Housing minister, Yvette Cooper, is expected to lead the defence of the Thames Gateway initiative, following high-profile criticism. She will use this week's Thames Gateway Forum to set out detailed plans to reject claims by the Commons public accounts committee (PAC) that the project was failing. But the Commission for Architecture and the Built Environment (CABE) will warn it will create an ‘urban wasteland of badly-designed housing estates' unless there is a commitment to design quality. CABE will launch a pact calling for an immediate step change to achieve this over the next three years. Richard Simmons, chief executive, said: ‘The PAC warned the Gateway risks becoming a public spending calamity. Therefore, a tangible commitment to design quality must form the basis, across all levels of delivery. The new and existing communities have the right to expect it.' Conservative London mayoral candidate, Boris Johnson, has criticised the project and said the Government was ‘missing a great opportunity'. He said: ‘We have to create communities which people can aspire to and I want to beat the spectre of NIMBY-ism.'
