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.
