Lorry loads of cash for Finsbury Park festivals - whither and in what quantities?

[Adrian Essex]

The Friends of Finsbury Park are definitely not happy that Haringey uses Finsbury Park for music festivals. Their appeal against the failure of their judicial review against the legality of hiring out the park in this way has not put them off. They are now demanding that all the income form the festivals be spent purely on the upkeep and improvement of the park.

The Friends' blog makes a number of assertions about the legality of the way in which Haringey is spending the money. For instance:

" . . . . the current council’s running of Finsbury Park is both unlawful and not in the interests of the park itself or its users."

Their solicitor's letter (22nd Feb) asks for some facts to back up the assertions , and finishes with this request:

1. In the circumstances, we request the following:
   1) that by close of business on 15 March 2018 you please account for all the monies
   that have been generated by Finsbury Park and how these monies have been
   expended;
   2) you confirm that your will amend your Council’s policy forthwith to confirm that
   monies generated by Finsbury Park will only be used for the purposes of
   maintaining and improving Finsbury Park.
   We look forward to hearing from you as a matter of urgency.

The blog was published on 23rd March and makes no mention of Haringey's reply, so we can be pretty confident Haringey simply ignored the 15th March deadline.

[Clive Carter]

LAST night I attended the final Overview and Scrutiny Committee meeting that included items about Finsbury Park (annotated video).

There—and from the Cabinet Member Signing last week on further events in FP—we heard from the Council Cabinet Member for the Environment—that includes Parks responsibility—that the Council accepts the principle that money raised on park X needs to be spent on park X. (i.e. not on parks Y and Z or other areas of expenditure.

This arises out of a Judgement.

--

Incidentally—and this is a point that bears repeating because there has been some misrepresentation about this in the past—the Friends of Finsbury Park are not opposed to all events in the Park. We are opposed to the mega-music events that:

• damage the park
• have on occasion, generated crime sprees
• disrupt through traffic and for local residents
• deny use of the best part of the park, at the height of summer, for some two weeks (including build-up & tear down) to the general public 
• occupy approximately a third of the overall area of the park, but half of the usable area; and due mainly to the noise, make the remainder of the park significantly less usable
• Noise: create too high and probably unlawful levels of noise, that falls mainly on the ears of residents in two other Boroughs, and who have no say in the matter