Drama at Brent Planning Committee as decisions overturned within minutes and allegations of intimidation fly. Kingsbury High MUGA approved,

The recording of Thursday's very unusual Planning Committee appears to have been delayed.

 

Brent Council website today

 

This is unusual but the meeting was extremely unusual. Three decisions were made on the Wembley Hospital, Chaplin Road: FOR, AGAINST, DEFER and serious allegations made about intimidation of residents by the applicant for Thanet Lodge.

One the recording is available I will cover fully but meanwhile the story can be told in my Tweets.

 

Proposed development on Wembley Hospital site

 

DEMOLITION OF WEMBLEY HOSPITAL AND REPLACEMENT BY HOUSING 

 

 Recorded Decision:

RESOLVED to defer the decision for the following reason(s): ·       As the majority of Members on the Committee had indicated that they were minded to refuse the application, it was agreed to defer a final decision to a future Committee meeting in order to enable a further report to be provided addressing the indicative reasons outlined as the basis for refusal, including: i)               insufficient provision of affordable housing; ii)              insufficient parking provision on site and impact of congestion on surrounding streets; iii)            lack of community space; iv)            lack of on-site play space for older children; v)             insufficient provision of family sized housing; vi)            harm to neighbouring amenity including loss of daylight; and vii)           impact on non-designated heritage asset and character to the streetscene.   Voting on the above decision was unanimous and accordingly, the application was deferred to allow for further assessment and consideration of the matters identified by the Committee.

 

THANET LODGE GARAGES, BRONDESBURY

Recorded Decision

 

Decision:

RESOLVED to defer the decision for the following reason(s):

 

·       To allow the ownership certificates relating to the application to be evaluated prior to determination and to clarify whether the scheme would fall within the definition of self-build.

 

 

A positive aspect of the meeting was the incisive questions posed by Cllr Suzanne Gallagher and Cllr Anton Georgiou who had clearly done their homework and showed they would not be fobbed off. This makes a refreshing change. Cllr Gallagher's contribution regarding the applicant's claim that the Thanet Lodge application was self-build was particularly effective.

 

Oh, and despite polite representations made by two Roe Green Village residents, the application by Kingsbury High School for a Multi Use Games Area (MUGA) in the school grounds was finally approved. Changes in where the MUGA was situated, a curtailment of the use of lighting, and assurances about the ecological status of the materials used for the MUGA were the background to the decision.

 

 

 

NHS to sell off old Wembley Hospital building in Chaplin Road

 

The NHS Property Services has decided that the old hospital buildings at Wembley Centre for Health in Fairview Avenue/Chaplin Road is surplus to requirements and have put it on the market.

Wembley Hospital was opened in 1928 after some years of planning and fundraising and has an interesting history. You can read more on the website Lost Hospitals of London HERE. The facility has servved residents of the borough well over the years. The sell-off is part of the previous Government's One Public Estate policy that encouraged public bodies to develop underused land. The huge Northwick Park development is our biggest later example combining council, hospital, university and housing association land in one scheme.

Savills the agent state:

Key features

• Unconsented residential development opportunity within the LB of Brent
• Strong transport links with Wembley Central Station and Sudbury Town
• The proposed development site extends to 0.72 hectares (1.78 acres)
• For sale freehold with vacant possession
• The Property benefits from positive pre application engagement
• Offers are invited on a subject to planning basis
• The Pre app consists of a residential scheme of 94 units across 3-7 storeys

Local information

·       The property is located within the administrative boundary of the London Borough of Brent. The site is not located in a Conservation Area and there are no locally listed or statutorily listed buildings within or adjacent to the site. A full planning history of the site is provided in a detailed note in the dataroom, provided by Avison Young.

·       The site has development potential for residential use, but may suit other uses, subject to securing the necessary consents.

·       Tate Hindle have produced a number of residential scheme iterations which have been tested at pre-application stage and with the Quality Review Panel. The schemes presented range from approximately 85 - 100 units in buildings of 3-7 storeys. A further scheme which responds to the comments made by the Quality Review Panel is available in the dataroom.

