Agenda and minutes

To approve the minutes of the meeting held on 16 October 2019.

8.27pm – RESOLVED:

That the minutes of the Council Meeting held on 16 October 2019 were confirmed and signed as an accurate record.

Apologies for absence were received from Councillors Sue Fennimore and David Morton.

Apologies for lateness were received from Councillor Matt Thorley.

New Year’s Honours

The Mayor noted the Council’s congratulations to Steve Miley, H&F’s former Director of Children’s Services, who was awarded an OBE in the Queen’s New Year’s Honours – and to Helen Kay Lederer, a resident of the borough who was awarded an OBE for services to Diversity and Inclusion in the Civil Service.

Colleagues We’ve Lost

With great sadness, the Mayor informed the Council of the death of former Deputy Mayor and Councillor Robert Moore-Mulcahy. Mr Moore-Mulcahy was elected as a Liberal Councillor representing Broadway Ward from May 1978 until May 1986. He served as Deputy Mayor from 1984 to 1985.

Speeches were made by Councillor Stephen Cowan and Councillor Alex Karmel.

The Council stood for a minute of silence in his memory.

If a Councillor has a disclosable pecuniary interest in a particular item, whether or not it is entered in the Authority’s register of interests, or any other significant interest which they consider should be declared in the public interest, they should declare the existence and, unless it is a sensitive interest as defined in the Member Code of Conduct, the nature of the interest at the commencement of the consideration of that item or as soon as it becomes apparent.

At meetings where members of the public are allowed to be in attendance and speak, any Councillor with a disclosable pecuniary interest or other significant interest may also make representations, give evidence or answer questions about the matter.  The Councillor must then withdraw immediately from the meeting before the matter is discussed and any vote taken.

Where Members of the public are not allowed to be in attendance and speak, then the Councillor with a disclosable pecuniary interest should withdraw from the meeting whilst the matter is under consideration. Councillors who have declared other significant interests should also withdraw from the meeting if they consider their continued participation in the matter would not be reasonable in the circumstances and may give rise to a perception of a conflict of interest.

Councillors are not obliged to withdraw from the meeting where a dispensation to that effect has been obtained from the Standards Committee.

There were no declarations of interest.

8.42pm - Councillor Colin Aherne moved a motion to:

·         Give precedence on the agenda to Item 6.1 (Youth Take Over Challenge), Item 5 (Public Question Time), and Special Motion 7.2 - under Standing Order 15(e)(3).

·         Suspend Standing Order 12(a) to allow all public questions and responses to be heard in full.

·         To extend the meeting for up to 3 hours under Standing Order 25.3 to allow for the consideration of all items of business on the agenda.

The motion was put to the vote:

FOR                            32

AGAINST                   10

NOT VOTING            0

The motion was declared CARRIED.

8.54pm – The Mayor invited members of the Youth Council to address the Council.

The members of the Youth Council –Ozan Erder, Ainhoa Reyes, Mariam Ali, Faye Cruvinel, and Sara Nabli – gave a presentation on the Take Over Challenge Day ‘With Me 4 Me’ hosted at Chelsea Football Club on the 25^th November 2019. Speeches were made by Councillors Larry Culhane and Andrew Jones (for the Administration) – and Councillor Mark Loveday (for the Opposition).

The Mayor thanked the Youth Council for all their hard work and contributions to the borough.

The Leader or relevant Cabinet Member to reply to the following questions submitted by members of the public:

Question from Sally Taylor, Resident

“I am a resident of West Kensington estate, and want to ask the council to confirm that the estates of West Kensington and Gibbs Green are fully returned to LBHF from the developers and why the original sale of our homes (against our wishes) ever went ahead at such a low price?”

Answer from Councillor Stephen Cowan, Leader of Council

“Can I thank Sally Taylor, for not just asking her question but for spending the last 12 years fighting to save her home. Now, many residents come to talk to us about many different things - their loss of their hospital, their loss of services - but particularly galling is the loss of the place where you sleep at night, the place where you feel safest. And Sally, I can assure you, after your 12 year long fight, that the London Borough of Hammersmith and Fulham is now the full landlord of your home.

