Plans submitted for 288 homes on Norbury sports ground

Housing correspondent, BARRATT HOLMES, looks at a planning application for a £75m scheme that the developers hoped you might never notice

What do you mean, you had no idea that there have been plans submitted for a massive development of nearly 300 homes and a 84-bed care home on a 21-acre sports ground in Norbury?

That’s probably because while the site borders Croydon, the old NatWest Sports Ground on Turle Road, Streatham, comes under Merton Council.

And while residents in Merton have been dutifully leafleted about the scheme, no one in the Croydon bit of Norbury or the part of Streatham Vale that’s in Lambeth seem to know very much about such a significant project.

And that’s just the way the developers appear to want it, as local schools, GP practices and even a government quango have been quietly excluded or had their role in the public consultation process diminished to such a degree that they have been denied any real say in the matter.

The poor level of engagement even prompted Croydon Council to lodge an objection on neighbouring authority Merton’s planning website.

“The London Borough of Croydon objects to the application by reason of the lack of information to adequately assess whether there would be a detrimental impact on the highways network and health care facilities,” council planning official Nicola Townsend wrote, after Croydon was formally notified last month.

“Comments have been made on infrastructure including potential contributions and mitigation from the development and including London Borough of Croydon in discussions on these matters. Representations have been received and are covered in the officer’s report for consideration by London Borough of Merton.”

The developer is the Biblically inspired Matt 6:33 LLP, a company name suggesting a Gospel reference: “But seek ye first the kingdom of God, and his righteousness; and all these things shall be added unto you.”

The NatWest Sports Ground has been largely disused since 2007. “Dispiriting” was how one former cricketer, with memories of happy summer afternoons there in his youth, described the scene recently.

The plot was bought in 2011 by the Ruach City Church, which says it is “one of the largest and fastest growing non-denominational Pentecostal Christian churches in Europe”, with bases in Kilburn, Walthamstow, Birmingham and Streatham.

Ruach appears very well-connected politically, having hosted visits by Tony Blair, as it staged “a pioneering initiative to encourage voters to register on the electoral role [sic]”.

The hoardings have been up along Turle Road for more than a decade, with only the Norbury Bowls Club from the once bustling sporting hub still actively providing facilities. The lawn bowlers are to be allowed to continue their genteel past-time under the Matt 6:33 LLP plans, which is nice.

Ruach call their scheme “Norbury Village”, and have presented animated CGIs of their proposals to their church congregation. “Please continue to pray as we bring the vision to fruition.”

Wrapped up in some significant public amenity are two hockey pitches and three padel courts (that’s a trendy form of tennis), with associated floodlighting, an artificial cricket pitch and field, sports hall and pavilion. The scheme also includes 288 new homes, of which 150 are houses, plus the care home, with buildings ranging from two to four storeys, a park and a pond, plus some car and cycle parking.

Approximate value of all that housing? More than £75million, if you wanted a ballpark figure for a scheme on a sports ground.

It’s just that Matt 6:33 LLP haven’t done much to… ahem… spread the word, at least not as far as the people who live in the area who don’t necessarily attend their church.

There was, belatedly, a residents’ meeting and Q&A staged by the developer recently at which fewer than 40 Merton residents showed up. “I’d say there was little if any support for the proposals from residents,” according to one local who was there.

“The general feeling was there hadn’t been enough engagement. There was a lot of concern about impacts on local parking and water and drainage issues.”

The Norbury Village scheme, if it gets to go ahead, “will have some big impacts on Croydon residents”, the local said.

Thing is, even with objections from Croydon Council and with Merton extending the period for public consultation to allow more people to participate, Norbury Village looks to be exactly the kind of brown-field, large-scale development which Keir Starmer’s Labour government has said it wants to encourage, as they link private house-building to economic growth.

One of the significant figures behind the scheme appears to be Dorothea Hodge, a former trustee of Ruach church, once a media officer with the Labour Party and former House of Lords SPAD to Baroness Amos – one of the politicians who Ruach says has paid them visits in the past.

Hodge is named in Matt 6:33 LLP’s charge document in documents published by Companies House as representing Ruach’s interest in the land at Turle Road, where the property is subject to a legal mortgage as part of the development arrangements. Hodge still mixes with the movers and shakers in the Labour Party, such as Starmer, Sadiq Khan and Anglea Rayner, now the Secretary of State for housing. They were all together at the same General Election event just a few months ago.

Perhaps Matt 6:33 and Ruach think that if they can get Labour-controlled Merton on-side, they do not have to worry about residents of other, neighbouring boroughs. The houses on the other side of Thurle Road from the sports ground, directly opposite the main (and only) access point to the proposed vast housing estate, are in Croydon.

And until a week ago or so, not one of the Croydon homes had received a consultation letter. Which is in part the reason why Croydon Council lodged its objection. That, and the notion that 288 households might all enter or exit the Norbury Village site by a single point, opening on to Turle Road.

Merton’s response to grumbles about lack of public engagement has been quite reasonable, and extended the public consultation period.

“Since the proposals were submitted, there’s been no publicity outside the statutory notices,” a resident told Inside Croydon.

It’s not just householders who have been by-passed in the consultation process so far. The two closest local schools and the closest GP practice were not included in the consultation.

And Sport England have said they intend to oppose the plans because of the loss of playing fields. However, Sport England have been denied a statutory role in the process because the site hasn’t been used as playing fields for more than a cut-off period of five years. That’s the beauty of land-banking for a decade.

Another quango, Historic England, have stepped in, however, saying that the site is of potential interest to them, related to its use in World War II, and potential even for Roman and medieval remains. They’ve said that archaeological fieldwork must be carried out as a condition of the development. And if they find anything of interest… it could all lead to further archaeology and a “programme of public engagement”.

It also appears that straightforward admin may not be Matt 6:33 LLP’s strong point. Their Companies House records include one Gazette notice for compulsory strike-off (for late filing), and they also got a stern warning from Merton’s chief planner for not registering their planning application properly.

But their statutory public notices also included obvious errors, referring to a development on “Turtle Road” which is to include a four-bed care home.

These kind of errors in what is supposed to be a legal document ought to see the consultation extended by a further three weeks, and force the developer to issue to notices, duly corrected, again.

And there remains some question about whether an Environmental Impact Assessment should be required, due to the scale of the development proposed. Merton’s planning committee, if the application ever gets that far, is expected to consider the scheme in March or, more likely, April.

Click here to view the Thurle Road development proposals on the Merton Council planning site

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