1 Morland Gardens – Is Brent Council “busy doing nothing”?

 Guest post by local historian Philip Grant in a personal capacity

 

The Victorian villa, “Altamira”, at Hillside, Stonebridge, in October 2023.

 

When I was growing up in the 1950s, there was a song by Bing Crosby that I often heard on the BBC Light Programme (now Radio 2). It was fun to listen to, and the words have stuck in my brain: ‘We’re busy doing nothing, working the whole day through, trying to find lots of things not to do ….’

 

I’m beginning to wonder whether the Council are singing that tune over 1 Morland Gardens. It is now more than four months since I wrote that Brent was reviewing its plans for this site in Stonebridge, after the 2020 planning consent for its proposed development there had expired. A report was supposed to be prepared, for submission to Brent’s Cabinet, with new proposals for the site. No report has yet emerged, and there is nothing on the Council’s Forward Plan for such a report to go to Cabinet in April or May 2024.

 

Although the original plans were flawed, including as they did the demolition of a locally listed heritage building and the construction of flats over a community garden, causing air quality problems, the site could still be used for a sensible development. This could include an updated college facility for Brent Start (currently stuck in a temporary home that the Council moved it out to, at a cost of £1.5m), or other community use, and some much needed affordable housing, while retaining and re-using the 150-year old Victorian villa, which was, until recently, in excellent condition.

 

Doing nothing with the now vacant Council-owned building would be worse than doing something. And damage caused to the building, while it was in the hands of contractors last year, is in urgent need of repair. So, what is Brent Council planning to do? 

 

In order to find out, I sent this open email to Brent’s Chief Executive and Head of Capital Projects on 25 March, headed: 1 Morland Gardens, NW10 - its future, and the protection of this Victorian heritage building.

 

This is an Open Email

 

Dear Ms Wright and Mr Martin,

 

1. I was told last November that, following the expiry of the Council's planning consent for its proposed 1 Morland Gardens development, a review of future plans for the property was being carried out, headed by Mr Martin, and that this would report back with proposals to Brent's Cabinet for a decision.

 

I submitted a paper to that review on 20 November 2023, but four months later, the report of that review has not yet been published or submitted to Cabinet, and it is not shown as an item for decision during the next two months on the Forward Plan.

 

Please let me know whether the review has been completed. If it has, when will the report be submitted to Cabinet, and made publicly available? If the review has not yet been finalised, please let me know the reason for the delay, and the date by which the report and recommendations on the future of 1 Morland Gardens are expected to be ready.

 

2. In my open letter of 30 October to you, Ms Wright, I finished by including a photograph of damage to the slates on the roof of the Victorian villa (which had been carefully restored by Brent Council in the mid-1990s, to provide a permanent home for its adult education college). I wrote: 'please ensure that urgent action is taken to replace the missing slates on the roof of 1 Morland Gardens, so that the condition of the empty property is not allowed to deteriorate further.'

 

Following the unsatisfactory reply to that point by Mr Ghani, on your behalf, I wrote again on 20 November, saying: 'There have been further strong winds and heavy rain since I saw the heritage building three weeks ago, so that point is even more urgent now, if expensive damage to the fabric of the property is to be avoided.'

 

It appears that nothing has been done to address this damage to the property, and it has got worse during the winter weather. Here are three photographs, taken yesterday (24 March) by a fellow "Friend of Altamira", with arrows indicating the damaged areas:-

 

Front view of 1 Morland Gardens, showing missing slates, 24 March 2024.

 

 

1 Morland Gardens from corner of Hillside, showing missing slates on south wing of Victorian villa.

 

 

1 Morland Gardens, showing serious damage to slate roof on north wing of Victorian villa.

 

The initial damage was not present when the building was occupied by "Live-in Guardians" up until January 2023, so was probably caused by contractors during the time that 1 Morland Gardens was under the control of the Hill Group (possibly during asbestos survey work). I realise that those removing slates at the edge of the roof thought at the time that the building would be demolished, so that failing to put them back in place did not matter. 

 

However, this locally listed heritage asset (one of only two in Stonebridge Ward) is not currently due for demolition. It would be a travesty if its condition was allowed to deteriorate further, particularly if this was deliberate neglect by Brent Council, to use as an excuse for further proposals to demolish this much-loved, beautiful and still eminently usable Victorian building. 

