KKG – Document 77           KKG – Document 78

Dear Neighbour

Attached (Document 78) is an exchange of correspondence amongst a Sunbury resident, our local MP, and the Chief Executive of Surrey County Council. The exchange concerns almost 70 CCTV cameras which suddenly sprang up between Halliford and Hampton Court Bridge at the end of September. And then, just as suddenly, disappeared again.

Our neighbour wrote to Mr Kwarteng, trying to find out who had put up all these cameras. Are these cameras, he asked, connected with the development of Kempton Park, the London Irish development, gravel extraction or the Halliford Incinerator fiasco?

Mr Kwarteng wrote to the Chief Executive of Surrey County Council, who replied saying they had been put up on behalf of Surrey County Council as part of a traffic survey, suggesting its purposes might be along the lines of the ‘Spelthorne Freight Review’. His reply was dated 21 October.

Look at Document 77, however. These are replies received on 4 and 6 October from, respectively, Nick Kilby of Cratus Communications (PR consultants to The Jockey Club regarding Kempton Park) and a representative from Surrey County Council Highways. Both confirm that the CCTV cameras, and the ATC cables, and all the other survey work, was being done on behalf of The Jockey Club. (Mr Kilby later telephonically corrected his comment about the road markings – those, too, were part of The Jockey Club’s survey work.)

So, the purpose of the CCTV cameras was for something along the lines of the ‘Spelthorne Freight Review’? Why say something which is so patently misleading?

If we were Mr Kwarteng, we’d be more than a little peeved to have been put in this position by the Surrey Chief Executive. Not to mention our neighbour who asked the question in the first place.

Recently released FOI documents confirm that a planning application is expected to be made by The Jockey Club after the general election in May 2015. We will need funds to fight it.

Donations to the Keep Kempton Green Fighting Fund can now be made through PayPal. Just go to http://www.losra.org, scroll down a little, and click on the button marked “Donate to the Keep Kempton Green Fund”. You can also donate by cheque. Please make your cheque payable to LOSRA and send it to:

20 Green Street, Sunbury, TW16 6RN

As you would expect, the identity of all donors will be kept confidential.

Remember: Keep Kempton Green began as a campaign to protect Green Belt at Kempton Park. That campaign has now been forced to expand to protect Green Belt throughout Spelthorne, which is all at risk in a forthcoming review of our Local Plan. This threat is against the whole Borough.

Visit us at http://www.keepkemptongreen.com, Like our Facebook page, and Follow us on Twitter (links to both on the website). Leave your comments at all three.

Kind regards, and thank you very much in advance for your generosity.

Keep Kempton Green

KKG – Document 69b      KKG – Document 74

Dear Neighbour

Missing since May this year! A published article mentioning that Redrow Homes had been granted the right of first refusal over 70 acres of land at Kempton Park. If found, please return to the Leader of Spelthorne Council.

This all goes back to the ongoing saga of the Spelthorne Overview & Scrutiny Committee, at whose 8 July meeting the Deputy CEO of A2 Dominion let the Kempton Park cat out of the bag, when he expressed his surprise that the Committee appeared not to know anything about the plans to build 1500 homes plus commercial units at Kempton Park.

To cut a long story short, Cllr Evans, a Cabinet member present at the meeting, demanded answers from the Leader and Chief Executive of Spelthorne Council. Initially, an email from the Head of Planning was all that materialised. KKG asked the Chair of the Committee why the statement had not come from the Leader and CEO, and why the minutes did not reflect that this (at times very heated) exchange between the Committee and A2D had even taken place. You can read the trail of correspondence in Document 69b, attached.

The Chair said she would correct both issues. In due course, on 7 October, Spelthorne published a joint statement from the Leader and the Chief Executive. (See Document 74 attached.) Amended minutes were published on 10 October.

Leaving aside the fact that the statement failed to answer the central question of what and when the Council knew about the plans for the massive housing development at Kempton Park, what did interest us was the first paragraph:

“The Council first became aware that the Jockey Club had agreed to work with Redrow Homes in relation to future development aspirations they have for the Kempton Park site, when the Leader, Councillor Robert Watts, read it in a weekly publication of the Institute of Civil Engineers, in or around May this year.”

In the correspondence in Document 69b, you will see that the release of the statement was delayed slightly in order to ensure that the date that that article was published was correct.

That might be interesting to read, we thought, as we had not come across it before. So we searched for it in the online edition of New Civil Engineer, which is the weekly publication of the Institution of Civil Engineers. We found nothing. So we phoned the Institution.

They couldn’t find it either. So we wrote back to the O&S Committee. They replied that it could possibly have been published in some other building trade journal, but that the Leader was adamant that he had found out about Redrow’s arrangement with The Jockey Club from something that was in the public domain.

We checked the Building Journal, and Construction News. Then we searched The Planner, the Architects Journal, and the Housebuilder. Nothing in any of those either. Where could the Leader have read it?

If you have any idea where such an article could have been published around May this year, please let the Leader know. He really would like to know.

Recently released FOI documents confirm that a planning application is expected to be made by The Jockey Club after the general election in May 2015. We will need funds to fight it.

