Secretary of State rubber stamps new suburban tower block, weeks after announcing new restrictions on new tall buildings 

On 13 January the Secretary of State gave the green light to the Mayor of London to approve the 11 story 514 home development proposal at the Master Brewer site in Hillingdon.  

This decision to lift the holding direction on the application comes a month after he ordered the Mayor last month to strengthen London planning policy on tall buildings to “ensure such developments are only brought forward in appropriate and clearly defined areas”.  

As the Mayor acknowledged when deciding to grant permission in September, the Master Brewer site is in a low rise suburban area; miles from “appropriate and clearly defined” parts of the borough where tall buildings are permitted, which the Borough clearly set out in the Hillingdon Local Plan adopted last year. 

The decision is enormously disappointing for local community groups, who had invested time and effort in creating a community masterplan to show the sort of development that would be appropriate for the vacant site.  

An association spokesperson said: “after hearing from our local MP that Robert Jenrick has confirmed plans to protect the character of our suburbs against inappropriate overheight developments, we were confident that he would step in. The Secretary of State’s new London tall buildings policy is barely a month old and already it seems meaningless.  We will now speak to our local Council and neighbouring residents’ groups to discuss our options.” 

For further background, please see our Sept 2020 update: https://ickenhamresidents.co.uk/2020/09/07/master-brewer-planning-application-update/