Well the battle to save the Cultural Quarter has been won, but sadly the war may not be over.

On behalf of the Community Voice Colchester campaign group I would like to congratulate all of the members of the Planning Committee for not being bamboozled by all the flummery offered to them and for making their splendid decision to reject Alumno’s plan unanimously.

Its a very significant decision, given that CBC’s Planning Officer for the application recommended the application be accepted. Which begs a few questions:

1. The major reason for the rejection decision centred on the non-provision of suitable diabled access to the site. The planned ramp from Priory Street is too steep and is thus dangerous for wheelchair users and cannot be used by people who need frames or walkers. Alumno maintain that there is no other way of constructing a ramp of suitable inclination. Various Planning officers attempted to suggest that the issue could be ignored.

Aren't Planning Officers paid to spot and hopefully get these issues rectified before an application is presented to the Planning committee? There appears to be a woeful lack of due diligence taken in this case.

Furthermore the provision of just 1 disabled parking space close to the student residence block is at best inadequate given the number of disabled access rooms on offer.

2. No feasibility study appears to have been done as to where all the students will come from. If a study exists, why has it been kept secret? And if it doesn’t exist, why not? Cllr Young and Cllr Barlow have both assured the people of Colchester via the media that the residence block would be fully occupied, without once offering any evidence for their assertions.

Given that the build for another student block is already underway in Magdelen Street, its difficult to see how the Cultural Quarter block will attract anything like full occupancy.

Alumno cited their successful builds in Norwich. Our understanding is that in Norwich, the UEA DOES require external student accommodation and has entered into partnership agreements where they guarantee the occupancy of new student builds. This is in direct contrast to the University of Essex who have adequate provision and land to build their own student accommodation blocks, which is their preferred method of addressing their students needs. Furthermore they have not entered into any partnership agreement with Alumno.

3. CVC knows of at least 5 detailed objections which highlighted a whole raft of Planning violations and inconsistencies in the Alumno plans. These were from:

a. Kathryn Oelman - Planning Consultant who objected on behalf of OMC Investments Ltd. OMCI owns Greyfriars Hotel and other properties which would be affected detrimentally by the development.

b. Dorian Kelly - Independant researcher representing almost 200 Colchester residents

c. Sir Bob Russell - ex Colchester MP, previously a CBC Councillor and Planning Committee member

d. Sir John Burton – World acclaimed Architect and Chairman of Colchester Civic Society

e. Mark Russell – Ex CBC Planning Officer now working for Ipswich BC.

The first four of the above also spoke against the plans at the Planning meeting. None of the material they presented was refuted. Why then were their written objections apparently ignored by the Planning Officer? In his report to the Planning Committee these evidential statements were glossed over.

4. CVC is aware that at least 20 meetings had taken place between CBC officials and Alumno before the application was filed. . And yet none of these meetings were apparently minuted and so no minutes were made available to the public. This appears to be either due to a deliberate attempt to make these meetings secret, or shows a worrying lack of understanding by the senior CBC person(s) at the meeting of the the need to maintain transparency AT ALL TIMES when dealing with potential business partners, and in fact ANY external entity.

5. A major concern was voiced at the Planning meeting about the lack of any meaningful public consultation, as is required by law. As far as CVC could ascertain, the only time that Alumno could be said to have engaged in any public consultation would be the 2 hour presentation that they made at Greyfriars Hotel when they launched their plans. This wasn't well attended and it appears that Alumno made no effort to invite many people to it.

While Alumno claimed to have made strong efforts to engage all interested parties, it emerged from the meeting that not even the full Council had been engaged, with Cllr Darius Laws and Cllr Simon Crow both testifying that neither had been made aware of the development plans until some time after the consultation period.

None of the residents associations in the immediate area were invited, and were ignored on multiple occasions when they attempted to engage with Alumno. CVC also wrote several times to Alumno requesting a meeting and were similarly ignored

6. The Old Bus Station buildings have now been demolished at CBC’s expense, presumably in the anticipation that the Alumno plan would be accepted. In similar fashion, legal work was rubberstamped by CBC to fast-track the handover of the lease on the land to Alumno. This putting the cart before the horse needs to be stopped. CBC need to be seen to be protecting its, and the people of Colchester’s interests, rather than bending over backwards to assist a potential business partner. So who may now be expected to pay the unnecessary 600k or thereabouts that was spent in levelling the Bus Station area?

It seems to me that before we go any further CBC needs to undertake an urgent, serious and very comprehensive review of how this fiasco was allowed to proceed thus far, and for CBC to take action(s) to prevent this happening again. It is evident from feedback both on the CVC Facebook pages and on the various Colchester community Facebook pages that there is widespread discontent with the conduct of CBC who are perceived to be a law unto themselves, who go ahead with initiatives without regard to the needs of the town, and without any meaningful consultation with its residents.

My personal opinion is that most of the Colchester Borough Councillors do a very good job under the very trying prevailing financial conditions. But there are undoubtedly some bad apples in the CBC barrel who are bringing the whole council into disrepute and who need to be brought to account.

http://www.gov.uk/guidance/consultation-and-pre-decision-matters http://www.local.gov.uk/our-support/guidance-and-resources/data-and-transparency/local-transparency-guidance http://www.local.gov.uk/sites/default/files/documents/councillors-guide-procure-4b2.pdf

Ian Cropton

12 Luard Way