Issue - meetings

The Committee received a deputation from three representatives of the Hornsey Town Hall Appreciation Society – Clifford Tibber, Alan Midgley and David Winskill.

Mr Tibber presented the deputation.  NOTED:

a.         At the Cabinet meeting on 17 October, a petition had been presented with 2300 signatures, asking Cabinet to reconsider the decision to turn HTH into a hotel.  Since this date, the number of signatories had risen to 6660.  Catherine West MP had received over 1000 emails requesting that the decision be referred to full Council for a decision.  A third of the Councillors had called in the decision, and had requested it to be referred to full Council.  Mr Tibber requested that Overview and Scrutiny Committee could not ignore these, as these figures alone should be sufficient to trigger a debate at a full Council meeting.

b.         The award of a contract to an SPV which had not been part of the original procurement process was not appropriate.  The original bid for the contract was by Far East Consortium, but the contract had been awarded to a newly set up company by FEC, who did not bid for the contract.

c.         The GVA Options Appraisal Report had produced definitions for the minimum requirements of community use and access of Hornsey Town Hall:

-       Regular tours of / interactive tools for, the historic spaces, with specific guided events at least once a month (minimum);

-       The building must be open and accessible to the public for key dates such as for example St George’s Day and Armistice Day ceremonies;

-       The building must be open and accessible for London Open House;

-       Special ‘one-off’ community requests should be accommodated wherever possible; and

-       HTH and its facilities should be accessible to all, and accordingly a differentiated price list for facility hire should reflect commercial and community needs and affordability.

It was considered that these definitions did not provide for community use.

d.         It was suggested that HTH could continue to run as a community building, with the rents from businesses run from HTH being used to fund community events.  The car park could be sold, and the revenue made from this used to repair HTH.

e.         There had been no consultation on this, and the only information provided to the public had been what Cabinet had chosen to publish.  A request had been made in June to see the tenderer information, but the information had not been released.  This was referred to the Information Commissioner, who had confirmed that this information should be made available.