Examination of Witnesses (Questions 3740
- 3759)
3740. MR ELVIN: Yes, I have that.
3741. LORD SNAPE: At the bottom of the
first page under, "These questions must be answered before
the Panel can be set up," and there is a list of questions
there. Can I ask you, following on the question from the Chairman,
item 2, what do you know of the residential groups in the King's
Cross area and what powers do they have?
3742. MR ELVIN: As a result of that letter
we wrote to Camden and in the exhibits bundle, my Lord, you will
find our letter to them and our letter back explaining what the
situation was. If you have the rather large exhibits bundle it
is divider F, the first two letters, in particular the letter
from Camden, pages 2, 3 and 4, which is the response from Camden
explaining to us about how the Coopers Lane Group works. That
led us to the view that that was consistent with our undertaking
to the Commons. If that is a way forward that is a way we will
take.
3743. LORD SNAPE: Can you stay with the
same letter and look at item 6 of the questions that were put
by the preliminary Crossrail group organisation? Question 6 asks:
"What arrangements have been made to inform, consult and
allow the Panel powers in participatory decision-making over the
Code of Construction practice?" My question to you is do
the residential groups in King's Cross have those powers?
3744. MR ELVIN: They do not have decision-making
powers, no, they are consultative only. The Construction Code
has been drawn up in consultation by a Panel of all London local
authorities. It is an effort between Crossrail, the Secretary
of State and all the local London authorities—it is a London-wide
document. But the working out of the details in the individual
area the community group, the panel, is consulted on the working
out of the details and what happens is that the local authority
who does have some decision-making powers regards the community,
the liaison group, the panel, whatever they call it—although
they are not a statutory consultee—as a necessary consultee
for making decisions as to how the Code should apply in a particular
location. So although there is not a statutory mechanism in fact
the way it works in practice is that the community panel is consulted
as a matter of course in the group and otherwise by the local
authority, which then makes its decisions in regard to any of
the Schedule 7 consents or making decisions in respect of the
Code.
3745. LORD SNAPE: I am sorry to emphasise
this, but it would be for the local authority to actually be involved
in the participatory decision-making and not the parties?
3746. MR ELVIN: Yes, and the local authority
has a statutory role under Schedule 7 of the Bill as well as under
the Code of Construction. Indeed, I should say that in addition
to the Schools' Panel we do have a community liaison panel which
is up and running in Paddington, which is not generating difficulties,
and that is running on a consultation basis.
3747. LORD SNAPE: I live there so I would
rather you did not go down that particular route!
3748. MR ELVIN: I live near there as
well, my Lord, and I get the letters too!
3749. CHAIRMAN: Ms Cove, I think the
situation is very simple. You want executive powers, you want
financial support. I think you are not going to get it.
3750. MS COVE: I think you are right.
3751. CHAIRMAN: And we cannot force Crossrail
to provide either. What we can do is try to help you to build
upon the experience at King's Cross, which has now evolved into
a situation where the group is positively engaged in taking useful
decisions, without necessarily having executive powers. Until
that stage is reached I fear that your panel is not going to be
very effective, but it does require cooperation from the panel
as opposed to total opposition to Crossrail driving tunnels through
Spitalfields. That is the situation at the moment, to be frank,
because there is total opposition to the whole thing—shaft,
tunnels and everything. And so long as that is the attitude I
do not think that any progress will be made.
3752. MS COVE: I would come back on that
because I have not expressed any opposition to the tunnel project.
I have talked about our concern about the construction site; I
have not opposed it. I do believe that other people may well have
done, but that is not what I have been saying here.
3753. CHAIRMAN: I am using you as a conduit
to address other people because there are certainly a lot of people
in the area, as we saw when we visited, who simply want it to
go away.
3754. MS COVE: Can I just make two final
points, then, in relation to what Mr Elvin has said here? He talked
about something like 300 lorries on Commercial Road. Commercial
Road is a major route through London—I cannot remember whether
it is the A12 or the A13, but it is a major A route—and
it is not in Spitalfields. Secondly, he has talked about 16 lorries;
we may well have 16 lorries in and 16 lorries out, those same
lorries going out, so we are talking about 32 lorry movements
and not just 16, Chair. I will finish there unless Mr Elvin says
anything else.
3755. CHAIRMAN: Tower Hamlets Council
are the highway authority and they are in charge of that sort
of aspect; that is their job.
3756. MS COVE: I appreciate that.
3757. CHAIRMAN: And unless they are involved
in these decision-making matters nobody is going to make any progress.
3758. LORD BROOKE OF ALVETHORPE: Which
brings me to ask Ms Cove, would you be willing to see the Tower
Hamlets Borough take the Chair?
3759. MS COVE: I am a member of the panel,
I cannot make that decision; that has to be a panel decision.
I just do not know what the response would be to that because
certainly somebody from Tower Hamlets did come to the very first
public meeting that Planning Aid organised and was there but we
have not set eyes on them since. So I do not know why they have
not been part of it. We have had all sorts of people along to
the two or three meetings but Tower Hamlets Council has not consulted
us.
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