CROYDON IN CRISIS: The borough’s £82,000 per year executive Mayor gave up a morning of his valuable time to help a property PR firm boost the flagging credibility of Westfield’s town centre proposals. And there among the breakfast croissants and coffees was BARRATT HOLMES, housing correspondent
“Get your chequebooks out!”
Doing as he is told: it is clear who is the organ-grinder and who is the monkey
That was the best that Croydon Mayor Jason Perry had to offer in an hour-long, but aptly named, “Breakfast Waffle” event held in central London yesterday morning at the offices of property developer lobbyists LCA.
That’s the same LCA who are managing the public relations for the latest, vacuous public consultation for Westfield in Croydon’s long-neglected town centre.
Oddly, where matters of transparency and openness are concerned (which Mayor Perry is subject to under the Nolan Principles for conduct in public office) there was nothing in the publicity related to this Waffle event that mentioned that Unibail Rodamco Westfield (as the Paris-based development giant is now known) are clients of LCA.
But yesterday’s hour-long session showed all too starkly who is the monkey and who is the organ-grinder in the relationship between the megabillions multi-national URW and the failed Mayor of a south London borough.
It’s probably not a secret that Mayor Perry likes a doughnut. Yesterday morning, he was in among the croissants and coffee set for this Breakfast Waffle, where his task was to pimp out Croydon to an audience of around 40 people.
Some of the audience eager to hear Perry’s every word may have been from other property industry clients of the PR agency, others may have been from development firms, but it was obvious that several were taking a break from their desks elsewhere in LCA’s Holborn offices, probably just to make the numbers attending at least appear respectable.
Yum: it is possible that some, including Mayor Perry, only showed up for the breakfast, and not the waffle
Which is odd, really, because when another Inside Croydon correspondent registered to attend this event, they were told, in polite PR-speak, to sling their ‘ook.
What was promoted as an event open to the public, with no restrictions mentioned, had suddenly become a private event once Inside Croydon showed any interest…
“Thank you for registering your interest in our upcoming Breakfast Waffle Event with Executive Mayor Jason Perry,” an unnamed LCA marketing flunky wrote to our scribe.
“Unfortunately, as this is a private event for LCA’s clients and associates, we will be unable to register your attendance on this occasion.”
Just as well, then, that more than one of this website’s citizen journalists was keen to sample the hospitality in WC1 on a Tuesday morning…
When I arrived, I found myself at a fancy, modern, minimalist office, handy for a pre-breakfast swim in the pool at the Oasis sports centre – just the sort of thing you would expect for a flashy PR agency, where a client’s money is no object. Lots of “bright young things” were working there.
The audience for the waffle was mostly 30somethings, looking far too pleased to be there, keen and eager to ask the easiest and most flattering of questions. The musical Scrooge had once been staged just across the road on Shaftesbury Avenue. This had all the look of a staging of Stooge.
Some LCA wonk stepped forward and said something about Chatham House rules, which seemed somewhat pompous and pretentiously secretive for a bit of property developer boosterism. Was Mayor Perry worried that he might say something wrong, and then get quoted as saying it?
Perry was courteously introduced with all his favourite old lines, born and bred in Croydon, Crystal Palace fan, plastic guttering salesman. Actually, they might not have mentioned the last bit. They certainly didn’t mention that Perry is the Mayor who failed to fix the finances in Croydon.
Perry started his waffle by blathering on about the Croydon “Growth Plan”, a plan that is utterly dependent on Westfield finally delivering on promises that they first made about Croydon town centre almost 14 years ago (there was no mention of that bit, either, funnily enough).
Croydon wanted to “align”, Perry said, with London’s growth plan. His best example of bringing this to reality? URW staging “Costa Del Croydon” on the top floor of a town centre car park, “following the success of last year”, according to Perry.
In the picture: LCA has been distributing generic-looking sketches of what a redeveloped Croydon town centre might look like, one day. They were less forthcoming at their ‘Breakfast Waffle’ in declaring that URW is their client
The detail-lite version of Westfield’s latest “plan” is less retail centre, and more residential in the town centre: 3,000 units more. This, according to Perry, is what Croydon wants. “We want to see a different Croydon going forward,” Perry rambled on. “More residential.”
