Who Will Cash in on Coin Street?

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planning spokesperson on Lambeth Council, reports on a battle between supposedly, lot. no prevaren posals - from 326 feet to Throughout the 1970's 453 feet in height. A two separate exercises number of planning 'gains' were going on, both con- proposals items of Chris Smith, chair of housing on Islington council and Labour PPC for Islington South, looks at the Labour Housing COMMUNITY planners may well know within the next few weeks whether potentially one of the most lucrative land projects in western Europe will be given to the local people for housing and light industry, or over to property speculators who want to build approaching a million feet of offices.

The Coin Street site on the south bank of London's river Thames has been the subject of two public enquiries, more than a decade of wrangling, and occasional direct action in trying to ensure that this area around Waterloo - has a future for the local people and not for international capital:

Eventually the final decision on how the site should be. developed rests with Environment Secretary Mr. Michael Heseltine. Given his recent decisions supporting demolition of listed buildings and communities in favour of grandiose, profitseeking developments one can only pessimistically predict that Waterloo, too, will fall under the iron heel Social of massive office blocks providing an easy fortune for those who own them.

The battle really dates back to 1953, when the Coin Street site - previously used for houses, industry and wharves - was purchased by the old London County Council at a cost of £48,000 per acre. The area remained largely undeveloped until 1969, when London Weekend Television was given permission to use part of the site as its headquarters.

Speculative

Planning permission for the 18-storey block was granted on the proviso that it would be entirely used by LWT for televisionrelated purposes - in true speculative style, half of it is now leased by LT to, ironically, the Customs and Excise department. So public money is spent on renting property built, -11gain!

cerning the future of the Coin Street Waterloo area.

Private developers were submitting grandiose plans for a hotel and office development, ranging according to different prowere attached to these occupier sector, and especially has to begin phasing out mortgage tax relief, and making capital gains accountable TOI tax too. 2. In one (unpublicised) respect the present Tory government has been more progressive than previous Labour ones: simply by holding the upper threshold Will Heseltine open up Coin St. to another 'competition'? alleged community benefit which would have been built by the private developers to sweeten the pill of massive office blocks. In many cases elsewhere, such planning 'gains' have been dropped or modified to make them worthless.

Meanwhile, the public authorities had been drawing up their own to a residual, weltare-only role. It's up to the Labour Party, and Labour Coun cils, to insist that Council housing must be available to anyone who wants to rent, rationed on a basis of need alone. 5. All our aims are of course rendered worthless unless we have a proper building programme for public sector housing.

Over the past two years most local authorities have seen their housing investment allocations halved. There are rumours now of a further 20% cut next year. The effects of this - in lost jobs in construction, and in fewer homes for those who desperately need them - are only now really beginning to bite.

Things are going to get worse; and we shall need all of Gerald Kaufmann's promises and more, from the first day of a Labour government, if we're to move forward Housing is too important for everyone, to be neglected any longer as a major political issue — especially by the Left in the Party. plans. Both the Greater London Council and Lambeth Council had set up consultation exercises and working parties to study the future of the area. Eventually, in 1976, the GLC gave a general guideline for the Waterloo part of London, with 'a substantial emphasis on housing and a severe restraint of further office development' Local groups had by this time become a dominant voice in the proceedings, supporting a plan in 1977 for 211 publicly-built houses in the Coin Street site. But that soon disappeared when the Tories took over at the GLC in May 1977 - the private developers, Heron, dusted off their plans for a huge office and hotel proposal, and immediately received the support of their political allies who were then running London.

So by 1977, the developers were supported by the GLC, and the local groups - 24 in all - were combining into a powerful lobby, the Coin Street Action Group, which coordinated a campaign against hotels and offices and for homes and a new park.

