Examination of Witnesses (Questions 100
- 119)
WEDNESDAY 24 FEBRUARY 2010
MS ROSEMARIE
MACQUEEN,
MR STEVEN
BEE AND
MR JAMES
HOWE
Q100 Mr Todd: You say "generally
speaking", what qualifications would you add?
Mr Bee: Well, I think there are
one or two occasions where we would have liked them to have come
to us rather earlier with a less fully formed proposal that we
could have helped them shape in perhaps a rather more sensitive
way, but I think on balance it is generally a positive story.
Q101 Jim Cousins: Mr Bee, both verbally
and in writing you have made a similar point about The Crown Estate,
so if you do not mind I will use the point in your written evidence
where you say: "The approach of The Crown Estate to development
opportunities is ... comparable with that of the premier private
development companies in England." Do you think you are setting
a high enough standard there?
Mr Bee: Well, we would like all
developers to work as well as The Crown Estate and some other
developers can work, and we would like them to work that well
all the time.
Q102 Jim Cousins: But you are seeing
The Crown Estate here very much as a development company rather
than as a body with perhaps a special remit?
Mr Bee: That is how we come across
them primarily.
Q103 Jim Cousins: That is how you
come across them. What would you expect of them?
Mr Bee: Well, it is not for me
to say what I would expect of them—
Q104 Jim Cousins: No, it is for you
to say what you would expect of them.
Mr Bee: Well, as far as English
Heritage is concerned, we would expect them to take the appropriate
responsibility for sustaining the historic significance of that
part of the estate which is recognised as being historically important.
A lot of it is recognised and is designated, like Regent Street.
There are large parts of it increasingly under the sea, which
are not well understood, not sufficiently recognised as being
historic and that is why we are working closely with them to help
them shape an approach to the exploitation of the seabed in particular
in a way which recognises and then protects the historic significance
of what may lie beneath the water.
Q105 Jim Cousins: Let us be clear
about this, certainly with regard to the marine environment you
would not regard simply acting as a premier development company
to be a high enough standard of performance?
Mr Bee: Not yet, no, because,
as we heard earlier, they had a monopoly in a very new area of
activity, but I was talking mainly of their activities in urban
development, where I would say that when they are at their best
they are comparable with the best that others can do in the private
sector.
Q106 Jim Cousins: Yes. I am a little
troubled by that because after all their name suggests that they
do have wider responsibilities. They told us that they wished
to get rid of what they call their "non-core activities"—we
will come on a little later to explore what that might be, but
they wanted to get rid of their non-core activities to become
a major developer of retail and industrial estates across England,
or for that matter Scotland, of course. Do you think that is a
good enough set of objectives for somebody with the responsibilities
they have through statute?
Mr Bee: Well, I cannot comment
on what their wider responsibilities should be, but as a developer
that does not seem to me to be a particularly unusual or unacceptable
aspiration.
Q107 Jim Cousins: So all your comments
are related to seeing The Crown Estate as a developer and you
are not willing to make any comments upon what standards we ought
to expect of them with a wider statutory or community remit?
Mr Bee: As a developer, I would
not draw a distinction between the standards that The Crown Estate
should adopt being different from any other developer. It may
be that the purely private developer might rely more on the local
planning authority to determine where their wider social responsibilities
lie, but on the whole we have found that in relation to the specific
schemes we have engaged with them on, when they have come and
talked to us early then we have found the negotiations in relation
to protecting and sustaining the historic significance of places
has been overall very good.
Q108 Jim Cousins: Comparable with
a good private developer?
Mr Bee: Yes.
Q109 Jim Cousins: Thank you. Mr Howe,
the name Paul Clark has been mentioned already and I thought you
were here from the Royal Institute of Chartered Surveyors, but
you made it clear to us that in fact you are with the Church Commissioners.
Did you work at the Church Commissioners with Paul Clark?
Mr Howe: Yes.
Q110 Jim Cousins: Thank you. That
is obviously helpful to put your evidence in some context, perhaps.
The Crown Estates in their evidence to us have said that they
operate with commercialism, integrity and stewardship. Commercialism
perhaps we have already explored. What would you understand either
from a RICS point of view or a Church Commissioner point of view
by the concept of "stewardship"?
Mr Howe: Looking after the asset
that has come down to the current generation, deriving the maximum
current income consistent with handing on, if possible, an enhanced
asset for future generations.
Q111 Jim Cousins: Thank you. I wonder
if I could ask the representative from Westminster, in your written
evidence you did express some concern about commercialism guiding
The Crown Estates and you mentioned particularly Regent's Park
and Millbank. Do you have any specific concerns of that kind or
was that just, as it were, a general precautionary point?
Ms MacQueen: It was probably a
general precautionary point at that time, but I have to say I
drafted that just prior to knowing about the possible sale of
the residential assets in the south. All the assets in the north,
in the Regent's Park area, are all market housing.
