Karl Brown argues why Enfield residents should lend their voices to a campaign to ensure that a Grade 1 Site of Importance for Nature Conservation just over the border in Haringey should no longer be classified as suitable for industrial uses.
As Enfield’s Local Plan trundles through its final stage, that of neighbouring borough Haringey reaches its Reg18 stage, a key milestone when the draft document is sent out for public consultation.
Enfield residents can comment, and it is worth doing so for at least one reason: Fifteen years ago, in a secret deal, Barnet council sold most of a site it owned, aka “Pinkham Way”, to the North London Waste Authority (NLWA) for an eight-figure sum. The site is actually in Haringey and so falls within the scope of its Local plan development.
NLWA is a local authority with a controlling board made up of councillors from seven north London councils, including Enfield, who also act as its primary funders, ie us. What it does, and spends, directly affects us.
The intent was for NLWA to build a huge waste plant on the site. Ultimately deciding such a plant was not required, the NLWA nonetheless owned the (costly) site; a site which is a borough Grade 1 Site of Importance for Nature Conservation (SINC) and it is suggested would cost tens of millions of pounds of remedial work to become a safe development location.
Huge resource, financial and human, has been expended over the intervening years as the NLWA has sought to maintain its value and options on the site’s use. At every turn they have been pushed back by the Pinkham Way Alliance (PWA). This has included several public inquiries led by a Planning inspector.
The Haringey Local Plan is the vehicle by which the Planning Inspectorate (PINS), acting for the Secretary of State, can determine the land classification of the site, potentially putting to an end this long-running haemorrhaging of time and money.
Over the years PWA has built a powerful reputation with PINS for the quality of its submissions. Acknowledging that, PINS are content that residents attach their individual support to PWA input but still have it count as an individual submission. In this way, 2200 residents submitted when challenging the North London Waste Plan via PWA. (More normally, such an approach would be counted as only one submission.)
You can read more about Pinkham Way here: pinkhamway.org.
You can read the main points of the PWA submsission and add your supporting name to it here: pinkhamway.org/regulation-18-consultation-survey.
Your support to the countless hours experts have voluntarily contributed to this work is worthwhile.
All members of a household over the age of 16 can sign individually (but please only one submission per email address).
