Kingston Council has budgeted £13,000 to attend the UK’s largest property networking conference, which has been marred by protests outside.

MIPIM UK, a three-day conference in London’s Olympia, lets local authorities meet multinational developers about selling and developing council-owned sites.

On the Kingston Futures website, set up by the council, it states that projects on the borough’s planning agenda include mini-Holland, estate regeneration, the Eden Quarter and Cattle Market, which is described as “currently a blank slate for development”.

Companies such as Eden Quarter developers British Land have stands and Cratus, the PR company that Coun Davis co-founded, is also in attendance.

Campaign group Architects for Social Housing has stationed itself outside the conference to protest and give advice about council estates across the capital threatened with demolition.

This is the second year that 12 high-ranking council representatives, including leader Kevin Davis and former mayor Ken Smith, attended the conference that started on Wednesday, October 21, and finished today (Friday).

Opposition Liberal Democrat Councillor Bill Brisbane and head officer of planning and transport Viv Evans are also attending.

Coun Davis said representatives from the borough would be attending “to discuss development opportunities with potential partners” much like the year before.

He said: “More than 2,000 companies, 600 investors and 4,500 participants from 35 cities will be attending.

“It provides a marketplace for UK players and international investors to meet, discuss projects and oppo- rtunities and to do business and therefore it is only natural that we have a strong presence.”

Some members of Kingston Residents’ Alliance (KRA), who have been opposing St George’s old post office development and other high-rises planned for central Kingston, expressed their worry about the council’s planning agenda.

Trish Beswick said: “I see decades of change and worry ahead.”

Mediha Boran added: “What would be newsworthy is contacting officials [to] ask what they mean by ‘Cattle Market currently a blank slate for development in Kingston town centre?’”

Councillor Liz Green, leader of the opposition, said: “My main worries are it leads to more mistrust from residents thinking that the leader is talking to developers behind closed doors.

“I would hope they had a stand and something good comes out of it for £13,000. Otherwise, it should have just been the cost of a travel card into London.”