SDEN’s business plan ‘dishonest at best, fraudulent at worst’

Posted on July 13, 2021 by insidecroydon

Sutton’s LibDem council was last night forced to agree to an independent investigation into its failing heating company. CARL SHILTON reports

Sutton Council’s controlling Liberal Democrats, after spending six years trying to deny that there was anything even vaguely suspicious about the multi-million-pound public financing of the council-owned heat network, last night voted unanimously in favour of an independent audit into the loss-making SDEN.

SDEN, or the Sutton Decentralised Energy Network, was used as a key part of the false eco-economics behind the building of the Viridor incinerator at Beddington, which has a £1billion contract to burn the rubbish from the four councils who comprise the South London Waste Partnership, including Croydon.

Last night, “Calamity” Jayne McCoy, the LibDem council’s deputy leader and the councillor in charge of the business, gave the appearance of welcoming an independent investigation, which she said might bring to an end well-founded allegations which according to the councillor were “damaging the reputation of the council and its company, SDEN”, while causing stress to officers and questioning their integrity. Continue reading →

Posted in Jayne McCoy, Nick Mattey, Sutton Council, Tim Crowley, Waste incinerator | Tagged , , , , , , , , , , | 2 Comments

Borough needs to change gear to access £100m cycle fund

Posted on July 13, 2021 by insidecroydon

Road to redemption: better infrastructure for safe cycling can help all of Croydon

CROYDON COMMENTARY: Our borough scored poorly in a Healthy Streets report published last week. AUSTEN COOPER on how that can be improved

“The joy of cycling is that doing it doesn’t just benefit you. It doesn’t just make you happier. It doesn’t just make you healthier.
“It helps millions of others too, whether or not they have any intention of getting on a bike. It means less pollution and less noise for everyone. It means more trade for street-front businesses. It means fewer cars in front of yours at the lights.”

Who said that?

Some middle-aged man in lycra on a £3,000 road bike?

No. It was the Prime Minister, Boris Johnson, just a year ago, when he kickstarted a “£2billion cycling and walking revolution” that promised thousands of miles of new protected bike lanes, cycle training for everyone and bikes available on prescription. Continue reading →

Posted in Community associations, Commuting, Croydon Cycling Campaign, Cycling, TfL, Transport | Tagged , , , | 4 Comments

Tories in reshuffle as Redfern and Streeter quit cabinet jobs

Posted on July 13, 2021 by insidecroydon

Our political editor, WALTER CRONXITE, reports on the latest departures from the Conservatives’ front bench at the Town Hall

Going: Helen Redfern

Less than 10 months out from the borough-wide local elections, and with Labour in Croydon on the ropes after the scandals of Brick by Brick, the South Norwood council flats and the Town Hall’s financial collapse, and Jason Perry, the leader of the opposition Tories, has been forced into reshuffling his cabinet.

With the deadline for applications to be Conservative candidates in the May 2022 local elections fast approaching, two of Perry’s front-bench spokespeople have stepped down from their roles.

Helen Redfern, one of Croydon Conservatives’ more capable performers (all things are relative), who has been a councillor for Purley Oaks and Riddlesdown since 2018, is standing down as shadow cabinet member for children, young people and learning, because of “increased work commitments”.

Gareth “Blubber” Streeter, the failed Tory parliamentary candidate who has been councillor for Shirley North for the last three years, is giving up on his role in the shadow cabinet on culture and regeneration, where he has not made much impact despite the rich source material presented to him by his bungling Labour opposite numbers. Continue reading →

Posted in Croydon Council, Gareth Streeter, Helen Redfern, Jason Perry, Jeet Bains | Tagged , , , , , , , , | Leave a comment

Police in second murder investigation after teen’s stabbing

Posted on July 12, 2021 by insidecroydon

The police have launched a second murder investigation in Croydon within barely a week, after a teenager stabbed in an altercation in Bensham Manor on Friday died in hospital last night.

Murder scene: Police in Bensham Manor on Friday, after the latest teen’s stabbing

The victim, who was aged 16, has yet to be identified.

The police were already investigating the murder of another 16-year-old, Camron Smith, who was stabbed on the doorstep of his family home just a couple of miles away in Shirley in the early hours of July 1. The two murders are not believed to be connected.

