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In Douglas Adam's book, The Hitch-Hiker's guide to the Galaxy, the Prostetnic
Vogon Jeltz of the Galactic Hyperspace Planning Council beams down some startling news to
the people of Earth. A planned the hyperspatial express route through the star means that
the planet will have to be demolished. They have two minutes to live. When they panic, he
tells them: there's no point in acting all surprised about it. All the planning charts and
demolition orders have been on display in your local planning department in Alpha Centuri
for fifty of your Earth years, so you've had plenty of time to lodge any formal complaint
and it's far too late to start making a fuss about it now.'
The Alpha Centauri of Hackney Planning is at 161 City Road, near Old Street. Difficult to
get to by public transport, with few parking spaces (at £4.00 per hour), the
multi-occupied building houses 3 million documents in the Department's offices on the
third floor. Photocopies of plans are expensive. A special request has to be made to have
them displayed on the official website.
Emma and Tim Carew live in Lordship Park. A year ago they were told that a developer in
wanted to build a block of 9 flats in the garden next door. The planning application was
for an 'extension' although it would have doubled the size of the house. The Council
informed the immediate neighbours on either side and those directly across the street.
Hackney's past policy was for much wider consultation with those who could be affected.
This has now been abandoned due to postage costs and staff time.
Emma and Tim consulted other people who live nearby and 30 letters were sent objecting to
the proposals. Eventually there were four planning applications, three of which (but not
the final one) were notified to the immediate neighbours only. Hackney Planning did not,
however, tell any of the other objectors when decisions were going to be made, nor did
they even acknowledge receipt of the objections. Information was only provided after phone
calls were made.
It's surely unfair for residents to have make what the Carews term a 'mammoth effort' with
a group of neighbours who have to stay on the case for month after month, making phone
calls during the working day and trying to access the planning website. Few people are to
make that effort.
In our last issue we reported the success of local residents in stopping Council plans to
seII the Morry Levy Memorial Garden in Yoakley Road, after they discovered (they were not
informed) that the site was up for auction. Councillors said that they had not realised
that ' 2-4 Yoakley Road,' as listed in their documents was, in fact, the address of the
garden.
The Borough Surveyor's Department was privatised about two years ago and its
responsibilities were handed over to Nelson Bakewell, a firm of estate agents. They are
paid a fee for each Council-owned site that they value and help to sell. It's in their
financial interest to recommend the sale of as many properties as possible and they are
being spurred on by Council officers anxious to raise some quick cash. It also raises the
question -apart from the wisdom of selling publicly-owned property -whether these fire
sales of Hackney's assets achieve their full market value. Potential buyers understand
only too well the state of Council finances.
Despite the useful Hackney Today paper, communications between the Council and its
tax-payers are not good and they could get worse. The ruling Labour Group have decided to
reduce the role of the monthly local Neighbourhood Committees. These under-publicised but
important meetings are held in public where Councillors from the relevant wards discuss
planning proposals and, occasionally, other issues.
Planning powers will be transferred to a Central Planning Committee in the municipal
bunker at the Town Hall in Mare Street. One of the unofficial reasons given is that it
will stop possible abuse of the system by some Councillors who allegedly failed to declare
an interest in certain developments. Decisions taken by the Stamford Hill Committee have
been investigated. Surely the response to any malpractice should be to prosecute or debar
those found guilty and to tighten controls, not to abolish a system that has worked
reasonably well with the Stoke Newington Neighbourhood Committee.
Labour Councillor Jessica Crowe genuinely believes that a centralised system will be more
democratic as Councillors currently cannot discuss specific planning issues with their
constituents outside the Neighbourhood Committee -for fear of a conflict of interest- if
they are voting on those matters at the Committee. She does, however, agree that
cost-cutting (as always) is one of the prime motivations of the proposed changes but says
that the money saved should be invested in the planning service to improve local
consultation. The Neighbourhood Committees (which will be renamed 'Forums' or something
similar) will deal with other issues such as parking, traffic management and streetscene
(pavements etc.).
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