Redbridge Council - out of touch with local people

An edited version of the letter I have written below appears in today's Ilford Recorder:

"Recent decisions made by Redbridge Council over the sales of allotments and the Seven Kings car park sale reveal a Council that is out-of-touch with local people and lacking a joined-up vision for the borough.

Unlike other London borough’s our Council’s priorities make no reference at all to involving local people in the borough and the way it is run. Instead, when it comes to making the borough a ‘better place to life together’ their priorities are simply about “developing housing needs” and “improving sporting facilities.” It is a desperately limited vision for the borough that ignores the wider community and cultural engagement and involvement that many other London boroughs value and promote. It should come as no surprise then that this Council has ignored the views of 86% of Seven Kings residents and rejected Lifeline’s car park bid which would have provided much needed community facilities, in addition to homes.

Another Council priority is to make the borough a ‘cleaner, greener place to live’ but again in a limited fashion; only by “improving the street scene and recycling.” Setting themselves such limited goals presumably means that it is okay for them to destroy green spaces by selling allotments and still claim to be making the borough cleaner and greener. Again, that decision has been made in the face of public opinion.

This Council’s past planning decisions have certainly not made Seven Kings High Road a cleaner, greener place to live and simply building 130 new homes without any community facilities to give people living in the area a sense of pride in their locality will not make the area any cleaner, greener or any more safe.

Other London boroughs are working with a broad holistic vision that seeks to engage and involve local people and which joins up priorities to deliver a community infrastructure that supports additional housing; but not Redbridge Council. The national Conservative Party has rediscovered the word ‘community’ and has embraced green issues; but Redbridge Conservative councillors clearly have not. Local people have made it clear that they want community facilities and allotments; but Redbridge’s Cabinet do not.

Does the fact that they are so far out of step nationally, regionally and locally not give them cause for concern or are they proud of their obdurancy? I am told that the reasons for the Seven Kings car park decision are not in the public domain. What is this Cabinet afraid of? Democracy? The opportunity is still there for them to listen to local people on these decisions but do they have the courage or the concern?"

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