Heating Phase 2 Key Decision

A Key Decision for Councillor Sof McVeigh, the Lead Member for Housing Management, Housing Safety and Building Homes, has been brought to our attention.

It is Key Decision KD1010888. 

You can find it on the Council website here: KD1010888. It looks like this:

The Key Decision is described as "covering the contract award in connection with the procurement of a contractor to deliver the Phase 2 domestic heating and hot water works and building fabric works at Cremorne Estate in the Chelsea Riverside Ward". 

In plain English that means that it is about the appointment of a contractor to carry out the heating works inside homes on the Cremorne Estate.

The decision is dated the 27 November 2024. That is the date that it became a matter of public record. The expected decision date is given as "Monday, 25 August 2025". That means the Council expect to have appointed a contractor to carry out the works before that date. 

If there was any doubt as to the Council's plans then this Key Decision eliminates them. 

This is happening. The Council DOES plan for there to be people in your home ripping out your existing radiators and all the pipework for both the heating and the hot water. 

The disruption to you, your household and your home will be massive. The Council will try to downplay it. They are misleading you and everyone else. 

They have done the same on other estates. They downplay the disruption works will cause. The disruption caused is then as bad as residents feared. The Council count on it simply being too late for anyone to do anything about it. Does this sound particularly "caring" to you? 

Now, for the obvious question is: if the Council expect to have appointed a contractor by the 25th of August 2025 when do they plan to consult all of the estate's residents? When do they plan to serve Section 20 notices on leaseholders? When do they plan to tell everyone about the 300% increase in heating and hot water costs that will result? 

As is often the case the Key Decision claims that resident consultation has already taken place. It says: "The residents on Cremorne Estate are aware of the Phase 2 works that are now following Phase 1" and that "The project team shall continue with resident consultation and engagement from phase 1 into phase 2". 

As far as we know there has been no meaningful resident consultation or information about any these works. There was little or no meaningful consultation about phase 1 (we would argue so little as to be equivalent to none), and there has been no meaningful consultation to date about phase 2. And there is no sign that the project team have any meaningful consultation planned any time soon.

Is this yet another Council Key Decision full of porkies?

To make matters worse our local Councillors have known about this project for many years. They have told us nothing and appear to have consented to our most vulnerable residents suffering the consequences. These are many of the same Councillors that wanted to demolish us. 

Heating - Phase 2

Back in July 2020 we sounded the alarm with regards to the Council's plans for the estate's communal heating and hot water system and, in particular, what the Council had decided to refer to as "phase 2" - work inside people's homes.

That original blog post is here. It's worth reading. 

A number of documents have since come into our possession which confirm many if not all of the concerns we had about the proposed heating works. 

The first document is a leaflet, pictured below. 

The second is a briefing note of some kind, describing some very specific issues and concerns in much more detail. That is pictured below. 

We will post our thoughts on these two documents shortly. In the meantime we thought it best to bring them to the attention of as many residents as possible. 

When the cat's away ... run a consultation.

An eagle eyed resident was kind enough to point out that the Council's consultation on opening up our gardens is both very short and taking place entirely during the month of August when many residents are likely to be away. 

The letter from Patrick Sean Sullivan is dated the 6th of August. The deadline given is the 28th of August. That is, at best, 22 calendar days. And all within the month of August. 

The consultation period is also unusually short. The equivalent letter for a proposal to paint some shed and garage doors was dated the 16th of July and set a deadline of the 14th of August. That's 29 calendar days. 

The proposal to paint shed and garage doors will not have a negative impact on anyone. Not all residents have a shed or a garage and many simply won't care whether the Council paints them or not.

The proposal to open up our gardens to the general public (for that is what it is) will have a detrimental impact on all residents, and particularly those living next to the gardens, for the many, many reasons we have cited previously (see our previous post for the gory details). 

Would any sane person believe that a proposal to paint some shed and garage doors is worthy of a longer consultation period than a proposal to open up our gardens to all and sundry? We suspect not. 

But the Council's Housing Management Department clearly do. 

Why? Because they are perfectly aware of the fact that a significant number of the estate's residents are likely to be away for some or all of the month of August. And they are quite cynically taking advantage of the situation. 

They are hoping that those likely to object will be away and will miss the consultation altogether.

Dissenting voices are very clearly not welcome. And if those likely to dissent are intentionally (ahem, accidentally) excluded by rigging (ahem, setting) the dates of the consultation in this way so much the better.  

