1. The Beetham Organization is a “a privately owned pioneering UK property development and investment company with a focus on prime city centre real estate”.2. Mrs Rina Begum is a Bengali single mother who has lived in her flat on the ground floor of the Guinness Trust flat in the ward of Portsoken in the City of London since 1994. Portsoken is on the Eastern fringe of the City bordering Tower Hamlets.
3. The Beetham Organization, based in Liverpool, wants to expand its property portfolio. Beetham have taken on development projects in Birmingham, Manchester and South London. To be considered one of the big boys they want a site in the City of London.
4. Rina has five children. Her next door neighbour, Ariful Nessa, also has five children. Her upstairs neighbour, Ayesha Azad, has four children. Two of Rina’s children go to the Sir John Cass’s Primary school, five minutes walk on the other side of the ward, through the Aldgate bus depot.
5. In April 2003 the Beetham Organization buys from another developer, called Hammerson, the freehold of the block of flats where Rina Begum lives, along with the bus depot (Hammerson is one of the big boys.)
6. Rina gets a bus from the depot once a week to buy her fruit and vegetables from Watney Market along the Commercial Road in Tower Hamlets. Although she has to spend £2 on her bus fare to get there, and £2 back, she says that it is worth the trip. She can get a bag of seven or eight green and red peppers for £1.20 and six or seven bananas for £1. In the Aldgate each banana cost 50p.
7. In August 2005, the Beetham Organization proposes a £700M office cluster for the Aldgate bus depot, introducing “more than one million feet of prime office space to the City of London.” The proposed buildings will be 12, 15 and 23 storeys high – three times the current capacity. It will include “active retail frontages helping to animate the pedestrian environment”. The buildings are to be “environmentally friendly” running on “energy efficient technology that retains heat in winter and cools buildings in summer.” It is a “regeneration project in a run down area of the City.”
8. Rina lives directly beneath one of the proposed buildings, along the route where the busses will pass from their garage onto the Aldgate roundabout. She is worried about the impact on her children of the pollution and the impact of the loss of light on her flat. She will lose sight of the sky. She doesn’t want to be overlooked.
9. The developer is proposing an extension to her flat in order to mitigate some of the loss of light. They have offered to pay £4,000 as a “one off” disruption payment while her family are moved out for ten weeks. The Guinness Trust reports that the Beetham Organization will withhold the money from anyone who objects to the flat extension or office proposal. The extension will mean she loses part of her garden.
10. Rina speaks to the Planning Committee when the application goes to the City Corporation: "I am Rina. I have lived on the estate since 1994. I have five children. The developer has told us to move out for the big development. We are not happy. After this development our homes will be dark, we will see no sky. We will lose our gardens. I love my garden. The developer has said they will give us money to move out. We don't want money. We don't want to move out."
11. In his report, the Planning Officer writes: “The residents of the adjoining Guinness Trust Estate will be impacted by the development through loss of daylight, sunlight, noise, increased massing and overlooking, servicing and in the construction phase . . . However, it is appropriate for a local planning authority to weigh the various planning considerations and to come to a conclusion that the development complies with the Development Plan in the light of the whole Plan.”
12. The Planning Committee, just before Christmas, decides, “in the light of the whole plan”, Rina and the other residents should be cast into darkness.
