Please join online meetings on how to get Right to Manage at Chelsea Bridge Wharf – November 30th 7-8pm and December 1st 1-2pm
Read online Click to access CBW news – winter 2022
Dear CBW residents
Are you tired of paying huge service charge increases?
Do you want a better level of estate upkeep and service?
Please join one of our online meetings — find out how we can get Right to Manage, choose our own managing agent and take back control of our development. The meetings feature a short presentation by Canonbury Estate Management
followed by a Question and Answer session
All residents welcome! Contact residents@chelseabridgewharf.org.uk if any questions
November 30th 7-8pm
Zoom link https://qrco.de/bdWj64
You should not need a passcode but if asked please enter TrK6yG
December 1st 1-2pm
Zoom link https://qrco.de/bdWjbi
You should not need a passcode but if asked please enter 2ajx11
Background
After maintaining for nearly two years that Right to Manage is not possible at CBW, for a variety of reasons which I personally do not find plausible, the ‘leadership’ of the Chelsea Bridge Wharf Residents’ Association now claim they will ’investigate’ RTM for individual blocks. Unfortunately, in my view, this is another half-baked idea (along with expensive failure of ‘retendering the management contract’) which will not work (the CBW blocks are joined by the underground car park and so are not ‘vertically separated’ from each other as required for RTM). Even if individual blocks achieved RTM they would not gain control of the external areas of the development where a great deal of the service charge is spent (these would remain with the Freeholder and their chosen agent i.e. Rendall and Rittner).
Sadly, the idea that the current leadership of CBWRA will deliver Right to Manage block by block has no credibility.
My CBW app account was arbitrarily closed by Mr Stephen Thompson on May 2022 apparently because I insisted that Right to Manage was possible (this is referred to by Mr Thompson as ‘misleading information’).
How sad that this is the state of our residents’ association under the current leadership, where freedom of speech on the CBW app is often impossible, resident consultation almost never happens and, rather than engage in a discussion of the issues, blatant censorship seems to be the preferred ‘solution’. This is intellectually immature and self defeating – you cannot silence intelligent adults simply by closing their CBW app accounts.
Why is the CBWRA leadership apparently so desperate to stop residents discussing Right to Manage? (e.g. a post on the above meetings was deleted from the app without explanation). If they are so confident that their position on RTM is correct then what do they have to fear from residents discussing the topic? Equally one might ask why CBWRA are so scared of the ballot box that they refuse to have elections for the committee and (I understand) are not planning to hold annual elections for Chair which are due in January but to postpone these to April, without discussion or explanation. If true, this would be the second time that the Chair has brought in a constitution which would allow him to extend his term as CBWRA Chair without election (this was one of the reasons I resigned from the CBWRA committee in October 2021).
I would urge residents not to allow this blatant censorship and not to allow CBWRA to dictate what they can and cannot see or discuss. Residents have the right to discuss what they want when the want and should be consulted on all major decisions, especially those around Right to Manage, but sadly this is not happening. Equally I urge residents to demand that fair and free elections for Chair and committee are held in January 2023. A residents’ association without elections has no legitimacy and does not speak for residents.
Please join one of these meetings for an open discussion (without censorship!). We need Right to Manage so that we can take back control of our development, keep our service charges in check and to get CBW looking great.
Hi
I tried to join since 1pm but didn’t get through. Appreciate if you would keep me posted of the conversation.
Thanks & regards, anne
On Wed, 30 Nov 2022 at 11:39, Chelsea Bridge Wharf – Residents’ News and
LikeLiked by 1 person
Hi Anne I’m so sorry about that. It seems some had a problem with the QR code although the link itself was correct
I will certainly add you to my contact list and I will publish and send you the key points from the meeting ..also very happy to have a one-to-one chat with you at some point if you would like a fuller update .
sincere apologies again for the inconvenience
LikeLike
Thanks to all who attended these meetings and to Canonbury Estate Management for providing expert advice. I will provide fuller notes in due course but the standout points from Canonbury./ the discussion are
i) The advice given by Stephen Thompson/Roger Southam/CBWRA that Right to Manage for the whole development is not possible because of the supreme court judgement of First Port v Settlers Court is completely and categorically WRONG. David Breare of Canonbury added that in his view, any competent advisor/consultant would come to the same conclusion (i.e. it’s not a grey area), This confirms Canonbury’s written advice of June 2022 https://cbwra.files.wordpress.com/2022/06/canonbury-summary-advice-1.6.22-correspondence-1522672.pdf
Residents should recall that this judgement of First Port v Settler’s Court was (according to Mr Thompson) the reasons why RTM was not pursued at the start of 2022 and why the management contract retendering was chosen (this failed in Sep. 2022, wasting up to £15,000 of residents’ money).
ii) The current position of CBWRA (after 2 years of saying that Right to Manage is not possible) is that they will investigate RTM on a block by block basis. Canonbury were equally clear that this will not work because all blocks are linked by an underground car park, and therefore cannot be coincide as sperate for the purposes of RTM (they are not vertically separated). Even if it was somehow possible to do individual right to manage application for particular blocks, there would be little gain because individual block applications do not get control of external areas (e.g. garden areas, fountains, lighting, cleaning, maintenance) and this is where a great deal of your service charge expenditure is incurred.
iii) There is not any legal obstacle to a RTM application for the whole development. Indeed in the view of Canonbury (and indeed other advice I have reived) this is the ONLY way in which RTM could proceed at Chelsea Bridge Wharf.
I would add (in passing) that my CBW app account was closed (for the 3rd time!) in May 2022 for basically stating the above points which Mr Thompson/CBWRA have perversely called ‘misinformation’. It seems the CBWRA committee, or some of them, now accept that the advice from Canonbury is correct and are advocating for it. Well that might be progress except for another spanner thrown in the works – CBWRA now to get the opinion of three ”barristers” about whether RTM for the whole development is possible or just per block. This is quite a radical change of position from May when the CBWRA newsletter was sent round stating so emphatically that RTM was not possible and accusing me (Mike O’Driscoll) of giving misleading information for saying that RTM was possible. I cannot imagine this would have happened had I not got the independent advice from Canonbury – clearly I am dragging the current CBWRA regime towards right to manage, even while not on the committee. However under the current regime I doubt there will be much progress on RTM and if forced to they will probably do the bare minimum i.e. RTM on one tiny block such as Horace (25 flats) which will be a waste of another year.
It is indeed an Orwellian organisation that calls the truth ‘misinformation’ and tries to silence those telling the truth – and as I have been proved right, an apology would be nice,
Until we get Right to Manage we cannot get back control of our development and we cannot stop Rendall and Rittner from hiking service charges and delivering a poor service, and we cannot get Right to Manage until we have a democratic and open residents’ association, which is elected by the residents, consults with residents and encourages discussion, so that we can build understanding of RTM amongst residents and get the job done. Two years since the reactivation of CBWRA have been largely wasted in my view – we must not let this continue,
Mike O’Driscoll
7.2.23
LikeLike