One of the best ways to make money in the 21st century is to have bought cheap land in the 20th. One of the best places to have bought that land is the Isle of Dogs, ideally before Canary Wharf appeared, which is what print magnate Richard Desmond did in 1984. Beside the Millwall Dock he built the West Ferry Print Works, a glass-fronted facility used to print the Daily Express, Telegraph and Daily Star. It looked futuristic enough to appear in a 1997 Bondmovie, but by 2011 it also looked like a goldmine, so Desmond vacated the site and moved newspaper production to a new plant in Luton.
This is a big site, its 15 acres equivalent to 2% of the surface area of the Isle of the Dogs, which just goes to show how cheap land was back in the 80s. It's also very well located, propertywise, with a southerly aspect overlooking a lengthy flank of water and within a five minute walk of a DLR station. That'll be why in 2015 a planning application was submitted to create a mixed-use development including 722 residential units and a secondary school, with buildings ranging from 4 to 30 storeys in height. But it was never built.
There were numerous objections. Most of the surrounding housing is lowrise, again built when land was cheap and density unimportant, so there were fears the higher towers might block sunlight. The neighbouring watersports centre also worried wind turbulence would disrupt dinghy sailing in the dock, and received £½m to help them introduce mitigating measures. Of most concern was the level of "affordable" housing, a paltry 11%, which the developers upped to 20% after protest. But Tower Hamlets planning committee still said no, so the final decision was called in by the Mayor... who approved it one week before he left office in 2016. Demolition of the print works duly went ahead the following year.
But Richard Desmond wasn't satisfied. He revamped his proposal and submitted fresh plans in 2018, almost doubling the number of flats on site to 1524. This was chiefly achieved by increasing the heights of the towers, with the tallest shooting up from 30 storeys to 46... that's 155m instead of 110m. Local people were even less happy. Sunlight was now more of an issue, the proportion of affordable housing had only been nudged up to 21%, and the stepped silhouette of the new development would intrude on views from Greenwich by appearing to the west of the existing Docklands cluster. Tower Hamlets again weren't impressed and again said no. The developers therefore appealed, so last summer a Public Inquiry was set up... at the end of which the independent Planning Inspector said no too.
However by this time ultimate responsibility had been landgrabbed not by the Mayor of London but by the Secretary of State for Housing. Robert Jenrick kept it in his in-tray for a few months and then in January 2020 gave the go-ahead for Desmond's expanded project to proceed. Tower Hamlets were livid, not just because they'd lost but because the decision was made one day before a new community levy was introduced. Had the go-ahead been given on January 15th Desmond would have to had to pay over £40m to boost local infrastructure, but because it was given on January 14th he paid nothing. They launched a legal challenge.
Last month the council won its challenge when the government accepted it had acted unlawfully. The planning application would now be redetermined and the Secretary of State would play no part in that judgement. Things got considerably murkier last week when it was revealed that Richard Desmond gave a £12,000 donation to the Conservative party just two weeks after Jenrick gave his ruling. Further digging has also revealed that Desmond sat next to Jenrick at a Tory fundraising dinner last November. Nothing watertight has been proven, and Jenrick insists he's "confident that all the rules were followed", but this still has the potential to become a huge ministerial scandal. The Daily Mail certainly aren't letting go.
Which leaves a massive empty space beside Millwall Dock, and as yet no confirmation of what will fill it. The site is surrounded by a low fence draped with fabric, which droops sufficiently to allow a glimpse inside from the waterside path. All that's visible amid the levelled soil is a long rectangular depression with one reinforced metal wall, which I understand is to be a shared basement running the length of the development. Purchasers of luxury apartments need to put their cars somewhere. Richard Desmond will probably get his plans through in one form or another, eventually, although a full decade after the last of his newspapers rolled off the presses on site. Some developments stink from start to finish. The Westferry Printworks now reek.
