Blog 533 18th June 2026

So where I left you I was off to my first Planning Committee for more than 4 years. We covered 3 applications. One was the former leader of the Conservative group who has now lost his seat to Green Councillor Rick Rowe. He wanted an uncontroversial extension to his home, but the convention is that Councillors' applications are formally reviewed. It was quite unnecessary since he is no longer a councillor, but of course we passed this with no discussion.

The next one was a rather odd redevelopment of a semi-detached house in Osterley. It had mainly been demolished and rebuilt, but the neighbour was upset about the rebuild including a side door. Officers saw no problem but some neighbours (well, at least one) was unhappy and was Cllr Tony Louki who I think had been following this matter for some time. It was passed, with Tony voting against and me abstaining. I trust Tony's views usually so I thought I was probably missing something!

The third one and the interesting one is a site up the far North West of the borough, with a postal address of Southall, and bang up against the canal. This used to be a cattery (not a cathouse) owned by the RSPCA but closed some years ago and had been derelict since despite various proposals to develop it. So I thought it was sensible to develop it, mainly as blocks of flats up to about 4 storeys. Design looked OK and would not be an unpleasant place to live. BUT. We hear that the proposal does not comply with the local plan in two respects: not enough bigger (3 or 4 Bedroom properties); not compliant with our policy of 50% affordable homes. OK, that has always been tricky because developers hate anything affordable because it is another way of saying less profitable. The developer assesses whether affordable housing is something they can afford and invariably they have a fit of the vapours, collapse in despair and say they can't possibly do that and keep their children from starvation. So the council engages an external assessor, who usually agrees with the developer. So I am used to wrangles about this. The old standard was 40%, the developer said we can't possibly afford more than 20% and we settled on a compromise, maybe 30%.

Now the standard is 50% and the developer's submission in this case was 0%.

My approach in the good old days was to say to the developer (and planners) why are you proposing something that you know perfectly well does not comply? Go away and come back with something that does, goodnight. There were usually 4 of us who made that argument. Sometimes nobody else joined us but often we got a result. Perhaps a compromise agreed at the committee, sometimes a genuine rethink. At least we would have put up a fight to defend our official policy. But we are in an era where every proposal for at least 2 years has been rubber stamped by the committee, partly (in my opinion) because it was 14 Labour and 1 Conservative and Labour included the Lead member for development and the Chief Whip glowering at any Labour member who considered disagreeing with them.

Well, I argued against approval. Nobody agreed, though Tony Louki returned the compliment by abstaining. This will be an uphill struggle. Oh, and by the way, development has got a lot more difficult, and the worst outcome is what we have around much of Brentford - derelict sites with planning permission like the police station, Watermans and many sites along the GWR and others. Developers are happy to hang on to empty or derelict sites for decades, because the cost of hanging on to them is minimal and they wait for something to turn up. The little island at the bottom of Gunnersbury park on the A4 is (or was) owned by Richard Tice's company Sunley. All the time it was in my ward we had regular fights about graffiti, flytipping, general mayhem about which they did nothing. Now it is a filling station for electric vehicles. Kerching.

Radical reform in law is needed to unblock that logjam.

So that's off my chest - thank you for your forbearance while I pontificate.

Oh, I forgot. Before planning I went to a local planning related presentation. This is for 'The James' named after James Street in Liverpool where I used to get off the train sometimes when I worked there. The James is a mainly 'co-living' place where people rent small studios but have access to generous communal areas and facilities.

It is on this little island between B&Q and Chiswick Roundabout. To provide some proportions, I reckon you could fit 250 of these sites into Gunnersbury Park though about 10 of them would be under water.

When I was first in Brentford I loved this site because this was the days when you went to the bank to get some money. Well, there was a Nat West bank there and you could go up a little service road from the roundabout and park right outside the front door. Those were the days.

When I moved to Chiswick there was a proposal that I liked but got a lot of opposition (we are talking Chiswick, folks) called the Pinnacle.

That never happened, nor did the 5 more that were proposed in that tiny site. None of them as interesting as the Pinnacle IMO, but what do I know. I actually think The James is an interesting idea, and may actually be viable. I will wait for it coming to Planning with interest (if it ever does!)