The situation was now polarised - private developers versus working people. The Labour Party, however, was slow to support the aims of the community. A series of planning spokespersons in AT the most recent meeting of Glasgow District Labour Party, on Thursday 23rd, much of the time was spent in an attack by the leadership of the council Labour Group and the District Party on a recent article in Socialist Organiser. The article was about the sale of the Hutchesontown E scheme in the Gorbals to private builders.

Jean McFadyen, leader of the Group, said that the article was in the hands of the Town Clerk, who was examining it with a view to initiating legal proceedings. Kit McCafferty, chairperson of the District Labour Party, further claimed that the article was disrespectful to the late MP for Queens Park, Frank McElhone, and the author should be expelled from the Labour Party.

What could account for this near-hysteria? The crux of the matter is the determination of the Labour council to proceed with the sale of a large chunk of the Gorbals to private builders for apparently bargain-basement prices.

They have shown no sign of being deterred by the opposition of the local Labour Party.

Jean McFadyen administrations were reluctant to listen to the community groups, and it was not until the summer of 1981 that Lambeth Council's submissions on the site fell into line with those of the local people -even though Lambeth had always been strongly against the use of the site for offices.

By that time, the GLC had again become the property of the Labour Party, with a radical administration supporting the tall for homes and light industry and a better environment, on the controversial site.

Meanwhile new developer, Greycoats Estates (50 per cent owned by the builders McAlpine) became the leading private interest in the scramble for the land.

So here we are. Two public enquiries later, with the battle between two completely different interests. The ball now rests, alas, in Michael Heseltine's court. His answer and final decision will have far-reaching consequences -well beyond the Coin Street saga.

So what will Heseltine do? A number of options are available. He could quite simply opt for one of the two alternative plans -either the community's or the developer's. He could, in the meeting that there would be discussions, but no consultations, between the councillors and the DLP.

Effective opposition to the sale has however emerged in the Gorbals: the Stop the Sale campaign, with which the author of the article complained about is closely associated.

The SSC has taken the issue out among the people of the Gorbals and the wider labour movement, and they are working towards the formulation of an alternative plan for the area based on the needs of the people who live there.

The leadership of the Labour Group and some people in the DLP are determined to discredit and weaken the campaign.

•Whatever is decided about legal proceedings, there can be no question of the expulsion of the author of the article from the Labour Party. Nor can there be any question of abandoning the good work done by the Stop the Sale Campaign.

No-one must be panicked or intimidated into abandoning the effort to build an effective campaign to stop the sale of the scheme. more likely, try to mix the two with a hotch-potch of offices and houses in what would become a totally undesirable coupling of residential accommodation and office blocks. He could even go for yet another public enquiry, although this would probably be resisted by all contending parties.

Or, in a more sinister way, he could use his powers to effectively 'appoint someone to develop the site, as he did nearby when he used a so-called Special Development Order on the Vauxhall Cross part of the south bank of the Thames.

complex There, he organised a competition for architects to design a huge office complex - the 'winning' entry has now been given planning permission, much to the delight of the international business interests who are sponsoring it. The fear is, Heseltine could do the same to Coin Street.

Now we all await the decision - dependent on that is whether the Coin Street area will return to a working class and dignified community, or whether it will fall victim to the property speculators who will be lining their pockets at the expense of Britain's housing and environmental needs. It has been drawn to our attention that unsubstantiated allegations against Glasgow District Labour Group are made in an article in Socialist Organiser no.99 (September 9. 1982.)

The last but one sentence of this article reads: "Although. the Hutehes ontown E scheme is now virtually empty, many of the problems associated with the decades-long anti-dampness campaign remain: a Labour District Group accountable not to the District Labour Group but only to back-handers from local building firms, a moribund local Labour Party, do-nothing local councillors, and an unscrupulous careerist MP* While standing by the comment that the District Labour Group is not adequately accountable to the District Labour Party (the sentence as published clearly contains a typesetting error), we accept that the other allegations in this sent ence are not supported by evidence. We unreservedly withdraw them and apologise.

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capitalists and the community.

We apologise