Agenda and minutes

To approve as an accurate record, and the Chair to sign, the minutes of the meeting held on 19 June.

RESOLVED

The minutes of the meeting held on 19 June 2018 were approved and signed by the Chair.

Apologies of absence were received from Stephen Waley Cohen (Co-opted Member), Farrah Rossi (Principal Planning Projects Officer) and Mike Rumble (Parks Inspector).

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 Audit, Pensions and Standards Committee.

There were no declarations of interest.

This report presents the Trust’s Annual Trustee’s Report which includes the draft 2017/18 financial accounts.

Arran Rose (KPMG) presented the Wormwood Scrubs Charitable Trust Annual

Trustee’s Report which included the draft 2017/18 financial accounts. He noted that financial performance for the Trust was £335,303 better when compared to last year, with the Trust achieving net incoming resources of £297,964. The amount carried forward consisted of unrestricted income funds of £515.243 and designated funds relating to the valuation of land and building of £5,000,001.

The Trusts balances reduced in recent years, mainly due to reductions in pay and display parking income and increased grounds maintenance costs due to annual contract inflation. The Trust continued to closely monitor and scrutinise its income and expenditure.

The work had identified only a few risks and the situation was being monitored. A key element in the management of risk was managing income and expenditure and setting a reserves policy for regular review by the Trustee.

Miriam Shea, referring to page 32 of the agenda pack asked what the debtor balance of £273,361 consisted of. Christina Cato said that this mainly consisted of income owed from UKPN, KAA and HS2, however would confirm and provide the exact details after the meeting.

Action: Christina Cato

Miriam Shea said that she had noticed some small errors, relating to the tone of the Annual Trustee’s Report, and asked that a word copy be sent to her to mark up and circulate to the Committee.

Action: Miriam Shea

RESOLVED

1.         That the Committee noted the content of the draft 2017/18 financial accounts for Wormwood Scrubs Charitable Trust.

2.         That the Committee approved delegation of authority to the Bi-Borough Director for Transport, Highways, Parks and Leisure, Residents Services for the approval of the audited 2017/18 Statement of Accounts and Trustee’s report in the event of auditor changes subsequent to this Committee meeting.

3.         That the Committee approved the management representation letter, attached as Appendix 2 of the report.

4.         That the Committee approved the Trustee’s Annual Report, attached as Appendix 1.

5.         That the Committee noted the contents of the annual risk assessment (contained in the Trustee’s report on pages 25-26).

The developer wishes to discuss options for accessing the construction site across Wormwood Scrubs Charitable Trust land and understand if in principle this might be possible.

Bryan Little gave a presentation and noted that the objective was to discuss plans to create a state of the art collaborative research facility at the Hammersmith Hospital Campus, Du Cane Road. All options proposed the use of the disused tennis courts as site accommodation and storage and short route from there into the hospital through the existing boundary treeline.

Jenny Smith said that the research focused on some of the biggest challenges faced by health care and the underpinning pressures behind how certain diseases progressed. The findings on how these diseases could be prevented was also being investigated.

Ben porter, provided an overview of the project and site coordination and noted that the institute was currently located in four different locations across the Hammersmith Hospital Campus. Existing facilities were aged and did not provide appropriate environment for housing high-tech equipment. The new building would provide greater research opportunities and build on the future institution.

Close collaboration between the Medical Research Council (MRC), London Institute of Medical Sciences (LMS) and Imperial College London (ICL) was an important element to provide fundamental research and clinical application. In addition, the project would be co-funded by MRC and ICL.

Miriam Shea asked if the height of the new building would be larger in comparison to the current site. Ben Porter explained that the proposed new building would be slightly taller than the current site, however design works were still in the process of being finalised.

Bryan Little presented three options that would be put forward in the planning application outlined below:

Option 1 - would allow construction traffic via Artillery Lane and access through Imperial College Healthcare Trust (ICHT) car park. This would minimise disturbance to Woodman Mews residents, school sites, the Pony Centre, and Grounds maintenance (GM) operations. This would increase traffic to public carparks and Artillery Lane.

Option 2 - would allow construction traffic via Woodman’s Mews and access through the GM deport and the Linford Christie Stadium (LCS) grass area to the site accommodation. This would cause disturbances to Woodman’s Mews residents, school sites, the Pony Centre, and the Grounds Maintenance (GM) operations.

