Can the GLA legitimately use the Direction of Travel to establish an Opportunity Area for Kingston? This is a question that the Examination in Public must address this Wednesday morning. Please come to the session starting at 0930 at City Hall. I will be there. I understand that nobody from Kingston council is coming to the session despite a manifesto promise from the LibDems that they would "robustly challenge" growth figures for the Borough. This can not happen unless they challenge the looming Opportunity Area status. Apparently, Sutton council officers will be speaking on behalf of a number of Boroughs, including Kingston.

Here is the email I sent to Mr Baker on 11 January 2019, to which I am still waiting a reply:

Dear Mr Baker

I am writing to request that you confirm urgently whether the Council's constitution and the democratic process were by-passed and residents of Kingston denied the exercise of their democratic rights in the approval process for the Direction of Travel followed by Kingston Council and subsequently by the GLA with the Council's full knowledge.

The facts are as follows. The Direction of Travel document was approved by the Growth Committee of the Council in the evening of 13th October 2016. It was included in the items subject to call-in up to and including 9th November 2016. The GLA approved The Direction of Travel within only two business days, on 17th October 2016.
I believe that it is right to say that legally no action should have been taken by Kingston Council to present the Direction of Travel to the GLA as an officially approved document until the period for the call-in had expired.

In addition, the decision to approve the Direction of Travel was in no way unanimous, and the audio recording, and to a lesser extent the minutes of the meeting, reveal that a number of Council Members raised concerns about the document's content and several local residents asked questions from the public gallery about the document's soundness. Consequently the Council was aware of the possibility of challenge. Nevertheless, the council appears to have knowingly bypassed its own rules and asked the GLA to approve the DIrection of Travel within days.

I am deeply concerned by the possibility that the Council ignored its own constitution and bypassed the democratic process in these actions. My concerns in this regard are in addition to the concerns that I expressed at the Call-In of the Issues & Options consultation document about the soundness of the Direction of Travel, and to which I am still waiting a reply - as promised at the meeting - from officers. I attach my call-in for reference purposes.

Yours sincerely