They are quite simply trying to engineer the end result they want. 

The consultation is really a non-consultation. It is designed to tick a box not find out what most residents actually think. Because it's quite clear that Housing Management don't really care what anyone thinks. They simply want to have their way.

This is the kind of behaviour that you might expect of dodgy property developers with questionable planning applications who submit their planning applications at the height of Summer in a cynical attempt to try and avoid any opposition from those affected (and we've had plenty of those before), not the Council. 

The Heating Controversy

Those of us living on the Cremorne Estate are no strangers to problems with the estate's district (communal) heating system. Parts of the system located outside people's homes have been playing up for many years. Many of the estate's blocks suffered lengthy outages to their heating and hot water in 2017 and 2018 due to problems with the pipework running between the buildings. 

There are of course disagreements as to the cause of these problems and outages. Some say the external parts of the system are too old and haven't been maintained properly. Others say the performance of the heating maintenance contractor leaves much to be desired. Given that the Cremorne Estate is not the only estate to have suffered severe outages in recent times we would suggest that there is more than a little truth to both of these suggestions - the system probably hasn't been maintained properly and the performance of the contractor probably has left much to be desired. And the two are very clearly related given that the contractor carries out the maintenance. 

Whatever the actual cause of these problems the Council proposes to remedy the situation by carrying out extensive works to the system. These works have been split into two phases. The first phase contains all the works to the boilers and distribution pipework. The second contains all the works within buildings/blocks and inside individual homes. 

The Council recently wrote to all residents with regards to forthcoming major works and described the works as follows (copied verbatim):

Phase 1:

Replace the whole boiler house including all boilers and relevant controls. Total refurbishment. 

Replacement of all pipework involved in the distribution of heating and hot water system throughout the estate running from block to block, but not into the block. 

This phase is to bring all the external heating systems into a good serviceable condition and increase efficiency in its present design.

Phase 2: 

All pipework within each block and into each flat will be replaced.

Redesign the system install additional radiators and controls in line with the current legislation 'Decent Homes Standards'.

This will be a carefully programmed approach as we will need to carry out invasive works within each property. 

The timelines given are 2020-2022 for phase 1 and 2022-2023 for phase 2. 

Phase 1 is not controversial. We are not aware of a single resident who objects in any significant way to the first phase of works. Everyone seems to agree that the works are necessary, precisely because the current system is not in "a good serviceable condition" (for whatever reason). Leaseholders may wish to argue over the costs of the works, in particular as it could be argued that said costs will be abnormally high as a direct result of many years of neglect, but whether they will do so remains to be seen. 

Phase 2 IS controversial. A number of residents have pointed out that the Council's description of the second phase is neither accurate or honest. They have noted that the second phase of works, as proposed will actually be:

1. Extremely expensive. In particular as it involves significant works inside both buildings/blocks and inside people's homes. 

If you're a leaseholder have a good think about this, because you're going to be paying for it. 

2. Extremely disruptive. Precisely because it involves significant works inside people's homes. And they will clearly be much more disruptive than the Council wants to admit. 

In some blocks the distribution pipework runs through people's homes rather than through communal areas or spaces, so even replacing that will be extremely disruptive. Residents are likely to have workmen in their homes for many weeks if not months replacing not only the radiators and pipework serving their homes but also the pipework used for distribution.

And a consultant's report we have had sight of clearly states that to be the case. The report goes as far as to state that it may even be necessary to decant residents during the works. That's a rather extreme definition of the word "intrusive" being used by the Council. 

3. Expensive for all in the longer term. That the additional radiators and controls referred to will include Heat Interface Units and Heat Meters and that their use will result in a significant increase in the cost of heating and hot water and drive many tenants and leaseholders into fuel poverty, something the Council has done before on a number of other estates. 

The Council has rather a lot of form in this regard. 

For example:

The residents of Grenfell Tower were convinced to have their district (communal) heating removed and replaced with individual boilers within their homes (arguably unsafe in a tower block) on the assurance that the new system would be no more expensive. This turned out to be a very blatant lie, the replacement system was a LOT more expensive and many residents were unable to pay to heat their homes as a result. 

And there's a very similar tale of woe at Wiltshire Close. 