“Growth will give us investment in Croydon to enable us to move forward,” Perry dribbled out, a line that must have been spoken in one guise or another by a dozen or more local politicians since 2012.
There was a mention of the borough’s heritage, and a mention of the BRIT School. Perry said something about Croydon celebrating young people. Gatwick Airport expansion is, according to Perry, “so important”. No one was so impolite as to mention it was something over which Perry had no control, and barely any influence, even before he was rendered a lame-duck Mayor by the arrival last week of government Commissioners.
Perry’s host, having wiped the croissant crumbs away from her chin, steered the waffle back to URW, and their “masterplan” for North End. As Perry hadn’t bothered (or remembered) to mention this, so the LCA person explained to the audience that the masterplan “framework” had been approved by the council’s planning committee in February.
“How important is it?” she asked (so clearly no threat as an interviewer to Paxman or Kirsty Wark).
“It’s really important,” Perry prattled.
Perry then went off piste slightly. Had he consumed too much caffeine than is good for him? Perry thought it was a good idea to mention comparisons between Croydon and Gotham City. “Crime is actually going down in Croydon – retail theft is going down,” Perry claimed, unchallenged by host or audience. Perry was saying this just days after one of the town centre’s longest-established businesses had announced it is to close, and cited shoplifting as one of its reasons.
There were some questions from the audience, though you sensed maybe not enough, as LCA’s host had to jump in and keep the waffle flowing. LCA’s “clients and associates” would be expecting their full hour’s worth of waffle on behalf of URW.
Asked about the “timeline priorities”, Perry blathered on about “an environment where investors want to go and people want to shop”. Investors always come first for Mayor Perry. He failed to provide any clue as to whether the “timeline priorities” will see Westfield begin construction work any time this decade, though.
“We need to create an immersive economy,” Perry said, without saying what that might mean. The suspicion being that Perry doesn’t actually know what it means, but he might have been told to mention it in briefing notes provided by LCA or URW.
LCA’s host seemed a little confused when it came to politics, and Croydon constituencies.
Sunny outlook: Costa del Croydon, paid for by URW, is what Mayor Perry considers to have been ‘a success’
She seemed to think the council is Labour-controlled (it isn’t; the reason was sitting there beside her: Tory Mayor Perry. How embarrassing!) and that the local MP is Conservative (she isn’t: the MP with constituency offices actually inside the URW-managed Whitgift Centre is Croydon West MP Sarah Jones).
“In our 2022 victory,” the lame-duck Mayor stepped in, “the Conservatives took over from a bankrupt Labour council.”
Then came a belated admission from Perry: “The Conservative central government did not really help. Now the Labour government is sending in Commissioners.”
This, the Mayor who has hiked Council Tax by 27%, presided over Croydon’s third admission of effective bankruptcy and then, this year, begged for another £136million in borrowing, still can’t accept his failure. Commissioners, Perry said, are “not the right answer”.
Perry referred to two senior Labour figures from City Hall. “I have a good relationship with Howard Dawber and Tom Copley,” he said. Perhaps he could ask them for the odd £136million next time his council has run out of money..?
By now, the questions from the floor had run dry. The LCA host was doing a lot of heavy lifting with patsy questions for her guest.
Green Belt? All for it, Perry said (apart from the bits he’s tried to build on or flog off, though he forgot to mention those).
Let’s get back to the town centre, said the host, as she prepared the next soft-ball question. Is it a catalyst for other parts of the borough? “You betcha!” Perry might as well have said.
“I am keen to develop areas where people want to come and shop,” Perry really did say.
The host then asked: “What are you most excited about?” It was as if CBeebies was doing a programme on town planning. But probably best not to ask Mayor Perry too complicated a question.
At one point, Perry described the council as “inward-looking and insular” in terms of its handling of its long-running bankruptcy. It was another rare moment of candour from the waffling Mayor.
“Residents should see improved services, they are our customers and I come from a business background where customers come first,” he said.
“We are improving technology, websites, chatbots etcetera… so that residents can get in touch.” The reality, of course, is the exact opposite. Croydon Council is “inward-looking and insular”, remember?
He even mentioned cutting the grass and emptying the bins, as if doing what the basic tasks that the council is supposed to do is some kind of achievement.