Donations to the Keep Kempton Green Fighting Fund can now be made through PayPal. Just go to http://www.losra.org, scroll down a little, and click on the button marked “Donate to the Keep Kempton Green Fund”. You can also donate by cheque. Please make your cheque payable to LOSRA and send it to:

20 Green Street, Sunbury, TW16 6RN

As you would expect, the identity of all donors will be kept confidential.

Remember: Keep Kempton Green began as a campaign to protect Green Belt at Kempton Park. That campaign has now been forced to expand to protect Green Belt throughout Spelthorne, which is all at risk in a forthcoming review of our Local Plan. This threat is against the whole Borough.

Visit us at http://www.keepkemptongreen.com, Like our Facebook page, and Follow us on Twitter (links to both on the website).

Leave your comments at all three.

Kind regards, and thank you very much in advance for your generosity.

Keep Kempton Green

KKG – Document 76

Dear Neighbour

A furious row has broken out in Richmond over markings left on the roads and pavements of the Hampton Triangle by contractors working – ultimately, through a somewhat tangled web – for The Jockey Club. In an exchange of emails which KKG has seen, a Richmond Council officer and councillor have expressed their outrage at the multi-coloured defacements. (See Document 76 attached.)

The marks were part of a cable and utilities survey done at the behest of Redrow Homes, according to the staff of Select Surveys, who spray-painted them on 3 October. Select Surveys were working for TriConnex, who were in turn working for Aspire (The Jockey Club’s lead consultant on the 1500-homes-plus-commercial-units development proposed for Kempton Park). Redrow Homes were recently granted the right of first refusal over 70 acres of land on The Kempton Park estate. Mouchel, who were conducting a traffic count on the same day, are The Jockey Club’s transport consultants for the same development.

It appears that the work was conducted without the consent of Richmond Council, and the Council consider that an offence has been committed “in direct contravention of Section 132 of the Highways Act 1980” and have threatened legal proceedings (although it has to be said that the penalty for first offenders is only £100). The email exchange continued.  Cllr Gareth Roberts, a representative for Hampton Ward, said: “It is an absolute disgrace that your company can simply come into our streets and graffiti the length and breadth of the pavements and carriageways without first seeking any permission from the local authority or offering any form of explanation.”

Despite being asked several times, TriConnex have been reluctant to explain the purpose of the survey work. “Everyone I have spoken with has been vague to the point of evasiveness,” said the Council officer. Despite the reticence of TriConnex and Aspire, however, the PR consultant to The Jockey Club confirmed today that the work was connected with the Kempton Park proposal. There are similar markings on the road and pavement at the racecourse, and also near the roundabout at Hampton Court Bridge, including on the cobblestones at the entrance to the Palace itself. TriConnex have agreed to remove the paint from the Hampton Triangle. It remains to be seen whether they will do the same at Kempton Park and Hampton Court.

Recently released FOI documents confirm that a planning application is expected to be made by The Jockey Club after the general election in May 2015. We will need funds to fight it. Donations to the Keep Kempton Green Fighting Fund can now be made through PayPal. Just go to http://www.losra.org, scroll down a little, and click on the button marked “Donate to the Keep Kempton Green Fund”. You can also donate by cheque. Please make your cheque payable to LOSRA and send it to:

20 Green Street, Sunbury, TW16 6RN

As you would expect, the identity of all donors will be kept confidential.

Remember: Keep Kempton Green began as a campaign to protect Green Belt at Kempton Park. That campaign has now been forced to expand to protect Green Belt throughout Spelthorne, which is all at risk in a forthcoming review of our Local Plan. This threat is against the whole Borough.

Visit us at http://www.keepkemptongreen.com, Like our Facebook page, and Follow us on Twitter (links to both on the website). Leave your comments at all three.

Kind regards, and thank you very much in advance for your generosity.

Keep Kempton Green

 KKG – Document 73

Dear Neighbour

The regular quarterly meeting of the Planning Department with the various Spelthorne Residents’ Associations was held last Monday evening. At the request of the Associations, the main item for discussion was the review of our Local Plan, which we first became aware of when we were given numerous copies of  the documents discussed by the Local Plan Working Party on 3 September.

John Brooks, Head of Planning, sought to quieten the deep unease which a number of Associations have about this review. There was a full and frank exchange of views on the subject. He did not succeed.

Ultimately it comes down to whether the Council is prepared to comply with the obligation it has to work with residents – right from the beginning of the process. There are a number of pieces of legislation which set out this obligation of transparency. But it is best summed up by the Practical Planning Guidance published by central government – guidance intended to explain the practical implementation of the National Planning Policy Framework, in particular paragraph 007, shown in full in Document 73 attached. The relevant section is shown below (our highlighting):

Guidance
Housing and economic development needs assessments
The approach to assessing need
Paragraph: 007 Reference ID: 2a-007-20140306

With whom do local planning authorities need to work?

…

Local communities, partner organisations, Local Enterprise Partnerships, businesses and business representative organisations, house builders, parish and town councils, designated neighbourhood forums preparing neighbourhood plans and housing associations should be involved from the earliest stages of plan preparation, which includes the preparation of the evidence base in relation to development needs.

