Grenfell, Climate Change and the Woodberry Down Regeneration

[Adrian Richard Essex]

Introduction

I am one of the elected representatives for the Spring Park  Private constituency of Woodberry Down on the Woodberry Down Community Organisation. Thank you very much for voting for me. In order to represent you I need to know your views. Please respond to this, on WhatsApp or in the comments below, or directly to any or all of the other WDCO members using the contacts page.

Within WDCO I am a member of the Executive, which is a sort of guiding light for the main board. A sort of elite.

Summary

A proposal has been put forward by one of the WDCO Executive and submitted to the Executive for further progress.

I am seeking your views on these proposals, so that I can represent them at the WDCO board.

I set out here my reasons for not wanting to support these recommendations as they stand. If it is your view that these proposals should go forward as they stand, or that you have a suggestion for some other course of action than the one I have proposed, please let me know. If you sign up to be a member of this website then you can:

• reply in the comments,
• or send me an email at [e-mail],
• or simply add  your thoughts to one of the many community comment WhatsApp groups
• or fill in this poll.

What I would suggest instead is that WDCO commence a dialogue with the partners to establish to what extent the Grenfell Recommendations and the Climate Change Policy are already in effect in the planning applications and the design standards, and in the local authority crisis planning process.

The proposals and my response in detail

I have been asked to consider the following motion, which so far has only been put to the Executive, and not yet to all WDCO board members.

Suggested additions to the Partnership Agreement

1. The partnership recognises that since the original Partnership Agreement serious flaws in construction, fire safety, governance and community consultation have been highlighted in the general regeneration and construction industries and the overseeing of these at a local level.

These have been highlighted by The Grenfell Inquiry.

While not suggesting that all the mistakes highlighted by this inquiry have been present in the regeneration of Woodberry Down, all partners to pledge to strictly adhere to all recommendation of the Grenfell Inquiry as they are at all relevant to the regeneration. A process for ensuring this should be agreed by all partners as a matter of urgency.

2. The partnership recognises that since the regeneration began there has been an acceleration of the recognition of for the need for a greener, healthier Hackney and the need to reduce emissions and adapt to climate change. Accordingly, we agree to

• a) adopt and abide by the Hackney Climate Action Plan (2023) and,
• b) investigate ways of reducing the carbon footprint of the regeneration.

My view is that this is an excellent proposal in principle, but I can see some practical difficulties.

 

The Partnership Agreement is the document that sets out how the partners in the regeneration interact. The partners are the London Borough of Hackney, Berkeley Homes, Notting Hill Genesis, the Manor House Development Trust and WDCO. 

In principle "lessons must be learnt" should not be an empty phrase and adding these two clauses to the Partnership Agreement would help to apply those lessons at Woodberry Down.

But sitting at the very heart of the regeneration is a cross subsidy agreement, indeed a contract, between Hackney and Berkeley Homes which sets out the financial relationship between these two. 

Part of the agreement is that

At least 41% of the 5,500 new homes being built over the 20-year period are for social rent or shared ownership.

and a further part that Berkeley can make a 20% profit on each phase of the development, with any overage being carried forward to the next phase.

To introduce these two requirements now (the Suggested additions to the Partnership Agreement), as Phase 5 (of 8) is being prepared for submission for Planning Permission, might well have substantial repercussions on the viability on the rest of the regeneration. For WDCO to attempt to impose these requirements without a full understanding of the implications would be unwise.

It is also true that the recommendations go well beyond building regulations, which is the first thing I think of in respect of the cladding used on Grenfell. Local authority preparedness for crises, and the capabilities of the emergency services are also considered.  WDCO has previously limited itself to a much narrower range of concerns, a shortcoming which needs to be addressed, but not with this proposal.

Further, in the case of the Grenfell Report, its contents only have the status of recommendations. These recommendations will be considered by the law makers and perhaps some, or all, or none of them will be passed into law. Building work is already beset with a huge raft of regulation - to ask a builder to voluntarily take on additional constraints is not reasonable.

The extent of the recommendations is quite overwhelming. Themanagement summary alone runs to 14 parts over 24 pages. The recommendations of part 2 of the inquiry is chapter 113 of the overall report and has 89 numbered points. To ask the regeneration partners to accept all this on the basis of 4 sentences in a high level agreement would be unwise.

Further to bundle this up with the implications of Hackney's Climate Change policy complicates the requirements very much further. WDCO already has a role in a working group to examine a District Heat Network, designed to reduce heating costs for the entire estate. The homes currently being built already conform to the building regulations in respect of heating, lighting, fenestration and insulation. WDCO has no right to request these additional, so far only partly defined, constraints on the development.

What I would suggest instead is that WDCO commence a dialogue with the partners to establish to what extent the Grenfell Recommendations and the Climate Change Policy are already in effect in the planning applications and the design standards, and the local authority crisis planning process.

Once this is established, then the gaps between current practice and policy can be identified and addressed.

Please let me know what you think

I set out here my reasons for not wanting to support these recommendations as they stand. If it is your view that these proposals should go forward as they stand, or that you have a suggestion for some other course of action than the one I have proposed, please let me know. If you sign up to be a member of this website then you can:

• reply in the comments,
• or send me an email at [e-mail],
• or simply add  your thoughts to one of the many community comment WhatsApp groups
• or fill in this poll.

What I would suggest instead is that WDCO commence a dialogue with the partners to establish to what extent the Grenfell Recommendations and the Climate Change Policy are already in effect in the planning applications and the design standards, and in the local authority crisis planning process.