DESPITE having spent tens of thousands of pounds on previous consultation exercises, cash-strapped Thurrock Council is to spend £200,000 on more liaison with residents of tower blocks in Blackshots that are earmarked to be torn down and replaced with a new development.

That's in defiance of an impassioned plea from a ward councillor who believes residents have had enough talk and want action. And a campaign going back more than a decade about the tower blacks which has featured extensive media coverage and research, including award-winning reporting by Thurrock Nub News.

Our campaign for action at Bevan House, Keir Hardie House and Morrison House was recognised at the national 2022 Newspaper Awards. It included our landmark report and comment published in December 2020.

A meeting of the council's cabinet on Wednesday, 7 December, rubber-stamped the latest consultation exercise and made a commitment to initiate a wave of essential repairs, despite knowing that demolition is a preferred option. It is also going to employ tenant advisors to liaise with residents.

Championing the toppling of the towers is housing portfolio holder Cllr Luke Spillman who says he has made it his mission to change the lives of residents in them for the better.

And he says the council's parlous financial position – it is about to go bankrupt – is no reason not to find a way to borrow more money.

The three 11 storey blocks in Blackshots were built in the mid-sixties. Between them they offer 168 dwellings.

Now, says Cllr Spillman, their time is up.

He addressed cabinet by urging his colleagues to support a series of recommendations (which can be read via this link), believing they offer the only way forward.

He said: "I'm going to make this very simple. Let's do this. This is the starting pistol. We request the resource and the means to make this happen.

"These towers are going to come down. They are going to be replaced by something better. That is my mission and it should be the mission of any responsible cabinet member for housing.

"We've got no choice. We can waste a load of money refurbishing them to a condition that isn't going to be adequate because the amount of refurb to take them to a quality that would be acceptable and that I would want to live in. And that's the key point. Would you want to live in them?

"I don't think anyone could sit round this table and say yes. They would be lying.

The cabinet meeting.

"If that's the answer we have got to do something about it.

"If we don't do anything about it and don't sort the refurb out then the new regulations next year will take the question out of our hands.

"So doing nothing is immoral. It's an absolute non-starter. 

"We are looking for the initial funds to get cracking and I commend this to cabinet."

However, Blackshots ward councillor Joy Redsell was vehement in her demand for action and said it was not the time for more consultation.

She said: "I don't want any remedial works on the flats, they have gone past that.

"Tenant advisors! I am not sure that's going to get us anywhere either.

"Cllr Ben Maney and I have been fighting damp and mould for nigh on 20 years. I am fed up with it now.

"I would go an knock them down myself if I could. 

"1990 was the last time a proper refurbishment and major works were done at all.

"The outside of the flats don't conform to regs, there is water running down Kier Hardy as we speak. Nothing the council can do now will mitigate it.

"We need clarity on a new build. We are not maintaining it, we are just putting a sticking plaster on it, that's all we are doing.

"We need to make this right. Residents deserve more than they are getting. They have been living like this for too long.

The October 2021 consultation.

"People will just get fed up with more consultations. We do not need any more resident engagement, they have had enough.

"As councillors we take the flack all the time for those flats.

"We need to get those flats down. We have lost a baby in those flat but that went by a while ago. We will lose another child because of the mould and the spoors that are in those flats.

"Please look at other options that we have got and get it done."

A Freudian slip aside, when he told Cllr Redsell that 'there's nothing that you say that I don't disagree with' Cllr Spillman said it was important that there was clarity through consultation, but he was grateful for the conviction and passion Cllr Redsell brought to the table and her cause was a just one and he recognised the previous fight against complacency within the council 

That complacency was perhaps best illustrated by cabinet member Cllr Barry Johnson, a previous housing portfolio who refused to acknowledge the seriousness of the problems at Blackshots when in office and dodged questions from Nub News and other media about them, said he was now supportive of the demolition plan and spoke up for it at the meeting.

In contrast to his reticence in previous years, Cllr Johnson said: "This has been going on far too long. These have been albatrosses round our neck and they must go."

Cllr Luke Spillman.

Cllr Spillman continued: "We've had so many conversations over the years with people telling us they are fit to live in. We know that. Now the council is going to crack on. We have got no choice.

