Is that not right that at the recent local meeting in Friars Place Lane, the representative of Catalyst Housing Association Limited (accomnpanied by Mr Nick O'Donnell of Ealing Council) was saying that they were financing the proposed skyscraper development themselves?But now we read that Ealing Council has decided to loan the sum of £30,000,000-00 to Catalyst even before a planning application has been notified to residents who are to be evicted from their homes of several decades.The Council also found £2,040,000-00 to pay to an off-shore company for the YMCA Building (a Locally-Listed Conservation Area property opened by Lord Kinnaird in 1907) so that it could be flattened and supposedly added into the Empire Cinema restoration - except that the Council did not bother informing Empire Cinemas that it was doing this to "help" them out! Empire Cinemas said at the time that they knew absolutely nothing about the land deal (believed to have been organised by a company called "Bohola" controlled by Mr Pat Doyle, that is, I understand, known to Mr Noel Rutherford, the Director of the Environment Group of Ealing Council).Despite the Council's instant production of millions of pounds for their favoured developer, they cannot afford the sum of £30,000 we are told to notify neighbours of the next skyscraper coming to their neighbourhoods! This refers to the announcement by the Assistant Chief Planning Officer, Ms Alex Jackson, that from April 2015, the Council will stop sending out the usual 21-day neighbour notification letters advising of new planning applications in the road or behind.This drastic change after at least 30 years to my knowledge of notifying neighbours is apparently to save £30,000 per annum.This withdrawal of neighbour notification letters perhaps demonstrates the importance that the Planning Department attaches to the views of the affected neighbours!As a local resident said at the Town Hall Planning Committee not long ago:"Judging by the contradictory and inaccurate case officer’s report, our own personal experience and other residents’ experiences it seems that the Planning Department is always on the developer’s side. Residents seem to be marginalised, disenfranchised and dismissed whilst the local environment and Victorian heritage is being slowly and insidiously degraded. We have to conclude that Ealing Planning Department, in conjunction with the developers it regularly supports, leaves a trail of misery, resentment, and anger, in its wake. If it carries on for much longer, Ealing “The Queen of the Suburbs” will have to go into intensive care! Intelligent, moral, and balanced policies are desperately needed!"
Victor Mishiku ● 3688d