As we posted a few days ago – perhaps stung by the criticism surrounding the plans for a new Rough Sleeper Assessment Hub / Hostel opposite Battersea Arts Centre, which came as a surprise to its neighbours and which saw over 500 (often very detailed) objection comments, Wandsworth organised a public meeting on the project earlier this week.  Councillor Aydin Dikerdem was the lead for the engagement, and before the meeting told us – I completely understand why people were concerned or worried about the plans when they first heard about them. We’re holding the public drop-in session so we can reassure residents and field any questions they might have about the proposals but I also welcome people emailing me directly. We are very confident this will be a discreet and incredibly safe service. We want to improve things for the local area by helping people rough sleeping get back on their feet, and as a local resident myself it is very personal to me that this does not negatively impact anybody who lives off and around Lavender Hill.

The meeting ran for three hours and saw around 100 people attend, including some who supported the idea in general but had quite specific asks on the proposal and suggestions for how the impact on the neighbours could be reduced, those who had a more general fear about impacts and how they could be handled, and those who did not want this to go ahead under any circumstances.  The general mood was fairly constructive, and the Council officers were noting the concerns and suggestions put forward.  A four page Q&A was handed out covering some of the most frequently raised questions and concerns, which we’ve reproduced at the end of this post.

In addition to Aydin, the meeting was joined by a mix of Council staff, mainly from the housing department and the existing team who manage the Council’s rough sleeper provision – including a rough sleeper assessment officer, and the lead for moving people on to more permanent housing options, and the project lead for the new Hub.  Aydin (pictured below) drew the largest crowd and also the loudest critics, while the other tables tended to be focussed on more technical discussions on the details of the approach to housing and developing the project.  

If you’re coming to this issue new, you may want to look at the post we published in early October, which spilt the beans on this proposal.  It’s still a bit of a mystery as to how the application went out unadvertised – seemingly something to do with the system classing it as a minor change of use rather than something more important like a loft extension – but our post got vast traffic and seemed to spread the word rapidly!   The second post we published – a long one – summarised the comments on the proposal, and distilled down the points raised, both the 500+ objections and the dozen or so support comments, and used this to pick out 12 specific areas where action could be taken to reduce the impact if this project does go ahead. 

Will the meeting this week have reassured people? On a fair few of the more technical points, yes it will.  It was clear that the feedback had been quite widely read, and it did seem that the points raised had had some thought – as a fair few things have changed on the details front.  It was clear that there’s a committed and hard working team behind this venture, who genuinely want it to work – this is not just a box ticking exercise. 

However on whether this reassured attendees the underlying questions of why the provision for the whole of Richmond and Wandsworth is being concentrated here (which is largely down to it being a Council building that’s available), and on how the inherent challenges of housing residents with many challenges in a less-than-optimal non-central location that’s full of children and which already has challenges of its own – maybe less so. 

Memories were clearly still quite raw for many attendees of the fiasco that was the now-closed drug rehabilitation centre in the Shaftesbury Estate, and the somewhat unhappy experience of neighbours of the Cedars Road hostel (which continues to cause some issues even in its current much reduced form), and there was some concern that Westminster and Lambeth have also placed their facilities close to this part of the Borough, leading to an unusually high concentration of provision in a small area. 

Emotions ran high at some stages: one attendee shared very personal concerns about people with similar characteristics to the target demographic of the facility being aggressive to both adults and young children in the area, and were concerned that housing them nearby could make the issue worse. It was clear that despite some attendees clearly wanting the whole thing to go back to the drawing board, the Council is not planning to abandon these plans any time soon.

For those who could not make the meeting, we have gone back to the 12 points we published that summarised the suggestions from those who responded to the planning application on how these plans need to be improved – and we’ve tried to summarise what progress has been made (as far as we can tell) on them, on the basis of some of the discussions at the meeting. 

1: The Hub must publish and implement a Good Neighbour Plan: Wandsworth must establish, and publish, a proactive plan that addresses the potential challenges and mitigates them, ensuring smooth operation and peaceful coexistence in the neighbourhood. This must set out the options for residents if they encounter abusive or antisocial behaviour, and have a clear complaints and escalation procedure including the ability to have issues appealed to someone independent of the local hostel management if complaints cannot be resolved locally.