"Anything other than moving forward at this point is a dereliction and I am not going to be a housing cabinet member who does that.

"I will go as far as to say that if I don't get this done it's a failing on my part. It's that serious. We have got to face up to it.

"There's options obviously that are still being considered; a consultancy will see what the most viable options are to be considered."

He rounded off by saying: "It will be quite emotional you and Ben and me to see this go forward. It is something this borough has to do.

A note of caution came from the council's finance portfolio holder Cllr Graham Snell. He is charged with supporting the ongoing and detailed forensic examination of the councils failed financial strategy and its billion pound plus debt.

That has brought about government intervention and a team of external commissioners to investigate previous governance and Cllr Snell warned they could pull the plug on the Blackshots project.

He said: "I do know this paper has been before the commissioners and they have agreed for it to come forward to this stage.

"However, it isn't a given that the commissioners will allow this to go forward at the moment. I hope it will, but I have to add that note of caution. It's still got another hurdle to get over first before we can definitely say yes, this is a go."

Cllr Snell also cautioned that there was little detail of what would happen to residents during the process of demolition and rebuild. He said: "My other point is, how are we going to be dealing with the decant of people from the tower blocks, I think that is quite important."  

Cllr Spillman shared the concern over the decant and, looking back at previous aborted plans to topple towers in South Grays, said: "That is probably one of the reasons why the Grays tower block scheme didn't get local support. Because the decant plan was unclear. There were absolutely no guarantees. I was shocked at the time how unprepared councillors and officers were.

"We will not be in that situation, it's going to be a challenge. But it's a challenge we will meet.

"Regarding the commissioners I had better put a compelling case before them. Excuse my characteristic bullishness but we haven't got a choice. And I know the commissioners will see that because there is no other choice. The alternative is completely unpalatable." 

Council leader Cllr Mark Coxshall summed up by saying: "The commissioners have given us the case that we must not increase our borrowing, we must reduce our borrowing, not increase it.

"We can make a case for spending if we show there is a compelling case and that spending will reduce the burden of cost on the council in future years. Our case is to show that it is virtually the same cost of refurbishment over that period and that it stops the cases, which will come in future, of inappropriate housing. And we have got a corporate responsibility for housing that we have got to upkeep."

Cllr Spillman said: "You are right. We are going to borrow the money to build these houses, but people have got to realise where we need to get the money to refurbish. That would be borrowed as well. And we would be borrowing money for a sticking plaster and I am not prepared to go down that road. The case is so compelling I think we will get the support of all the stakeholders."

Cllr Coxshall agreed, saying: "The consultation process brings that to light, in an open way, that there's a good reason to spend the money on this. And make sure we reduce the size of this council's debt and not add to it. Let's get the consultation back and look forward to moving forward on the project."

In a statement after the meeting the council said: "Proposals for a brighter future for the Blackshots estate in Grays will be developed while essential work takes place immediately to improve the three 11 story tower blocks.

"Thurrock Council's Cabinet approved plans to create and consult residents on proposals that could see the estate redeveloped. Cabinet also approved plans to carry out essential repairs on the existing building.

"Cllr Luke Spillman, Cabinet member for Housing, said: 'We feel that the most effective way to improve the estate is to look into redeveloping it entirely, so we will now progress with the creation of proposals for a new estate on the site.

'It is vital that current residents have a voice in this so we will be carrying out extensive consultations with them throughout this process and appointing and Independent Tenant Adviser to help make sure that tenants have a strong voice as proposals are developed.

'In the meantime we will carry out essential works on the existing blocks'."

The one item not discussed at all during the meeting could yet scupper all of Cllr Spillman's plans and rhetoric.

During October's full council meeting Cllr Coxshall was asked about the possibility of the council being forced to sell off its housing stock to pay off part of its huge debt.

Cllr Coxshall said: "I cannot really say anything. Everything is on the table, we have to look at everything."

So should that happen, it is possible the three blocks could be sold and the fate of its residents put into other hands.

More information about the tower block demolition proposals can be found at: democracy.thurrock.gov.uk/ieListDocuments.aspx?CId=129&MId=6121

Read the previous consultation report via this link.

A full recording of the meeting can be viewed here. Debate on the Blackshots project starts in the 35th minute of the broadcast.