CBWRA ask Rendall and Rittner to provide two security guards for ten weeks at a cost of £29,544 – no resident consultation as ever
Many residents were astonished to learn that the Chelsea Bridge Wharf Residents’ Association (CBWRA) had asked Rendall and Rittner to commission 2 security guards for a 10 week period at an estimated cost of £29,544 (Rendall and Rittner update 21.11.22) and that the firm recommended by CBWRA appear to have serious financial issues. CBWRA appear to be trying to distance themselves from this fiasco but Rendall and Rittner have made it very clear that it is a CBWRA initiative and that in fact CBWRA wished to add the expenditure to the 2023 budget (i.e. to make it part of normal expenditure, not just a trial).
CBWRA initially claimed that the security guard initative was supposedly a result of an unspecified number of residents expressing unspecified ‘concerns’ and the reporting of unspecified ‘incidents’. The 10 week period is a ‘trial’ and CBWRA have stated it will not continue past 10 weeks without consultation and a vote by leaseholders. However, CBWRA do not have a good record on consulting with residents (in fact there have been zero consultations since the reactivation of CBWRA in January 2021, excepting the Annual Residents’ Survey carried out by the author of this blog). Furthermore consultations usually happen BEFORE decisions are made not after spending nearly £30,000 of residents’ cash on a scheme (which if continued over a year) would have an annual cost of £153,628.
Decisions which are made without consultation are often bad decisions, as we saw in CBWRA’s decision to pursue the retendering of the management contract (which predictably failed, at a cost of up to £15,000 to residents) rather than pursuing Right to Manage and their suggestion that Rendall and Rittner could make a £700 ‘cash call’ on residents (despite their being no provision in the lease for any such demand).
Although there has been one horrendous incident recently involving an assault on a resident in the carpark, these incidents are mercifully extremely rare and we have the hard data on that already in the crime questions in the annual residents’ survey 2021. In the incident referred to, a security guard was present but did not apparently make any meaningful difference to the situation. It is understandable that some people may feel concerned about their safety but spending the best part of £30K for ten weeks of security guard patrols is not going to make people any safer. A much better option would be to provide much better detailed advice on personal safety and improving CCTV and lighting.
According to Rendall and Rittner, the security budget for 2022 is already overspent by 46% due to to ‘ad hoc requests and one off events’ whatever those may be, so to add this wholly unnecessary cost, which will add little or nothing to security, shows a complete lack of financial responsibility and a lack of accountability at the heart of CBWRA.
Apparently Mr Thompson, chair of CBWRA now claims (CBW app, 14.12.22) that this commissioning of security guards was initiated by Rendall and Rittner and CBWRA had no power to stop it. This seems in complete contradiction of earlier statements which implied that the hiring of the security guards was initiated by CBWRA and that CBWRA supported it. It also contradicts the claims made by CBWRA that being recognised as an official RA was somehow a major achievement which would give them a lot more influence/power.
In fact, Rendall and Rittner make it clear that it was CBWRA who requested the security guards. The extract below is from a Rendall and Rittner update on the CBW online platform (21.11.22)
”’The Chelsea Bridge Wharf Residents Association (“CBWRA”) have made a request to introduce two security guards for the following times until the end of January 2023:
• Monday to Thursday 6pm to 1am (7 hours)
• Friday 5pm to Monday 1am (56 hours)”
Furthermore it is not clear if any formal competitive tendering or due diligence has taken place. The firm which Mr. Thompson/CBWRA recommended, Crownguard Security, seems to have financial problems (a charge on their property from NatWest bank) and very little capital (less than £6,000) so it seems unlikely that they will provide a high quality or reliable service.
It would also seem that CBWRA asked Rendall and Rittner to add the cost of the security guards to the 2023 budget (i.e. to continue the so called ‘trial’ throughout 2023 and probably beyond). Rendall and Rittner refused to do this without resident consultation. So the behaviour of Mr Thompson/CBWRA now puts residents in the absurd position of having to rely on the managing agent to protect us from wholly unwarranted expenditure from the residents’ association, which has no democratic mandate.
