THE long battle to keep the vacant Hayes Library block publicly owned appears to be lost, after Hillingdon Council said that they would not go back on their decision to sell it for housing.
It was announced last Friday (23) that it 'would make no sense, financial or otherwise,' to turn the treasured building in Golden Crescent into a community centre or another type of local amenity, and to do so would be 'nothing short of ineptitude' when frontline services need funding.
Hayes and Harlington MP John McDonnell said that he thought the way the matter had been handled was 'despicable', and has vowed to continue the fight against the sale.
“I will be calling upon David Cameron himself to intervene, and ask the Equalities and Human Rights Commission to investigate how the council arrived at this decision, ignoring all the representations of local residents, and community and religious groups."
"We will not be divided as a community."
Hillingdon Council announced its intention to offload the historic building on a peppercorn rent in April, in order generate cash to build schools.
A backlash from residents followed, and a petition with more than 3000 names precipitated a councillor debate at a Civic Centre meeting in July.
The petition was drawn up by Dev Dhillon, a worshipper at the Ramgarhia (sic) Sikh Association who occupy the building next door to the site, and expressed an interest in buying it and opening it up to the wider community.
Mr McDonnell also mounted a campaign and collected hundreds more signatures, in support of his vision for a centre shared by all the different faith groups and local organisations.
Campaigners were given a lifeline after Leader of the Council Ray Puddifoot said that cabinet would reconsider the matter if Mr McDonnell and the Townfield and Botwell Ward Councillors - who all opposed the sale - could make 'sensible individual responses' to set questions about how the site would be best be used.
The responses were deemed 'inadequate and incomplete', however, and the local authority will now press ahead with marketing the premises to potential buyers.
A planning application to convert the eighteenth century building - a former mission church - into five flats had been submitted in the meantime.
Councillor Jonathan Bianco, cabinet member for finance, property and business services, said that recalling the decision was a 'complete nonsense' and added: "It raised false hope, and the councillors for the area should have known better.
"The separate groups could have got together and drawn up a joint proposal, but that didn't happen.
"We see the need for all different faith groups to have suitable facilities for their requirements, and we do our best to cater for everyone living in our borough.
"This is why we asked the ward councillors for their opinions on this issue, so we could make an informed choice, and we think it best to get on with the business of selling it."
The Ramgarhia Sikh Association was unavailable for comment.
