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Countdown to loss of shops
• THE sale of 220 small shops and business premises is underway. Business owners daily confront the sight of property investors hovering around their premises like bees around the honey pot.
Packs for the sale of Islington Council’s commercial property portfolio actively promote the added value to prospective purchasers of outstanding lease renewals and rent reviews.
More than 50 per cent of the portfolio properties are so affected. The marketing literature suggests that rental returns could be doubled on many of these properties.
The council’s agents, Erinaceous, have attempted to renew and review leases and rents in the few months leading up to and subsequent to the announcement of the sale. Leaseholders have been confronted with demands for 80-100 per cent increases in rent, with the knowledge that, if they do not agree, their properties will be disproportionately valuable to portfolio purchasers.
Any attempt to seek arbitration – “the protection of our leases” – in such circumstances is impossible because of the time constraint of the sale and the significant expense involved.
After the sale of more than 50 commercial properties by the council in 2002-03 to Derwent Valley, many leaseholders faced rent increase demands of 300 per cent. Many of these properties are now boarded up around the borough, awaiting redevelopment.
Property investors have billions of pounds to invest and time to wait for their investment to accrue value. But they will want a current return on their investment. This will mean large rent increases and some immediate redevelopment.
The result will be a loss of shops and services to the community, both in the short and long term.
This process is what the Lib Dem executive has called “a level playing field”.
Dale Barter
Islington Traders Group
Amwell Street, EC1
q LIB Dem council leader Councillor James Kempton is either kidding himself, or everyone else in Islington, if he thinks that listening is his top priority (Your vote can help drive out pollution, April 20).
Cllr Kempton is clearly not listening to the people of Islington who do not want the council to sell off 200 shops. Nor was he listening when he used tax-payers’ money to pay the legal bills of fellow Lib Dems.
He is about to ignore local people again and press ahead with his unpopular plans for Archway, which will blight the area for years to come.
Cllr Kempton was part of the Lib Dem administration which ignored the views of residents and closed the much-loved Arthur Simpson Library.
If Cllr Kempton is really keen to listen to people, he would welcome Islington Labour’s idea for a wider referendum on whether the council should sell the shops, whether we should freeze the sale of community assets and give a better deal on estate parking. This is his opportunity to show Lib Dems don’t just say one thing and do another.
CLLR RICHARD WATTS
Labour, Tollington ward
•IT’S good that listening to Islington is Councillor James Kempton’s top priority. But why hold a referendum on parking charges? The idea of less- polluting vehicles paying less and more polluting ones more is fair and sensible. It was proposed by the Green Party, seconded by the Lib Dems and backed by Labour – impressive cross-party consensus.
Meanwhile, the council is forcing through the sale of its commercial properties. This was not in the Lib Dem manifesto at the last election, is opposed by Greens and Labour and by thousands of local people. Surely, this sell-off is the right subject for a referendum.
JAMES HUMPHREYS
Islington Green Party |
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