The O2 Centre site on Finchley Road

• IN their letter (We have a better vision for the O2 Centre site, September 23), Camden Labour councillors accused local Conservative activists of hypocrisy relating to the redevelopment.

I am one of those activists and would like to comment here in a private capacity. It is revealing that some Labour representatives are only now taking a stand at all.

The fact is local activists have been in close communication with residents for weeks. I have spoken to hundreds of our neighbours and even more have so far supported a petition and taken a stand in a survey in opposition to the redevelopment plans.

Conservative councillors have been fighting at the council for months to get the Labour majority to take residents’ concerns seriously. If Labour representatives now call this hypocritical, then I will gladly pin that to my chest as an accolade.

However I call talking with, working with, and being politically active on behalf of, residents the be all and end all of local democracy (something some within Camden Labour have obviously lost sight of for so long that it only occurs to them when they can use it as an attack on a perceived enemy).

I am sure people can see through the attempt to use diversionary tactics. The fact is that the O2 Centre redevelopment is the sole and entire responsibility of the Camden Labour majority.

It is a charade beyond compare that those responsible for rushing this project through, against the will of the people, now pretend to be on the side of those people. And they call those who side with the people from the beginning hypocritical!

Please, let us stop divisiveness now. Let’s not be enemies but opponents that joined hands and stood up together for the residents we represent or would feel honoured to represent in the future.

My message is clear, the O2 Centre must remain a centre for the local community, a place where children can continue to go swimming and attend their art, dance, or karate classes, a place where our neighbourhood families can go to the cinema, and where we can visit a garden centre without driving miles and polluting the environment.

Last but not the least let us keep it a place where our disabled friends, neighbours, and family members can shop in comfort and accessibility. Does living at the edge of central London necessarily mean living in dense, concrete chaos?

Of course, we in our neighbour­hood are willing to contribute to deliver more homes. But we cannot solve the housing crisis by destroying our communities.

MARX DE MORAIS
The Heights, NW3