The developer is appealing against the Council’s refusal of a 650-bedroom hotel between Smith Square and Millbank.

Criterion Capital has appealed to the Planning Inspectorate against the Council’s refusal of its application to convert the former government offices at Nobel House, between Smith Square and Millbank, into a 650-bedroom hotel.

Earlier this year the Council’s Planning Committee rejected the application, agreeing with local residents that a hotel would have a substantial negative impact on this mainly residential area. St James’s councillors San Abishev, Tim Mitchell and Mark Shearer are working closely with the Residents’ Action Group that led the campaign against the hotel, to make sure the case against the proposal is robustly made.

In September, people living in Smith Square were woken in the middle of the night by two articulated lorries unloading for an event at Nobel House. The councillors found that the operators did not have the Council’s permission to work at night, and the landlord and its contractor were issued with Community Protection Warnings ordering them to stop.