Councillor Tony Belton’s Battersea Newsletter, October, 2018, #112

1. It’s now two months since I wrote about building control regulations and Mrs. Thatcher’s so-called reforms. Last month I said that I have had a heart-felt response on the subject. Two of you, however, thought I was criticising builders, which was certainly not my intention. But this last month I got yet another reply strongly supporting my criticism of the process and the rules. I quote it extensively, because I think it exposes the idiocy of having a regulatory regime, being subject to freelance inspectors, who are picked by builders. The quotation is as follows:-
   • “I am an original owner of a flat in a block built in 2010, where we have had a major issue on fire safety. We flat owners have had to pay around £40,000 to make structural improvements to the block …, having been told by fire safety experts, and ultimately by London Fire Brigade under threat of enforcement order, that it did not meet fire safety regulations (I understand the words “we can’t believe a new block got through like this” were used)
   • .……… it raised the question who signed off on the block, the answer being precisely your scenario of privately contracted building inspector engaged by the developer. I cannot express how inadequate their response was when we took the issue up with them. The particular fire safety point may have been signed off without the inspector ever actually having viewed the property.
   • I suspect an endemic issue of private inspectors ‘waving through’ building sign offs, partly due to being paid flat fees which incentivise ‘light touch’ engagement, and partly being concerned not to raise issues which discourage repeat business from developers.
   • Subsequently we have seen the appalling Grenfell tragedy. You refer to the “dreadful price” of the building control system, but building control concerns much more than cracked walls and damaged foundations. I wonder just how dreadful the price of this rancid system might yet be, scaled across the vast levels of development in London alone, blithely waved through by these shoddy operators.”
2. Surely this quotation is proof enough that there is a problem, and Grenfell is a massive statement about how serious it is. We need fresh legislation to re-establish a simple regulatory regime, with an established, reliable and respected inspectorate – not a random set of freelance experts not subject to official validation.
   

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3. Ever been to Bordeaux? Not many of my friends have done anything more than pass through. It is actually worth a bit more than that. The fundamentally 18^th century centre has been re-engineered around four or five brand new tram lines and is almost entirely pedestrianised. OK, it’s a relatively small city by London standards, but it was so pleasant walking around the town day and night, without having to dodge cars, or breathe their fumes, and to hear laughter and voices across the road. We went by train and then flew from Bordeaux to Croatia, where we stayed in the same fishing village that we have stayed in for five years – lots of swimming, reading Trollope’s The Way We Live Now and fish, fish for breakfast, lunch and dinner!
   

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4. Whilst I was away my fellow Labour councillors organised a public meeting about Wandsworth Council’s response to fire hazards in multi-storey tower blocks. It was held at the Alma pub and was a reaction to the apparent intention of the Council to install sprinkler systems in all 10+ storey blocks.
   

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5. It was an understandable reaction to Grenfell but it was essentially a knee-jerk one. For example, the Council did not suggest even the most cursory of inspections, when a moment’s thought might have suggested that Grenfell-style risks are much reduced where there are separate staircases at either end of blocks, such as on the Doddington estate, or where the construction method was traditional brick and mortar, such as Battersea Fields, or where cladding had or had not been used. Given also that it appears as though leaseholders could be charged up to £5,000 each for an installation they do not want and which may be of only dubious purpose, it is not surprising that there is a head of steam against the proposal.
   

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6. The meeting was held on Sunday, 2^nd September, and was packed out with at least 100 tenants and leaseholders in attendance. It was chaired by the vastly experienced councillor and Wandsworth Greater London Assembly member Leonie Cooper, standing centre. The other four councillors on the platform as shown in this picture were Claire Gilbert (Roehampton), Maurice McLeod (Queenstown), Paul White (Tooting) and Angela Ireland (West Hill). Of these four, three were only elected in May, less than four months before this meeting. They organised and ran the whole meeting in what was quite an impressive baptism as it appeared to this “mature” councillor then sunning himself in Croatia. Well done to the team.
   

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7. On the 18^th September I had the Strategic Planning and Transportation Committee, which had one of the lightest agendas I can ever recall. There was, however, an interesting paper on how to remould Battersea High Street, and especially the market, into a street just about worthy of the name. Unfortunately, I didn’t think the Council’s paper was up to the task (and it was amazingly expensive for what it proposed), but improvements to the High Street are now, as they say, on the agenda and I hope to see some exciting ideas coming forward.
   

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8. The next day, 19^th September, I had the Planning Applications Committee. At first glance, there did not seem much of interest but further study proved otherwise. There was new detail on the mega-development of the old post office sorting office site in Nine Elms. The application from US company, Greystar, was for 894 BtR (Build to Rent) units. This was one of the first and definitely the largest appearance in the UK of the US housing product, BtR. Yes, I hate the phrasing too – “housing product” – Ugh!
   

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9. The Tory majority on the Committee were really proud that this new “product” should be coming to the Borough, making us a pioneer of a new, efficient, privately rented sector. For everyone’s peace of mind, I hope that they are right, but I suspect that corporate America invading our housing market is going to have similar impacts as Uber to taxi services, Amazon to high street shopping and PayPal to subscription services, etc. It will put pressure on our own landlords at the medium and top end of the market and in the end leave local authorities and housing associations to pick up all the pieces at the lower end of the market.
   

