Hammersmith and Fulham council bid to take back Earl’s Court land: site could be seized for housing

BY OWEN SHEPPARD
Local Democracy Reporter
yann@slpmedia.co.uk

Hammersmith and Fulham council will embark on a £2.15billion bid to take back swathes of “derelict” land in Earl’s Court, in the hope of building thousands of homes.

Labelled 10 years ago as the Earl’s Court Opportunity Area, work on the chunk of land once home to the Exhibition Centre of the same name, and equal to the size of 29 football pitches, has been stagnant.

At a council cabinet meeting last week, council leader Stephen Cowan took aim at developer Capital and Counties (Capco) for leaving the area “desolate”.

The Labour leader said: “It’s hard to see a less competent approach to redevelopment than the one that Capital and Counties have taken.”

After threatening Capco for several months, council chiefs voted on October 7 to go ahead with a bid to force the company off sections of the land, and break a long-running deadlock.

Mr Cowan, said: “It’s a desolate and derelict site… in a capital city, during Brexit and an economic slow down that’s on the horizon. It’s a crying shame when you consider the housing crisis.

“It is only right that when this moribund scheme isn’t going forward, that we should move forward with a compulsory purchase order (CPO) and provide the economic infrastructure and homes that are much-needed for London.

“Capco are not a developer. What Capco are is a property speculator.”

Much of the site was sold to Capco by the council when it was led by the Conservatives. It was given planning permission to build 7,500 homes across the site in 2013.

A recent council report said: “The compensation cost to acquire the land alone is estimated to be £650million, based on information currently available.”

And that’s before it plans its own giant housing scheme, which it predicts could cost “a further £1.5billion over and above the remaining infrastructure costs”.

As part of its case for making the CPO, The report suggested that “funding” would come from borrowing, and trying to establish “market interest” in joining with an “investment partner”.

However the report also said that if the council gets its way, the end of 2021 may be the earliest it can reclaim the land and plan its new housing scheme.

A spokesman for Capco said it was “advised that LBHF (the council) has not demonstrated that they have a credible position in relation to CPO, a process which is only likely to slow down the Earl’s Court scheme and delay the range of public benefits that could arise from the Opportunity Area”.

Capco, also a major real estate mogul in Covent Garden, has reportedly been trying to sell its stake in Earl’s Court for up to a year.

The Mail on Sunday reported last week that Capco has been in talks with property giants including Delancey, Canary Wharf Group, Hong Kong-based CK Asset Holdings, and Asia’s richest man, Li Ka-shing.

A spokesman for Capco said this was “speculation”.

The CPO could prove controversial because large parts of the site, such as the Lillie Bridge Depot, are co-owned by Capco and Transport for London (TfL).

Another section, the area north of West Brompton Station, sits outside the council’s land, in Kensington and Chelsea.

The CPO area does not include the West Kensington and Gibbs Green estates, where residents have felt uncertainty about the future of their homes.

In a public inquiry that would decide whether the CPO is valid, the council would have to show that no other options were available to free the land from Capco.

Permission would also have to be given by the current Secretary of State for Housing, Communities and Local Government.

The council and Capco dispute whether “formal talks” between the two sides, about selling the land back to the council, have taken place.

A Capco spokesman said previous comments by Mr Cowan, that Capco had wanted to sell the land back to the council, were “not factually accurate”.

A report produced for the council by real estate services company Avison Young has advised the council it should pursue a final round of negotiations with Capco for a period of four months next year, before submitting the CPO plans to the Government.

The council hired Avison Young for £3.2 million to compose a strategy for the CPO.

A TfL spokeswoman said: “We share Hammersmith and Fulham council’s desire to see development under way at Earl’s Court.

We welcome any proposal that will see development commence quickly with much higher levels of affordable housing brought forward.”

Kensington and Chelsea council did not respond to requests for comment.