Danebury demolition defeated

The Conservatives have finally bowed to the inevitable and are going to drop their dreadful plans to demolish the top end of Danebury Avenue.

Up until a few days ago, Conservatives in Roehampton were delivering a newsletter promoting their dreadful demolition plans for Danebury Avenue. Last week the plans were dropped. Talk about the right hand not knowing what the far right hand is doing!

At the end of four years of broken promises the only people who've benefited have been the printers of the endless glossy leaflets the council churned out and the (two sets of) expensive consultants paid huge amounts of money to tell the Tories that their plans won't work.

They could have saved taxpayers that money and simply taken the word of Roehampton residents, members of the Putney Society, Labour councillors, Roehampton Labour Party, English Heritage, the Conservative Mayor of London, the Wandsworth Cycling Campaign, local businesses and, well, me - all of whom told them this over and over again these past two years.

This has been a folly characterised by ego, arrogance, ignorance and woeful incompetence. Roehampton has had a Tory council for 30 years, Tory councillors for 11 and a Tory MP for four.

We have to hold them to account but in so doing let's just remember that Roehampton - the most deprived part of our area - is still without any investment, any leadership and any cohesive plan to transform lives on the estate.

What a pitiful way for the Conservatives to mark the fiftieth anniversary of the Alton estate.

Equitable Life: resolution in sight?

A few days ago the government made two important announce-ments about compensating the victims of the collapse of insurance company Equitable Life (EL) in 2000. This collapse affected quite a few Putney residents, many of whom have been in touch with me.

The announcements extend the period within which investors can claim for losses incurred by the collapse, and ask the expert body reviewing how to set up the ex gratia payments fairly to report back by the Spring.

The Government has always had to balance the demands of those who have lost money in this collapse with the wider interest of taxpayers. Were 100% compensation to be paid by the government, taxpayers would beexposed to a liability of up to £1.5billion when it was principally the mismanagement of a private business that generated these staggering losses.

That's why it's taking far longer than anyone - particularly those who have been hardest-hit by the Equitable Life disaster - would like to sort out.There are over 2 million records the government does not have access to, yet, to process.

Of course, any payments that do not fully compensate Equitable Life policy holders is not going to be viewed entirely favourably by them. That's why there have been court cases as well as two inquiries. But no government, Conservative or Labour, was ever likely to pay 100% compensation.

There is a moral obligation for government to act, and I'm glad we are taking the action needed to get the best resolution for policyholders and taxpayers alike. It won't please everyone, but this is such a calamity that it was never going to.

Click here to read the parliamentary statement Liam Byrne MP, the Chief Secretary to the Treasury, made to the House of Commons on 20th October.

Published and promoted by Adam Gray on behalf of Stuart King, both of 35 Felsham Road, Putney, London SW15 1AY

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