Labour U-turn over ‘vanity project’
In opposition it criticised sale of prime-site offices, but now says plan makes financial sense
Published: 22 July, 2010
by RICHARD OSLEY
A PROJECT to sell off part of the Town Hall and build offices for Camden Council on the King’s Cross railway lands is set to go ahead even though Labour councillors criticised the idea in the past as a needless “vanity project”.
When Liberal Democrats and Tories drew up the scheme last year, Labour members campaigned against the proposal, which will pave the way for developers to seize the 1970s annexe connected to Camden’s old Town Hall, demolish it and build on the site.
Labour MP Frank Dobson even contacted the then Labour minister John Denham urging him to investigate the sale.
But, despite that opposition, the new Labour-led council is to press ahead with the move to new offices close to St Pancras International rail station, to be built on top of a new leisure centre. Labour finance chief Councillor Theo Blackwell said the council was “bleeding money” in trying to maintain old buildings.
At the root of the turn-around is the claim it would cost £77million to put right the annexe building. Less than 35 years old, it has daily faults with lifts and plumbing.
Cllr Blackwell said: “There are lessons to be learned about how you take the community with you and we will be very open with people in King’s Cross about this. When the plans were first announced, I think people were frightened by the size of it but a lot of the issues have been resolved and to do nothing would simply be too costly in the economic climate.”
Nevertheless, there is division in the Labour group about whether it makes sense to embark on a scheme dismissed as a “vanity project” in opposition. Cllr Blackwell said there had not been enough transparency about the project when it was first suggested. “The council is quite far along with this already,” he said.
An unnamed developer has already agreed in principle to buy the annexe, a site which property experts believe could be a goldmine to the right buyer, due to its close proximity to St Pancras International. The railway lands site has also been provisionally earmarked for the new Town Hall.
In December last year, Labour councillor Jonathan Simpson, now the Mayor, wrote in a Forum article for the New Journal: “Once Camden has sold off all their valuable buildings and land it will have raided the family silver and it will be unable to replace it. ”
He warned that moving St Pancras Library, housed in the annexe, across Euston Road to the new site would create difficulties for elderly residents, and forecast problems for Argyle Primary School during the construction period.
The sale is part of a wider property review which is also likely to see the sale of council-owned buildings and land at Bedford House, in Camden Town, offices in Cockpit Yard, Holborn, and buildings in St Pancras Way, Camden Town, and West End Lane, West Hampstead.
Former Lib Dem finance chief Ralph Scott said: “I am pleased Labour has seen sense. It is a testament to the work of the Lib Dem-led council.
“We came up with projects that benefited residents in Camden, so I’m not surprised they are continuing with it.
“I am surprised they have managed to convert some members who were rigid in the opposing stance they took to it.”