Now your second question, should there be some kind of inquiry into what happened? I suppose I have some sympathy with the Councillors on the Conservative benches. The second question is, go why did the sale go ahead at such a low price. I will absolutely explain why. I’m already being heckled from the Conservative benches. And actually, what I want you to do and tell people back on the West Kensington and Gibbs Green Estates is exactly what you’re witnessing here. Because there is no good explanation why the West Kensington and Gibbs Green Estates were sold for £105 million when they were a ransom site, which means you have to have them in order to build big buildings next to it - and they were roughly a third of the total Earl’s Court site - and at the time your homes were sold Sally, the Earl’s Court site was valued at £12.5 billion pounds. Now that in itself should be a concern, not just to the residents of the West Kensington and Gibbs Green Estates who faced the nightmare of turning up to the Council and doing what, as one of the Conservative Councillor said, ‘shouting and screaming’ at meeting, after meeting, after meeting - only to be ignored. Only to be facing a consultation that four to one voted against the sale of their homes but still saw them sold off.

The real issue here is that every single resident of the borough, everyone who lives in Hammersmith and Fulham, who is in here tonight, would have had to pay for that mistake. And it was a mistake, despite the tweets I’ve seen from some of the Conservatives involved. And the reason it was a mistake is because that £105 million was not index linked, and what the Council was required to do with that £105 million was to buy all the freeholders and the leaseholders out with compulsory purchase orders - and to do it on a scheme that was said to be a 25 year long  ...  view the full minutes text for item 5.8

Question from Kate Jakobsson, Resident

“The Minister for Digital has tried to dissuade local authorities from refusing mobile phone masts etc on health grounds. However, the official ICNIRP guidelines are very limited, out of date and carry a heavy disclaimer. The weight of independent research shows that 5G and related technology is likely to cause serious health problems, causing a strain on our health services.

What will Hammersmith and Fulham Council do to stand up to the government and protect everyone’s health?”

Answer from Councillor Ben Coleman, Cabinet Member for Health and Adult Social Care

“Thank you, thank you very much Miss Jakobsson. Thank you for the question.

I’ll try and keep this short. I thank you also for the email you sent to me setting out your concerns in more detail. I’m very happy to assure you, it comes perhaps as no surprise that anyone standing up from our administration will ever do anything that we think puts residents’ health and wellbeing at risk. So I hope that reassures you but I think you want more detail than that. When it comes to 5G, the science at the moment, says 5G is safe. But we’re aware that this is contested by some, and you put some points in your email to me.

What we want to do is we want to use what Greta Thunberg talks about as the ‘best available science’, she talks about it in a different context but I think the context that we should look at the current best available science – now the question then becomes, ‘what is the current best available science?’ Although we don’t expect the decision on 5G to have to come to Cabinet or Council for some time – you’re more informed than me I would think on the timing of the way this whole thing is rolling out – I can assure you that we are going to go the extra mile to ensure that the current best available science is what we base any decision on.

And we’ll be no doubt talking more about what that science is - there’s a lot of information, I won’t say on all sides because that makes it sound too adversarial and I think we all want to try and understand what really the impact is - and some people say there’s no impact and some people say there will be some. So we want to get the best current, at the time we’re talking the decision, available science - and I can assure you also that we will stand up, as we always do, to whoever we need to stand up to ensure that the decision we take is the right one, and that we continue to protect residents’ health the way that we already do now.”

Supplementary question

“Can we have a halt on this until we know more? We have LED street lights, we have 5G and we get so worried about it, we have to look after our  ...  view the full minutes text for item 5.4

Question from Carolyn Daly, Resident

"The residents of Peterborough Villas are now locked in whether it is a car or a bicycle they are driving it's become very difficult to enter or exit Peterborough villas, not to mention the noise and pollution the residents are experiencing. The residents of Peterborough Villas were not included in the initial informal consultation although they are clearly the residents most adversely impacted by the gridlock on Bagleys Lane. What was the criteria for the first consultation as it seems that only those benefiting from the closure were consulted?"

