A campaign group has started a petition to try to prevent a parcel of public land being sold for luxury flats.
Brighton and Hove City Council appeared to deny that Freshfield Industrial Estate, in Stevenson Road, Brighton, would be sold for housing, given the long leases on the site and the focus there on jobs.
But the community union Acorn has publicised a petition and is encouraging people to write to councillors to try to head off any potential sale of the land to a developer.
Acorn, a national community organisation which campaigns on housing and poverty, said that it believed that the site was among those listed in confidential papers to the April meeting of the council’s cabinet on the “capital asset strategy”.
A report published before the meeting, which was on Thursday 28 April, said that the council was looking at low-yield properties and considering which could be sold.
The confidential papers included a list of properties which could be sold or used for housing.
Acorn Brighton branch organiser Toby Sedgewick said that the organisation had tried to share its concerns at a meeting with the council but its fears were not allayed, with the council citing “commercial sensitivity”.
He said that Acorn had been told that the site was for sale and if someone from the council had denied it, that would prove that the issue was not commercially sensitive.
Acorn’s greatest concern is the site being sold to a developer to build “luxury flats” or student housing rather than homes for local people.
Mr Sedgwick said: “We’ve seen developments across the city, such as Circus Street, the Lewes Road Student Castle and most recently St Catherine’s Lodge, in Hove, include little or no genuinely affordable housing despite the council telling us its policy is for every development to have at least 40 per cent affordable.
“We’ve got no faith the council will stand up to developers and we’re worried we’ll just end up with another luxury development on the site, driving up rents and pushing locals further out of the area.
“If the council wants to take the housing crisis seriously, they have to commit to holding developers to account, ensuring genuinely affordable housing is built in every single development and build at least 500 council homes a year.”
Labour councillor Jacob Taylor, the council’s cabinet member for finance and city regeneration, said: “We agree with Acorn on the urgency of fixing the housing crisis in the city which is why we’re building major new sites for affordable housing – like Sackville Road and Moulsecoomb Hub.
“The situation at Freshfield Industrial Estate is somewhat complicated. The site is leased out on eight long leases, five of which expire in 88 years and three of which expire in 90 years.
“The site would therefore not be available for any alternative use for the council until 2115.
“The site is occupied by 25 sub-tenants, each of which supports vital jobs within the city.
“It is allocated in our City Plan as being for employment use and our policy means any future developments would need to enhance the employment on site.
“There is an expectation within that guidance the employment floorspace will be improved and although there is an allowed allocation for some housing, that is secondary to the employment requirement.
“This therefore restricts the potential for a housing-led redevelopment of the site.”
To read more about Acorn’s letter-writing campaign or to take part, go to acornuk.good.do/southeast/ourland.
As a builder and carpenter, tasked with numerous maintenance jobs, I was a customer on the Freshfield estate today – and I’d add to this news story in that Freshfield is the last remaining retail park for building supplies on the east side of Brighton.
If you need timber, or plaster board, or paint, or screws or a plumbing part, then the Freshfield estate is where you go, without crossing the city to alternative places like Shoreham harbour or Southwick. There’s also a vet’s practice, and some storage facilities there.
We can keep seeing these ££££££ valuable plots of land as ‘brown-field’ sites for high rise flats, but we now know those modern flats really get sold on to local people, and the buy-to-let rents are rarely affordable to anyone already here.
The ‘shared ownership’ schemes are also a modern scam, and a disasterous trap for half-home owners who can’t escape the ripoff and spiralling maintenance charges.
So building flats is rarely a true solution to the housing crisis, and what you get on the ground floors of these developments is just more gyms and supermarkets, while ‘Screwfix’ et al are ousted. .
The industrial estate jobs are also lost. If you actually live in the area, you then have to commute elsewhere to work in any non-online job.
And then try and get a jobbing builder or repair person to come and work on your place, once they can’t get the necessary spare parts or construction materials.
correction: ‘those modern flats ‘rarely’ get sold to local people….’
So there is no plan to turn this industrial estate into any type of housing!
Have Acorn run out of things to do?
Sounds like Acorn thought so, looked into it, and it was confirmed legally not feasible until 2115.
Short, important question, simple, straightforward answer.
Perhaps then Acorn should refrain from orgainsing petitions and encouraging residents to email their councillors, thus wasting everyone’s time, before they even ask the council. Still, an effective way to get their name back in the press.
Can’t argue with that, in hindsight, a simple exploration of the question would have been enough. Save the petitions until they are really needed! I’m all for avoiding diminishing returns.
Right, so Acorn who used to be a “renters union” and have close links to the Chair of Housing learned of a confidential report in April.
And have stopped campaigning against exploitative landlords and are now campaigning against housing.
Even though this is allocated as employment land in the City Plan, so is unlikely to happen.
Funny they never raised concerns about the 9 blocks of council flats that need to be pulled down. Something Housing has known about for a year?
Something a bit whiffy here.
The highrises were common knowledge for a long period of time before they were published as a news article, Palmeria, even if we didn’t know what direction the council were going to take, and even before the new regulations forced the council’s hand on the matter, the buildings themselves were at the end of their working life. The consensus has logically been that they need action, and there’s not really anything to campaign about here other than which method is used. Therefore, I can’t share your conspiracy here.
Acorn still seems to do a lot of campaigning on exploitative landlords, but that’s only part of their position, according to their website. They seem to take a more holistic aspect, because accommodation is more than just rogue landlords, right? Makes sense to me.
The best way to stop terrible housing conditions is to encourage better housing developments, in my opinion, so absolutely, well within their remit to express an opinion here.
What makes Acorn believe the site was in confidential papers. Would one of their regular spokespeople care to explain where this information came from? Otherwise we can take this as mis information to publicise their group.
A group which has now expanded it remit from housing to anything anti-council, such as bus fares.
If they can’t reply then this is just a stunt.
It drew out an answer from the council, didn’t it? I’d say their “stunt” worked pretty well?
The point being not the ‘drawn out’ discussion but who told them, if it was in confidential papers or
Is this a non story that is a stunt? Where is the proof that the site is under consideration at all?
Who knows, it could have been leaked in a variety of different ways for a variety of different reasons. I don’t think we’d ever likely get a firm answer on that one, and I don’t think it makes too much of a difference if we do or don’t. But that’s just my opinion.
Lots of if, could be, possibly, maybe, and a maybe campaign about some plot maybe possibly available early next century, more like somone walked into a fart and decided to build a story around it.
Future-future-future planning?
Could be Benjamin, might be a council money grab trying to extract a few shillings from the next Century hopes and promises never to be kept,