Agenda item

The meeting paused while Cllr Berryman and Cllr Hearn left the Chamber.

A deputation was put forward by Mr Stephen Brice on behalf of the Pinkham Way Alliance in relation to item 9, Pre-Submission Consultation on the North London Waste Plan.

Mr Brice was accompanied by Eveleen Ryan and began his representation by drawing attention to the fact that the Pinkham Alliance had written a letter to the Monitoring Officer with regards to some misrepresentations and errors in the earlier draft of the report, shared with them. The Council’s response, itself, raised issues and the Pinkham Way Alliance’s reply to the Monitoring Officer would include a number of additional points about the report at item 9. Mr Brice continued to highlight the areas that required attention:

• Paragraph 6.33 – stated that Pinkham Way was also proposed to be designated as a site for waste planning purposes in the waste plan. Mr Brice contended that this demonstrated the Councils intention to re-designate this site, through the back door, as locally significant industrial land. This was something which the 2012 Planning Inspector had summarily rejected.

• The Deputation felt that paragraph 6.39, overall, did not make sense. They contended that the North London Waste Authority had made clear, in correspondence on the 14^th of January, that their focus and strategy is on Edmonton and there were no plans for developing Pinkham Way but perceived this site as an asset for the future. Although, the NLWA were not asking for the site to come out of the plan, in the Deputation’s view there was a marked difference from needing the site for delivery of its waste strategy or the potential for it to be used for waste use as asserted by the report at item 9. This section also left out the recent statement of the NLWA which set out that they do not consider the Pinkham Way site ideally suited for waste and maybe open to offers for the land.

• The statement that any proposal for waste use at Pinkham Way would be smaller than previous proposed developments, had no supporting evidence anywhere in the document.

• There was no reference in the report to the consultation response from Natural England, commenting on the rich diverse bio mix of habitats at Pinkham Way which would be a loss to Haringey and more widely to London, if the site was developed. The latter part of this comment was the form of words used to describe a site of metropolitan importance. The Deputation contended that this assessment put Pinkham Way on a par with other Haringey sites of metropolitan importance such as Queenswood, Highgate and parts of the Lea Valley.

• The Deputation referred to Metropolitan sites which reported that the London Plan includes the best examples of London’s habitats including sites in urban areas such as abandoned land colonised by nature and that these were the highest priority for protection. As a SINC, the site had fulfilled its planning purpose for 40 years. However, as designated employment land it had not provided employment in the last 19 years, since holding this designation.

• Deputation advised that in their view, the report did not address: the imbalance in the sustainability appraisals conclusions,  the negative environmental consequences of development, the loss of the SINC designation, air quality problems and other matters not supporting the designation of this area as a site for waste disposal use.

• The Deputation then questioned the Council’s ruling on treating two separate petitions as being one representation. The Deputation contended that the 2011 waste plan consultation guide specifically allowed groups to make a single response supported by signatures and the North London Waste Authority accepted the Alliance’s submission on that basis. In Oct 2011, the planning inspectorate instructed the Council to follow the same process. The Council would be sent written evidence to support this issue of contention. The present consultation report revealed that the Pinkham Way Alliance made a submission supported by over a thousand signatures, consisting of 30 pages, 10,000 words, and 10 appendices. Also, late last year, the Alliance had launched its petition to Haringey, including a simple request to remove Pinkham Way from the waste plan. If there was confusion about distinguishing the status of the two petitions, then the Deputation suggested that the Council contact the lead officer at the North London Waste Authority.

The Leader sought the Deputation’s view on the suitability of the other sites listed for waste composting, waste transfer and waste disposal. In response the Deputation contended that the remainder of the sites listed were industrial land sites which was suitable for inclusion in a waste plan. The London Plan identified SIL and LSIS as the places to go for waste land. All the other North London Boroughs had done this. However, Haringey Council was the only north London borough prepared to include a grade 1 site of importance for nature conservation on no solid grounds. There were 58 hectares of land allocated for potential consideration of use for waste when only 9 was needed. The Deputation’s view was that the 5.5 acres of the Pinkham Way site was an extraordinary inclusion and there were no planning grounds for this.

The Deputation referred to the previous planning examination of the Pinkham Way site, through the site allocations plan process, and at this stage the site’s designation of employment land was not found to be suitable and therefore it was questionable how it could it be designated as industrial land.

The Deputation further contended that the Planning inspector had advised the Council, at the last hearing, that this land had not produced employment for the last 19 years and it was not right to keep this designation on a site that was not producing this outcome. The Deputation asserted that the Planning hearing had questioned if the Pinkham Way site was needed by the Council for employment given that this had now become a valuable environmental site. This had further indicated that this land should not be allocated for employment purposes and the Deputation felt that this was likely to be the conclusion of the next Planning Inspector too. The Deputation contended that this view was supported by employment adviser and environmental adviser at the hearing, adding that a viability study considered at the hearing found the site not suitable for employment. The Deputation concluded that this was not objective planning action being undertaken by the Council and re-designating the site as a waste site was not acceptable and indicated that the decision could be legally challenged.

Mr Brice added that the Council was always maintaining that the site was objectively identified as required to meet employment needs. However, the employment needs identified, specifically related to B class business unit use at the site which was unsuitable for Pinkham way.

The Assistant Director for Planning was asked to respond to the technical points raised in the Deputation.

• The Deputation were selective in their quotes of the Planning Inspectors report. The site was an employment site and a SINC and the Council did not believe that these two uses for the site were incompatible. The site was not open space and was contaminated. In terms of the viability reports, these were responding to whether there were new employment uses put forward for the site and were not relevant for this particular instance as it would be the waste authority that would be bringing forward a new use for the site. Therefore, it was not correct to quote the viability report on this particular aspect without information on the context.

• The Assistant Director for Planning also advised that the matters raised in the Deputation tonight were not the matters raised in the written submission of the Deputation. Therefore, it was proposed that there be a response in writing to the issues, raised above, when there had been adequate time to consider the issues. The Assistant Director for Planning referred to the letter that was sent by the Pinkham Way Alliance to the Monitoring Officer and copied to the Chief Executive and Leader which had been responded to by the Legal department.

The Deputation clarified that there was a letter specifically sent to leader which had been sent in September without a direct response and they acknowledged receipt of the Monitoring Officer’s letter .The timing of the required submission of a Deputation also meant that the submission could not include references to the report in question and therefore to avoid making representations in line with the report being considered at a meeting was also felt, by the Deputation, to not be appropriate.

The Leader responded to the Deputation, emphasising that the North London waste plan was in line with the London Plan and national planning guidance steer of requiring planning authorities to look at employment land for waste site use. The Deputation interrupted the response to dispute this. The Assistant Director for Planning further confirmed that the North London Waste Plan was in line with the London Plan. The Leader underlined that waste had to be recycled somewhere, and making use of contaminated land which was a long way away from where people lived was an appropriate consideration. Neither national guidance nor the London Plan stipulated that only certain types of employment land should be identified for potential waste use. As required, the boroughs have assessed all sites and areas including Pinkham Way against a set of social, economic and environmental criteria as to whether the land is suitable for potential waste use.

The Leader was aware of the previous proposal, eight years ago, to put a larger incinerator on the Pinkham Way site and this was no longer planned. If the site were to be used, only part of the site would be used for the waste site, and this would be for recycling, waste composting or waste transfer.

The Leader thanked the Deputation for attending the meeting and for making their representations.