Public accountability vs commercial confidentiality
The case for and against E-Racing in Battersea Park
Amidst all the political events of 2015, the General Election, the impending demise (or is it revival? and actually probably neither) of the Labour Party and the build-up to the London Mayoral elections, one local event stands out for displaying political and even moral issues with extraordinary clarity. That event was the final race of the inaugural season of Formula E racing.
The race took place on 28th June in Battersea Park. The winner, appropriately enough, was local Wandsworth boy Sam Bird. Look him up on Google and, until you refine the search a bit, you get nothing, nada, zilch. This tends to justify those, and there were plenty, who described the race as a trivial event for Dinky toys, with none of the speed, noise and glamour of the real thing – Formula 1.
But the top three racers, crowned in Battersea Park as 2015 World Champions, were Nelson Piquet Jnr., Sebastien Buemi and Lucas di Grassi, all of whom have been involved at the very top of motor racing and must be described as top rate drivers. In addition, the location of the season’s races reads like a compendium of some of the top world destinations. They were, in sequence, Beijing, Putrejaya (a suburb of Kuala Lumpur), Punta del Este (a Uruguayan seaside resort), Buenos Aires, Miami, Long Beach, Monaco, Berlin, Moscow and London’s Battersea Park.
To state the obvious motor racing is trying to expand into a new area, perhaps merely just a new commercial opportunity but maybe just possibly the “petrolheads” recognise that they need to present a more ecological image and a more family focused, less “macho” image. It doesn’t take much imagination to see that London Mayor, Boris Johnson, and Wandsworth Tory Council might want to jump on that bandwagon.
Well, maybe, you might say but what has that got to do with using a major public park over a long week-end in high summer, more or less to the exclusion of all other park users? Indeed, it was more than the week-end, with barriers and lorries, minor road works and “offensive” security staff getting in the way of normal park users for much of June.
Local opinion is clearly divided, but, not surprisingly, the nearer you get to the Park the greater the majority against the use of it for such purposes, and the further away the less the opposition. Indeed, there was quite a large number of supporters for the race in some of the major estates a mile or so away from the Park.
However, the most interesting arguments about the race centre on the issue of what people perceive to be appropriate uses for a public park.
There is a substantial core of people, who argue that a publicly provided facility, such as a park, should never be used for private profit, even to the extent of excluding ice cream vendors or park cafés. I imagine that municipally run ice cream vans and cafés might be acceptable to this minority, but this seems to be complicating the argument rather in today’s climate (of privatisation and private provision of services)!
But once the absolute principle is breached then it becomes, as so often, a case of drawing lines. In Battersea Park, for example, there is a privately run café; ice cream vendors do ply their trade; there is a privately run Children’s Zoo; and more contentiously there is a big tent, where beer festivals, art fairs, commercial and charitable entertainments are frequent occurrences. None of this would happen, however, if these events were not fulfilling a need, or responding to a demand.
But there is no doubt that the Formula E-race, and the threat of 5 more years of such racing is more than just a step change from the other examples. Let’s assume, as is clearly the organisers intention, that the disturbance to the Park will not be on the same scale in future years – they have learnt lessons about the barriers and the staffing. Nevertheless, for at least 2 and probably 3 or 4 days in high summer, use of the Park will be severely curtailed. Should it be allowed?
My argument is that it is a matter of degree, a matter of drawing lines. Should we or should we not allow Formula E a 5 year extension in Battersea Park? As a Wandsworth councillor I will be one of 60 making that decision. But there is a problem! I know, or can easily find out, how much the café business pays for the benefit of using the café building. I know the income that the Council gets from the other operations and, more importantly, I can tell my constituents and the public at large what that income is and why I think that justifies use of the Park for those operations.
I don’t know the income from Formula E, or more honestly I am constrained from telling the public because of “commercial confidentiality”. In other words, I am (and 59 other councillors are) saying to the public it is my (our) judgement that use of the Park for 3 or 4 days is (or is not) worth, say, £1 million. Now I don’t mind making that call. I was elected, I believe, to take such decisions. But what is problematic is that the public is not really in a position to judge my (or our) decision because the public is not allowed to know whether we are talking about an income of £1million or £10million. Or to make the same point a different way, whether we are talking about £1million or £10million’s worth fewer cuts in other Council services – that being the reality of local government finance today.
It is a matter of “commercial sensitivity”, because the Council bureaucracy has said it is. Indeed, I have received the following eloquent response from the Town Hall. “The reasoning that we are using and quoting is that disclosure into the public domain would be deemed prejudicial to the commercial interests of both the Council and Formula E. If the Council decides to continue with the event, it is likely that there will be competition to provide a site for Formula E after five years, and at that point (subject to experience of the first five years) the Council may want to bid against other interested parties to continue to host the event, and so the sum agreed would be of interest to commercial competitors. Equally, Formula E would not want their other venue hosts, world-wide, to know details of the financial deal with the Council. It’s therefore our view that there is a greater public interest in maximising the Council’s ability to compete for the right to host the event beyond the current contract (if such is decided)” than [my phrasing] for councillors to be able to justify their decision to the public.
So the argument is posed: is the perceived “commercial sensitivity” of this decision more important or not than the accountability of councillors to their electorate? Should the electorate simply take their elected representatives’ judgement on trust? Or should they have all the information so that, whether or not they agree with the councillors’ judgement, they can at least see the case and the grounds for the decision.
Two recently Tory but now independent councillors, Cllrs Cousins and Grimston, have made their position clear and voted against the use of the Park for E-Racing. But actually is their position any more defensible than any others of us. Without knowing how much money they are prepared to forego for the sake of keeping the Park untouched, how can we/they argue the rights and wrongs of their case?
I suspect that there will always be conflicts between the demands for “commercial confidentiality” and democratic accountability, and once again it will be a matter of drawing lines, or of making judgements. But surely, in the last analysis, democratic accountability has to have priority over “commercial confidentiality”?
Tony Belton
Tony Belton 