Similarly the "hidden homes" flats created on the World's End Estate next door were intentionally removed from the estate's district (communal) heating system for no good reason and despite the opposition and objections from that estate's Residents Association. The tenants who subsequently moved into those "hidden homes" found themselves facing heating costs up to three or four times that of their immediate neighbours. And, unsurprisingly, having committed the dastardly deed neither the Council nor the TMO felt any obligation to either remedy the situation or help the affected tenants and that remains the case to this day. 

And, we suspect, that's just the tip of the iceberg. The Council clearly has no qualms about making tenants and leaseholders fuel poor. It might say it has no intention of doing so but its actions to date clearly say otherwise.  

And again we have had sight of a consultant's report that states that will indeed be the case if the second phase of works proceeds as planned. 

The report states, quite clearly, that some households on the Cremorne Estate are likely to face increases in their heating and hot water charges of up to 300% if Heat Interface Units and Heat Meters are installed and used.

So there are some very obvious issues with the second phase of these works. And they have been brought to the Council's attention, both directly and via the office of Greg Hands MP. And what have the Council done? Not what you might have expected. 

Or perhaps exactly as you might have expected.

The "heating controversy" referred to above is that having been told of these issues and concerns the Council has decided not to engage in a serious, adult conversation with the residents that have pointed them out. Rather it has decided that it would be best to pretend that these issues don't actually exist and suggest that those raising them are being "difficult", "obstructive" or "troublemakers". 

Some members of Council staff have gone as far as to refer to the issues raised as "misinformation" which, given the existence of the two reports from the Council's own consultants, is not only farcical but bordering on the behaviour of Orwell's Ministry of Truth.

And where have we heard this kind of thing before? Oh yes, that's right, at Grenfell. When the tower was refurbished (and clad in highly combustible materials) the Council referred to any residents raising any issues or concerns as "difficult", "obstructive" and "troublemakers". The Council thought it better to insult, demean and denigrate residents than try and address their (clearly justified) concerns. It appears very little has changed.

What the Council should have done is respond to the issues raised by engaging in an open and honest discussion about the scope of the works, the impact they are likely to have on residents and allow residents to be actively involved in making the decisions that may yet mitigate, minimize or even eliminate that impact. 

We appreciate that the Council may not have wanted to have that conversation at this time. But now that the cat is well and truly out of the bag it would be sensible to try and engage in a proper discussion with the residents that treats them as adults. 

Said residents may, unsurprisingly, wish to have some input into a decision process that is likely to have a monumental impact both on their homes and on their lives but is currently completely opaque and in which they have no real involvement. 

Sadly this has not happened. Other than the descriptions of the works quoted above the Council have sent us nothing. And the responses to any residents who have made queries or raised issues are not being provided by technical staff who might actually understand the issues and be able to address them properly but by "resident engagement officers" who clearly haven't a clue and are not beyond simply lying to make the residents and their issues go away.

And referring to any resident as "difficult", "obstructive" or a "troublemaker" suggests the Council has learnt nothing from the Grenfell Tower tragedy, let alone improved in any way as a result. 

But should the Council ever get round to addressing these issues properly we will be more than happy to document their response here. 

We hope for and await something meaningful. But we're not holding our breath. 

We're back!

We're back because it looks like the Council have plans for us again.

Back in 2014 the Council suggested to TfL that they build a Crossrail 2 station on the site of the Cremorne Estate rather than near Chelsea Fire Station, which had been the proposed site of a station for decades. To hide the truth from us they labelled it "West Chelsea" not "Cremorne Estate".

Why did they do this? We still don't know. We suspect money had more than a little to do with it.

We fought back. The estate fought back. Our neighbours fought with us.

Thankfully that proposal appears to have been shelved. TfL no longer mention "West Chelsea" when talking about Crossrail 2. They're now suggesting there won't be a station in Chelsea at all. Which suits us fine.

Seventy two of our fellow residents died in a terrible fire on the Lancaster West Estate on the 14th of June 2017. The Council now claim they don't have plans to regenerate any estate. We were glad to hear it when they said it but we suspect their new found generosity won't last long. They will once again hear the siren call of regeneration, and the money that comes with it, soon enough.

Which is why recent events are a cause for concern.

A letter has gone out announcing the Resident Association's Annual General Meeting. The letter is written by the Council. From speaking to our neighbours it seems the letter was sent out without the knowledge or consent of the Residents Association.

The Council appear to have taken over the Residents Association.

Now why do you think they would do that?

The Council have plans for us again. We don't know what and we don't know how, but they're back to their old tricks and we're not going to take it lying down.

SAVE THE CREMORNE!