It is a source of constant frustration for Kensington and Chelsea minority party Councillors – currently eight Labour, three Independent and one Green – that they are so often completely and utterly side-lined by the Tory-run Council. In a recent review of the ‘Charter for Public Participation’ the role, purpose and experience of N Ken Councillors has been barely mentioned. The relationship outlined is purely between the Council and the residents. Yet we are the ones, alongside our residents, who supported our friends and neighbours during and after the preventable atrocity of the Grenfell Tower fire. We are the ones who endlessly chase officers from the Council and housing associations to do their job and support our residents. We are the ones who do our best to scrutinise their work while being denied information.
We were then, and are now, treated with disdain. And sometimes contempt.
I’ll explain.
In September 2018 the Kroll Report’s detailed investigation of the secretive purchase of K&C College (Wornington College) stated: ‘KCC and RBKC purposefully limited communications with the local community [due to what they called] the local dynamic’ (my emphases). The report quotes RBKC’s lawyers saying on record in May 2016 ‘… if a rogue Councillor or third party started making noise about RBKC doing deals in secret, they would have to put out a reactive statement’. The Kroll Report concluded: ‘Labour Cllrs were not even informed of the sale, until the deal had been completed.’
Did relations improve after that damning report? They did not.
The years and years of ‘obfuscation’ and ‘misrepresentation’ about the prospect of a Crossrail (Elizabeth line) station at Kensal Gasworks were deliberately maintained, allegedly to raise land values and to tempt developers into North Ken. A station may have been a possibility in the past, but from 2006 to this day – it’s a blatant lie. While officers maintained that ‘an announcement would be made in two weeks’ (for years) in 2012 then Transport Minister Stephen Hammond told the Council that it would never happen and to take it out of the Local Plan. Fellow Councillors and I were told definitively by Crossrail officers that it was a fantasy. However there is still a reference to it and a ‘safeguarded site’ in the latest plans.
In 2020 I commented on the Council Plan and Charter for Public Participation with these words:
‘Council members and officers should be made familiar with The Charter, to counter our concerns about lack of cultural change. In addition, officers should undergo training to better understand the role of elected members given that many senior officers see themselves as the executive, and Councillors (particularly minority party Councillors) as working for them.’
And in relation to endless rounds of policy documents the LGA Review of Governance and Scrutiny of 2020 stated: ‘We were told by a number of people that they felt that the Council uses the act of strategising, and of reviewing and evaluating strategic changes it has made, as a proxy for taking meaningful action.’
Roll forward five years, and minority party Councillors in North Ken are still being excluded from ‘deals in secret’. I mention here the following assets undergoing ‘review’ where the relevant Councillors are kept entirely in the dark: Canalside House; Lowerwood Court; Bays 18/19; Unit 12 Latimer Road; and others I shouldn’t really mention.
From the Council that committed to the Hillsborough Charter in December 2017 there is no openness and transparency; honesty and respect has been by-passed.
We don’t know if officers are simply overworked, deliberately obfuscating, or under strict instructions from the Tory Leadership Team to create yet another magnificent fudge and deliberately by-pass elected Councillors, as they were in the past.
We are not rogue Councillors; we are elected members who live in, understand and serve our communities. Grenfell tenants were named ‘rebel residents’ by the Grenfell Tower refurbishment contractor in 2015: : “We are under massive pressure from the rebel residents about our quality of work … so far their complaints are unfounded, but I need to ensure our finish is good quality, especially on the show areas.”
I feel especially badly for residents getting involved in panels, focus groups and online consultations, in the genuine hope of one more step towards ‘the best Council we can be’.
Sadly, it seems RBKC Council is ‘best Council we can be’ and that just isn’t good enough.
May the rogues and rebels prevail!
5.12.2025