Answer from Councillor Wesley Harcourt, Cabinet Member for the Environment

“Thank you Ms Daly, thank you for your question and thank you for coming along tonight and for your patience in waiting.

The Council, as my colleagues have already said, always endeavours to hear the widest number of people's views when it develops policy but in this particular case it wasn’t actually a requirement for Peterborough Villas to be part of this particular consultation.

I am sorry to hear what you’ve said and I’ve seen any number of letters from people from Peterborough Villas making a similar point. I’ve read them, I’ve listened to them and I’ve asked Highways officers to go away and look at those traffic issues around Peterborough Villas and see what they can do by way of mitigation.”

Supplementary question

“I’d like to know what your vision is for the future - are you taking into account all the increased traffic that’s come in to the gasworks plant - are you taking into account the pollution level that’s been put in there, and that’s going to increase with this? What is your long term goal for the families, the children, the seniors, and all the other residents that live in that area - minus the thirty houses that have an empty street now? It’s all been condensed into one area, instead of being spread - we have trucks, I timed todays, I know you’ve done lots of data… it’s not consistent data. It’s never been the same test monitoring more than once, so how are you going to solve this and what’s the vision for the future?”

Answer to the supplementary question

“Thank you very much for that follow up question.

Our vision for the future - the immediate issue that we had to deal with was the volume of traffic and the number of accidents that there have been in Harwood Terrace.”

“They were having up to 400 vehicles per hour at peak times going through that. And there were a number of accidents at the junctions with Waterford Road and Edith Road so we wanted to try and resolve that as an immediate problem. Yes, there are issues coming out with the gasworks site, there are plans for that and there’s plans for a road to go through the middle of it which will eventually resolve some of these problems. That’s a couple of years away, but we felt  ...  view the full minutes text for item 5.1

Question from Karen Thompson, Resident

"The Fulham Gas Works development and the expansion of Chelsea Creek will add thousands of homes to the area. Can the Council share what analysis it used to assess the impact of the closure of Harwood Terrace on the surrounding area in the context of all the traffic volume expected to come from these new developments (and especially given the closure of Hammersmith Bridge)?"

Answer from Councillor Wesley Harcourt, Cabinet Member for the Environment

“Thank you very much Ms Thompson.

Yes I have been down there myself, I have seen the lorries coming out of there. They wouldn’t get through the width restriction - it’s ordinary volume of ordinary vehicles going through Harwood Terrace, which has always been the problem we’ve been trying to deal with.

The development of the gasworks site is still in the planning stages, it’s got planning permission admittedly, but at the Planning Committee we looked at the predicted impact and estimates in the number of trip generation that there’s going to be done as a result of this and these were discussed openly at the Planning Committee when planning permission was given.

The experimental closure of Harwood Terrace has given us an opportunity, given us the chance, to gather data, gather evidence. And based on that evidence we will publicly share, as I promised before, to inform the council's approach to any further property developments in the area.”

Supplementary question

In view of the fact that the closure of Harwood Terrace has created, by itself, all this additional pollution for the neighbouring residents, and increased noise pollution, which was also evident on your data collected, how on earth can the Council justify keeping Harwood Terrace closed a moment longer?”

Answer to the supplementary question

“It was a plan that was discussed with residents - certainly the residents of Harwood Terrace. And I have spoken to your lead campaigner, as you may well know, on more than one occasion and he’s been invited in to meetings with myself and Highways officers to discuss this.”

The answer at the moment is - we need to gather the evidence. We haven’t got all the evidence in yet. We’ve looked at the time it takes buses to get across from Harwood Terrace to Tyrawley Road bus stop. We’ve only so far been able to get data for one single day from TfL. So we’re trying to get that. Trying to get anything out of TfL is impossible. But we are getting that and when we get that data, when we look at all the other data - the other data only came in on Monday - so we haven’t had a chance to finalise it yet. As I said I can promise you that when we’ve got it, collated it, analysed it, it will be presented to one of our Policy and Accountability Committees and all of you will have the chance to input into that. They are public meetings and they make policy.”  ...  view the full minutes text for item 5.2

Question from Nicola Dryden, Resident

"As per a freedom of information request, PCNs at the Bagley’s Lane l New King’s Road yellow box junction have increased a whopping 83% in the four weeks prior and post the Harwood Terrace closure yielding an additional £213,760 for the Council. Why has the Council not liaised with TfL to adjust the lighting sequence at the "money box" junction given the thousands of vehicles displaced by the unilateral closure of Harwood Terrace?"

