Local Liberal Democrats attack Council’s “secret process” to approve redevelopment of controversial King Alfred site in Hove.
This follows last weeks announcement that home builders, Crest Nicholson in partnership with the Starr Trust charity who help young people aged 10-18 fulfil their potential in sports, arts and education, have been chosen as the preferred bidders by the City Council.
Michael Wilbur, Chair of Brighton & Hove Liberal Democrats, said: “It is outrageous that councillors from the Labour, Conservative and Green parties have agreed to a conspiracy of silence.
The lack of transparency in allowing local residents to evaluate the merits of the competing bids is quite insulting. This does not happen with major schemes in other cities and shows that the local councillors have a contempt for democracy.
We are keen to see redevelopment at King Alfred but Hove residents must have the chance to air their views. It is time for the Council to come clean and make the details of the bids known immediately. Without transparency we have no way of evaluating whether this development helps solve Brighton’s housing crisis.”
Abraham Ghebre-Ghiorghis, the Council’s head of legal and democratic services, said: “The council is committed to openness and transparency and strives to make information public as soon as possible, unless there is some legal or other good reason not to do so.
“In the case of the King Alfred project, a large-scale major development, given the competitive dialogue process that was adopted, and the complex nature of the project, an assessment was made by the council’s in-house legal team. The view taken was that publishing the detailed information ahead of the policy and resources meeting would increase the risk of legal challenge. Given the general public interest, we obtained second opinion from Counsel and this confirmed the position.
“This means that the identity of the successful bidder and outline details of the bid cannot be disclosed until the bidders receive the Regulation 32 notice and a reasonable time expires. The legal preferred option would have been not to issue the information until the standstill period (10 calendar days, to Feb 1) expires. However, given the public interest, a decision was taken to release this information a day after the Policy and Resources committee meets.
“We are sorry if this comes as a disappointment but cannot expose the council, the project and taxpayers’ money to risk of legal challenge.”
Plans to redevelop the King Alfred site have been ongoing for many years. Planning permission was granted in 2007 by the Labour administration to Karis Developments to build a development designed by the international architect Frank Gehry. The proposal proved to be very controversial and did not have the support of the Conservative group on the City Council who added many conditions to the original planning granted when they took control of the council in 2007. In 2008 due to the global financial crisis the project was shelved.
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