We didn’t get explicit confirmation of this, though Councillors were keen to stress that they recognised the fears and concerns of neighbours, and wanted to make this work.  The facility will remain directly fun by Wandsworth, even though it will have partner agencies including Spear and St Georges NHS trust working on site – which does preserve a higher degree of accountability than some of the hostels in neighbouring boroughs which are fully owned and run by charities (and where the standard of engagement with neighbouring residents ranges from excellent & constructive, to shambolic & really abysmal).

2: The Hub needs to commit to community engagement and awareness: The Hub should engage with the local community and businesses to understand their concerns and incorporate their feedback into the Good Neighbour Plan. They should also organise regular meetings or forums with neighbourhood representatives to discuss ongoing issues and solutions.

This meeting was a good start, after the lack of communication earlier in the development of the project.  The Council is now working with the Police, and has also belatedly spoken to businesses next to the proposed site to work out ways to reduce the impact of the new development; and they confirmed they are now liaising with neighbours like the nursery.  The idea of a dedicated community engagement lead in the facility was taken away for consideration.  A lot more planning and operational detail needs to be shared (and formally committed to) before this is really ready for any kind of signoff – we’ll keep you posted if we see further updates on this front. 

3: The Hub needs to operate controlled entry, and run by appointments only: An important one is the need for residents to exclusively be brought to the site, and those seeking services to only arrive on appointment, rather than being allowed to turn up unannounced – to avoid the sites becoming a late night magnet for anyone looking for a room, and people then going away disappointed and causing havoc. This is quite standard in some Hubs (but not all) and significantly helps them be calm and effective places. The Hub must, as a planning condition, be required to implement an appointment-only system for those seeking services to prevent unexpected arrivals and potential disturbances.

We learnt quite a lot about this aspect at the meeting.  On the rooms, these will not run as a ‘just turn up; shelter – they will be allocated to people referred by the Council’s outreach service, on a strictly referral-only / ‘by appointment only’ basis (and this will need to be secured as part of the planning & licensing permissions).  A major concern of several attendees was what would happen to the tenth, eleventh person who needed a room; the Council confirmed that they would continue to do what they do now, which can mean putting them up at Council expense in a local hotel, or for slightly longer term cases, sending them to the accommodation they use (which is often in Croydon and Surrey – and where the Council is increasingly being outbid for the supply of accommodation by the Home Office!). 

In addition to the residents of the nine rooms there will also be day visitors, coming to meet with the various outreach services (and in some cases, book facilities to use IT to do things like get basic identity documents and apply for employment opportunities), in the ground floor appointment area.  Running 9-5 and with four pods and a treatment room there could be 50 or so (ish) visitors a day – but again they will need to have made an appointment, and will not be allowed to just turn up unannounced.  This will clearly bring a certain number of people to the area who would not otherwise venture to this side of the town centre, although Council officers were at pains to stress the (fair) point that the people they are working with and who are booked for appointments tend to be the ones looking to get things sorted and back on track, rather than the more chaotic and criminally active types.  They also need to be reasonably receptive to support to be a priority for the Council’s finite funds – given that someone who is very entrenched in a rough sleeping lifestyle may not want to leave it. 

4: The Hub needs to commit to an all-hours complaints hotline: A formal planning and licensing requirement must be that the Hub will operate a 24-hour complaints hotline within the service (which is not likely to be difficult if it is, as suggested, staffed 24/.7). They must ensure advertisement of this telephone & email contact service is prominent for local residents and businesses to see and use.

The Council agreed on this point, and there was a clear commitment to have a contact line that would be staffed on a full time basis from within the facility. 

5: There must be a requirement for strict enforcement of House Rules: We recognise that the Hub can’t fully control who arrives, and that residents can be complicated people with their own challenges. However the culture of a hostel matter – not least for its own residents who will make better progress if they themselves feel safe there. Good behaviour is also essential for this venture not to cause severe harm to its neighbours. The facility should formulate clear and strict house rules pertaining to noise control, prohibition of begging/shoplifting, abusive or antisocial behaviour inside the facility but also in the neighbourhood, and illicit substance use/dealing. The facility must commit to investigating any neighbourhood complaints / concerns in a timely manner and reporting back to those who raised them, and to implement a swift eviction policy for repeat breaches.

