Save Wanstead Flats

A LARGE and angry audience of local residents packed a meeting hall in Forest Gate, east London, on 6 October to quiz the police and City of London Corporation trustees over plans to build a ‘temporary’ police station on Wanstead Flats to serve the 2012 Olympic Games.

Dave Carr, East London Socialist Party

The Flats is an area of open land in congested London used by local people for recreation. It is managed by the City of London Corporation trustees, who are allowing the police station to be built there despite the impact on the environment and the precedent it sets for possible future development.

The police spokesmen stonewalled audience questions by repeatedly saying that no other potential site met their (unspecified) criteria. They also refused to reveal the whereabouts of the other sites on the grounds of “commercial sensitivity”.

Some of the most searching questions came from school students who accused the police of hiding behind a screen of “commercial sensitivity”.

The audience made it clear that they would fight the planning application and continue the campaign to save the Flats even if the police station development was a ‘done deal’.

The meeting voted unanimously to reject the police station proposal.