Answer from Councillor Wesley Harcourt, Cabinet Member for the Environment

“Good evening Ms Dryden, thanks very much for that question.

We have actually approached TfL about changing the sequence of those lights. As you know that is a particularly difficult junction anyway and the amount of storage space i.e. the space between the yellow box and the next set of traffic lights, the one at the bottom of Harwood Road, is fairly limited. It’s okay if you’re going right and then left up Harwood Road, you can get round it - it’s the other bit but we need to try and get TfL to tweak that a little bit more and we’ve started that.

Now as you know we have already looked at a number of measures to try and cut the number of penalty charge notices, PCNs, that are being issued at those yellow boxes. For example, and let’s look at the Bagley’s Lane one and its junction with New King’s Road yellow box junction. The number of PCNs issued have fallen.

Back in 2012 PCNs stood at 35,100 a year. This has now come down - last year, including the end of the year when Harwood Terrace was closed, it’s down to 16,200.

92% of the people who have been issued PCNs are issued at that junction during the experimental period come to people who did not live in the London Borough of Hammersmith and Fulham. So that goes to make the point that people from outside the area have been using Harwood Terrace as a cut-through and we’ve had PCNs issued as far away as Peterborough, Oxford and such like.

We are liaising with TfL and we’re going to do everything possible to make sure that the only people issued with PCNs are those who continually breach highways laws.”

Supplementary question

“Will you open Harwood Terrace and do a far wider review of the whole area so that we can get an outcome that works for everyone across the borough?”

Answer to the supplementary question

“Thank you. It was interesting, those of you who were here earlier this evening will have heard the discussion about the Freedom of the Borough, when Michael Mansfield made his comment about defending the little guy. Now you’ve talked about 2000 people, 2000 names against however many it is who live in Harwood Terrace - they are the little guy who have been suffering for years.

I think it is important for the safety of people, and for the wellbeing of people that live  ...  view the full minutes text for item 5.3

Question from Alex Agha, Resident

Note: Alex Agha was unable to attend but his question was read out by another resident.

“The Council's Consultation hub, under the heading: “Reducing traffic and improving safety around Harwood Terrace”, dated 15 March 2019 states that the closure will "only make the scheme permanent if feedback from residents supported it." 'With an unprecedented 2,000 objections, a resident's petition with over 300 residents and a business petition with over 100 signatures, isn't it clear that the experimental scheme is not supported by neither the vast majority of residents or businesses and should be stopped?"

Answer from Councillor Wesley Harcourt, Cabinet Member for the Environment

The following answer was sent by the Cabinet Member in writing:

“The Council will always listen to its residents and take those views into account when it develops evidence-based policies to make our residents safer. We commit to do exactly that as we develop this Highways Policy.

The Council has not received an unprecedented 2000 objections from local residents and businesses and, while it recognises the importance of web-based petitions for community and even party-political campaigning purposes, they do not fit the statutory consultation criteria.

I assure you that the Council will actively listen to all our local residents and businesses as we develop our policy about what to do next on this temporary scheme and that the evidence generated will be the best foundation for that policy.”

Question from Lady Emma Hill-Wood, Resident

“Please can you answer the reasons factually as to why you are not re-opening Harwood Terrace with immediate effect?”

Answer from Councillor Wesley Harcourt, Cabinet Member for the Environment

“In answer to your question, as you may know, the Council was asked by the residents of Harwood Terrace to look at the traffic situation and close their road due to the large amounts of traffic that were using Harwood Terrace, Waterford Road and Edith Row as a cut-through and there had been a number of traffic accidents.