Q112 Jim Cousins: Within those areas
of housing there are, of course, undeveloped areas of land. The
attention of the Committee has been drawn to one such area of
land within their estate portfolio. Are you concerned about what
their attitude might be to the development of those otherwise
undeveloped areas of land?
Ms MacQueen: I am not sure whether
that is within our area because part of the Regent's Park estate
is, of course, within Camden, but wherever it is, if it was within
our area I am not sure that I would say I would be concerned because
we have got very strong planning policies and any application
for building within that area is either going to be acceptable
or not, depending on what it is that they are proposing. So within
that, if we were looking at market housing, after a certain threshold
we would be looking for affordable housing, then whether it is
an opportunity to have commercial. Then again, after you get a
certain threshold of commercial you are expected to put in the
mixed use, so when you were talking about stewardship we have
a slightly different view, which is that for the settled estates
there is an expectation in a sense that they are not an in and
out developer. Because they are longer term they do all have corporate
governance, policies they work to, and The Crown is not different
from that. The point I was making about Regent Street—and
it would be the same case here—is that all of those developments
in a sense come with what you might call community costs attached
to them which are either delivered ongoing or delivered at the
time of development. So I would not be pushed into saying that
I have got grave concerns. Obviously they have got to make a commercial
decision about whether something is acceptable but I am not going
to in a sense flex the policies if it is uncommercial for them
to do something.
Q113 Jim Cousins: Right. Again, you
are looking at them very much as a commercial developer. I want
to move you straight on to the point about housing, which you
yourself raised earlier. I understood your comments then to mean
that you had got an assurance from The Crown Estate Commissioners
that existing social housing, assured shorthold tenancies, key
worker tenancies, would be maintained. Is that assurance in writing
or did it emerge at a meeting?
Ms MacQueen: It emerged at a meeting,
but subsequent to that there is a copy letter which I have which
is obviously part of this narrative which is ongoing with tenants
who have been concerned, but the point I was making is that it
actually does not give us what we would seek. It actually is about
the current people who are in properties and not for the longer
term, and that is where our concern would be.
Q114 Jim Cousins: It might be useful
for us to see the letter you have just now referred to, but let
us be clear about that. That assurance relates to the present
tenants. It does not offer any assurance that the accommodation
which the tenants are using will continue to be social, affordable
or key worker housing?
Ms MacQueen: Yes.
Q115 Jim Cousins: And it is that
assurance that you are seeking from Westminster Council and that
assurance presently you do not have?
Ms MacQueen: Yes, that is correct.
Jim Cousins: Thank you.
Chairman: I want to turn finally in the
last few minutes to the role of Crown Estate Commissioners as
a rural landlord.
Q116 John Thurso: We had one written
submission which described The Crown Estate Commissioners as an
exemplary rural landlord. I think probably James Howe is best
to answer this. Would you agree with that and can you give me
any specific examples of best practice?
Mr Howe: I think, from my experience
of meeting with opposite numbers at The Crown, I would not differ
from that description of them. In terms of best practice, there
are many areas, as I am sure you are familiar with in the management
of a rural portfolio and best practice might, for example, be
in the employment, the contract arrangement and the control of
managing agents, the Crown Estate being an estate which is managed
by managing agents under contract who report to a central small
group in head office, so the arrangements that those agents will
be operating under in terms of rent review, dealing with renewals
of leases, tenancies, taking of surrenders, and so on, all of
that would be identified as best practice.
Q117 John Thurso: The Crown Estate
works through a variety of firms of land agents and do not actually
do any in-house management?
Mr Howe: Correct.
Q118 John Thurso: Whereas many larger
private sector landowners would tend to have their own either
factoring or land agent resident, as it were. Do you think what
they do is a good idea or a bad idea, or not a factor?
Mr Howe: I think both regimes
have their benefits. I think that it is perfectly acceptable.
It is one that the Church Commissioners follow, to use outside
agents and in fact we use some of the same firms to carry out
the administration. The reason is that the estates of The Crown
are spread fairly thinly throughout the whole of England and also
into Scotland and in order to directly employ it is not always,
I think, cost-effective. So to have the benefit of local knowledge
and to have people based locally under a contract of employment
which is regularly tested against other comparable firms is a
very satisfactory way of proceeding.
Q119 John Thurso: The NFU is slightly
more critical and they made the point that when they got shot
of Cluttons it was in mid rent review for a lot of people, so
the rent review was started by the agent who knew them it would
be finished by a new agent who did not know them and that was
not terribly helpful, so perhaps they need to look at that bit?
Mr Howe: That is certainly something
I have first-hand experience of. It was impossible. Because of
the length of the procedure for rent reviews on Agricultural Holdings
Act farms it is almost certain that you will have that particular
arrangement, notices served running before the conclusion of the
negotiation.
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