Inquiry - Day Sixteen

Thursday's inquiry saw the re-examination of Mike Hollis, Knowsley Council’s witness on retail and regeneration.

Inspectator Wendy Burden began by asking the four economic consultants involved in the public inquiry to come up with a set of tables, showing the quantitative need for this scale of retail and an assessment of the impact on expenditure growth of the current recession.

She said she did not expect the four consultants to agree but she wanted to be able to see their different approaches and conclusions.

Roger Lancaster continued his cross examination of Mr Hollis, on behalf of the Combined Authorities Objectors, asking him about the effect of the proposals on Skelmersdale.

Mr Hollis agreed that the Secretary of State would need to consider whether the Kirkby proposal would have an impact on any investment decisions made in Skelmersdale, adding that the decision would need to take into account that both centres are equal in the retail hierarchy and the deliverability of both schemes.

He said nobody had cast doubt on the deliverability of Tesco’s proposals for Kirkby but St Modwen, the developers for Skelmersdale, had indicated they were reviewing their investment proposals in view of the downturn in the housing market. He said that, if the Secretary of State turned down the Kirkby proposals, she would be aware that there was a chance that neither town centre would be redeveloped.

He later added that there was “no real evidence” that this proposal would effect the Skelmersdale development.

Mr Lancaster and Mr Hollis went on to discuss a series of statistics, comparing the size of the Kirkby and Skelmersdale proposals.

They agreed the net floor space of the Kirkby scheme and agreed that Skelmersdale’s proposed store would be just over half the size of Kirkby’s. But Mr Hollis pointed out that this would be Skelmersdale’s second food store, whereas Kirkby, at the moment, had none. Mr Hollis said the larger size of the Kirkby scheme was due to the greater need there and the opportunity to tie in their development with a stadium for Everton.

Mr Hollis believed the developments would move both towns up the retail hierarchy by five places and said Kirkby was moving up from a lower base than Skelmersdale. They were both towns that needed improvement and faced the prospect of large increases in the amount of retail floor space.

Mr Hollis agreed that correspondence showed St Modwen were concerned about the downturn in the housing market and would be “planning their business accordingly”. The Skelmersdale project had a much larger housing element than Kirkby and the housing market was suffering at present.

He agreed that St Modwen were continuing to “marshal” their schemes and did not agree the Kirkby proposals would kill the Skelmersdale project “dead in the water”. He said the Secretary of State would have to take a view on this.

On the effect on Walton, the area in which Goodison Park sits, Mr Hollis said he thought the move of Everton's stadium to Kirkby would not lead to any decline in the direct workforce and could lead to an increase, as the larger and improved stadium would generate more business.

He agreed there would be some retailers and service providers in Walton that would see a decline in match day trade but he could not quantify how many job losses would result. He agreed it was likely some of these jobs would go, but that this would be balanced by an increase in jobs linked to the stadium in Kirkby.

Martin Kingston, QC, then went over some final points with Mr Hollis on behalf of Knowsley Council.

Mr Hollis said Kirkby and Skelmersdale were beginning from “an unequal base” as Kirkby had not had any major food store for thirty years – a situation that he said was “very unusual”. He added that it was “unreasonable” to come to the conclusion that Kirkby’s proposals would have a detrimental impact on Skelmersdale, based on the evidence.

He said he had not yet seen a planning application for the Skelmersdale development, despite the fact correspondence had suggested it would be in before the end of this year.

He added that, in his view, if the Skelmersdale proposal did not go ahead, that would have “nothing to do” with the Kirkby scheme. He later said, using the Government’s measurements of multiple deprivation, it was “absurd” to suggest that Skelmersdale suffered more derivation than Kirkby.

To conclude the day, Mrs Burden went over a few points with Mr Hollis.

Mrs Burden made reference to the scale of the development and the planning regulations’ requirement that this should be related to the role and function of a town centre. Mr Hollis responded by saying this could be balanced by the exceptional circumstances relating to deprivation that the RSS made reference to and that were applicable to Kirkby.

Mr Hollis was then asked to explain what he had meant by the RSS allowing a “more ambitious” approach to be adopted to the larger suburban areas. He said the Secretary of State had made several references to the need to encourage investment in areas where there was significant deprivation.
 
Mrs Burden closed proceedings and said the inquiry would resume at 1pm on January 6, 2009, to hear from a witness who would speak on the noise impact of the proposals.