The four-year battle to stop the construction of a 22-storey tower outside Tate Modern has finally got personal.
Residents of nearby flats on Bankside have now launched a legal action against the the developers and John Prescott who backed the plan.
The history of the 'Prescott Tower' goes right back to 2001, but the short version goes something like this:
On 12 July last year the Court of Appeal dismissed an appeal by the residents group BROAD (Bankside Residents for Appropriate Developments') to stop planning consent for the buiding.
This was after a similar decision by the High Court...which itself supported another ruling, this time by the Planning Inspector...which followed a recommendation by Southwark council's planning officers...who had already overturned a rejection fo the plan by Southwark Planning Committee.
Still with us? After a petition to the High Courts also failed last year BROAD have decided that their last resort is to take the Office of the Deputy Prime Minister to the European Court of Human Rights in Strasbourg because "the block of flats would devalue their homes by as much as £50,000".
Tate Director Nicholas Serota has been backing the campaign, calling the planned tower "an opportunistic attempt to cash in for private gain on the public benefits that have been created".