 

As a reminder, if any were needed, Brent's own adopted Historic Environment policy on "Valuing Brent's Heritage" states:

 

'The effective preservation of historic buildings, places and landscapes and their stewardship is therefore fundamental to the Council's role.'

 

I am copying this email to the Lead Member for Customers, Community and Culture, and to the councillors for Stonebridge Ward, for their information.

 

I look forward to receiving an update on the situation over the review of the future of 1 Morland Gardens, and to hearing that the necessary repairs to the roof of the Victorian building are being carried out. Thank you. Best wishes,

 

Philip Grant.

 

Morland Gardens – Brent Council reviews its development plans

 Guest post by Philip Grant in a personal capacity

 

1 Morland Gardens, entrance seen from the Community Garden, 30 October 2023.

 

My guest post on 31 October, Brent’s Halloween Nightmare – its Morland Gardens planning consent has expired!, had an Open Letter to Brent’s Chief Executive attached at the end. I promised to share the Council’s reply to that letter with you, and will ask Martin to attach it at the end of this post (the first of two documents).

 

Although the letter, from Brent’s Director of Property and Assets, is dated 10 November, it mysteriously never got delivered to me, until the Chief Executive sent me a copy on 17 November. The letter is quite brief, but it did include the following important sentence: ‘We agree that the planning application as described below expired on 29th October 2023.’

 

So what happens next? The letter says: ‘Following the expiration of the planning permission, the Council is reviewing its options for the Morland Gardens site, including the Altamira building.’

 

“Altamira” is the locally listed heritage Victorian villa (pictured above), so after campaigning since the Council’s planning application, including its demolition, was submitted in February 2020, there is now a second chance to save it. I understand that the review aims to put forward recommendations to the Cabinet meeting in December (perhaps as part of the Affordable Housing Update which is due to be on the agenda?).

 

The third ‘key issue’ from my Open Letter which the Director of Property and Assets identified was not allowing the condition of the empty property to deteriorate further. His reply about the security of the site missed the point. My response reminded him that it was missing slates from the roof (and possibly more of them missing following recent strong winds) which needed the Council’s early attention.

 

Although we will have to wait and see what Officers recommend to Cabinet over the future of 1 Morland Gardens, I do not want that to be a repeat of the 2020 proposals, which have already caused a long delay and wasted several million pounds. When I replied on 20 November, I included my own contribution to the review, as a genuine attempt to help the Council “get it right” this time. I will ask Martin to attach a copy of that document below, so that anyone can read it if they wish to. 

 

Philip Grant

 

Brent Council's reply to Philip Grant's letter of 31st October on 1 Morland Gardens

 

  

Review of Options for Morland Gardens – getting it right this time

 

 

 

1 Morland Gardens – How many more times can they get it wrong?

 Guest Post by Philip Grant in a person capacity

 

 

1 Morland Gardens, behind locked Heras fencing, 26 January 2023
 

 

It is almost three years since I first wrote about Brent Council’s plans to demolish “Altamira”, the locally listed Victorian villa at 1 Morland Gardens, and build a new adult education facility and 65 homes there. Ever since the project for an updated Brent Start college, intending to retain this beautiful heritage building, was “hijacked” at the end of 2018, to provide a large number of new Council homes, there have been mistakes and delays. Now there are more.

 

Brent Council does now have a vacant building, as the six month stay by Live-in Guardians has ended, and a barrier of Heras fencing now surrounds the outer wall of the grounds. They also have a contractor in place for their project, Hill Partnerships Ltd, under a two-stage Design & Build contract awarded last July. The first stage, a Pre-Construction Service Agreement, is underway, and as part of that the contractor submitted a Construction Logistics Plan (“the Plan”), as required by one of the conditions of the planning consent (given in October 2020!).

 

Condition 20, for a construction logistics plan, from the 1 Morland Gardens planning consent.

 

The submission of the Plan, in December 2022, was treated as a separate planning application (22/4082), but it was not advertised. I only discovered it online last week. It may not sound like a very interesting document, but when I read it, I found a number of things to comment on, pointing out in my objections how Brent, and their contractor, have got it wrong again.

