Lansbury Steering Group

l3th January 2004 AT 6:30PM at Lansbury Lodge, Ricardo Street, E14

MINUTES

  1. Present: Carol Farnum (CPT), Jenn Pepper (NPI), Rob Lantsbuy (Poplar Harca), Tracey Fletcher (Poplar Harca), Rob Hannabuss (Poplar Harca), Robin Whitby (Poplar Harca), Andrew Hargreaves (Poplar Harca), Mo Ali (PPCR), Ann-Claude Ruet (PPCR), Michelle Gordon, Marie Litson, V Durrance, G Garmer, Martine Barnard, John Lyydon, M. Bell, D Paul, Adam Kirkpatrick, John Winney, Marilyn Ballutis, Simon Kempson.

  2. The Chair did not ask for apologies for absence. However, these were received before the meeting from Julie Browne.

  3. The minutes of 4th November 2003 and 11th November 2003 were approved.

  4. A vote of thanks was given to Carol Farnum for her contribution to the group. Jenn Pepper of the New Partnerships Initiative (NPI) was then introduced as being the council's representative during Stage III.

  5. Harca's response to the query re keys was noted by the ESG.

  6. Harca presented their proposed selection process for the Master Planners. It was agreed that Adam Kirkpatrick, George Farmer, John Winney and Simon Kempson will attend the selection process on behalf of the ESG. The draft interview questions and marking , scheme were discussed. It was agreed that the marks allocated to the presentation would be increased to 40% and that question one would be dropped, but that the answer to question one would be added to the answer to question three, i.e. the Planners will be expected to show an awareness of differences between tenant/leaseholder issues when responding to question three. It was agreed that the Planners will not be given the questions in advance.

  7. The restrictions imposed by parts of Lansbury having conservation status were noted; including the likelihood of either increased costs or of less being achieved. It was agreed that the Chair should (contact) the local MP on behalf of the ESG to discuss the possibility of having the conservation status removed.

  8. The proposal that the ESG changes to become a Shadow Board was presented by Harca. The proposed constitution of the Board was made available to the ESG. Harca offered to arrange for members of the ESG to observe the main Harca board.

  9. Roles for the sub-groups were proposed. It was agreed that at least initially the sub- groups will be open to everyone on the ESG who wants to attend, with the exception of the Leaseholders sub-group which will be only (open) to leaseholders.

  10. Subject to detailed planning and approval of the ESG, Harca proposed that the aim should be to ballot in October of this year. The proposed ESG meeting on 24th August was cancelled as it's in the school holidays. The following dates and times were agreed:

  11. It was requested that anyone at the meeting who didn't want Harca to have their address details should say so, or notify the Chair afterwards. No one did.

  12. Harca reported that they will be meeting with both the council and the RSL concerned with regard to Flora Close and will be in a better position to report what is happening at the next ESG meeting.

  13. Both Harca and NPI confirmed that appropriate documentation was delivered to the government by November 15th, as requested at the last ESG meeting.

  14. PPCR presented their proposed newsletter, which was agreed as is with typing errors corrected, except that CPT's details were to be replaced with NPI's. As there are relatively few Bengali speakers in Lansbury and a number of other languages may in fact be more common, it was requested that the newsletter isn't translated into Bengali but that instead information on translation services is included. NPI agreed to notify PPCR as to whether this is acceptable to the council. Harca were asked to provide PPCR with text for the message from Poplar Harca.

  15. NPI indicated that we have been given a budget of £44,982. Harca agreed to add an extra £18 to this to make it £45,000. PPCR said that their charges for consultancy are £450/day and for field workers are £175/day. Evening meetings are charged as half a day. It was agreed that PPCR should not attend further meetings until requested to do so, with the intention of saving their services until later in the process.

  16. PPCR, NPI and Harca explained their understanding of the current position on leaseholder capping. It appears that the government have removed the mandatory cap and left individual councils to decide policy. Tower Hamlets council were due to make a decision on the evening of the ESG meeting. It was requested that NPI provide a document for the leaseholder meeting outlining the council's proposals. It was stated that there will be considerable problems proceeding with the Stage III process if ordinary leaseholders have to pay over £10,000 and it was requested that Harca prepare a document for the leaseholder meeting giving an initial assessment of the consequences of us requiring an effective cap of £10,000.

  17. Any other business: it was requested that in furure, documents for the meeting should be labelled "sheet 1" etc at the top to make it easier to identify them.

Minutes prepared by Simon Kempson