On Friday night I attended a leaving do for Tom Brooks, the council officer who had a special link with Brentford and led on the Digital Dock. An excellent man, a good friend of our town and (I discovered) the son of a well-known actor. Many, me included, will miss Tom, but he promises to lurk around Brentford after a period of travelling.

On Saturday I joined some cycling chums including Katherine Dunne and the new Liberal Democratic councillor for Isleworth Roger Crouch to cycle from Isleworth to Osterley Park for the cycling Mela. On the way we dropped in on the any ability cycling place in Inwood Park in Hounslow.

Great to see people of all sizes and types, some disabled, getting to know bikes and trikes, including one that you can propel with your hands.

The Mela was great fun. These young women were the cycle ballet I believe

On Sunday was my joint surgery with Katherine Dunne and Dan Bowring (no residents on that occasion) who try to work together to improve our town.

Later I went canvassing in North Acton, where I once lived in a very cheap hovel for several years from 1976 which makes me feel old. We were canvassing in what had once been a very posh road but now every house seemed to have been converted into about 10 flats. I hate canvassing these because inevitably the person who answers comes down the stairs from the 4th floor and oftem hold their climb against whomever had disturbed their afternoon!

I noticed some things they do better in Ealing like this volunteer created little garden on the pavement.

I want more of these in Hounslow (well, I really mean Brentford) but I failed to get Hounslow Highways and the council to enthuse about this whilst I was on Cabinet. I asked Amy Croft who is the Cabinet member now to get on with it!

Also been noticing how the initiative I fought for to improve verges has not prospered.

This is one I did earlier. We planted some flowers then SSE dug it all up. I insisted they replanted, which they did. A few years on, though, it is just a bug hotel, a bit of litter, overgrown grass and about 2 surviving plants.

The vision I was looking for was based on something I saw years ago when I was diverted off the M1 to Doncaster and saw this display, described as the River of Flowers. 

The scene on Ealing Road doesn't seem quite as stunning. Must be the weather.

On Monday I was due to meet the Council CEO. I went into Hounslow House and went into Teams, but the CEO being a lot clever than me noticed I was actually sitting in the office next to where she was sitting, so we met face to face! She wants to have a periodic update with the leaders of the groups on the council. I had quite a list of topics I wanted to cover - a lot of Brentford and some more generic Hounslow matters. I have nothing much to report because this was a first chapter but it was friendly and felt constructive.

Afterwards I met Amy and talked to her about Hounslow Highways, street cleaning and enforcement which (my readers will know) I think is very badly directed at present. Amy was listening and I hope to see a sea change to this.

Meanwhile the grit bins we introduced a few years ago to stop people who live above flats dumping bags on the pavement... well, it works well in some places but quite often they are abused or simply not enough capacity provided. Amy has the extra problem we could defer in my time which is providing recycling facilities for the same set of residents. It is now becoming a council responsibility so they need to find a solution! Sorry for the blurry picture, provided by a resident!

On Tuesday evening I had an update with the man who runs Gunnersbury Park on account of Hounslow and Ealing councils, who jointly own the park. It was in my ward for 7 years and I got to know the problems very well. The bad news is that they seem to have got worse, with inadequate support from the 2 councils (which in itself makes things difficult) a lot of local opposition to any financially-advantageous schemes for the park and increasingly difficult financial challenges. It is hard (and always was) to get Hounslow to give it the support it needs. Even harder with Ealing, and the magic money tree attached to lottery money seems to have lost its leaves. The worst thing that could happen would be for the park to go back to being semi-derelict, as it was until about 10 years ago when lottery money fixed one of the 3 main listed buildings (another had previously fallen down). Improving this is way above my pay grade, is no longer in my ward, and needs radical change, but I can try to make the case.

On Wednesday I attended a training on Council finances. They are quite complicated but over the years I have quite a good understanding (being a qualified accountant in a previous life does help quite a bit!)

I will bore you with just this one slide. People think all the council does is fix potholes and clean the streets, so please concentrate on the blue bits. Two thirds of what the council does, with a budget comparable to what Holland and Barrett turn over in the UK is run social services. Not a lot of people know that (or choose to forget it!)

This weekend!!!!

The Canal Festival

Don't miss it (I will be doing some helping some of the time)

And don't miss challenging fit young Adonis Cllr Dan Bowring

If it's half the fun it was last year....