Planning Committee Membership
The LTGDC Planning Committee comprises three LTGDC board members and five independent members. The committee is chaired by Cllr Conor McAuley, former chair of Newham’s planning committee and the borough’s current lead member for regeneration.
What does the committee do?
The committee considers planning applications at public meetings, at which both supporters and objectors of individual proposals have the opportunity to speak. Members vote on whether or not to approve planning applications based on guidance in relevant planning policies and planning legislation and the views of the public and other interested parties. These parties include the Greater London Authority and local authorities in addition to local residents.
Committee Members
Cllr Conor McAuley Chair – board member
Conor McAuley was appointed to the LTGDC Board on 1st November 2004 and is the Chair of the LTGDC’s Planning Committee. He has been a member of the London Borough of Newham’s Council since 1982 and has served as both Deputy Leader of the Council and as Chair of Newham’s Planning Committee. He led Newham’s successful campaign for the International Passenger Station on the Channel Tunnel Rail Link at Stratford.
He currently advises Newham’s elected Mayor on regeneration issues. He was a board member of the London Docklands Development Corporation from 1991 until it wound up in March 1998. In addition, he was a founder director of the Stratford Development Partnership Ltd. He chairs the Stratford Tomorrow’s City SRB Partnership, is Vice Chair of the Thames Gateway London Partnership and is a member of its board.
Dru Vesty Deputy Chair -Â independent member
Dru Vesty is Vice Chair of LTGDC’s planning committee. She was the Principal Planner at the London Docklands Development Corporation and then Director of the Royal Docks, responsible for the long term commercial strategy and urban development framework as well as the large scale advance infrastructure programme. As Director of Property Development for British Gas PLC, she established a property operation able to address historic contamination issues and to regenerate the company’s portfolio of 300 ex-town gas manufacturing sites. Dru has been a director of a public/private partnership company, leading consortia undertaking design, build, fund and operate projects and currently runs her own consultancy company. She is also a member of the Olympic Development Authority Planning Committee and is a Board Member of the Homes and Communities Agency.
Malcolm Chumbley independent member
Malcolm Chumbley is an Equity Partner , Commercial Board Member and Head of UK Development Agency in Cluttons LLP.
He has over 30 years experience in the development market as a valuer and development surveyor.  He specialises in advising public and private sector clients on the financial viability of projects, sales, acquisitions, joint ventures, option and development agreements.
Since 2004, he has led Cluttons’ specialist teams working on urban regeneration projects in the Thames Gateway.
Prior to joining Cluttons in 1988, he worked for the London Docklands Development Corporation, LB Barking and Dagenham, LB of Hammersmith & Fulham and LB of Tower Hamlets.
He is a member of the Royal Town Planning Institute, a Fellow of the Royal Institution of Chartered Surveyors and an RICS Registered Valuer.
Alan Clark independent member
Alan Clark has been an elected member of Nottingham City Council for the last 23 years and is cabinet member for housing and planning.
Alan is a member of the development control committee, and was a tenants’ and residents’ activist in the 1970s, and a member of housing committee in the 1980s. The committee’s policy thrust is to ensure a good range of comfortable homes are provided with a wide mix of tenures, alongside the building of decent neighbourhoods.
With four Joint Service Centres built or being built in four communities and Building Schools for the Future schemes in several others, Alan is charged with making sure these fit in with the aspects of physical transformation.
As a governor of three inner-city schools, Alan is working hard on raising aspiration as well as achievement in Nottingham’s very diverse communities.
Neil Deely independent member
Neil is a founding partner of Metropolitan Workshop Architects and formerly a Director of MacCormac Jamieson Prichard. His experience as an architect encompasses the disciplines of urban design and masterplanning and the design of buildings in sensitive heritage contexts such as Durham and Westminster and Cambridge.
The practice’s current portfolio includes major architectural projects in the UK and mainland Europe including Bergen’s new Exhibition Centre and a masterplan for the regeneration of Dun Laoghaire Harbour. Neil has led the design of several new town District Centres, and major cultural and mixed use building projects in Scandinavia and North Africa.
Neil was appointed to the CABE Enabling Panel in 2004 and CABE’s National Design Review Panel in 2007. Neil has taught and studied in Architecture Schools in the UK and USA including Oxford Brookes, Bartlett and Arkansas.
Cll Mick McCarthy board member
Mick McCarthy was appointed to the LTGDC Board on 1st December 2008. He is a member of the Labour Party and a councillor for the Eastbrook Ward in the London Borough of Barking and Dagenham. Mick is a Cabinet Member with the Regeneration portfolio which covers Spatial Regeneration and Development, Thames Gateway, Skills and Enterprise, Lifelong Learning and Adult Education, and Transport Planning Regeneration.
Councillor McCarthy also sits on the Board of Thames Gateway London Partnership, the Public Transport Liaison Group, Greater London Enterprise, Local Development Framework Steering Group, and the Local Government Association’s Urban Commission. He is also a Governor at All Saints Catholic School and Technology College and Rush Green Junior School.
Sylvie Pierce board member
Sylvie Pierce was appointed to the LTGDC Board on 1st February 2009. She is a director of Equity Regeneration, a regeneration advice company set up in 2010. Prior to this, she was founder and Chief Executive of Building Better Health. Prior to her career in property development, Sylvie had a long career in local government where her last post was Chief Executive at the London Borough of Tower Hamlets.
Sylvie is Chair of Governors at Mossbourne Community Academy; a Richard Rogers designed school, which she worked on for the sponsor, Sir Clive Bourne. She is also on the Board of London Remade, a social enterprise specialising in recycling. In the past, she has been on the Board of the Financial Services Ombudsman Scheme, an equal opportunities commissioner and a visiting professor at Guildhall University.
Richard Turner independent member
Richard is a Chartered Engineer and spent his early career working in local government designing, building and maintaining roads including the M1 and the Leeds and Bradford Airport. His latter career has been dominated by representing freight business interests and promoting sensible freight planning, safety and compliance. Richard has been an active member of a number of key government groups including Traffic Forecasting 1999, Road Pricing 2005, Road Haulage Forum, and Road Haulage Charging 2005.
Richard is a member of the Commission for Integrated Transport to which he was appointed by the Secretary of State for Transport in 2004. He is also on the Board of the Road Safety Foundation.
