Council slammed for not buying biggest park to open since London Olympics for £1

By Charlotte Lillywhite, Local Democracy Reporter

A council has been accused of failing to secure a new 32-acre public park for future generations after deciding not to buy it for £1.

Wandsworth Conservatives have raised concerns about the future of Springfield Park, in Tooting, following the decision. It has been dubbed the biggest park to open in the capital since the Olympic Games.

The park is opening to the public in phases, as part of a major revamp of Springfield Hospital to create Springfield Village.

The village will include more than 800 new homes, two mental health facilities, shops, a café, a care home and land for a new school when it is completed by 2026.

The project is being carried out by South West London and St George’s Mental Health NHS Trust, master developer STEP and other partners.

Wandsworth council has come under fire for its decision not to adopt the park, which it said was partly due to the cost of maintaining it.

However one knock-on effect of not adopting it is that rather than the council paying for its maintenance, residents in the newly-built homes may have to foot the bill.

It had the option to take ownership of the park under a legal agreement it entered into with the NHS trust in June 2012, while the council was being led by the Conservatives. 

The agreement required the trust to serve the council with an adoption notice giving it 30 working days to decide if it wished to adopt the park, including all management and maintenance costs. Freehold of the park would then have been transferred to the council for £1.

Wandsworth Conservatives said it negotiated this clause in the agreement so the council had the option, which it claimed would secure it for future generations. But the Conservatives lost control of the council when it switched to Labour for the first time in 44 years at the local elections in May 2022.

The trust served the council with the adoption notice in August 2022. 

A report from the trust estimated it would cost around £180,000 a year to maintain the park and a previously agreed endowment fund of at least £900,000 would only fund five years’ maintenance.

It recommended the council did not adopt the park “due to the positive social benefits the continuing ownership by the trust will bring and to the ongoing revenue commitment adoption of the park would create for the council”.

At the meeting on June 27, Conservative councillor Peter Graham said the council had the chance to buy the park “to secure it as a public asset, run for the public benefit”. 

But the committee voted to support officers’ recommendations not to adopt the park, with six councillors voting in favour and three against. The decision was confirmed by the council’s executive on July 17.

A Wandsworth council spokesman said: “Wandsworth council currently invests more than £3.2million a year in looking after the borough’s council-maintained parks and open spaces.

“We want to ensure we’re continuing to support people with the cost of living by keeping council tax low and providing the most generous cost-of-living support fund in London.”

Pictured top: A new 32-acre park is opening to the public in two stages (Picture: South West London and St George’s Mental Health NHS Trust)