And one of the things that really got to me when I was down there talking to residents was when I spoke to one woman who told me that she was eight months pregnant and a car was taking its time to get through the width restriction so somebody decided to go up the other side of the road, knocked her over - she ended up with a detached placenta, nearly lost her baby - the pair of them were in intensive care and luckily they have now recovered. I cannot have accidents like that happening. So those are the reasons behind it.

At the same time - it’s a temporary closure, an experiment lasting possibly up to six months only. We are not doing eighteen months, we are doing six months. That’s what it says here, it’s said everywhere else so there’s no question mark about that one.

The Council has been gathering evidence about the closure, about the traffic, not just at Bagley’s Lane - and we’re going to be doing work about how people have changed their routes across other areas. But the volume of traffic has settled down as I’m sure you’re aware.

Now we’ve almost finished gathering the evidence that we need and as I said before, and said to previous questioners, I’ll say it again, time and time again - that I will share that information and make sure it is shared with the public through our publicly accessible Policy and Accountability Committee. And that will be used to develop a way forward that works for the whole area in that neighbourhood.”

Supplementary question

“In terms of the local roads, the other roads impacted - you obviously know that the measures introduced on Harwood Terrace in both 2001 and 2006 were both extremely effective in reducing the speed of traffic and volume. What are you going to be doing to the other local streets that are impacted to such a degree daily?

Answer to the supplementary question

“As I said, we are looking at where those issues are - where those streets are the ones which are badly affected. And I’ve tasked officers with going away and looking at what mitigating issues can be done to try and solve that. The whole purpose of this is safety issues. We’ve heard it from cyclists and many of you will have seen the amount of issues that have been raised on Twitter and  ...  view the full minutes text for item 5.6

Question from Susan Haug, Resident

"LBHF Council has sought public consultations as "best practice" in experimental traffic orders in other road closures in the area; for example, most recently regarding 'Perrymead/Studdridge/Rycroft Streets. As a local resident, l received notification of this and was able to submit comments at the time. Unusually, the Harwood Terrace experimental traffic order only consulted 40 Harwood Terrace addresses — in short, primarily those standing to benefit directly from such a closure. This restricted consultation resulted in 60-40% rejection of the closure proposition. Nonetheless, the Council took the radical action of closing the street thereby causing major traffic disruption in this previously relatively quiet and manageable area.

Shouldn't the Council have followed a similar best practices strategy in the Harwood Terrace experimental traffic order by at least consulting those residents living in the area most directly affected on Bagley’s Lane, Acfold Road, Bovingdon, Cresford and Maltings Place? These streets are most severely and directly impacted by this experimental closure as they are sandwiched between the now bottle-necked egresses of Wandsworth Bridge Road, Imperial Road/New Kings Road. I ask this question especially in light of the rejection of the original "informal" consultation?"

Answer from Councillor Wesley Harcourt, Cabinet Member for the Environment

“Thank you very much for that question. The Council does undertake to do best practices in all its public consultations. That’s something I’m really concerned about. In this instance, we were actually keen to tackle the safety issues and air pollution issues faced by people living in Harwood Terrace. I’ve already mentioned about the volume of traffic down there and you can imagine what it was like. So Harwood Terrace, Waterford Road and Edith Row - with 400 vehicles an hour going through there much of that traffic is generated by people living outside of the borough as we have just heard. Therefore, we have discussed, or spoke to residents of Harwood Terrace, a number of them as I said to you, came to me with this particular problem. I listened to them and their particular problem, as indeed I’ve listened to people in Barkley Road and Iffley Road when there were problems there and we had to shut that road. I did the same with people in Bishops King’s Road - we’ve shut that one. I’ve done the same in other parts - in Fitzneal Street in my own ward for the same sort of reasons. So it’s about listening and then taking some sort of action.

But I also need to be sure that what people are asking for is something that everybody in that street wanted. That’s why we looked at that particular street. And when it then comes to the experimental closure - that itself is part of the consultation. The comments that come back, the emails that come back, all of these emails are going to be collated - we’ll look at all those issues that are raised and they will inform that consultation.  ...  view the full minutes text for item 5.19

Question from Alexandra Jarvis, Resident

"The closure of Harwood Terrace has greatly improved the poor quality of life of the residents living in this small residential street, which prior to the closure was dealing with 30,000 cars a week in each direction. Could the Council Cabinet Member for the Environment please assure the residents of our street that he will continue to support the road not being used as a rat-run?”