 

The Plan treats the development site as a single plot of land, when it is actually two. Brent Council owns the public realm and highway outside the boundary of 1 Morland Gardens, which its proposed new building would partly cover. But it does not have any legal right to build on that piece of land. It first needs to obtain a Stopping-up Order for a section of the highway, and if it gets that order, the Council would need to appropriate that land for planning purposes. 

 

There are objections to the proposed Stopping-up Order, and Brent has yet to submit its request for an Inquiry by an independent Inspector. As far back as May 2021, Brent’s Development Management Manager confirmed that an order would need to be: ‘approved prior to any development taking place on the areas that are currently adopted highway. Until the stopping-up process has been completed under S247 of the Town & Country Act 1990, works will not be able to start on the development insofar as it affects highway land.’

 

The Plan has been submitted because it needs to be approved in writing by the Local Planning Authority (Brent Council) ‘prior to commencement of the development’. If or when the legal hurdles I’ve just mentioned have been overcome, and the contractor has a site it can start work on, there are still plenty of problems.

 

The Key Site Constraints page from the Construction Logistics Plan.

 

As this early page from the Plan shows, there are a number of “constraints” involved in developing the site. Some of these are the result of the project’s designers trying to squeeze too many new homes into an unsuitable site, and ignoring the practical “constraints”. (Does that sound familiar? Newland Court and Kilburn Square come to mind, among others!)

 

One of the “constraints” listed is the single access/egress point to the site during construction, along the residential cul-de-sac of Morland Gardens itself, which would restrict the size of delivery vehicles. The Plan deals with this by saying that deliveries by articulated lorries will be unloaded from the lay-by, or “pit-lane”, on Hillside. What lay-by? 

 

Page showing where vehicles would deliver materials to the site, from the Logistics Plan.

 

Someone involved in Brent’s project has made a major mistake here. The lay-by on Hillside for deliveries and refuse collections was part of the original plans submitted in February 2020. Those plans had to be revised, because both TfL and Brent’s Transportation Unit objected that a lay-by there would be unacceptable. Hillside is a London distributor road and bus route, with no waiting allowed at any time along its frontage with 1 Morland Gardens because of the proximity to traffic signals. A lay-by there would also be too close to the bus stop, and make the footpath too narrow for safe use by pedestrians. It appears that the contractor has been given the original, and incorrect, plans! 

 

The site diagram above shows all deliveries by “rigid vehicles” coming through a gate from Morland Gardens, and then using the existing “turning head” to drive into and then reverse, so that they can exit forwards once they have been unloaded. But that “turning head” would no longer be available for vehicles making deliveries to, or collecting refuse from, the other properties in Morland Gardens. This, again, would ‘unduly prejudice the free and safe flow of local highways’, something the Plan should not be allowed to do, if it is to be acceptable to Brent’s planners.

 

Access for deliveries to Brent’s proposed Morland Gardens development is not an unforeseen problem. I raised it in an objection comment in July 2020 (see the “Transport and Access” section of a guest post I wrote before the Planning Committee meeting), after the revised plan removing the lay-by had been submitted in June 2020. However, Planning Officers dismissed my objection by saying it would be dealt with by a condition requiring a Delivery and Servicing Management Plan for the new college (ignoring the fact that there would also be deliveries and servicing for 65 homes!).

 

The other page from the Plan which has caused me to make an objection comment is the one labelled “Proposed Sales & Marketing Area”. 

 

The “Sales & Marketing” page from the Construction Logistics Plan.

 

Sales and Marketing? The 65 homes in this planned Brent Council development are all meant to be “genuinely affordable” homes. Condition 3 of the planning consent confirms that, stating: ‘The development hereby approved shall be implemented and maintained for the lifetime of the development as 100% London Affordable Rent.’ Yet the diagram above shows a 2-bedroom, 3 person “show apartment”, available for viewing in the first section of the development (due for completion in week 64), to be used for sales and marketing purposes.

 

The 1 Morland Gardens planning application went totally against both Brent and London planning policies on the protection of heritage assets, and Planning Officers admitted that. The justification for doing so was the “public benefits” of the development, particularly the provision of 65 homes which would all be “genuinely affordable”. If some of the homes are to be sold, not let to Council tenants who urgently need them, that shifts the balance more towards scrapping the demolition, and keeping the Victorian villa as part of a more sensible scheme.

