Wednesday July 31 | 2019
Times
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OF TUNBRIDGE WELLS
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Protesters oppose new council plans By Grace Lewis and Thomas Manning AROUND 100 campaigners [pictured left] marched through Tunbridge Wells on Monday in a protest against council plans to build on Green Belt land. As well as the proposed 6,000 homes intended to be built in Capel and Paddock Wood, the council has revealed further details of its Draft Local Plan, which include: ■ A new secondary school for Tunbridge Wells ■ More than 400 homes on Hawkhurst Golf Course plus a new relief road ■ Over 700 houses in Cranbrook ■ 300 houses in Pembury
Full details on pages 3, 4, 5 and 11
Hub project could collapse after the NHS threatens to withdraw funding While Tunbridge Wells Youth Football Club warns it won’t survive any delays to the project By Richard Williams THE £10million Southborough Hub is at risk of being cancelled after the NHS threatened to withdraw funding, the Times can disclose. The threat follows attempts by the town council, now controlled by Labour, to renegotiate a key contract. Any delay in the project would hit Tunbridge Wells Youth Football Club, which could lose a £500,000 grant after seeing its pitches sold off for the development. The club warns that it would not survive such a loss. The mixed-used hub, which combines a community centre, theatre, library and medical centre, was proposed in 2015 by the Conservative-led council.
It is, in part, meant to be a replacement for the Royal Victoria Hall, which was demolished in 2017. The Hub though, has been beset with delays, and has been dramatically scaled back from the £30million facility original proposed. The health service had agreed to pay
‘Essentially they have moved the goalposts’ Labour Cllr, Nick Blackwell £4.2million in grant funding to cover both the cost of the medical centre as well as contributions to other aspects of the development. This key NHS England contract was due to be signed on August 19.
Now though, according to a letter seen by the Times, the whole project hangs in the balance after health officials have threatened to withdraw their grant funding by the end of this week. NHS bosses say Southborough Town Council [STC], which swung to Labour control during the last local election, is trying to renegotiate the deal by asking for ground rent on top of the £4.2million grant funding already agreed. NHS England says this will ‘undermine the business case’ for the health service. In the letter, NHS England said asking for ground rent was ‘flawed and inappropriate’ and not ‘evidence of value for money for the public purse’ and that their previous offer was ‘full and final’. They have warned the council to accept the deal this coming Friday
[August 2] otherwise the NHS will withdraw it completely. If this happens, it is likely the project, which is receiving funding from a number of other sources, including Kent County Council [KCC] and Tunbridge Wells Borough Council [TWBC], will face significant delays and funding shortfalls and may not go ahead at all. Conservative councillor, Ian Kinghorn, who until the last local election had been the lead on the Southborough Hub project, said the controlling Labour group, which has nine members on the council while the Conservatives have six and the Liberal Democrats have three, now ‘risk losing everything’.
Continued on page 2