Answer from Councillor Wesley Harcourt, Cabinet Member for the Environment

“Thank you Ms Jarvis for that. You know, you’ve heard a lot of what people are saying tonight but you haven’t actually listened to what you’ve just been saying. 30,000 vehicles a week in each direction. That’s incredible for a street where there’s barely room to get two cars to pass each other in. It’s unbelievable. It’s a purely residential street, it’s not a main road. It’s not like Imperial Road which is quite wide.

As I’ve said, I want to support you to find a way out of this particular problem. I appreciate what everybody else is saying but I do need to listen to what everybody else is saying and the problems they are having as well.

We have written to Chelsea Harbour and asked them whether they would consider opening that road - haven’t got a reply yet. So that is being done as well. But I think it is important to make it absolutely clear that whatever is said and done, with the outcome of all these traffic surveys that we’re going to be doing, that Harwood Terrace is considered and made sure that it continues to be a safe and healthy street to live in. It fits our plans for reducing traffic in the area. It fits the London Mayor’s plans to reduce traffic. It fits the policies around healthy streets. So all of those things are important to make sure you maintain a good quality of life and I will continue to do that.”

Supplementary question

“Is it LBHF’s policy to sanction the reuse of Harwood Terrace as a rat-run to encourage the avoidance of main roads and traffic lights, thereby risking the safety and lives of cyclists and pedestrians of all ages in the future?”

Answer to the supplementary question

“I’m somewhat lost for words at the moment. I’ve always tried to listen to both sides of any argument. I’ve always tried to do things with residents.

It’s always a good thing to try and do that in an objective manner and listening to each other. This level of interruption and haranguing is something that doesn’t get anybody anywhere.

Yes we will look at this and no it is not our policy to have any further accidents. That is the last thing we want in this borough. We are trying to reduce accidents to nil. We will be meeting with TfL any day now to discuss their Vision Zero - i.e. no accidents on London’s roads by 2030. And that’s exactly what  ...  view the full minutes text for item 5.9

Question from Nick Smith, Resident

"Since Harwood Terrace has been closed the air quality in the area has significantly improved and residents no longer have to contend with over 400 vehicles an hour using their quiet street as a rat run. Would the Cabinet Member for the Environment please make sure that rat running through Harwood Terrace is not allowed in the future?"

Answer from Councillor Wesley Harcourt, Cabinet Member for the Environment

“I will reiterate what I said earlier - the idea of rat-running is not something that is supported. You have raised it quite clearly and your colleague also has raised it quite clearly - and residents from Harwood Terrace have raised it with me quite clearly. Rat-running is not an acceptable issue. There are other streets in this borough that come to me complaining about rat-running. Now I’ve had an email this morning from somebody saying they support the closure of Harwood Terrace because they live in a street in another part of the borough where their road was constantly used as a rat-run. And as soon as we looked at that one and changed the layout it made the world of difference. And it’s absolutely essential, given the situation we’re in now, with climate emergency, air pollution, and everything else, that we reduce the volume of traffic. 27,000 or 37,000 vehicles in each direction a week is wholly unacceptable through our residential streets.

We are here to make sure that our residents can live safe and healthy lives and that is the reason why we took the action that we did in closing Harwood Terrace, on an experimental basis. Now, at no point can it be said, and I’m looking at the traffic counts in other streets just to get hard evidence - and we do need hard evidence before we can actually make a decision, it’s not something that you can just do on a whim. Therefore when we’ve got that we’ll be looking at how much traffic there is in other streets, but I doubt very much whether any other street is experiencing 30,000 vehicles a week in each direction, let alone 400 an hour at peak times.”

Supplementary question

“Could the Cabinet Member please confirm that [the objectives for the closure] were reasonable objectives and that they are being met without a disproportionately negative impact on other nearby residential streets? And with the overall benefit of a reduction in the number of car journeys in the area.”

