Planners block New Covent Garden sell-off


24 November 1998


Planners block New Covent Garden sell-off


LOCAL planners have dealt a blow to the Ministry of Agricultures plans to raise tens of millions of pounds by selling the New Covent Garden wholesale fruit and vegetable market in London.

Wandsworth council said it was opposed to changing the use of the site, which had been earmarked for possible redevelopment as supermarket space or housing.

The ministry was expecting to raise up to £60 million from the sale. Nick Brown, the agriculture minister, told a parliamentary committee recently that his department would run into some financial embarrassment if a sale was not made.

Traders on the site are preparing a consortium to buy the market from the Government.

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