The council’s planning department not only left out an MP’s objections to the Queen’s Hotel scheme, they tried to ignore entirely the findings of their own panel of conservation experts. KEN LEE reports
Serious questions continue to be raised over the competence, or lack of it, of Croydon Council’s planning department, and – once again – of the conduct at planning meetings of the chair, Labour councillor Paul Scott.
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Last night’s meeting was an object example of a recurring theme at Croydon Council planning committees.
There was an official council report recommending the granting of permission for the Queen’s Hotel scheme in Crystal Palace, despite objections from 250 residents, opposition from two MPs and two Assembly Members, and after the proposed scheme had been subject to a damningly critical report from the area’s conservation advisory panel, a group of experts appointed by Croydon Council.
That the submission opposing the proposal from the MP, Steve Reed OBE, was not included in the council planner’s report to the committee could be seen as a woeful error by officials.
If Reed’s objections were left out of the report in error, then it is incompetence of the worst kind. If deliberately omitted the matter is, if anything, even more serious. Given the findings of the recent Ofsted report on the council’s children’s services department, it is long past the time when the work of some senior council officials can be taken on trust.
The chair of the planning committee, Scott, should be demanding of the council chief executive, Jo Negrini, and the chief planning officer, Pete Smith, how this could have possibly happened, and insisting that those responsible be held to account. Continue reading →
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