The drivel went on. “Hopefully, residents would say this is now a cleaner, brighter borough than it was three years ago.” You can feel a reader survey coming on…
Other highlights included Perry saying that he is “relatively relaxed about housing numbers”, and pleading for more fees from developers with planning applications. “If we could charge more, we could give a better service to developers.” Croydon has long been notorious for having an under-staffed planning department and slow turnround rate for applications.
Public speaker: Jason Perry is always happy to turn out for a doughnut
Perry said that the “biggest challenge is to change the perception – people say Croydon is finished, but it is not”. Although Perry has certainly done more than his fair share to make it that way.
I think I counted the pedestrian crossing on Wellesley Road being mentioned four times. It was at least four times.
That’s the pedestrian crossing that doesn’t exist yet, to provide a safe way to the Whitgift Centre from East Croydon, although Perry’s council closed the existing pedestrian underpass eight months ago. Not once did anyone mention that the pedestrian crossing is being paid for out of money from a £6million fine Westfield were forced to pay because of the non-delivery of their previous plans.
We were coming towards the end now. Those croissants seemed a long time ago, and Perry’s message was as repetitive as it was dull, despite all the careful prompting from the host.
None of the lessons of Croydon’s period of “Peak Negrini”, when the borough’s politicians and council officials gave developers licence to do pretty much as they pleased, all in the name of “growth” that was never delivered, seem to have been learned.
For here was Croydon’s Mayor making all the noises that the borough’s (potentially) biggest developers would want to hear.
“What advice would you have for developers?” the host asked.
“Get your chequebook out!” Perry squeeled, all excited, and more than a little desperate-sounding. “We are very much open for business.”
He then said something along the lines of, “Come and have a conversation, we will find ways to unblock things.” Seriously. This from the head of a local authority which has many serious, statutory planning responsibilities. Or “blocks”, as they are seen by profit-hungry developers.
Then it was time to go. The LCA stooges went back to their desks, and Mayor Perry scurried off somewhere. It was only 10am, but it would likely take him at least an hour to get back to his desk in Fisher’s Folly and start actually doing some work for the people he is supposed to represent. And anyway, he’d soon be ready for his lunch.
It had all been very light on data and evidence, and heavy on vague aspiration with no real plans.
There was no mention of increasing affordable housing, nor the need for Housing England and the GLA needing to stump up millions towards the scheme, nor of improving transport links, nor of what Community Infrastructure Levy receipts there might be, nor of resolving the council’s ongoing financial woes.
But then, this wasn’t about accountability to the Croydon public. There was no Croydon Council branding to be seen, at an event held a long way from Croydon.
Because this was all about Mayor Perry paying service to the people he has always thought matter most of all.
Read more: Another Croydon mugging as Westfield stages latest charade
Read more: Perry allows Westfield to spend £6m ‘fine’ on own interests
Read more: Perry’s council endorses scheme for 3,000 flats in town centre
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So Mayor Perry is claiming the credit for the decline of retail crime in Croydon, but could it be related to the ever diminishing number of significant retail outlets under his watch? It is getting to the point where next he will be claiming credit for the never ending chicken and vape shops opening up as signs of a booming local economy.
And Piss-Poor Perry will probably claim that the increasing numbers of barber shops is also a sign of the “booming local economy”.
Thanks to ‘Barratt Holmes’ for enduring, witnessing Breakfast Waffle and relaying an account to us. I thought this was a broadcast or webcast event but seemingly not.
Breakfast with property developers and speculators – but the Whitgift Centre and Croydon Town has already suffered at their hands for over a decade.
As soon as Mayor Perry read this article he put out an X post regarding the “7 chicken kiosks” at Allders. Mayor Perry going out all all guns blazing it seems.
“Hopefully, residents would say this is now a cleaner, brighter borough than it was three years ago.”
You ‘hope’, Perry? That must be a nice sort of feeling.
No one with working eyes would describe Croydon as cleaner, or brighter.
perry is subject to ‘under the Nolan Principles for conduct in public office’ – you’re having a laugh, right? Since when does any council adhere to that, or held to account for not complying with it? Ask Sutton council’s hellen bailey what she thinks about it, as her council doesn’t comply with it.