£800,000 Aveling & Porter demolition disgrace

Local campaigners worked with local Labour Councillor Stephen Hubbard to save the former Aveling & Porter building from being demolished. The former Aveling & Porter steamroller factory building, which overlooks the River Medway, formed part of Medway Council’s civic centre until the Conservative decided to sell and move across the river to its current Gun Wharf headquarters in May 2008.

Historic Asset - Fear of demolition

The A&P building has, since 1910, has been an attractive and iconic part of the setting for the historic buildings across the river. The former factory site was an important element in the economy of the City of Rochester and the other Medway towns for many years. Together with A&P's successor, Winget, they were in the forefront of the manufacturing industry which was once of great local importance and of which there is now unfortunately very little evidence.

A&P were world leaders in the manufacture of steam road rollers and traction engines. Their products were sold for use throughout the British Empire and beyond. Many examples remain in working condition both in this country and abroad - a great tribute to the excellence of their design and to local workmanship here in our city.

Bulldozing over history, heritage and public opinion

Labour campaigners, led by Stephen Hubbard, questioned the leader of the Conservative council in March 2009. We cited the significant concerns that the Conservative Party was bulldozing over a historic asset, purely to sell the land to cover the massive black hole in the council books caused by overspending on the Chatham two-way fiasco. The leader of the council made no clear statement to support the building and it is now extremely likely that the building was be demolished. Another piece of Rochester & Strood histroy laid waste by a culturally moribund administration.

Local residents and the SAVE Britain's Heritage Group have suggested that whilst the majority of the building be demolished the older, historic Aveling & Porter building be retained as an historic facade and tribute to the cultural history of Rochester & Strood. The Labour Group suggested that developers may be open to the retention of the historic building as a value-add to any development or alternatively the Council could use the building for young people in Strood.

Sadly the Conservative run Medway Council does not wish share that ownership of Strood’s manufacturing heritage and is proposing to demolish all the buildings on the civic centre site in order to maximise the profit from selling the site to a developer. In May 2006 the council’s Tory Cabinet adopted a Building Height Policy that gave them the right to give planning permission, on the civic centre site, for blocks of flats between 6 to 8 storeys high - right up to the river’s edge.

£800,000 Cost to tax payer

In June 2009, it became clear that the Tories had massively underestimated the cost of the demolition of the Strood Civic Centre which was budgeted at £300,000. This figure has now doubled to £800,000.

£800,000 which could have improved all the road surfaces across Strood and still had spare to spend on a youth centre.

The Tory relocation to Gun Wharf was justified on cost grounds, but it has became increasingly clear that the £800,000 cost was a staggering financial oversight.

£800,000 which could save a primary school from closure or paid for extra teaching assistants in our classrooms.

The Conservative Party has a lamentable record in Strood; litter, griffiti and anti-social behaviour problems ignored, care homes privitased and closed like Shaws Wood, cuts to services at Strood Sports centre, and the bodged and rushed closure of the Civic Centre. The Tory record of ignoring residents and concerns in Strood is plain to see from simply the closure of basic services across Strood