 

Wembley’s hospitals and the NHS 70th Birthday

Guest blog by Philip Grant

July 5^th 2018 sees the 70^th anniversary of the founding of the National Health Service, and there will be a community tea party in Wembley’s Yellow Pavilion the following day (Friday 6^th July, from 1pm to 4pm) to celebrate the event:-

But what medical facilities did the ordinary folk of Wembley have before the NHS was set up, and who provided these? I was invited to provide some “local history” information for this NHS70 event, and I would like to share some of it with “Wembley Matters” readers here.

Ever since Tudor times (after Henry VIII dissolved the monasteries who had often provided some health care to the areas around them) the Church of England parishes were expected to provide care to poor people within their district. Every year each parish appointed two or three local men to serve as Overseers of the Poor, raising money to meet the costs of providing “relief” and (if they were lucky) some basic medical care.

Most of Wembley was in the Harrow parish, but in the 1840’s two spinster sisters, Anne and Francis Copland, who had inherited their father’s estate at what is now Barham Park, campaigned for Wembley and Sudbury to be made a separate parish, and paid to have St John’s Church built in Harrow Road, not far from their home. They were great philanthropists, providing money for a school, and a workmen’s hall (including a small library).

Anne Copland, c.1860

In 1871 (the year before she died) Anne Copland gave money to build and endow a Village Hospital. The site is now Wilkinsons, in Wembley High Road, near the junction with Park Lane.

Charles Goddard, 

Unfortunately, Anne had said that only the interest (at 4%) from the investments she had given the hospital could be used to fund its running costs, and the hospital had to stop taking inpatients in 1883. After that, the building became a doctor’s house, at which the sick could be seen, and given medicines from a dispensary.

The doctor living in the former cottage hospital, Charles Goddard, became Wembley’s first Medical Officer of Health, when it was made a separate District Council in 1895. He held that post for around forty years, and in 1924 he called a public meeting to propose that a new hospital be built. There was a lot of support from local people, and Titus Barham (who owned the Express Dairy Company, and lived at Sudbury Park, which had been the home of the Copland sisters) donated land at Chaplin Road, which was part of his own dairy farm, as a site for the new Wembley Hospital. Barham also donated £2,000 towards the cost of building it, and he and his wife Florence were active in organising fund-raising events for the project as well.

The foundation stone for the hospital was laid in October 1926, a Board of Management for the hospital was set up, and the new hospital was opened on 2 June 1928 by the Duke and Duchess of York (later King George VI and Queen Elizabeth, who became the Queen Mother when their daughter succeeded to the throne in 1952).

Wembley Hospital, around 1950.

When Titus Barham, who had been the hospital’s president, died in 1937, he left a further £20,000 to Wembley Hospital in his will. But as a charity (a bit like St Luke’s Hospice today), it needed to regularly raise money from other sources. One of the ways this was done was by holding an annual hospital carnival week, with a Carnival Queen, street parade and various fundraising events. Another important source of funds was a “hospital savings scheme”, where by paying contributions of sixpence a month (made by 20,000 of the 90,000 residents in Wembley and Kingsbury in the late 1930’s) local people were entitled to free treatment in the “public wards”.

The Anne Copland Ward at Wembley Hospital, around 1950.

When the NHS was set up in 1948, Wembley Hospital was absorbed into this new service, but although its management had changed, it still provided the same type of care to its patients. Like many other hospitals, as well as training local young women as nurses (under the supervision of the Matron), Wembley also benefitted from some who came from the Caribbean (another 70^th Anniversary! – LINK

 

 

Christmas time in the Children’s Ward, Wembley Hospital, 1950’s

Wembley Hospital’s role diminished over time, especially after the new District Hospital at Northwick Park was built in the late 1960’s, but its site in Chaplin Road is still providing a range of health services for local people (me included!) as the Wembley Centre for Health and Care. So, Happy 70^th birthday NHS, and thank you.

Philip Grant

Acknowledgement

All images are  from the Wembley History Society Collection at Brent Archives.

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