Capco have sold their interest in the Earls Court Project Joint Venture scheme to developer Delancey and APG for £425m; as part of the exchange, LBHF council are buying back the 760 homes in West Kensington and Gibbs Geen estates for the same price – £105m – as Capco paid for the land before 2012. Here is a link to a summary of the situation: https://www.onlondon.co.uk/earls-court-capco-sells-interests-in-controversial-boris-johnson-backed-redevelopment/ There was a post in this blog on 14 July 2019. Here is a link to the Evening Standard article: https://www.standard.co.uk/news/london/earls-court-resident-victory-housing-estates-under-threat-of-demolition-handed-back-to-council-a4289941.html?fbclid=IwAR1DHOWr2UfU_6G8EcGxBQN7Fp8mIPo797aanOT6nUKVOHj6dk1nPeO2ZRw Or click here for hard copy image: IMG_0002 Here is a link to the West Kensington estates Facebook page: https://www.facebook.com/pg/westkengibbsgreen/posts/
Here is the Hammersmith MP Andy Slaughter’s summary of this saga: AndySlaughterNews19Nov2019 He has done an immense amount of work to oppose the harmful Capco Earls Court Project.
Update on 100 West Cromwell Road (The ‘Tesco Tower’ site): Further to our post about this site on 17 July 2019, the Mayor of London had called in the RBKC planning decision on 1 July 2019. The Planning Application reference PP/19/00781 for the local authority RBKC is here: https://www.rbkc.gov.uk/planning/searches/details.aspx?adv=0&simple=West+Cromwell+Road&simpleBatch=20&simSubmit=Search&id=PP/19/00781&cn=225262+DP9+Ltd+100+Pall+Mall+London+&type=application&tab=tabs-planning-1 The GLA reference is 4810, and the public hearing details are here: https://www.london.gov.uk/what-we-do/planning/planning-applications-and-decisions/public-hearings/100-west-cromwell-road-public-hearing Subsequent to the Mayor’s direction on 1 July 2019, on 13 November 2019 the applicant developer submitted revisions to the Application. Here is the Notice letter about the consultation until 20 December 2020; click on each page: IMG_0005 IMG_0006
Following the Dame Judith Hackitt’s Review of Building Regulations and Fire safety recommendations, the government issues a consultation called “Building a safer future: proposals for reform of the building safety regulatory system.” Here is a link to the consultation: https://www.gov.uk/government/consultations/building-a-safer-future-proposals-for-reform-of-the-building-safety-regulatory-system
Here is our hasty response: EarlscourtierResponseBuildingSafetyReformConsultation
Our response is based on the well-informed London Tenants Federation model Response; here is a link to the LTF briefing: https://londontenants.org/publication/briefing-government-proposals-for-reform-of-the-building-safety-regulatory-system/
The Earls Court public sector Tenants’ Association has expressed concerns about planning proposals for the 100 West Cromwell Road site since 2004. There have been about ten major planning applications for the area around the Tesco megastore, which is also known as 135-179 Warwick Road. It was originally called ‘Fenelon Place phase 2’; (‘phase 1’ being the Tesco megastore.) Here is a schematic diagram in 2008 of the northern end of Warwick Road: 
100 West Cromwell Road site is coloured red at the bottom.
The site owners Meyer Bergman and development managers Londonewcastle submitted a planning application (PP/19/00781) in February 2019, in essence for the erection of eight buildings up to a maximum of 22 storeys (above the existing podium on top of part of the Tesco car-park), providing 427 residential units, sports hall, swimming pool and some open space.
The application was heard before the RBKC Planning Committee on 30 May 2019. The planning officer’s report recommended Refusal. The planning committee decided to Refuse permission, on the grounds set out in the Officer’s report.
Here is an article about the government’s housing minister’s decision on 11 July 2019: https://www.onlondon.co.uk/government-grants-right-to-transfer-to-cressingham-estate-but-rejects-earls-court-bid/
The Sunday Times wrote on 7 July 2019: “London mayor Sadiq Khan bids for part of Earls Court development site. Transport body seeks bigger share of stalled project. By Oliver Shah & John Collingridge.
The mayor of London has made a surprise bid for part of the troubled Earls Court site in London as takeover interest swirls around its FTSE 250 developer, Capital & Counties (Capco). Transport for London (TfL), an independent authority that reports to mayor Sadiq Khan, made an unsuccessful offer to Capco for part of the site around the now demolished Earls Court Two exhibition centre in west London.
Capco, whose main holdings are the Earls Court development and a retail portfolio in Covent Garden, put together the Earls Court scheme in the boom years of the London housing market between 2010 and 2013. It envisaged building 7,500 homes on 77 acres.
However, the scheme has become mired in difficulties since control of Hammersmith & Fulham council swung from Conservative to Labour in 2014. The council has demanded the return of two estates sold to Capco by the previous administration and engaged in a war of words with the company’s bosses, Ian Hawksworth and Gary Yardley. Capco announced in May last year that it was considering demerging Earls Court from Covent Garden, encouraging approaches for Earls Court from the Hong Kong billionaire Li Ka-shing and the developer Canary Wharf Group. Capco’s attempts to sell have been complicated by the council’s insistence that the West Kensington and Gibbs Green estates be returned to public ownership.
