• Ocado’s PR blitz is designed to deflect from next week’s High Court case.
• Ocado have shown nothing but arrogance and contempt for the community and due process throughout.
• Ocado’s electric vans claims are meaningless and unenforceable.
• The website fails to mention non-electric staff cars, Zoom motorbikes and HGVs.
• The site has never been used for Warehousing (B8).

Bill Eyres, former sustainability director of O2 and co-founder of Islington’s Environmental Emergency Alliance said:

“This is not a legitimate consultation. Ocado does not have the authority to run an objective process which should have been instigated at the beginning in conjunction with the Council and not two years’ later to cover up their consistent failure to listen to the community’s concerns.  It is yet another attempt to distract attention from the truth of the situation and mislead.  

“Ocado is taking Islington Council and Concerned Residents to the High Court next week to overthrow the fact that in October the Council designated the site unlawful for intense 24/7 grocery delivery usage.  On the one hand Ocado is launching an illegitimate online consultation, on the other, they have chosen to take us court which again, they have also chosen to withhold as information within their sham ‘public’ consultation. This the real face of Ocado: a belated greenwash consultation whilst wielding a legal sledgehammer against the opposition of the community and its children.”

Natasha Cox, campaigner and parent at the affected primary school bordering the site said:

“Ocado’s launch of an ‘online consultation’ is more Con than Consultation. They claim it is “in respect of a Confirmation of Use application.” There is no such thing as a confirmation of use application in planning law. 

“If Ocado were seriously interested in working “in partnership with residents”, as they claim, they wouldn’t have already spent millions developing the site, they wouldn’t be suing the cash-strapped council in the middle of Covid for their decision not to allow Ocado’s plans due to unlawful usage, and they wouldn’t be continuing to plan a ‘fulfilment centre’ with lorries delivering 24/7 right next to a primary school and flats.  

“The evidence is clear: bad air quality affects children’s health and can kill the vulnerable. There is no place for this kind of operation a skipping rope away from a primary school and its playground.”

Andrew Grieve, an air pollution scientist at Imperial College London and campaigner said: 

“Ocado’s belated commitment to electric vans is meaningless unless and until they submit themselves to the proper planning process which they are still desperately trying to avoid by taking us and the Council to the High Court next week. 

“Their PR website fails to mention pollution from 90 staff cars, delivery HGVs and the motorbikes and cars which power their Zoom service. 

“Children are particularly susceptible to air pollution as their brains, immune system and lungs are still growing. We have a duty to protect children who have no voice in the planning process. Ocado can find another site. The children can’t find another school.”

Head to https://www.nocadon19.co.uk to see our alternative consultation.