Examination of Witnesses (Questions 10820
- 10839)
10820. Chairman:—but what he was
giving a guarantee of is that yes, that could be done.
10821. Mr Mould: The deed procedure will
apply in this case. I am not going to burden the Committee with
the whys and wherefores, but it includes appropriate provision
for the arrangements that you have just mentioned to me and which
we mentioned in relation to St Dunstan's Church.
10822. While I am on my feet, forgive me for
testing the Committee's patience yet further, but you asked me
about noise in the basement and I said I was going to deal with
that, but in fact, in my desire to sit down as soon as possible,
I did not mention it.
10823. Chairman: Before you do, we have
revisited this particular issue about lack of consultation time
and time again. We have returned to it today about extra impact
assessments, latest impact assessments, renewed impact assessments
and all the rest of it. I really do think from listening today
in this session, you should take away the general consensus from
the Committee that we really do need not to come back and revisit
this time and time and time again. We have had a policy that we
should, with the Petitioners, make contact. Ms Symes, perhaps
you would allow Mr Mould to come back just to give us a sentence
on that and then we will proceed to deal with the matter which
I asked him about which is the noise impact assessment.
10824. Mr Mould: Certainly. What I think
we will do is we will have an audit of those Petitioners who are
coming in the next few weeks and any that raise similar concerns
in relation to the impact of the proposals in terms of settlement
on Listed buildings, we will contact them in the way that you
have indicated.
10825. Chairman: I think that is great,
but I think you should do it for anybody. If they have got a Petition
and the assessments have been done, you should just send them
because it is my belief that if we do not do that we are going
to get people turning up anyway and revisiting the whole of this
issue and I do not think we should do. We should get the reports,
if they are there, sent to them.
10826. Mr Mould: I can confirm again
that is what we will do. All I wanted to say about noise was just
to remind you that we have heard from Mr Thornely-Taylor on the
issue which you mentioned earlier and the simple proposition is
this as he has explained to you in evidence before, the design
criteria that we have adopted for groundborne noise is one that
we will build to and building to that criteria, his evidence is
that will avoid, on the basis of experience, disturbing noise
and vibration impacts on the occupiers of the buildings over the
railway line, that is the position.
10827. Chairman: What we did do in one
or two of the cases was to send somebody down to do an assessment
in the basement area of this particular property, that might be
advantageous. Do you think that could be arranged?
10828. Mr Mould: You would like us to
go and have a look at this basement?
10829. Chairman: Yes.
10830. Mr Mould: If Mr Berryman says
yes, that is fine. He is the man from Del Monte.
10831. Ms Symes: With respect to Mr Berryman
I want to be a little more careful if I may because going out
to have a look at the basement does not quite reassure me about
the care—
10832. Chairman: Let me reassure you.
When I said he should come out and have a look at the basement,
that is my language. I can assure you that Mr Taylor who handles
these matters is a bit more thorough than that and be assured
we will get that report to the Committee and we will consider
that.
10833. Ms Symes: I would like to go a
little further if I may not because I am not completely clear
in my own mind precisely what an Engineering Impact Survey involves
but I do know that there is a very complex range of very different
specialists required for this building because I have been in
consultation with them for some years. It is a very complex combination
of people who are experts in construction, in structural engineers
and then the noise. I do think it is absolutely essential that
we have independent advice from the best possible people. As counsel
said, this is extremely important building and it deserves the
best possible experts giving it independent reports on all these
aspects including the likely noise levels but not restricted to
that and I do need to see that happen. The final point I would
like to make and I am looking at Mr Mantey's response letter now
is that words like "appropriate" do not reassure me,
they certainly do not reassure me on the basis of what I have
seen. For the Promoter to be left to decide alone what is "appropriate"
does not seem to me to be satisfactory, certainly not on the basis
of all the evidence that I have seen and read.
10834. Chairman: That is a factor which
you have stated throughout and repeated. We have taken that into
account. What I can say is that when this Engineering Impact Assessment
is done, if you still at the end of that feel dissatisfied then
you have every right to come back to this Committee, to write
to this Committee and say you are unsatisfied.
10835. Ms Symes: It was clear from Ms
Serota's evidence to you and there was, for example, an agreement
reached on the best possible site for the sound engineer to be
involved in making an assessment for both parties. That seems
to me to be a very reasonable thing for us also to look to the
promoter to do and that might well apply. Rather than doing a
process of let us get the Engineering Impact Survey done and then
say we need something else and perhaps we can have another little
add on and it does not look as if that really could fund this.
That seems to drag it out and make things painful. Could we not
on the basis of the experts that we have currently been using,
with English Heritage's agreement and approval, to advise us on
all aspects of our conservation that the promoter should pay the
costs of putting together for us and for you a full and detailed
careful report. I do think such reports are also needed for many
other buildings to compare this alignment with the number of other
alignments which do not represent the same issues.
10836. Chairman: Mr Mould, do you want
to respond to that?
10837. Mr Mould: Sir, we have said what
we will do in response to your questions. I have indicated our
willingness to do what you have asked us to do and I am not prepared
to go any further than that. That is adequate. Mr Thornely-Taylor
is the Ronaldinho of the noise assessment world and he will look
at this very carefully.
10838. Chairman: Thank you. Ms Symes,
can I say that we have heard your request and we will consider
it. Is that the conclusion of your contributions?
10839. Ms Symes: It is indeed.
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