MP ‘so disappointed’ by news of Wimbledon Tennis expansion

Fleur Anderson, Labour MP for Putney, said she is ‘so disappointed’ by news of Wimbledon Tennis expansion.

Transcript

00:00I'm so disappointed about the verdict. We were so hopeful that the Deputy Mayor might

00:05listen to our arguments about environmental protection and the damage this would do,

00:09and really I don't think Wimbledon proved the economic case at all. So I really hoped

00:14that he would come out with a verdict and say, yes, you're right, we won't be going ahead with

00:18this. But I'm also really proud of all the campaigners. I mean, we really did what we could.

00:22So many of us came together, 21,000 people signed the petition. So I feel proud that we put up the

00:28fight, but really, really disappointed with the verdict. What did you make of the hearing as a

00:32whole? It was a long, several hours of evidence being heard before the Deputy Mayor retired.

00:37How did you think the process went? I think I was really disappointed with the process before

00:42we got here, actually, that Wimbledon haven't really engaged with local people. They haven't

00:46come and said, what would you like from us? How can we have a discussion? They've just told us

00:50what's happening at every stage of it. So when it came to the hearing here, I feel that we didn't

00:55really hear all of the issues that we needed to hear. Is there a really viable alternative? Yes,

01:02there is a viable alternative. And we really didn't get a chance to explore that with the

01:05Deputy Mayor. So it was a good hearing. We heard from lots of different people, but there were so

01:10many issues in this very complex project that I'm just disappointed. And what do you hope will

01:17happen next? There has been talk of the verdict being legally challenged in some ways. Is that

01:22something you'd support or want to see? We're a big local campaign and quite a few of them are

01:27lawyers. So they will be looking at the small print of that verdict as well, because there are

01:31potentially ways in which this can be challenged. So that is a potential route.

01:36And it's something you'd support? Absolutely, I'd support anything that would stop this development.