|
|
 |
| |
 Patrick Pugh |
‘I’m innocent’ pleads former planning chief
SPECIAL REPORT: probe into bias claims over £2bn King’s Cross development
CAMDEN’S former planning chairman has claimed his innocence at a Standards Board hearing investigating whether he was unfairly biased against £2 billion plans to redevelop the King’s Cross railway lands.
Labour councillor Brian Woodrow was quizzed in front of a three-man investigating panel for five hours about his conduct on Thursday.
He is accused of trying to ‘tap up’ influential government advisers English Heritage and of speaking out against the redevelopment in the Architects Journal (AJ), a specialist magazine, before the designs had been considered by a committee of councillors. At times during the hearing, Cllr Woodrow, who uses a walking stick, looked drained and exasperated. He paused for deep breaths and sipped from a glass of water as he was bombarded with questions by Matthew Horton QC, representing the Standards Board for England.
He repeatedly denied any wrong-doing and was insistent that phone calls to English Heritage were not an attempt to raise opposition to the blueprint mapped out by developers Argent Limited – since approved by the Town Hall.
Asked several times what the purpose of his contact with Patrick Pugh, a senior figure in the London branch of English Heritage, whom Cllr Woodrow had known from Mr Pugh’s previous job as a Camden planning officer, he told the hearing: “I have known him for around 30 years, he is as concerned about conservation issues as I am.”
The Standards Board contest that phone calls made by Cllr Woodrow to Mr Pugh, sometime during summer 2004, were an attempt to convince English Heritage to raise objections to Argent’s plans.
Cllr Woodrow said: “It is absolute nonsense to suggest that I was trying to influence the views of everyone.”
In relation to comments attributed to him in AJ, he repeated his claims that the magazine could not be taken seriously because the magazine had a history of making mistakes and then having to make formal corrections.
He disputed several aspects of journalist Ed Dorrell’s AJ article in September 2004 which alleged he was opposed to the redevelopment on the grounds that there were plans for too many high buildings and offices.
Mr Dorrell had been scheduled to give evidence but refused to appear at the hearing. In an interview with an investigating officer, he said that he stood by his story and the AJ’s performance.
But the journalist’s decision not to attend the proceedings was at the centre of a point of contention.
Mr Horton QC said: “It is quite common for journalists to shy away from giving evidence to a tribunal.”
Dame Jane Roberts, then Labour’s leader of the council, wrote to the AJ with a strongly-worded article claiming Mr Dorrell had been mistaken.
Robert McCracken QC, appearing for Cllr Woodrow, said: “Mr Dorrell chose not to come and give evidence to the hearing despite the most serious allegation that a journalist can face from Dame Jane Roberts – that his report is untrue.”
Argent’s outline for the 65-acre site – the biggest brownfield site in Europe and perhaps most important planning application the Town Hall has ever dealt with – was approved by councillors in a split vote in March.
By that time Cllr Woodrow had been stripped of his chairmanship of the planning committee, a post he had held since the late 1990s, by his own Labour colleagues. He told the hearing that he was the victim of a “campaign” against him waged by councillors and officials.
Roger Madelin, the chief executive of Argent complained about Cllr Woodrow to the Town Hall, Cllr Woodrow claimed the complaint had been kept from him until he was summoned to a meeting in Dame Jane’s office.
Cllr Woodrow told the hearing that he had since been told by new chairwoman Councillor Dawn Somper, a Conservative, that she would rather he was still in the job.
He said: “She hates the job quite frankly. She told me that. She wants me to come back to do it. It is quite nice to be flattered by a leading member of a party I have been fighting for years.”
Councillors from both the Lib Dems and the Conservatives, as well as conservationists, community campaigners and journalists have written to the investigating panel in praise of Cllr Woodrow.
They include Mira Bar-Hilel, a property journalist with the Evening Standard, who said she admired Cllr Woodrow’s “genuine modesty” and “integrity”.
After coming through the courtroom-style examination, Cllr Woodrow was told his ‘trial’ was not over yet and must roll over to a further two days in December.
The case has been hanging over him for 18 months and it is understood his side were keen to bring the case to conclusion as soon as possible, with Cllr Woodrow recently suffering from poor health and stress.
If the adjudicating panel rule Cllr Woodrow did break the rules, it has the power to suspend him from representing Holborn and Covent Garden ward.
The hearing had been scheduled to run for two days at Shropshire House in Capper Street, Bloomsbury, but Cllr Woodrow’s time in the witness box ran over its planned schedule.
Mr Horton QC told the panel that “on the balance of probabilities” Cllr Woodrow had broken the rules but Mr McCracken QC said there was a need for much stronger proof.
The hearing will resume on December 12.
|
 |
|
|
|
