Guest post by Philip Grant in a personal capacity
“Altamira”,
the landmark Victorian villa in Stonebridge, and subject of the petition.
On
Monday evening (15 September) I will be presenting Willesden Local History
Society’s petition, calling on Brent to retain the heritage Victorian villa as
part of its redevelopment of the Morland Gardens site, at the Full Council
meeting. As the petition was active a few months ago, I will include a copy of
what it said at the end of this article, should you wish to read it.
I
won’t go into the detailed reasons why Brent should not demolish this beautiful
and historic building here, as you can read those in an
open letter to two Cabinet members in May, when it seemed likely
that the petition might need to be presented at a meeting in June. That didn’t
happen because Council Officers had still not decided whether or not to
recommend retaining this locally listed heritage asset, even though they
were supposed to have been reviewing that since November 2023!
Ahead
of the Full Council meeting, I had written to the Mayor, who will be chairing
it, last Monday, with two requests. The email was copied to the Council’s
Governance Manager, who organises arrangements for the meeting and had notified
the Society that it would be allowed up to five minutes to present its
petition.
The
first request was that the photograph of “Altamira”, shown above, should be
shown on the small screens around the meeting hall during the presentation
(with the countdown clock in a window at one corner), so that councillors and
members of the public not familiar with the building could understand what the
petition was about.
When the
Governance Manager responded last Thursday (‘after discussions with the Mayor’),
I was told: ‘I’m afraid that won’t be possible to arrange alongside the speech
timer.’ My reply to that was:
‘I
find it hard to believe that this would not be possible technically. It may be
that the Officers controlling the screens at the meeting do not know how to do
that, but if they were to ask a member of the Council's IT staff to show them
how it can be done, that would improve their skill set and allow them to
provide a better service to councillors at future meetings.’
My
second request to the Mayor was for him to agree that if I gave up some of the
five minutes allowed for my presentation, he would use the "spare"
time to invite any councillors who wished to speak briefly on the petition, to
do so. Such an arrangement would be within the Mayor’s discretion, as Standing
Order 6 in Brent’s Constitution allows him to decide on how the proceedings at
Full Council meetings are applied (subject to a majority of councillors not
objecting to his decision).
Standing
Order 6, from Part 2 of Brent Council’s Constitution (May 2025 edition).
The
response I received from the Governance Manager was: ‘Whilst your request has
been considered, I can confirm that the mayor intends to follow the same
procedure as at previous meetings. This
will mean you having up to 5 minutes to present the petition with the Lead Member
then having the opportunity to provide a brief response.’
There
is actually nothing, in Brent’s Standing Orders regarding petitions, saying
that the response to a petition will come from a Cabinet member, or excluding
any other councillors from responding to one! It appears to have just developed
that way [probably because the Leadership wants to keep control of the
Council’s business, and to exclude the majority of the borough’s elected
councillors from having a say].
I have
to admit that the reason I was willing to give up some of the five minutes I
would be allowed is that I know there are eight individual councillors, from
across all three political groups on the Council, who have told me privately
that they want to see the Stonebridge heritage villa retained. I had written to
each of them to say that there might be an opportunity to say a sentence or two
in support of the petition. [There may still be, if the Mayor changes his mind.]
Although
I’ve heard it rumoured that the Labour Group/Council Leader enforces strict
control over his backbench councillors, I was still surprised by the first
reply I received from one I had written to:
‘It
will be difficult for me to go against the party as part of the collective
responsibility that I am subject to. The decisions are made in Cabinet and so,
as a back bencher I have no input. Sorry I can't be of any more help.’
I did
reply, saying that, as far as I was aware, it was not Brent Labour policy to
demolish this locally listed heritage building, and the councillor should not
be afraid to express their genuine personal belief that ‘this iconic building
should be saved.’
Another
Labour councillor replied: ‘Ordinary Councillors like me are not permitted to
issue independent responses unless they are explicitly supporting the Cabinet
Lead Member’s position.’
[These
replies do not reflect well on democracy in Brent, where there are 57
councillors elected to represent the views of residents in their wards!]
So, I
will present Willesden Local History Society’s petition on Monday evening, and
hope that the Cabinet Lead Member’s position (probably written for her by a
Council Officer) is that they will retain Altamira, when the Council
finally gets round to regenerating the 1 Morland Gardens site.
Philip
Grant.
The Willesden Local History Society petition:
Title: Retain
the heritage Victorian villa, Altamira, as part of redeveloping 1 Morland
Gardens
Petition: We
the undersigned petition the Council and its Cabinet, when considering the
regeneration of 1 Morland Gardens, as part of the Bridge Park / Hillside
Corridor proposals, to retain the beautiful and historic locally listed
Victorian villa, Altamira, as part of the redevelopment of that site for
affordable housing and youth facilities. The 150-year-old landmark building is
part of the original estate which gave Stonebridge Park its name, and its sense
of place can be an inspiration to local young people who would use it, while
there is plenty of space behind the Victorian villa to build a good number of
genuinely affordable homes.
Background
Information: Between 1872 and 1876, the noted Victorian
architect, Henry Kendall Jnr, developed an estate of middle-class homes on a
field beside the Harrow Road, just to the west of Harlesden. He called the
estate Stonebridge Park, and that was the origin of the name for the area which
grew up near it.
Although
there are other late 19th century houses in Brent which are described as being
of Italianate style, numbers 1 and 2 Morland Gardens, originally “Altamira” and
“Hurworth”, are the only surviving examples with distinctive belvedere towers.
Seen from the crossroads at the top of Hillside, and with the trees of the
community garden in front, they provide one of the best streetscape views in
the area.
“Altamira”
remained as a private house until around the time of the First World War, then
became a members’ club for many decades. In the 1990s, this beautiful Victorian
villa was chosen by Brent Council, and sympathetically restored and extended,
with funding from Harlesden City Challenge, to become the home of the Brent
Adult and Community Education Service, in an inspirational Stonebridge setting.
In
2018, it was decided to upgrade the facilities for what is now the Brent Start
college, and an architect was chosen, through a competition, with experience of
combining heritage and modern buildings. Sadly, at an early stage, a planning
officer wrongly advised that the locally listed building could be demolished,
without taking into account Brent’s adopted heritage planning policies or the
heritage significance of the Victorian villa.
As a
result, the scheme which was given the go-ahead by Brent’s Cabinet in January
2020, and received planning consent later that year, despite numerous valid
objections, would have seen the heritage asset demolished and a new concrete
building of up to ten storeys constructed over the site and the adjacent
community garden, providing a new college facility and 65 homes.
That
scheme saw a number of problems, because of mistakes that had been, and
continued to be made by the Council and its Officers, and even though an award
was made for the first stage of a two-stage design and construct contract in
the summer of 2022, no actual construction had begun on the site when the
planning consent expired at the end of October 2023.
A
review of what to recommend for the future of the 1 Morland Gardens site was
begun in November 2023, and a year later the outline of “affordable homes and
community facilities” was included as part of a large consultation exercise on
Bridge Park and the Hillside Corridor. The second consultation in March 2025
has refined this further to “affordable homes and youth facilities” for 1
Morland Gardens, but without giving any indication over whether Council
Officers will recommend retaining the heritage building, “Altamira”, as part of
their proposals.
This
locally listed Victorian villa is a much loved and much valued part of the
Stonebridge streetscape, and this petition has been set up by Willesden Local
History Society so that people who live, work or study in Brent can express
their support for it to be retained as part of the Council’s latest proposals
for redeveloping 1 Morland Gardens.