TfL already owns 37% of the main Earls Court scheme, with Capco owning the rest. TfL said it had “put forward a proposal” to buy land around Earls Court Two on the condition that Capco hand back the estates. The move is said to have been driven by Khan’s need for more affordable homes to be built.
TfL said: “We believe our proposal would have enabled development, with higher levels of affordable housing, to quickly progress, while also representing good value for Capco’s shareholders. Unfortunately, our proposal was not accepted. We are reviewing next steps.”
Relations between TfL and Capco have come under strain amid the row with the council. In May, after TfL obtained its own valuation of Earls Court, Capco was forced to disclose that its share of the development had fallen in value to £412m from a peak of £803m in 2015. The company’s share price has halved to 223p over the same period.
Capco said all approaches for Earls Court were “evaluated with regard to their likely value and deliverability”. TfL is under huge financial pressure. Its budget has been shredded by delays to Crossrail, the new east-west rail development now due to open by the end of 2021, up to two years late. Ratings agency Moody’s recently said that the delay will cost TfL more than £1bn in lost revenue. The authority is also being weaned off subsidies from Westminster, which will cost it c£700m per year.”
Here is a link to the above article in an update on the Earl’s Court ‘regeneration’ site: on 7 July 2019 in the Sunday Times: SundayTimes7July2019 ; and here’s a link to the Estates Gazette article on 11 July 2019: https://www.egi.co.uk/news/malthouse-rejects-earls-court-tenants-acquisition-bid/
Here is an earlier summary of the situation on 6 July 2019: https://www.onlondon.co.uk/transport-for-london-steps-up-pressure-on-earls-court-developer-over-failure-to-build-homes/
On 13 June 2019 we showed our feelings outside parliament, whilst there was a debate in the Chamber calling for the building of at least 100,000 per year by Matt Western MP. The motion has now become the View of the House, as a result of no MP speaking against it. Here we are: 
This was the outcome of the Debate: Question put and agreed to: Resolved,
That this House recognises that there is a housing crisis with too few genuinely affordable homes to rent and buy; further recognises that the number of new social rented homes built in recent years has been too low; notes that the Government has set a target to build 300,000 homes a year, which is unlikely to be achieved without building more social homes; further notes that Shelter’s recent report, A Vision for Social Housing, concluded that 3.1 million new social rented homes need to be built over the next 20 years; and calls on the Government to adopt a target of building 155,000 social rented homes, including at least 100,000 council homes, each year from 2022.
On 25 May 2019 the ‘Homes for All’ campaign (UK) sent a message of support to the National Alliance of HUD housing tenants in the USA; here’s the pic: 
We fight for decent, secure, affordable and safe homes. We meet on Saturday 29 June 2019 at the Unite regional office, 33 Moreland Street. We also assemble on 6 June 2019 11am in Parliament Square, outside where the MPs debate about the re-housing of Grenfell victims. There is a protest on Saturday 15 June 12noon demanding justice over the delay of the Grenfell fire Inquiry report outside parliament; see the facebook event page: bit.ly/GrenfellJune
On 19 February 2019 we were in the Social Housing Action Campaign successfully disrupting the Savills auctioning of social housing property; here’s a video: SHACdisruptsSell-Off
Here’s a link to the press release: SHACpressReleaseFeb2019
On 1 May 2019 some of us took part in the “Alternative Housing Awards” outside Grosvenor Hotel in Park Lane. Here’s a photo, which includes the Kensington & Chelsea banner: 
Here’s the event flyer: AltHousingAwards2019flyer There’s lots of resources on: shac blog
There are films being screened on Wednesday 1 May about the late Father Bill, former priest at St Cuthbert’s Church:
Wednesday 1 May
14:00
Father Bill Kirkpatrick
The screening of the films
A Life of a Priest and
Memories of Father Bill Kirkpatrick
with afternoon tea
at St Cuthbert’s Church
50 Philbeach Gardens
The Egyptionate frieze on the external wall of the Warwick Road Homebase was destroyed in 2014. One of the cobra water spouts, made out of St Bees stone, was salvaged. Here are photographs: 
The Post-Modernist architect Ian Pollard has been visited and informed.
The Social Housing Action Campaign (SHAC) meeting on Tuesday 29 January 2019 was well attended. Here is the website: https://shaction.org/ Some of us attended a very good discussion on SHAC’s position on the Labour Party’s housing green paper and our general manifesto. Tenants and residences from housing associations, councils, housing coops, and Unite and GMB housing workers, and more, all contributed.
For one million council homes in a first term of a left wing Corbyn government and decent housing and rent controls for all! That’s our starting point! From pics, here’s Notting Hill/ Genesis Housing Assoc merger activists: 
earlsct 