Option 3 - would allow construction traffic to enter and exit via Du Cane Road. This would have the least disturbance to any Scrubs or LCS activities but would require the hospital to resolve internal circulation issues.

Miriam Shea felt that Option 2 was the least favourable as this would impact the Pony Centre and the residents at Woodman Mews. Furthermore, this option would also require a greater footprint on Linford Christie Stadium. The Chair asked for option 2 and 3 to be avoided due to the disturbances these would cause to residents. The Committee agreed and noted that option 1 had offered the best alternative provision and felt it was the most viable option.

The Chair thanked the developer for their presentation and contributions made at the meeting.

RESOLVED

That the Committee considered the options presented by MRC LMS.

The Committee is asked to note all matters in this report.   

HS2 Bill – Proposed Wetland Mitigation Legal Agreement

Richard Gill provided an overview and noted that a Project Initiation Document (PID) had been completed with agreement of HS2. The PID outlined a planned direction for the AEM project and was included in the agenda pack for information and comment. It was a reference document for stakeholders which outlined the motivation, objectives, benefits, and costs of the project. The PID would be agreed by the project board and would be adapted if required to respond to further issues and opportunities. The aim was to appoint consultants in January 2019 to design the AEM proposals. The consultants would produce detailed draft proposals to be approved by HS2 before a specification was developed and agreed.

HS2 Bill – Re-Routing Stamford Brook Sewer Legal Agreement

Richard Gill said that the location of the boreholes was agreed and works had been completed. A meeting would be held with HS2 to conclude the final details of the route and an update would be provided once this was confirmed. The works for the re-route of the sewer were planned for the summer of 2019.

OPDC Draft Local Plan

Richard Gill provided an update and noted that Draft Local Plan could be viewed on www.london.gov.uk/opdclocalplan

The OPDC carried out 2 rounds of regulation 19, public consultation on their Draft Local Plan. The first round was carried out in June to September 2017. The Wormwood Scrubs Charitable Trust made representations which were considered by the OPDC in reviewing and redrafting their draft plan. A further regulation 19 consultation ran from 14 June to 30 July.

Kensington Aldridge Academy (KAA)

Mahmood Siddiqi explained that the license for KAA had been renewed for another year, however the school had returned to their main site in North Kensington in September 2018. They intended to rent the site for a further year in case there were any concerns with the RBKC site and needed to decant at short notice. In addition, they also wished to rent the 6 car park spaces on site for a further year. The Chair noted that he was happy for the rental of the school to commence for a further year.

Community Safety Update

Officers provided an overview and noted that from 1 June 2018 Parks Police had carried out 67 patrols on the Scrubs and attended 16 incidents. Two fixed penalties had been issued to ‘professional’ dog walkers for breaches of the PSPO (dog control).

The Chair highlighted that there were some concerns relating to a Husky dog climbing into the enclosure and chasing the horses located in the Pony Centre. He noted that further action needed to be taken and requested that officers and parks police worked together to resolve this issue as the owner of the dog had not been receptive.

Action: Mahmood Siddiqi

Grounds Maintenance and Site Management Update

Ian Ross noted that in general there had been no issues, however litter continued to be the biggest challenge on the Scrubs but some  ...  view the full minutes text for item 6.

That under Section 100A(4) of the Local Government Act 1972, that the public and press be excluded from the meeting during the consideration of the following items of business, on the grounds that they contain the likely disclosure of exempt information, as defined in paragraph 3 of Schedule 12A of the said Act, and that the public interest in maintaining the exemption currently outweighs the public interest in disclosing the information.

That under Section 100A (4) of the Local Government Act 1972, that the public and press be excluded from the meeting during the consideration of the following items of business, on the grounds that they contain the likely disclosure of exempt information, as defined in paragraph 3 of Schedule 12A of the said Act, and that the public interest in maintaining the exemption currently outweighs the public interest in disclosing the information.

Verbal update on the future plans for the Linford Christie Stadium.

Offficers apologised that an oral update had to be provided to the meeting.  David Burns said that a written report would be presented at the next meeting. The full details of the update and discussions are contained in the exempt minutes.