The latest fatal stabbing occurred at around 3pm on Friday, close to the junction of Bensham Manor Road and Swain Road, according to the Metropolitan Police, who are seeking witnesses. Continue reading →

Posted in Bensham Manor, Crime, Knife crime, Policing | Tagged , , , | 3 Comments

The Children’s Trust sponsored walk, Tadworth, Aug 21

Posted on July 12, 2021 by insidecroydon

Step Forward for children with brain injury this August and sign up to take part in a sponsored walk to raise funds for The Children’s Trust.

The charity is calling for supporters to join them on a physical walk, starting and finishing at The Children’s Trust headquarters in Tadworth, on Saturday August 21.

Participants can choose from a five- or 10-mile walk, and The Children’s Trust says, “The whole family is welcome, whether they’re on two legs or four.” Continue reading →

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Croydon Mencap: Support worker driver, apply by Aug 3

Posted on July 12, 2021 by insidecroydon

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Where Mummy knows best: taste of Egypt comes to Boxpark

Posted on July 11, 2021 by insidecroydon

Cairo cool: Koshary Kitchen offers a fresh take on Egyptian food at Boxpark

When SANJANA IDNANI heard that there was a new restaurant in town offering the best of Egyptian street food, she went along to find out more and, naturally, she took her Mum(my)

A trip to Cairo might not be on the cards any time soon, but the reopening of restaurants means that I can at least travel with my tastebuds. The opening of a new, Egyptian-themed restaurant at Boxpark offered the chance to enjoy the buzz of eating out again and have lunch with my mum.

Sweet chick: the Koshary street food that gives Boxpark’s newest restaurant its name

Koshary Kitchen was opened by Ramy Abdelrehim and is named after the popular Egyptian street food dish – a combination of rice, lentils and macaroni with a spicy tomato sauce and crispy onions.

This street food aspect of the dish was brought to life by the surrounding atmosphere in Boxpark, making it the perfect location for the restaurant. The hum and chatter in the background, the ebb and flow of people drifting in and out, and the stall-like set-up of the restaurant units seem to add authenticity of the style of food we were trying.

Koshary Kitchen’s décor adds atingle to the excitement of the new, a colourful mural that fuses Ancient Egyptian and British culture, including a ram-headed figure holding a dog. Continue reading →

Posted in Boxpark, Business, Restaurants | Tagged , | Leave a comment

Public outcry as council off-loads historic Heathfield House

Posted on July 10, 2021 by insidecroydon

CROYDON IN CRISIS: The future of a long-established ecology charity has been placed under threat, as well as hundreds of school visits conducted annually, by a council plan to lease out a publicly-owned listed building.
By our environment correspondent, PAUL LUSHION

The listed Victorian Heathfield House in the Addington Hills could soon be taken out of public hands

The council has caused another public outcry over proposals to dispose of public green space in a scheme to lease Heathfield House and fence off land around it, potentially breaking previous promises about the use of the building and forcing a local ecology charity to close.

Heathfield House is the former home of Raymond Riesco and his family, which was acquired for the people of Croydon after the industrialist’s death in the 1960s.

The Victorian villa-style house in the Addington Hills has been poorly maintained and neglected by Croydon Council over the past couple of decades, during which time it has been used by the authority for staff training and meetings, and the gardens and surrounding fields have been well used by charity the Croydon Ecology Centre. Continue reading →

Posted in Art, Charity, Croydon Council, Croydon Friends of the Earth, Croydon parks, Environment, Heathfield, Heathfield House, History, Property, Riesco Collection, Sarah Hayward, Schools, Selsdon & Ballards, Wildlife | Tagged , , , , , , | 13 Comments

How Grand Tour to Italy ended tragically for Croydon artist

Posted on July 10, 2021 by insidecroydon

Picture perfect: Jonathan Skelton’s watercolour of Croydon Parish Church from 1754 is the oldest known to exist

MARVELS OF THE MINSTER: Four paintings in the Museum of Croydon’s collection show the town 250 years ago as a rural idyll. They are by a talented watercolourist whose career was marred by politics and professional jealousies, as DAVID MORGAN explains

Over the years, many artists have been inspired to paint a canvas of Croydon Parish Church, now Croydon Minster. The results of their creativity provide not only a view of how the church has changed over time, but also how the surrounding landscape has altered too.