I note Mr Thompson has stated on the CBW app that the author of this blog ‘has a history of misleading residents’ – this is beyond ironic given the above and coming from the person who claimed that retendering the management contract would be a quicker and cheaper alternative to Right to Manage and also claimed that retendering the management contract was the same thing as Right to Manage. We await in vain Mr Thompson’s apology for wasting £15,000 of residents’ money on the failed management contract retendering. It would also be good if Mr Thompson apologised to residents for claiming that the agreement with Fairhold Artemis required Rendall and Rittner to be one of the contractors allowed to bid if the management contract was retendered (it did not). An apology is also overdue from Mr Thompson for telling residents that ‘everything had been done’ to encourage attendance at the failed AGM in May (when in fact no invites to apartments had been sent out as required in the constitution) leading to just 24 people attending. Mr Thompson’s claim that Right to Manage for the whole of CBW is not possible because of the Supreme Court judgement of First Port v Settlers Court has been shown to be complete nonsense, according to expert independent advice received by residents.
I have referred Mr Thompson’s comments regarding my alleged misleading of residents to my solicitor.
This is simply outrageous. £28 K for ten week and £150,000 a year if it is continued which apparently the CBWRA committee are keen to do. No resident has been asked what they think because CBWRA knows the answer will be No! Stop wasting our money. This committee are unelected, they have no accountability and no legitimacy. They do not speak for residents. We need elections and those who don’t think they need to ask residents before spending their money need to explain why they think they can do that
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So I see from app that CBWRA now claiming this was nothing to do with them – that Rendall and Rittner just asked them to identify areas for security guards to patrol but that’s not what the Rendall and Rittner update says and it’s not what CBWRA said themselves a few weeks ago. This is clearly driven by the residents’ association but why? £150.000 added to the already massive service charge and won’t change anything as there is almost zero crime already. I wonder if the firm employed to do this, who were suggested by CBWRA, have any connections to Chelsea bridge wharf residents? I do not feel safe to ask any questions about this on the app – they will close my app account! This is not normal. We need a proper RA that is elected
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Thanks for your comment. It is indeed a mystery why CBWRA seemed to be pushing so hard to spend money on security guards, and why CBWRA are recommending a firm that obviously has serious financial problems (Nat West has a charge on their property) and very little capital (about 8K according to their last published accounts at companies house). https://find-and-update.company-information.service.gov.uk/company/12313080
This suggests it will not be a high quality or reliable service, There is very little resident support for this massive expenditure because most residents understand that a) there is very little crime at CBW and b) security guards have little or no impact on crime.
It is amazing to see CBWRA now trying to deny that this was a CBW led initiative. The Rendall and Rittner update could not be any clearer that the security guards were requested by CBWRA and indeed it seems CBWRA wanted this added to the 2023 budget (i.e. to make it part of normal expenditure, not just a trial) – amazingly it was Rendall and Rittner who refused to do this without resident consultation – so we are now in the crazy position of having to rely on R and R to protect us from the spending sprees of CBWRA.
Not surprising that CBWRA now refusing to name date for elections for chair which are due in January and is just saying they will be ‘sometime in quarter 1 of 2023’ – i.e. anytime up to end of April . In that event the Chair would be is helping himself to an extra 3-4 months beyond his elected term. That’s on top of a committee which is unelected, the arbitrary closure of CBW app accounts if people ask too many difficult questions, no statement of income and expenditure, no consultation etc . If there was a contest for poor governance/lack of democracy ./ transparency of an RA I think CBWRA would have to at least be finalists, on those criteria
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This ‘initiative’ was ended early (after 8 weeks). What the benefit is or was remains unclear. Some vague data has been gathered which supposedly would inform the positioning of CCTV cameras. But as someone who worked in the field of crime reduction on residential developments (a long time ago admittedly) I know that this is not how you make an assessment of where to position cameras.
There is no evidence that security guards make any difference to crime levels especially in very low crime environments.
It is likely that this ‘experiment’ can not be continued without a section 20 notice (a formal consultation with residents) by Rendall and Rittner and it is clear they are not keen on that as they know it is unlikely to be supported by a majority of leaseholders and given the lack of trust in Rendall and Rittner many would likely perceive it as further cover for increasing service charges even if (in this particular case) the initiative is not coming from Rendall and Rittner.
As ever there has been no resident consultation by CBWRA but now as Chair elections approach (albeit well behind schedule and only after resident protests) we may get some token effort to do that at last, as some kind of afterthought , when in fact that should have been the starting point.
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