A survey across Sutton South Ward in the period immediately before the Brighton Road car park closed and immediately after shows that the closure of the Brighton Road car park has not had an impact on parking in the Ward.

 

The results are shown below.

 

Now that the decision is reached on the Subsea7 proposal to build their new offices in Sutton, Richard has written to residents setting out his thoughts on the impact locally. He claims that that he and Heather are probably the most successful local Councillors in Britain, as few have been involved in attracting 500 new jobs to their Ward. He writes:

 

“When I was elected in 2010 I observed that Sutton South is a generally affluent area but there are pockets of poverty, particularly in the social housing estates in the Ward. Many of these people are people who are at the margins of the labour market, often single mothers or people in their 50s who have been made redundant, unskilled and struggling to find work, people whose lives would be transformed if they could get back into employment. Jobs are gold dust.

 

I cannot pretend that the Subsea7 proposal was something I was responsible for. But when it was proposed, I felt that to have a major, successful, expanding engineering company create 500 jobs in my Ward by building a modern, attractive HQ building, replacing a half empty car park, was something positive. So, with Heather, I had a lot of discussions with Subsea7 and we would like to think that we were responsible for many of the improvements made to the plans as they developed. 

 

There were three sets of objections put to me by residents.

First, Subsea7 could have gone to one of the other empty office buildings in Sutton. I discussed this with them. They had a number of technical objections, in particular that the size of their work teams meant any conventional 80s or earlier tower block would not be suitable as the teams would be spread over several floors. But it became clear to me that they wanted their own, prestige building, being prepared to spend surprising amounts of money employing a top firm of European architects to design it, and if we could not accept that they would go elsewhere – Epsom or Leatherhead seemed likely. In fact Sutton has suffered a decline in the number of office buildings, as many are converted to residential uses, and it is a bonus to have this new prestige office development.

 

Second, the development would only create jobs for engineers, and not for local people. This is not so. An office complex of this size will create jobs for cleaners, receptionists, clerks, drivers, catering workers etc. The site is surrounded by social housing estates ( Sutton Court , Beauclere House, Westmoreland Drive , Ambleside Gardens ) and local people within walking distance will be well placed to compete for these less skilled jobs. The workforce in this office complex will spend money in local shops and restaurants. The clients will come to these offices from, we are told, all over the world, spending money in local hotels and restaurants. This is the type of upward momentum the area needs.

 

Third, it would displace parking into local streets to an unacceptable extent. The current evidence, in the immediate aftermath of closure, is that this has not happened. Heather and I insisted on a substantial discount being offered to drivers to move to Gibson Road , and the deal done by Reed to enable their staff to park in the underused B and Q car park has been significant. For the longer term, we know Network Rail is interested in expanding the station car park. There still is a problem of parking in some roads in the Ward, though the closure of Brighton Road has not affected it.

 

From my point of view, my term as a Councillor ends next year and I would like to think I am leaving some legacy in the location in our Ward of such a prestige development by an expanding company, creating local jobs. There are very few Councillors in the UK who have got 500 new jobs in their Ward.”

 

1. Thursday 26 September, in the week before the car park closed
2. Monday 30 September, the day before it closed
3. Tuesday 1 October, the first day that it was closed
4. Thursday 3 October, for comparison with the previous Thursday.