The earliest paintings show the church nestled in a rural idyll. The church, positioned next to the Archbishop of Canterbury’s residence, Croydon Palace, is surrounded by greenery, with the River Wandle flowing past it. Continue reading →

Posted in Art, Croydon Minster, David Morgan, History, Museum of Croydon | Tagged , , , , , | Leave a comment

Complaints to regulator over council’s £100m pensions deal

Posted on July 9, 2021 by insidecroydon

CROYDON IN CRISIS: The scandals at Fisher’s Folly surrounding questionable property transactions keep emerging.
EXCLUSIVE By STEVEN DOWNES

Long-term investment: the council had to buy ‘street properties’ for its pension property deal after Brick by Brick failed to deliver

The council’s £1.5billion pension fund has been the subject of two complaints to the statutory watchdog, the Pensions Regulator, Inside Croydon has discovered.

Both complaints centre on a 40-year property deal involving 346 council-owned homes, some of which were supposed to be provided by the council’s failed house-builders, Brick by Brick.

In the end, such were the delays in Brick by Brick’s delivery of finished homes, what have been described as “street properties” were acquired instead. Continue reading →

Posted in Andrew Pelling, Chris Buss, Croydon Council, Richard Simpson, Simon Hall | Tagged , , , , , , , , , | 3 Comments

Magic! Bodged repair gets fixed after Inside Croydon report

Posted on July 9, 2021 by insidecroydon

It was almost as if by magic.

Bish, bash, bosh: How the light fitting in the stairwell was repaired yesterday afternoon

Within a couple of hours of Inside Croydon approaching senior council figures about the latest “bodged” repairs jobs carried out by contractors in the residential blocks on Regina Road, suddenly workmen appeared in the damp and dripping wet corridor.

They removed the gaffer tape and plastic bags, properly secured the light fitting and plastered over the ceiling.

Bish! Bash! Bosh! Job’s a good ‘un.

Remarkable. And surely more than mere coincidence that this works in the council-owned block was carried out yesterday afternoon, just as iC was reporting the tenants’ growing frustration at being ignored, yet again, by their councillors and council staff.

After all, some council tenants went for four years, constantly reporting leaks into their sodden and mould-infested flats in South Norwood, with the council taking no proper action to fix the issues. But the worst-affected tenants were rehomed, albeit temporarily, within a day of broadcast journalists from ITV News contacting the propaganda department at Fisher’s Folly. Continue reading →

Posted in Community associations, Croydon Council, Regina Road Residents' Support Group, South Norwood, South Norwood Community Kitchen, South Norwood Tourist Board, Steve Reed MP | Tagged , , , , , , | Leave a comment

14-year-old schoolboy from Sanderstead wins a BAFTA

Posted on July 9, 2021 by insidecroydon

Andrew Ah-Weng, a 14-year-old from Sanderstead, has won a BAFTA, as the British Academy of Film and Television Arts yesterday revealed the 2021 winners of its Young Game Designer Awards.

Andrew Ah-Weng: BAFTA-winner at just 14

Ah-Weng’s game, called Getting Out Of It, took top prize in the 10- to 14-year-olds’ Game Making category.

There was also a winner in the Mentors’ category for Raynes Park teacher Richard Harris.

BAFTA YGD is a year-round initiative for 10-to-18-year-olds that includes public events, workshops and a competition that culminates in yesterday’s BAFTA ceremony that celebrates the achievements of the finalists and winners. Continue reading →

Posted in Business, Education, Sanderstead | Tagged , , | Leave a comment

Reports on Fairfield Halls and BxB missing from audit meeting

Posted on July 8, 2021 by insidecroydon

CROYDON IN CRISIS: Tonight’s meeting of the council’s GPAC – General Purposes and Audit Committee – will mark the end of a error, as Labour councillors risk handing even more control to council executives.
By STEVEN DOWNES

Getting worse: council leader Hamida Ali

Karen Jewitt, the councillor for Thornton Heath ward, will chair what is probably her last General Purposes and Audit Committee meeting tonight – which will probably be the last to be chaired by a Labour councillor at least until 2025.

You might say that tonight’s meeting marks the end of an error. Potentially, it marks the start of yet another new one, thanks to more bungling by council leader Hamida Ali and her cabinet.