 

The Report to November 2022’s Cabinet meeting about the conversion of some LAR homes to shared ownership did include a paragraph on Morland Gardens, which suggested “value engineering” the project (without giving details). Martin published a guest post from me, including my open email to the Council Leader and Lead Member for Housing. I suggested, not for the first time, an alternative solution, but Cabinet members and Brent’s New Council Homes team seem determined to carry on with a project which is unviable and impractical.

 

How many more times can they get it wrong, before they realise they’re just throwing good money (our money!) after bad?

 

Philip Grant.

1 Morland Gardens – Brent’s final word on a potentially unlawful contract

 Guest post by Philip Grant in a personal capacity.

1 Morland Gardens and the community garden, July 2022.

 

Two weeks ago, I shared with you an email I’d sent to Brent’s Legal Director, asking her to reconsider her view that the recent contract awarded for the Council’s proposed Morland Gardens redevelopment was lawful. This was in the light of information I’d obtained under an FoI request.

 

As I think it is important to give the Council a “right of reply” when important points are raised with them and made public, I will ask Martin to publish the full text of the email I received on 25 August. For completeness, I will also include the response I sent on 30 August, and divide the two with an illustration.

 

If you haven’t already done so, it will probably help to read my earlier guest post (see “link” above). The first email, from Brent, is not “light reading”, but it does give anyone who may be involved in similar disputes with the Council a flavour of what they might expect! Here it is:

 

‘Dear Mr Grant

 

Thank you for your email of 18 August that was received whilst I was on leave.

 

I have now had an opportunity of reviewing your email.

 

I note that you have helpfully highlighted key parts of your email on which you seek a response from me. 

 

You indicate:

 

I believe that Brent Council has failed to treat those “economic operators equally and without discrimination” as required by Regulation 18(1).

 

This statement relates to the process operated by Council Officers in the direct section of a preferred contractor under Schedule 1 of the Network Homes Framework Agreement.  Paragraph 3.1 reads that:

 

‘Direct selection may be used where the Client or any Additional Client considers that it will demonstrate best value for a Project. Subject to paragraph 3.2, the Client or any Additional Client will make a decision on who to directly appoint for a Project based on a best value assessment using a combination of the Contractor’s tender submissions for the Framework and where relevant the Contractor’s:

3.1.1    knowledge and experience of, or relationship to, the site of a Project;

3.1.2    capacity (quantity of work currently instructed) under the Framework;

3.1.3    previous performance under the Framework; and/or

3.1.4    resources available for the particular Project.’

 

It is clear that under the Network Homes Contractors Framework, “Additional Clients” must carry out an assessment using a combination of the Contractor’s tender submission for the Framework and where relevant the various matters detailed in 3.1.1 – 3.1.4.  Officer’s approach to the best value assessment is contained in the Direct Award Evaluation Process Document, particularly in paragraphs 2.3 – 2.6 and paragraph 2.9.  There is no requirement under the direct award procedure to contact bidders directly in carrying out such assessment.

 

Hill Partnerships Ltd. detailed knowledge of the Morland Gardens site was considered significant and as detailed in paragraph 2.6 of the Direct Award Evaluation Process Document:

 

“It is felt this is a key element of the best value justification as the supplier knows the site and the requirements of the project and would need little time to provide a compliant tender for a call-off from the Network Homes Contractor Framework Lot 3….”

 

 You further state:

 

I also believe that the answer to question 6 of my FoI request, about Brent Council’s contacts with Hill Partnerships Ltd over a possible contract award under the NHCF, shows that there is a clear breach of Regulation 18(3).

 

As you indicate, Regulation 18(3) of the Public Contracts Regulations 2015 (PCR 2015) states:

‘For that purpose, competition shall be considered to be artificially narrowed where the design of the procurement is made with the intention of unduly favouring or disadvantaging certain economic operators.’

 

I do not consider that Officers selection of the Network Homes Contractors Framework was in breach of Regulation 18(3) of the PCR 2015.  By its very nature, the use of any framework will unduly favour those economic operators on the framework but the use of frameworks is provided for in the PCR 2015.  Indeed the PCR 2015 permits the use of single supplier frameworks.  The selection of a framework of itself is therefore not unduly favouring or disadvantaging certain economic operators.

 

From the Direct Award Evaluation Process Document it would appear that Officers followed the direct award process as provided for in paragraph 3.1 of Schedule 1 of the Network Homes Contractors Framework and as such it is not considered that this process unduly favoured or disadvantaging certain economic operators.