Two points need to be made:

Firstly, the phrase “work with” means, specifically , a more collaborative process than the standard consultation exercise where the public is presented with a finished document, and some tinkering around the edges may be allowed. It means, specifically, that the public has a right to have a more direct input into actually compiling that document.

Secondly, the papers discussed by the Local Plan Working Party on 3 September indicate that substantive work has already been done on the “preparation of the evidence base”. i.e. the public should have been involved already.

We await the response of the Council as to how they are going to incorporate this obligation in the work programme for the remainder of the review.

With regards to Kempton Park, the 69 CCTV cameras which suddenly appeared last week disappeared 24 hours later. The pairs of traffic counting cables which have been spread throughout Sunbury and Hampton since 21 September have also been taken away. The little blue air quality diffusion tubes, however, are still there.

Both Surrey CC Highways and The Jockey Club have confirmed that all this equipment was used for the traffic survey conducted by Mouchel in connection with the proposed development of 1500+ homes at Kempton Park. Similar work at the Hampton Triangle was carried out at the behest of Redrow Homes, who were granted the right of first refusal by The Jockey Club over 70 acres of land on the Kempton Park estate.

Donations to the Keep Kempton Green Fighting Fund can now be made through PayPal. Just go to http://www.losra.org, scroll down a little, and click on the button marked “Donate to the Keep Kempton Green Fund”. You can also donate by cheque. Please make your cheque payable to LOSRA and send it to:

20 Green Street, Sunbury, TW16 6RN

As you would expect, the identity of all donors will be kept confidential.

Remember: Keep Kempton Green began as a campaign to protect Green Belt at Kempton Park. That campaign has now been forced to expand to protect Green Belt throughout Spelthorne, which is at risk in this review of our Local Plan. This threat is against the whole Borough.

Visit us at http://www.keepkemptongreen.com, Like our Facebook page, and Follow us on Twitter (links to both on the website). Leave your comments at all three.

Kind regards, and thank you very much in advance for your generosity.

Keep Kempton Green

KKG – Document 68     KKG – Document 71

Dear Neighbour

On Tuesday 30 September, the Spelthorne Cabinet voted to give planning officials permission to begin the review of our Local Plan. You will remember that this review was most recently discussed at a meeting of the Local Plan Working Party (LPWP) on 3 September, from which members of the public were barred.

The minutes of that LPWP meeting, which were presented at the meeting of the Cabinet, are in Document 71, attached. The main paper discussed at the original meeting of the LPWP is in Document 68, attached.

As you can see, there is about as much resemblance between the minutes and what was actually discussed at the LPWP, as there was between Mr and Mrs Huhnes’ first account, and who was actually driving their car on the M11 in March 2003.

What the Cabinet was in fact voting for was an increase in the housing target from 166 p.a. to a minimum of 400 p.a. That equates to 8000 new dwellings across the Borough over 20 years, an increase in the population of the Borough of 20%.

Where are they going to put these 8000 homes? Any open space they can find.

Cabinet members present were Councillor Watts in the chair, Councillors Evans, Gething, Leighton, Mitchell, Patel, Pinkerton and Sexton. There were no dissenting voices. Councillor Gething made a point at the end of the discussion of asking for extra measures to be taken to ensure the process was kept completely confidential, with no further leaks of documents.

On which subject:

None of the many documents relating to that meeting of the LPWP was marked ‘Confidential’ in any way.

None was on the yellow paper commonly used to denote ‘Confidential’ material.

KKG received so many copies of the documents discussed at that meeting that at one stage we thought we might have to tape up the letter box.

Just because the Council says something is confidential does not necessarily mean it is. They may not want us to see certain documents, but that is not a reason to claim they are ‘Confidential’. Frankly, those documents are no more ‘Confidential’ than the Ten Commandments.

Today, a rash of CCTV cameras appeared on the streets around Sunbury, Halliford and Hampton. 64 in all (and we may have missed a few) plus another half dozen at the Hampton Court Bridge roundabout. See https://keepkemptongreen.com/2014/10/02/who-are-these-nosy-parkers

All Kempton Park-related, and a gross invasion of privacy, not to mention some homes being clearly in the field of view of some of the cameras, and the tall poles on which they were mounted waving precariously in anything more than a breeze. A number of residents have expressed their formal displeasure to the police. In Spelthorne, the email to use is spelthornenhw@surrey.pnn.police.uk .

Our fund raising effort is exceeding expectations. LOSRA (the Lower Sunbury Residents Association) have kindly offered to receive and account for donations to this campaign. LOSRA have been around for more than 40 years, and have impeccable credentials with regard to accountability and reliability.

Electronic methods for donations will be set up shortly. In the mean time, if you would like to donate by cheque, please make your cheque out to LOSRA and send it to:

20 Green Street, Sunbury, TW16 6RN

As you would expect, the identity of all donors will be kept confidential.

Visit us at http://www.keepkemptongreen.com, Like our Facebook page, and Follow us on Twitter (links to both on the website). Leave your comments at all three.

Kind regards, and thank you very much in advance for your generosity.

Keep Kempton Green