Letter – ‘Halt demolition of Britannia Leisure Centre’

The Britannia leisure centre is located on the edge of Shoreditch Park

An open letter to Philip Glanville, Mayor of Hackney

Dear Mayor,

Congratulations on being elected as Mayor of Hackney.

We are asking you as one of your first decisions to call a halt to the demolition of Britannia Leisure Centre and its replacement by a tower block of 176 flats for market sale.

Hackney’s original proposal in its Site Allocations Local Plan included some leisure provision. Now it has added one, possibly two, schools. But at the core is still the destruction of the Britannia and the building of a tower block of unaffordable flats which will do nothing to solve Hackney’s housing crisis.

This massive redevelopment has huge implications. But no public consultation on this core plan has been carried out so far, besides an announcement in Hackney Today and some leaflets which very few people have seen.

A feasibility study produced by a consultancy for the Britannia site redevelopment, which also affects Shoreditch Park, was due in summer but will not now, according to a council officer who spoke at our recent public meeting, be ready until at least November.

Until it is published the people of Hackney will have no opportunity to formally comment on the proposal.

The plan includes a temporary site for the school on Haggerston Park. The limited consultation on this site met with overwhelming opposition. But even this proposal has not yet gone to the planning committee.

Yet the City of London Academies Trust, Hackney Council’s selected provider for the new academy, is already meeting parents and putting out materials advertising itself as opening in September 2017, and being on Hyde Road, the Britannia site, from 2019.

This is deeply undemocratic, especially as the people most heavily affected, the users of Britannia Leisure Centre and local residents, have not been consulted at all and have reacted with shock and dismay to the news that the centre is to be demolished.

Since 22 August more than 2,200 people have signed the petition Save Britannia Leisure Centre.

More than 700 people have written comments. They show that, contrary to what the council is saying, Britannia is not old, out of date or unsuitable for the local community, but instead a well loved and well used centre that attracts people from all parts of Hackney and beyond.

That is why we are asking you to call a halt to this redevelopment. It is not wanted by most of the Hackney people affected by it and Hackney Council has not given us the opportunity to tell you that.

We look forward to your positive response.

Haggerston Park Users’ Group
Save Britannia Leisure Centre
Shoreditch Park Users’ Group

Editor’s note: An edited version of this letter appeared in the Hackney Citizen print edition for October 2016