CAMDEN GIVES UP £100M IN CHALCOTS SURRENDER
Camden has signed away over £100 million that it had projected to win from contractors Rydons due to mis-cladding of the Chalcots.
This is tantamount to Camden conceding that it would lose the case if it went to court - and that the court would likely find Camden was at fault for the initial cladding debacle that has caused so much misery to Chalcots residents.
Instead of the £130 million that Camden sued Rydons for, Camden has settled to receive just £19 million. Of that, Camden paid its lawyers an eye-watering £6 million, meaning it received just one-tenth as much as it had projected!
To win back so little after so long with so much risk is a total failure, has cost Camden millions of pounds, and has delayed and jeopardised the works to the towers. Private Eye magazine has reported on this in its Rotten Boroughs section!
That whole process also put on hold the vitally important phase 2 technical report into the causes for the evacuation of the flats: robbing residents of clarification and closure.
Former Conservative councillor for the Chalcots, Steve Adams, has called for a thorough investigation. That is the only way can Camden confidently manage the new works.
Continued mismanagement means the promised works programme is lagging badly. The achingly slow scaffolding makes Labour-run Camden Council’s recent claims that the project will be completed early seem totally unrealistic.
Camden has fed Chalcots residents too many over-optimistic fantasies. Labour need to urgently publish a fixed, detailed programme for the works, engage with residents and not drip-feed them highly-controlled hype through one-way communication.
Questions even remain on what the works are actually going to comprise. Camden’s fan-assisted radiator has yet to be resolved. Why is this after a year of talk?
Labour-run Camden have neglected the Chalcots and now signed away over £100 million they could have clawed back from Rydons for the hell you’ve been through.
Alex Andrews Pierre Andrews Alexandra Marsanu
[email protected] [email protected] [email protected]
Primrose Hill and Chalcots Conservatives
