Head of the Islington Society David Gibson

• THE retiring head of the Islington Society, David Gibson is bang on the button: Islington’s need for more affordable housing must not be at the expense of the borough’s green spaces, (‘Planning rules pose a threat to our high streets’, April 2).

Particularly so, as our borough has the second lowest amount of such space across all UK local authorities.

Hidden inside planning applications across 17 estates where permission has already been granted for an additional 550 council homes to be built by 2022 (in time for next year’s local election?) the following policy statement can be found: “Regarding open space, Development Management Policy DM6.3 states that development is not permitted on semi-private amenity spaces, including open space within housing estates and other similar spaces in the borough not designated as public open space within this document, unless the loss of amenity space is compensated and the development has over-riding planning benefits”.

What those “planning benefits” are isn’t spelled out but it’s hard to see, for example, what they might be in the case of the Dixon Clark Court, where a residents’ beautiful communal garden and the Highbury Corner “little forest” of mature trees have been destroyed for a maximum of 25 council homes and a block of small leaseholder flats.

Meantime a further nine estates are listed under Islington’s Local Plan Site Allocations policy, currently out for consultation. Among these are Bemerton South in Caledonian ward, and Aubert / Drakeley courts in Highbury West where a by-election will be held on May 6.

The latter presents an opportunity for the estate’s residents to express their views through their vote – the detailed proposals can be found here.

Like local authorities across the country, Islington desperately needs affordable homes but why should these be at the expense of the environmental amenity of already-existing tenants, some of whom will be the least well-off of local residents?

How resident agreement to estate changes is secured also needs to be examined. Existing tenants are offered “first dibs” on their estate’s new-builds as a matter of housing department policy, while it seems that Dixon Clark Court residents were offered one year free from council tax if they agreed to the planning proposals for their site.

No one can blame tenants for accepting these offers, “bribes” by another name, particularly if their existing homes are in a state of disrepair or they’re in financial need. Whether the proposed densification of their estates and loss of green space is actually in their longer-term interests is another matter.

Islington Council might need to reconsider the financial viability of the schemes for which permission has already been granted and the additional ones it’s considering, as there’s growing anecdotal evidence that small, two-bed, leaseholder flats without private gardens are sitting unsold on estate agents’ books as London undergoes significant pandemic demographic and employment changes.

Add to this the line being spun by some councillors that tenants can no longer afford to exercise the right to buy their homes, and there’s a steaming stew of a failed financial model behind the new-build proposals.

Meantime some 180 mature and semi-mature trees are to be destroyed across 15 of the already-permissioned estates new-builds…

MEG HOWARTH
Ellington Street, N7