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10. The second interesting application was for a housing development on the site of the old Balham Bowls Club, Ramsden Road. I found this rather sad, because it meant the loss of a pub’s bowling green. I don’t know how many pubs in the country, let alone in Inner London, still have their own bowling greens (I know one in Suffolk), but I wouldn’t mind betting that this was the last in London – gone for ever.
    

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11. Meanwhile, in another interesting indication of how the market is moving, the Council has taken enforcement action against a property in Battersea being used as an Airbnb property. I haven’t come across this much but a fellow councillor in Tooting tells me that he is plagued with 100 or so Airbnb (or similar company) “hires” usually of private houses, which are being used as vice dens or party locations. I would be interested to know if any of you are experiencing similar problems associated with this trend, here in Battersea.
    

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12. I went back to my old college on 22^nd September. About a dozen of us, from further back than I care to admit, met up for dinner and a drink or two. It was great fun, but it meant that I totally missed London’s Car Free Day and no one has mentioned it to me either – I guess that means it was a bit of a non-event, which is a shame. It becomes clearer by the day exactly what damage is being done to our environment (and our health) by the internal combustion motor car – a great pleasure but also a killer!
    

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13. I didn’t go to Liverpool for the Labour Party Conference but it appears to have gone rather better than many expected. Last month, I said that if Brexit is a disaster and if Labour hasn’t had the courage to take a stand on the issue, then the Labour Party will pay a heavy price. I suspect that Keir Starmer has created enough space, just about, for Labour to avoid that trap and come out of this sorry saga in not too bad a shape. How come he doesn’t get mentioned as being the next Leader? OK, not being a woman is a handicap, but not even getting a mention!
14. I suspect that there are quite a few Tories, who rather desperately hope to leave their Conference in Birmingham in as good a shape!
    

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15. On the 27^th September, I went to the pretentiously named Village Hall, Battersea Power Station, to hear Dorian Gerhold talking about the history of industrial Wandsworth. He gave a broad sweeping description of the many major industrial plants and processes that have developed in Battersea, from the first major railway in Britain (horse drawn trucks), Battersea enamels, early aircraft manufacturing and copper smelting techniques to the UK’s busiest railway junction and the Power Station.
    

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16. I say the “pretentiously named Village Hall”, because of course, whatever the Power Station development becomes, it can never really be a village. I have never made any pretence of liking much of what has gone up in the Nine Elms area, but many in the Council’s planning hierarchy, official and political, are very proud of most of the developments. Of course, getting the US Embassy and Apple to move in are major triumphs, which cannot be ignored. So, putting jaundice and prejudice to one side, I ask myself, and some of you, do you see any really valuable and innovative developments? And, even if you do, are those developments worth the unremittingly Alphaville kind of atmosphere of the place? I would be interested in your views – one thing one can say for the development, however, is that it has opened up the riverfront – here is Chelsea Bridge, more or less from the Village.
    

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17. On Saturday, 29^th September, I went to a dinner in commemoration of the life of  Sally-Ann Ephson, a Labour councillor in Queenstown, who died two years ago after suffering for many months from Sickle Cell Anaemia. The dinner was both a tribute to the brave Sally-Ann and a fund raiser for the Sickle Cell Society, a ferociously painful and merciless condition. The picture is of our guest speaker, Battersea MP, Marsha de Cordova.

My Programme for October

1. The first week of October will be dominated by the Tory Party Conference – not something that I would normally highlight but something makes me think that this particular week could be of major significance for all our futures – ho, and just might provide a few laughs!
2. If you follow my newsletters closely then you will know that I accompany my partner to many of her lectures, hence you will not be totally surprised that on 5^th October, we are off to Reykjavik, Iceland. That will be a new experience – especially if we are lucky enough to see Aurora Borealis – the Northern Lights!
3. There will be a Council Meeting on the 17^th October and the Planning Applications Committee on the 18^th.
4. On 20^th October a plaque to Caroline Ganley will be unveiled at 5 Thirsk Road at 11 a.m. This is part of Battersea Society’s plan to install as many commemorative plaques to women as we already have to men. Why does Mrs Ganley deserve a plaque? See below.

Do you know?

Last month, I asked as an aside whether anyone knew the connection between Lavender Gardens, Henty Close on the Ethelburga Estate and the Cornet of Horse? Two of you did, the connection being one G A Henty, who wrote a phenomenal number of books, 100+, either for children or adventures about the British Empire. He lived in Lavender Gardens and drank at the Cornet of Horse (now named the Four Thieves). Surprisingly enough, Henty Close on the Ethelburga Estate was also named after him. I think that one can imagine the style and values of his books by saying that one of my readers thought her comments wouldn’t get through the censors and the other, remembering books she read at the age of eight, thought they were rattling good yarns!

But my main question was about the photograph on the right, which I took in Webbs Road. This got the most enthusiastic response that any of my questions have provoked. What is it about bodily functions that interests the human so much?

The answer is that it is a “stink pipe” or as one person said a “stench pole”, installed by the Victorians to take the stench out of the sewerage system and expel it high into the sky. There are hundreds of them on our streets and most of us never notice them. There are about four on Bolingbroke Grove alone. One respondent sent me the addresses of three websites devoted to mapping and photographing them and yet another tells me that they were exported to Sydney, Australia, where they can also still be found. Here is just one of the websites: http://stinkpipes.blogspot.com/

So, to this month’s question: Caroline Ganley is having a plaque unveiled to her next month. Ganley Court is a fairly unremarkable Council block on the Winstanley Estate, which was named after her. Here she is, on the left, but who was she and why is she worth commemorating?