New residents will need to sign a ‘resident expectations agreement’, covering issues like noise and antisocial behaviour – which will apply both inside the Hub and in the area around it.  Breach of these conditions will lead to (at first) short term exclusions of a few hours, and (if the issues reoccur) eviction.  This is a key point, as the Council recognises that some residents will have challenges – it pretty much goes with the territory – but that it’s also important to protect the neighbourhood.  The details of these agreements are still being developed; we noted that this should explicitly include a prohibition on any antisocial behaviour or theft in retail premises along the whole of the street. The agreement will prevent any drug use on site; as far as we could tell alcohol would be allowed provided residents did not break the wider house rules (which may well be a sensible compromise: residents drifting out to nearby streets to drink isn’t especially helpful).

6: Security within the site – and in its neighbourhood: The Hub must more formally be required to commit to the 24/7 security staffing alluded to in the rather vague proposals, and these staff need to be assigned to regularly patrol areas around the hostel, as well as the site itself, to prevent offsite congregation and ensure the safety and cleanliness of the surrounding area. The hostel should introduce a plan to increase surveillance technology especially in darker alleys / car parking areas opening off Mysore Road and Sisters Avenue immediately behind the hostel where crime and loitering are especially likely.

A fairly clear and generally reassuring answer on this one: there will be 24 hour double cover security on site, and they will also have patrol duties around the site as a whole to ensure there is no loitering (some more details are in the Q&A below).  The alleyway at the back of the hostel (opening on to Mysore Road) will have a gate fitted.  The car park on Sisters Avenue is clearly a trickier one to deal with as it;s shared between several businesses, and the Council don’t own it.  

Several of those at the meeting were also concerned about the impact on the dark and little-overlooked streets north of the Battersea Arts Centre, which already face challenges of drug sales and petty crime – both in terms of increased crime, and the risk of vulnerable residents being housed so close to temptation.  This issue is already live (indeed, maybe to illustrate the point, a small crowd of dubious characters had taken up in a dark exterior alcove at the side of BAC during the meeting!) – but these plans could well make things worse for all concerned.  The use by residents of this area is an aspect could maybe be made explicit in a good neighbours agreement and the resident expectations.

7: Provision of Supermarket Vouchers to all residents: As is done on some similar facilities, there must be a commitment to provide all residents who need them with supermarket vouchers to enable them to buy food and general supplies without resorting to shoplifting, in order to reduce harm to nearby traders and businesses through shoplifting and threats to staff.

A reasonably clear commitment was made that residents will be supported with food (most likely in the form of supermarket vouchers), as well as with clothing where residents need it, and travel passes to get to appointments further afield.  This is clearly good news, and very important in a world where small business owners and even larger chains are having a tough time of it without another nightmare to deal with (and we’ll be writing in the near future on the headaches that residents of another nearby hostel have been causing one of our local retailers). This doesn’t solve everything – for example it won’t prevent people stealing to fund drug & drink habits – but coupled with a clear resident expectations requirement to not cause trouble in local businesses, it does go a long way to reducing the risk to nearby shops. 

8: Support and Rehabilitation Programs: Develop and offer support and rehabilitation programs for residents to address underlying issues and assist with their reintegration into society. Potentially, the Hub could partner with local businesses to explore potential employment opportunities for residents, contributing to their stability and reducing potential strain on the community.

The team present gave a pretty convincing picture of the work they do, and how having the various agencies based in a single location, and having some of their customers on site rather than at far flung accommodation in Croydon or outside London, should significantly improve their ability to make an impact and offer the joined-up care and support needed to get people’s lives on track.  Partnerships are being worked through with St George’s to be able to offer some clinical assessments, and the existing SPEAR outreach service is preparing to redesign its outreach activity to provide support for the teams at the new facility.  The overall numbers aren’t huge but they’re not trivial either: as a guide to the numbers involved – in the recent cold snap (when the Severe Weather Emergency Protocol meant the Council was both allowed and expected to reach out to house all rough sleepers, rather than just the subset whose immigration status is above board), 20 people in Wandsworth borough and 9 in Richmond were temporarily housed.

9: Safeguarding neighbouring businesses: The rear facing windows should be non-openable (to avoid smoking and the throwing / dropping of objects), and the three bedroom windows that face the nursery playground must be permanently fitted with frosted glass as a planning condition. The Hub should also commit to screening any new longer term residents and avoid housing anyone on the sex offenders register next to the nursery school.

It’s fair to say that the impact on the immediately neighbouring and locally very popular nursery was high on everyone’s mind – with several parents (and tiny babies!) present at the meeting.  That they had not initially been told about the plans at all was hugely unfortunate, to put it mildly.  The plans have clearly had a bit of a rethink following the concerns we and many others have flagged. 

