The Council Are Funding The Havering Mosque Application
After an eye watering 102 days, our Freedom Of Information request has been answered. Havering Council did everything it could to delay and frustrate any kind of response, using time extensions, threats of charging for the information, and repeatedly suggesting that our team complain to the Information Commissioners Office.
However we stuck to our guns and insisted they answer.
As you can imagine, the council haven't supplied a lot of information, and have cited a whole raft of legal reasons, not to comply with our information request, and claimed an almost blanket exemption on all information relating to the Havering Mosque plans at 222-226 South St.
In fact 22 of the 57 documents they supplied, were from outside of the specified date range we requested, and many of the extra documents were emails from Cllr David Taylor, who is the bane of the Customer Insight, Information & Investigations Team. We'd suggest this is some kind of "in" joke amongst the staff.
But the documents we did receive were enlightening, although they were all heavily redacted, apart fro Cllr Taylor's
The Leader Of The Council's Statement 16/08/24
Read it here
Ray Morgon's statement of 16/08/24 goes to great lengths to clear up "misinformation" using his own "misinformation". This paragraph is key:
"The negotiations the Council is having with the HICC is governed by CPO legislation and guidance. Essentially this means the Council must, by law, offer the HICC owners a fair market price for their land and pay for equivalent like for like reinstatement elsewhere. Plus, reasonable compensation for the loss of the land."
Now we have no issue with a like for like replacement, but take a look at the photo above, is that what's happening here ? The current mosque holds about 300 worshippers in a single sitting, the new proposed mosque holds 3,000.....10 times the size of the current building ! Like for like it is not !
We have no issue with a fair market value or compensation, but as long as that's all that's going on. However the Havering Mosque website offers some additional information
So How Much Is This Contribution ?
We suspect that any contributions made by the council will be hidden amongst the costs for The Bridge St regeneration scheme. All throughout the summer, the council has been helping to facilitate the complicated surveys required for the large mosque application. And you'll never guess who's picking up the bill ?
And it's not just a single survey !
Have Havering Mosque Let The Cat Out Of The Bag ?
Nestled deep in the Havering Mosque website, is this nugget of information;
And what agreement have the Havering Mosque made with Havering Council ? If this is true, the council would be furious about his informtion being leaked, and Cllr Williamson does seem a bit miffed:
And the timing of this email is significant, it's a day after Cllr Morgon's statement, clearing up "misinformation"
And Just How Involved Are The Council With The Application ?,
We have emails going back as far as February 2024, showing the attendence of Cllr Morgon and Cllr Williamson at meetings with the Havering Mosque, something Cllr Morgon forgot to include in his statement.
It's kind of telling that the Leader of the Council and Cabinet Lead for Development are getting involved in a process normally handled by the planning team.
This final email is either from Havering Mosque or their developer, asking Cllr Williamson to organise the presentation of the Pre Planning Advice (PPA) to the Planning Committee, to answer the questions of certain councillors.
In our opinion this is completely.inappropriate and amounts to pre determination and lobbying.
So much for Cllr Morgon's claims that ""Any request from the HICC regarding the planning permission will follow the existing planning process"
But that's not what's happening here !
© Copyright. All rights reserved.
We need your consent to load the translations
We use a third-party service to translate the website content that may collect data about your activity. Please review the details in the privacy policy and accept the service to view the translations.