 

You state:

 

The procurement process, which Cabinet approved on 20 June, was designed “with the intention of unduly favouring” one particular economic operator, Hill Partnerships Ltd.

 

Cabinet on 20th June 2022 approved the following recommendations:

 

2.1       Approve the inviting of a tender using a direct award process under the Network Homes Contractor Framework agreement on the basis of the pre-tender considerations set out in paragraph 3.6 of the report.

2.2       Delegate authority to award the contract for the Morland Gardens Redevelopment Design and Build contract following the successful outcome of the tender exercise to the Strategic Director, Regeneration & Environment, in consultation with the Cabinet Member for Finance, Resources & Reform.

 

For the reasons detailed above, the selection of the Network Homes Contractor Framework agreement of itself is not considered to be unduly favouring or disadvantaging certain economic operators contrary to Regulation 18(3).

 

Further it was indicated to Cabinet in the report that a contractor would be selected to tender based on a best value assessment.  Cabinet in making its decision did not therefore know which organisation would be identified for direct award.

 

In view of the above, I do not consider that there has been an unlawful contract awarded for the Morland Gardens project.

 

Best wishes

 

Debra Norman

 

Director of Legal, HR, Audit and Investigations’

 

Regulation 18, Public Contracts Regulations 2015. (From the Government website)

 

This was my response to Debra Norman’s email of 25 August:

 

This is an open email

Dear Ms Norman,

 

Thank you for your email of 25 August. Your response was not unexpected, as I know that you will always seek to defend Brent Council and its staff.

 

I will not prolong this correspondence unnecessarily. You have set out your position, and we will have to agree to disagree.

 

It is quite clear from the evidence (especially the answer to question 6 of my FoI request) that when Council Officers realised, at the end of May 2022, that they would not be able to award the Morland Gardens contract to Hill Partnerships Ltd under the Notting Hill Genesis Framework, they were looking for a way to award the contract, to that contractor, as quickly as possible by another means.

 

The Network Homes Contractor Framework provided the means, as it allowed for the direct award of contracts, and Hill Partnerships Ltd were one of the approved contractors under its Lot 3. The Direct Award Evaluation Process was carried out, as required under the Framework, but in such a way (because of the timeframe constraints imposed) that there was only one possible outcome.

 

That is why I still consider that the procurement process, approved by Cabinet on 20 June, was designed “with the intention of unduly favouring” Hill Partnerships Ltd, so that it breached the Public Contracts Regulations 2015.

 

Best wishes,

 

Philip Grant.

 

Question 6 and Brent’s response, from my Freedom of Information Act request.

 

You can make up your own minds as to whether or not Brent Council’s 1 Morland Gardens contract was awarded unlawfully!

Philip Grant.

New Homes at 1 Morland Gardens – but not the ones Brent promised! Has Brent Council shot itself in the foot?

Guest post by Philip Grant in a personal capacity

 

In January 2020, Brent’s Cabinet approved proposals for a new adult education college, and 65 affordable homes, on the site of the existing Brent Start building at 1 Morland Gardens in Stonebridge. They delegated authority to make all the Key Decisions for this project to the then Strategic Director for Regeneration (in consultation with a Lead Member). His report told them that work on the new building should be completed by the summer of 2022:-

 

Morland Gardens “Delivery Timetable” from the report to Cabinet, January 2020.

 

In fact, the scheme had already been informally approved by the Leader, and then Deputy Leader and Lead Members for Education and Housing, at a meeting with the project team in February 2019. Then they were told that 89 new homes could be built on the site. That number was later reduced to 65, as even Brent’s planners would not agree that the impact on neighbouring residents (loss of light, etc.) of the 89-home design would be ‘acceptable’.

 

The proposal had started off in 2018 as an updated college and some new housing. The original design by the architects would have retained the locally-listed Victorian villa, and developed the site in phases, so that there was no need for Brent Start to by decanted. There was a viable alternative to the scheme which the Cabinet approved. However, it seems that the Council were determined to build as many new homes as they could on the college site, even though it meant demolishing a valuable heritage asset their own policies promised to protect, and that was the first of many mistakes they have made on this project.

 

Architect’s image of the proposed new building (viewed from across Brentfield Road).