Answer to the supplementary question

“Thank you for that. I think the objectives that you mentioned - the stop the rat-running, the safety of cyclists, and air quality - are all absolutely admirable objectives. I think they’re perfectly sound objectives. They’re objectives that, as I’ve said earlier, they meet the Council’s aims, it with the London Mayor’s London-wide strategy as well. Those are things that we support, and we need to start thinking now about how do we reduce the numbers of cars being used.  It’s  ...  view the full minutes text for item 5.10

10.00pm – Councillor Andrew Jones moved, seconded by Councillor Zarar Qayyum, the special motion in their names:

“This Council thanks the Labour administration for winning the return of the West Kensington and Gibbs Green estates and agrees the former Conservative administration should never have sold them in the first place.

The Council notes that as well as it being morally wrong for the former Conservative administration to have sold the estates against the residents’ wishes, it was also one of the worst property deals done by any local authority in modern history.

The Council notes with alarm that:

·         At the time of the sale to Capital and Counties Properties Plc (Capco), the whole Earls Court scheme was valued at £12.05billion but that the two estates, which comprise 20.87 acres and make a high proportion of the Earls Court scheme were sold for just £110million.

·         The Conservative administration negotiated just 11% ‘affordable’ housing – most of which would have been unaffordable to local people.

·         The deal done on replacement council homes was not linked to inflation and therefore not sufficient to provide replacement homes for the vast majority of residents. That meant:

o   The vast majority of tenants would not have been given new homes on the scheme and would have needed to be re-housed elsewhere

o   Leaseholders and freeholders would only have been given the legal minimum sum and therefore unlikely to afford to stay in Hammersmith & Fulham

o   Temporary tenants would not have been re-housed in this deal.

The Council recognises that the Conservative administration planned a similar approach for the rest of the borough’s council housing and had talks with developers about doing the same to residents’ homes on:

o   The Clem Atlee estate

o   The Queen Caroline estate

o   Ashcroft Square

o   Linacre Court

o   The White City estate

o   And many others

The Council also notes that the Capco Earls Court scheme was deemed undeliverable and that the company was openly seeking a larger masterplan to further increase the value of the scheme while travelling around the world trying to sell the whole Earls Court scheme, including our residents’ homes, to a variety of buyers in China, Saudi Arabia, and elsewhere.

The Council also notes how Capco’s Earls Court scheme collapsed in value and was sold in November 2019 for just £425million.

The Council calls on Hammersmith & Fulham’s Conservative councillors, and Greg Hands MP to apologise for their active and ignorant support of Capco’s dreadful Earls Court scheme and for their local party causing such huge levels of anxiety and worry to thousands of people living on the West Kensington and Gibbs Green estates and to people living in council homes across the borough.

The Council thanks the residents of the West Kensington and Gibbs Green estates for their bold fight and their resilience and welcomes them back.”

NOTE: There was a short adjournment from 10.06pm until 10.11pm.

Speeches on the special motion were made by Councillors Andrew Jones, Zarar Qayyum, Lisa Homan, Sharon Holder, Patricia  ...  view the full minutes text for item 7.2

This report details the Council Tax Support Scheme for 2020-21.

11.11pm – The report and recommendations were formally moved for adoption by the Cabinet Member for Finance and Commercial Services, Councillor Max Schmid.

A speech on the report was made by Councillor Max Schmid (for the Administration). The report and recommendations were then put to the vote:

FOR                            Unanimous

AGAINST                   0

NOT VOTING            0

The report and recommendations were declared CARRIED.

11.15pm – RESOLVED:

That Council will, for another year, continue to support our most vulnerable residents by protecting our local scheme. Once again for the eighth year running, we are proposing providing the maximum 100% support to our residents where they are on low incomes. This is at a time when we continue to have reduced funding from Central Government and are observing that many other local authorities, including our neighbours, are asking their vulnerable residents to now contribute towards their council tax, at levels often up to 25% of their actual charge.

This report contains an estimate of the Council Tax Collection rate and calculates the Council Tax Base for 2020/21.

