‘I am a bit confused; may I ask exactly what our relationship
is with the Borough? If we pay rent to anyone for the land? And what the
position is with our farm neighbours?’
I looked around the table to my fellow Committee members and
awaited the clarity I sought. I was new to the Committee and as treasurer I
needed to understand whether we had cost liabilities which I had not seen in
the accounts. I also knew there was history, but being relatively new to the
allotments, I was unclear what was fact and what was urban myth.
My questions received as many different answers as the
number of members that sat around the table with me. What was clear was that no
one knew with any authority what the answers were. This was some five years ago
and since then we have taken a long and often frustrating journey to gain
clarity, address the issues identified and be where we are today and in doing
so securing our future for the next 99 years.
I realise all allotments are different, have different legal
and commercial relationships with other parties, so some of this journey has
been taken, or a different path pursued by others. However, I would like to summarise
the steps we took and how we achieved what we did. In doing so I hope that some
of what I share will help others to open the opportunities before them and have
the confidence to take their own or similar journeys. This is not definitive route,
nor is it meant to be prescriptive, but just a sharing of lessons learnt.
Research: It is impossible to understand where you
can go unless you understand where you are and how you arrived there. Research
might put folk off but unfortunately is part of the journey.
Our allotments are over 120 years old and have survived two World
Wars where they not only fed many in the East End of London but being in the
heart of London Docks, the whole area was subject to considerable bomb damage
and lost records. On consulting old committee records and members, I quickly
discovered many conflicting stories and many more questions that needed answers.
Many of the records themselves were mainly paper and had not been well
maintained and time consuming to review. There were many words but little
substance to the answers sought. The Borough Archive Library was then searched,
and it unlocked lots of information. As departments had changed names and references
were often inconsistent or poorly indexed it was again a challenge to plough
through Council minutes and papers. Newspaper records were useful but again often
only confirmed what had been discovered.
I did unearth a comprehensive Council Administration book of
record on the allotments which covered everything from 1947 to 1962. It
detailed all minutes, AGMs, plot allocations, disputes, works. A great source
of management information but more about day to day administration. I
discovered several important council records which detailed department
decisions and importantly those relating to the closure of the allotments and
their reopening in the 60s and allocation of extra plots in the 70s.
We were able to conclude:
The earliest record was from 1892, the council took active participation
in 1913, between 1913 and up to 1962 there were 365 plots covering the whole
Mudchute managed by the Borough and under the freehold of the PLA (Port of
London Authority). The PLA provided its own policing of the plots, which were surrounded
by high fencing and had a manned controlled ticket access gate.
In 1962 the PLA took back the land to extend the docks. However,
it was clear from the records that this was not done fully in accordance to the
statute and alternative land that was sought but even then could not be found.
The rich Mudchute topsoil was sold off by the PLA. In 1965 and thanks to Lord
Simon of the PLA and the then MP Dr Ian Mikado a small piece of derelict PLA land
was given to the society as allotments. But this only gave us back some 30
plots. By the early seventies, the PLA had realised that containers were coming,
and the docks expansion was a questionable move.
In 1978 we were given a further piece of land to accommodate
a further 70 plots. This was initially established through the Borough and as
part of the exercise we were granted full self-management and allowed to retain
all rent collected. A year later the PLA sold the freehold of the whole Mudchute
to the Borough and this in turn was managed by the new LDDC (London Docklands Development
Corporation) which was established to transform and rejuvenate the whole
Docklands area.
In 1994 a lease was granted by the Borough to Mudchute
Associates who had established an urban farm on the Mudchute. The 30-year lease
covered all the Mudchute including the allotments. The specifics of how this
somewhat audacious move happened remain subject to many different viewpoints
and what some would refer to as ‘minefield’ of council papers. The result was
24 years of soured relationships and ambiguity between the farm and allotments and
what some may described as ‘sloping shoulders’ from the Borough.
The research and a host of formal questions raised to the
Borough established that we were a statutory allotment, that they had not
disposed of us in 1994 and that the lease they entered was unworkable with
respect to the allotments. We could have left it there, but we didn’t want further
ambiguity and wished to secure our rights and position going forward. There was
no relationship between the allotments and the farm, no financial obligations
and the allotments were not even mentioned, nor the land identified within the
lease.
This may have clarified the position of how we got to where
we found ourselves and it did not address how we resolved the mess legally, amicably
and rebuilt lost opportunities and secured our future.
Tomorrow; the steps we took; ACV (Asset of Community
Value) we were granted, the Society’s constitutional and tenancy rule changes
we needed to make, the change to becoming an Incorporated Co-op and the 99 year
lease we were granted.