The Council officer in charge of the designs of the fit out, who has a budget in the low hundred thousands to refit and equip the building, confirmed to us that the bedrooms at the rear of the hostel will have fully frosted glass to prevent overlooking, and Council officers confirmed that windows will not be more than minimally openable (which again will need to be a formal planning condition to ensure that it isn’t changed in the future).  There will be no resident access at all to the rear yard, which will be closed off with alarmed fire doors, and only accessible to the staff. 

The front of the hostel will have CCTV and the security service will have a task to prevent any loitering.  This remains a pretty tricky area and the adjacency is far from ideal – but at least it seems steps are being taken to address the issues, and we are not likely to see a repeat of the disturbing scenes seen previously when squatters invaded the building.

10: Daytime activity: The Hub should ensure that its residents assigned to rooms can, while they are residents, be accommodated ‘full time’, rather than on a minimal overnight-only basis, to ensure that they get some stability, that they feel safe (and that they are confident their possessions are safe), and have somewhere warm and safe to socialise other than neighbouring streets. The design also needs to be amended to provide some onsite ‘living space’ other than just the small bedrooms. An important detail is that the Hub needs to make clear, as part of the application, whether it will allow the consumption of drugs & alcohol onsite to avoid consumption in the surrounding streets.

A clear answer here (and some changes that clearly followed feedback).  This is medium-stay accommodation rather than a night hostel; and the target stay length is 28 days, though some may move on faster and others may take longer.  Where people go next will depend on the person’s needs, what progress they make and what is available – there is some capacity at other comparable facilities with varying degrees of intensity of support, some supported housing, and some regular housing. 

On the point about residents having somewhere to stay in the day that’s neither a small bedroom nor someone else’s front garden, the plans have been changed from what was on the planning application, to remove the first floor short-stay beds (which seemed to have a dubious prospect of success, not least as residents probably wouldn’t feel safe there), and create a resident lounge.  As noted above, this will be a drug-free hostel, but seemingly one that allows reasonable use of alcohol.

11: Monitoring and Evaluation: The Hub needs to regularly (and at least annually) evaluate the effectiveness of the implemented measures and adjust strategies as needed based on continuous monitoring and feedback.

Not much clarity on this, though the fact that it remains Council-run should be a somewhat better arrangement to what was seen in some nearby hostels, which were sharply criticised both for poor engagement with their neighbours and lack of impact in moving people on from rough sleeping.  After funding ends (in 2025), there will need to be a new bid for funding to continue the service – which will presumably take account of whether it has proven to be effective.  Running costs aren’t expected to be huge; helpfully the Council owns the freehold of the right hand building (and has a lease on the other) – but there are clearly no guarantees at this stage.

12: Transparent Communication: The Hub should commit to and ensure transparent communication with residents and businesses about any upcoming changes or developments related to the rough sleeping hub, as well as with police – and agree to report any incidents to the police to enable their work to be linked with wider community crime prevention efforts, as well as to inform police if violent offenders from Category A & B prisons are housed.

No major updates on this point, but the Council team confirmed that they are now liaising with the police.  Some attendees asked whether any risk assessments had been undertaken (the short answer seemed to be – not yet).

All in all – this story still has a long way to run, before it goes to Committee for a decision (potentially mid January) so there’s plenty of time to feed in further thoughts on the proposals (search for application 2023/3434 at  wandsworth.gov.uk/planning  – we’re well past the deadline, but late comments are usually also taken in to account where possible). It’s fine to submit more than one comment if you’d like to make further input based on what you have seen since.

A lot of local residents and traders clearly remain pretty worried about these plans, but there’s a desire in the Council to get this troubled project back on track, and the relatively detailed information shared at the meeting has clearly helped address some of the concerns. Thanks are due to the many readers who have been in touch with us with thoughts and suggestions, and who have also fed thoughtful and detailed comments to Wandsworth on the proposals – it does seem that these are being taken on board to some extent.  There will obviously need to be more detail on the planning case before it gets to Committee, as it is still notably lacking in detail – and a fair few important points discussed above will need to be committed to as planning conditions. We and Clapham Junction Insider will aim to keep you posted if we hear further updates. 

What follows is the full Q&A that was handed to those who attended the meeting –

Thanks to Aydin and colleagues for their engagement as this story has developed. Sign up here if you’d like to receive occasional updates from lavender-hill.uk (most of which are not about planning or the Council’s rough sleeping).