 

In August 2020, the Council controversially obtained planning consent for the development, despite strong local opposition. It was soon celebrating its “award winning” Morland Gardens scheme, and the 65 new homes it would deliver. Two years later, there are new residents at 1 Morland Gardens, but in the original building, not the new one pictured above. 

 

The Brent Start college was moved out earlier this year to a “temporary home” in the former Stonebridge School Annexe. (The adaptations to the annexe cost at least £1.2m, and the building will be demolished once the college leaves, as it is on the site of Brent’s Twybridge Way 67-home housing scheme, which was given planning consent in May 2020, and should be nearing completion now!) That left 1 Morland Gardens vacant.

 

What do you do with a large empty building, when the catalogue of mistakes you’ve made means that you are still not ready to go ahead with its redevelopment? In May 2022, Brent contacted Live-in Guardians, and by early July this organisation was housing mainly young single people in the former college building.

 

An Instagram advert for Live-in Guardians at 1 Morland Gardens, July 2022.

 

I was first aware of Live-in Guardians (“LIG”) there when I attended a site meeting with Brent’s Project Manager on 26 July, to discuss my objections to the proposed Stopping-up Order for the highway outside the property. There was a sign on the gateway to say that they were providing live-in protection for the building, and a resident would not let us enter because the Officer had not arranged access in advance. 

 

I’m interested in all aspects of the Morland Gardens project, so I put in an FoI request for a copy of the Council’s agreement with LIG. This has been supplied to me, and as live-in guardianship is an idea which may be of wider interest, to single people (or couples) in need of an affordable short-term home as well as to property owners, I will include some information and extracts from it below.

 

The opening paragraphs from Brent’s agreement with LIG.

 

These “new homes” would not be for people on Brent’s housing waiting list, so who were they for? The agreement says that up to 26 “Guardians” would be provided with accommodation at 1 Morland Gardens, and gives details of the type of person and how LIG selects them.

 

It sounds from this extract that the Guardians living here will be people who do need relatively inexpensive accommodation, at a stage where they are not in a position to rent or buy somewhere more permanent. But how long can they stay in the building?

 

The paperwork makes it clear that the Guardians only have a licence to occupy the premises, subject to the right to 4 weeks’ notice to leave after the 26-week contract period. Their legal status is explained to them on the LIG website.

 

From the LIG website.

 

1 Morland Gardens has been used as a college since 1994, when it was sympathetically designed around the restored Victorian villa. Turning it into living accommodation would require some alterations, but as part of the agreement LIG paid the initial fit-out costs, for things such as installing a kitchen, 4 extra showers, and carrying out all of the necessary safety checks. The cost of this work was estimated at up to £17k.

 

It appears that Brent is getting a good deal out of allowing Guardians to live at 1 Morland Gardens. The Council would not have to pay a security company to look after the vacant property. The only expenses they would incur during the contract period would be the Council Tax or Business Rates, and any repairs or maintenance which the agreement made them responsible for. And, at any time after the 26 weeks, they could get vacant possession of the building and land within its garden walls by giving only four weeks’ notice.

 

I have to say that I approve of Brent’s decision to allow 1 Morland Gardens to be used for providing temporary accommodation, rather than remaining empty after they had moved the Brent Start college out of the building. The presence of Live-in Guardians will hopefully prevent the beautiful heritage building from being vandalised (and among the potential vandals, I include Brent Council and the contractors it has recently hired, perhaps unlawfully, to demolish it!)

 

1 Morland Gardens, the former Brent Start college, June 2022.

 

Another reason why I like Brent’s agreement with LIG (although, on refection the Council may regret it) is that the 26-week period will last until at least the end of December 2022. At a Scrutiny Committee meeting on 9 June, Brent’s Strategic Director for Regeneration justified the urgent award of a c.£38m contract for the Morland Gardens development on the grounds that if work did not begin on site by August ‘the Council stood to lose the £6.5m GLA grant towards affordable housing.’

 

The site is in two parts. They can’t build on the land outside, because there are open appeals against the proposed Stopping-up Order. Now they can’t begin any work inside the boundary, because that is legally occupied by Live-in Guardians. Brent can’t “start on site”, within the terms of their GLA grant agreement, this month (or this year), because they have no site to start on! 

 

Philip Grant.