11.16pm – The report and recommendations were formally moved for adoption by the Cabinet Member for Finance and Commercial Services, Councillor Max Schmid.

The report and recommendations were put to the vote:

FOR                            UNANIMOUS

AGAINST                   0

NOT VOTING            0

The report and recommendations were declared CARRIED.

11.16pm – RESOLVED:

1.    That the estimated numbers of properties for each Valuation Band as set out in this report be approved.

2.    That an estimated Collection rate of 97.5% be approved.

3.    That the Council Tax Base of 80,495 Band “D” equivalent properties be approved.

4.    To delegate authority to the Strategic Director of Finance and Governance in consultation with the Cabinet Member for Finance and Commercial Services, to determine the business rates tax base for 2020/21.

5.    To note that Cabinet has approved the recommendations in the Council Tax Support Scheme 2020/21 report, prior to the recommendations in this report, as they are reflected as Band “D” equivalents in the Council’s Tax base calculations in section 8 below.

6.    To confirm that the London Borough of Hammersmith and Fulham wishes to continue in a pan-London business rates pool in 2020/21.

7.    To delegate authority to the Strategic Director of Finance and Governance in consultation with the Cabinet Member for Finance and Commercial Services, to agree the recommendations in this report from 2021/22 in advance of budget setting.

This report recommends the creation of an additional Assistant to Cabinet role, updates to the departmental register of authority, and updates to Contract Standing Orders.

11.16pm – The report and recommendations were formally moved for adoption by the Leader of the Council, Councillor Stephen Cowan.

The report and recommendations were put to the vote:

FOR                            30

AGAINST                   8

NOT VOTING            0

The report and recommendations were declared CARRIED.

11.17pm – RESOLVED:

1.    That an additional Assistant to the Cabinet position be created to support the Cabinet.

2.    To note that Councillor Rebecca Harvey was appointed by the Leader as an Assistant to the Cabinet in July 2019.

3.    That amendments to the departmental register of authorities be approved (Appendix 1 of the report).

4.    To note the new Contract Standing Orders attached at Appendix 2 of the report.

This report seeks approval to enable the acquisition of commercial units that will be constructed by the King Street Joint Venture as part of the Civic Campus Programme.

Exempt appendix

This report has an appendix which contains information exempt within the meaning of Schedule 12A to the Local Government Act 1972 and is not for publication. The appendix has therefore been circulated to Councillors only.

Any discussions on the contents of an exempt appendix will require Council to pass the proposed resolution identified in the exempt appendix to exclude members of the public and the press from the proceedings for that discussion.

11.18pm – The report and recommendations were formally moved for adoption by the Cabinet Member for The Economy, Councillor Andrew Jones.

Speeches on the report were made by Councillors Andrew Jones and Stephen Cowan (for the Administration). The report and recommendations were then put to the vote:

FOR                            UNANIMOUS

AGAINST                   0

NOT VOTING            0

The report and recommendations were declared CARRIED.

11.24pm – RESOLVED:

1.    That Council approve a capital budget of up to £64m for the purchase of the office space, start up units, commercial units, restaurant and cinema as set out in this report and the associated professional fees and Stamp Duty Land Tax (SDLT). The total budget will be funded by general fund borrowing represented by an increase in the Council’s capital financing requirement, supplemented by capital receipts, or developer contributions when available, with final confirmation of funding delegated to the Strategic Director, Finance and Governance, in consultation with the Cabinet Member for Finance and Commercial Services.

2.    The Council approve a capital budget of up to £25m to purchase a 50% stake in the joint venture limited liability partnership with A2 Dominion, funded by general fund borrowing, represented by an increase in the Council’s capital financing requirement.

3.    That the Council, where appropriate, grant a lease of any of the Civic Campus commercial units to H&F Housing Developments Limited or any newly created company or companies (limited by shares).

4.    That authority be delegated to the Borough Solicitor to exercise Financial Regulation 3.4.3, i.e. to acquire an interest in a company, joint venture or other enterprises, in respect of the Civic Campus Programme and to finalise any legal formalities including, but not limited to, appointing Directors and amending articles of association related to the project.

The special motion was withdrawn.