrs Justice Lang in R (Kinsey) v London Borough of Lewisham [2021] EWHC 1286 (Admin) quashed the Council’s decision declaring it was unlawful after a conservation officer’s advice was withheld from the planning committee when it approved the redevelopment.
A meeting lasting 2 hours 18 minutes of the strategic planning committee meeting at Lewisham Council subsequently granted permission for a second time on 29th June 2021, by five votes to one. The full papers, many released shortly before the meeting was held can be read here and the webcast is here
During the last High Court hearing it was revealed a letter by email, from the London Wildlife Trust who managed the important ancient woodland at Sydenham Hill was not opened by Lewisham Council.
Susan Ring of Harrison Grant Solicitors and Richard Harwood QC of 39 Essex Chambers and the members of the Friends of Mais House will be issuing a statement shortly.
The lengthy full Judgment of Mr J Fordham in R (Kinsey) vs London Borough of Lewisham No2 can be read below.
Lewisham trade unionists have been on the march. The Trade Union Council, TUC, co-ordinated a march and rally on Saturday, 18th June 2022 where tens of thousands took to the streets of central London to ‘Demand Better’. TUC General Secretary, Frances O’ Grady said that the pressures facing households are getting worse. It now costs more than £100 to fill a family car, with many low-paid workers unable to drive to work. Energy bills are set to rise 23 times faster than wages. And next year, the influential OECD think tank forecasts zero growth for the UK economy
Cheryl McLeod, Lewisham TUC President says: “I am proud that Lewisham residents took to the streets on Saturday to #DemandBetter.
Helen Pearce, Director, Labour Unions has said: “Working people have had enough. That’s why unions are taking action, why we hit the streets last weekend, and it’s why we need a Labour Government. Labour’s New Deal for Working People is a plan to raise wages and put power back in to the hands of working people. Drawn up in partnership with affiliated unions, the New Deal is a comprehensive plan to improve the lives of working people by strengthening individual and collective rights, and by introducing Fair Pay Agreements to drive up pay and conditions for all workers.”
Labour’s New Deal for Working People was launched by Deputy Leader Angela Rayner at Labour Conference 2021 and drawn up in partnership with Labour’s affiliated unions, it is a comprehensive plan to improve the lives of working people by strengthening individual and collective rights.
Labour’s Leader, Keir Starmer has promised that a Labour Government will write this plan into law within 100 days of taking office.
The cost of living crisis hits working people in Lewisham hard
It includes the following commitments:
•Labour will strengthen rights at work for all workers, from day one on the job. •Labour will end fire and rehire. •Labour will make work more family-friendly, and make it easier to balance work with home, community and family life. •Labour will ban zero-hours contracts and ensure everyone has the right to regular hours they can rely on. •Labour will strengthen trade union rights, raising pay and conditions. •Labour will bring in Fair Pay Agreements to drive up pay and conditions for all workers, using sectoral collective bargaining. •Labour says work will be more secure and better-paid, and unions and individuals will have stronger rights to redress the power imbalance in the workplace.
The Labour Party has a proud history of being the party of working people, for working people. It must honour this collective agreement and campaign for these policies. We are at a crossroads and the question on everyone’s lips is ‘Whose side are you on?’
The trade union movement comes together to demand better
“Never again” was the refrain during and after the Second World War. It was through the bloodshed and carnage of war that the idea for an agreement or convention on human rights was formed.
No government would be allowed to dehumanise and abuse people’s rights with impunity, and any that strayed would be held to account.
In May 1948 after the war had ended, the ‘Congress of Europe’ was held in The Hague. Over 750 delegates that included leaders from civil society groups, academia, business and religious groups, trade unions, and leading politicians from across Europe met and the assembly proposed a list of rights to be protected, and also drew a number of articles directly from the United Nations’ Universal Declaration of Human Rights.
“In the centre of our movement stands the idea of a Charter of Human Rights, guarded by freedom and sustained by law.”
The European Court of Human Rights, the international court based in Strasbourg came from this. It consists of a number of judges equal to the number of member States of the Council of Europe that have ratified the Convention for the Protection of Human Rights and Fundamental Freedoms. The Court’s judges sit in their individual capacity and do not represent any State. Once they are appointed the judges are entirely independent of their country of origin and do not represent either applicants or States.
It should be stressed that the UK courts and the ECHR have not had time to deal with detailed challenges brought by asylum seekers facing removal to Rwanda. The detailed examination of their challenges are to be considered in the High Court in July. The only issue has been whether they should stay in the UK in the meantime. The UK courts accepted the Home Secretary’s assurances, however the ECHR has placed more weight on the United Nations’ evidence.
Among those on flight: 1 Iranian man who'll be separated from his son & another with PTSD who has a sister in UK, a Vietnamese man receiving death threats from loan sharks, & a Kurdish Sorani speaker being deported to a country without any interpreters.https://t.co/fwrfu6E9dI
“In the interests of the parties and the proper conduct of the proceedings before it, to indicate to the Government of the United Kingdom, under Rule 39, that the applicant should not be removed until the expiry of a period of three weeks following the delivery of the final domestic decision in the ongoing judicial review proceedings. The parties are therefore required to notify the Court immediately of the delivery of that final domestic decision.”
Is the UK Government playing politics to generate headlines? Is the UK Government expecting the courts to strike down this populist policy so that it can feign anger and dismay? Does the Government really believe that this is an acceptable way to behave? If so, this is a disgrace.
If not, it is worse.
The United Kingdom was the very first nation to ratify the convention in March of 1951.
"The Bar Council and Law Society of England and Wales together call on the Prime Minister to stop attacks on legal professionals who are simply doing their jobs." pic.twitter.com/DgErYdMpMk
Lewisham Council has finally published its Infrastructure Funding Statement for 2020/21. This document outlines what money the local planning authority – Lewisham Council in this case – receive from developers in contributions.
A contribution means any Community Infrastructure Levy (CIL) or money or in-kind for works received from a Section 106 agreement. Section 106 agreements are private agreements made between local authorities and developers and can be attached to a planning permission to make acceptable development which would otherwise be unacceptable in planning terms.
There is a statutory requirement to publish all this information by 31st December each year and this includes:
a) The infrastructure projects or types the authority intends to be funded b) A CIL report c) A section 106 report
The Planning Advisory Service has said that the IFS should include all the new activity in the year as well as all unspent money from previous years. Some councils will therefore have to perform a one-off “stock take” of obligations from lots of old agreements to establish whether they relate to unspent funds that need to be reported.
It will be very interesting to see whether the published document is accurate and contains all the detail recommended by planning experts and the Government. Take a look below:
There have been lively debates on the use of Section 106 monies and the amounts available across the borough. The use of earmarked Section 106 cash for Catford station improvements has been questioned recently, as has how much unspent money remains from all the developments in Deptford?
Question raised on 21st July 2021
The Sydenham Society and Bell Green Neighbourhood Forum often seek the answer to how much money remains in the pot from the Bell Green Retail Park development – this report is supposed to give the answers. Perhaps, it raises more questions?
