If you’re reading this in print, you may well know the outcome of the London mayoral race, but for those following the digital edition or online, it’s probably election day.
As always, housing has been one of the major issues for the leading candidates, whether it’s Sadiq Khan’s slightly vague “every Londoner should be able to afford somewhere they can call home” or Shaun Bailey’s 100,000 (shared ownership) homes for £100,000. Further down the ballot is where you get the real blue-sky thinking though.
Count Binface (formerly known as Lord Buckethead) includes the following in his manifesto: “The royal family to keep one of Buckingham Palace, Kensington Palace, St James’s Palace and Clarence House, with the rest gifted to the nation to help eradicate homelessness. If the royals complain that one palace isn’t enough, they will be forced to buy Crystal Palace FC.”
He has commercial property ideas too: “The Trocadero to be turned back into a truly top-notch video arcade.” And we admire the sentiment of his top pledge: “London Bridge to be renamed after Phoebe Waller.”
But, to be honest, Count Binface has been out-Binfaced by a protest vote rival. No, not Laurence Fox. YouTuber Niko Omilana has promised to shut down any McDonald’s with a broken McFlurry machine and turn it into low-rent housing. Simple, effective, brilliant.
Shopped for Photoshopping shops
We have sadly grown used to images of boarded-up shops and deserted high streets during the pandemic. Images like the one used in The Sunday Times on a report into how much accountants are making from troubles in the retail sector.
But some of its readers were surprised by the detail of this particular picture. The owner of Chester Health Store tweeted at the paper: “I have a shop on Bridge Street Row, Chester. This picture has been Photoshopped!! There are NO shutters nor will there ever be.”
Another local was equally aggrieved: “Horrified at this Photoshopping of Bridge Street in Chester… seems sloppy and ridiculous… this street is beautiful and has NEVER had shutters like this. The conservation officer would have a fit.”
To be fair, it’s not like The Sunday Times was trying to hide its digital trickery – the image is a photomontage dominated by a pair of sinister eyes with pound signs in them. Subtle, this is not. But Diary is inclined to agree that they didn’t have to fake the shopfronts too. The number of shuttered units on many of the UK’s high streets is already depressing enough – do we really need to invent yet more?
Teenage kicks
Fancy a plunge in a warm-water lagoon? A bracing cold-water surf? Or is a leisurely stroll around a boat show more your cup of tea? Regeneration specialist Peel L&P has all this and more in its sights across its UK placemaking projects – including TraffordCity and Chatham Waters.
Its focus on innovative leisure facilities makes sound business sense. “We need to bring people back,” says James Whittaker, executive director of development. “Then the F&B can develop surrounding that. And then the retail can also have success on the back of that. The social interaction is going to be really important for us all, I believe.”
But business is not the only motivating factor, it seems: Whittaker has three teenage daughters to keep busy at weekends. Suggesting another walk during lockdown, he admits, was starting to wear thin, so now their demand for higher-octane activities is helping inspire the company’s leisure plans… and motivating Whittaker himself.
Starting on 30 June in St Andrews, he will be spending a month cycling 6,000km around the UK coast, raising funds for WaterAid. Clearly a case of like father, like daughters.
Reasonably unreasonable
EG’s weekly case summaries in print (with even more available online) are an invaluable resource, offering clear, authoritative updates on all major property law decisions. But they don’t usually make great Diary page material… until now.
One of our dutiful sub-editors spotted this head-scratching passage in the summary of Hicks v 89 Holland Park (Management) Ltd, a setback to an architect’s plans for a strikingly contemporary home in Holland Park. This section may read a little like one of Sir Humphrey’s speeches in Yes, Minister – but to the right eyes should make perfect sense:
“Where reliance had been placed on grounds, some of which were unreasonable and some reasonable, if the reasonable grounds were ones on which consent would in fact have been refused even if the unreasonable grounds had not been put forward, the refusal would be reasonable; but if the unreasonable ground was the most important reason for refusal, with the other grounds being makeweights, then the refusal would be unreasonable and where an outright refusal was said to be reasonable by reference to a factor or circumstance that could have been neutralised by a condition, generally the refusal would be unreasonable.”
It reminds Diary of the time it heard a barrister in court utter the words: “In particular, the particulars are not particularly well particularised.”
Bad neighbours
Did someone at McCarthy Stone have their bank holiday weekend ruined by the folks next door having a noisy barbecue? We only ask as, first thing on Tuesday morning, it shared research on the UK cities with the worst neighbours. OK, they tallied the best too, but nobody would ever commission a TV show called “Neighbours From Heaven”.
So let’s lead with the nasty end, and it’s Nottingham where the fewest residents report their neighbours as “nice” (only 32%), closely followed by Sheffield, Newcastle, Cardiff and Bristol in the bottom five.
When it comes to kindness, Brighton comes out last, with 31% saying their neighbours don’t do anything for them. Bristol fares badly on this metric too, which is one in the eye for our friends who are always banging on about how great it is.
Diary doesn’t have much to do with its neighbours, but if niceness is something you’re looking for, get thee to Southampton, Plymouth or Glasgow. And if you are after actual acts of kindness, then head to Liverpool, Newcastle or Belfast. Or, if you want the whole package, there’s only one sensible option, and that is Erinsborough, Australia.
Get in touch via diary@egi.co.uk