GPAC is supposedly a crucial part of the local authority’s scrutiny function, where elected representatives hold the council’s professional staff to account. But GPAC is about to be placed in the hands of an individual who could end up being dominated and answerable to senior council executives, the very people whose work GPAC is supposed to scrutinise. Continue reading →

Posted in Brick by Brick, Chris Buss, Fairfield Halls, Hamida Ali, Karen Jewitt, Katherine Kerswell, Tim Pollard, Tony Newman | Tagged , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , | 6 Comments

‘Shoddy’ botched repairs as council housing scandal deepens

Posted on July 8, 2021 by insidecroydon

Wet paint: Despite televised apologies from the council, leaks and damp remain a daily issue for residents

CROYDON IN CRISIS: ‘Nothing has changed’: Regina Road residents are planning a protest march next week over the continuing neglect and mismanagement of their council homes.
By STEVEN DOWNES

Despite solemn apologies and promises made on national television by council leader Hamida Ali back in March, the residents who remain in mouldy, damp and dangerous flats in Regina Road say that they are still battling to get serious issues with their homes resolved.

Photographs taken this week show continuing problems with damp and leaks in some of the three residential blocks’ common areas, which are not being fixed by the council contractors but simply being addressed with some plastic bags and gaffer tape. Continue reading →

Posted in Clive Fraser, Community associations, Croydon Council, Hamida Ali, Housing, Regina Road Residents' Support Group, South Norwood | Tagged , , , , , , | 2 Comments

Tributes paid to Croydon’s, and UK’s, first black policewoman

Posted on July 8, 2021 by insidecroydon

Tributes have been paid this week to Sislin Fay Allen, Britain’s first black woman police officer, who has died, aged 83.

Trailblazer: Sislin-Fay Alllen

Allen had served as a nurse in Croydon’s Queen’s Hospital before joining the Metropolitan Police in 1968. Her first posting was to the police station then on Fell Road in central Croydon, close to where she lived with her family.

In a statement, the Metropolitan Police said: “We are grateful for your service Sislin, you paved the way for so many others.” Continue reading →

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Beddington Farm Beer Festival, Anspach and Hobday, Aug 7

Posted on July 8, 2021 by insidecroydon

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‘Unlawful killing’ among possible tram crash inquest verdicts

Posted on July 7, 2021 by insidecroydon

The coroner at the inquest into the deaths of seven people in the Croydon tram crash told the jury today that they can return a verdict of either accidental death or unlawful killing.

Sandilands tram stop shortly after the crash in 2016: the inquest into the deaths is finally drawing to a close

The jury retired to consider its verdict at lunchtime today, less than two months after being sworn in at Croydon Town Hall for the long-delayed public hearing into the events at Sandilands on November 9, 2016.

Dane Chinnery 19, Philip Seary, 57, Dorota Rynkiewicz, 35, Robert Huxley, 63, and Philip Logan, all from New Addington, and Donald Collett, 62, and Mark Smith, both from Croydon, were killed in the crash.

Coroner Sarah Ormond-Walshe sent the jury of eight men and three women to consider its verdict at 1.32pm. Continue reading →

Posted in Sandilands derailment, TfL, Tramlink, Transport | Tagged , , , | Leave a comment

Croydon among worst London boroughs for ‘healthy’ streets

Posted on July 7, 2021 by insidecroydon

The council deputy leader’s cycling strategy appears to have gone down a dead-end street, as environmental report ranks the borough the 10th worst in London. By STEVEN DOWNES

Punctured: Stuart King’s cycling strategy has failed, according to the Healthy Streets scorecard

A report published yesterday shows that even when Croydon Council does have a couple of pennies to rub together, its delivery in terms of cleaner air and healthy streets is one of the worst in the whole of London.

The third annual London Borough Healthy Streets Scorecard places Croydon only 23rd of 33 councils in the capital, an embarrassingly poor score for council deputy leader Stuart King, who until last autumn had been in charge of the borough’s drive to have safer roads and cleaner air.

One of the factors in which Croydon scored particularly badly was its number of low traffic neighbourhoods, with only 4 per cent of the borough’s streets being subject to LTNs even after the flurry of activity during the past, covid-affected year to introduce more social distancing, and making it easier to walk or cycle, with measures to eliminate rat runs and reduce car usage.

Croydon has fewer LTNs than any other borough in London – though that will hardly come as a surprise with senior Labour councillors such as Clive Fraser and Pat Ryan actively conspiring with anti-LTNers and Tories to undermine their own party’s policies and have traffic reduction measures removed from their wards, and doing so apparently without fear of sanction. Fraser just happens to be the Town Hall Labour group’s choice of chair for the council’s Cycle Forum.

Continue reading →

Posted in Clive Fraser, Croydon Council, Croydon Cycling Campaign, Cycling, Environment, London-wide issues, Pat Ryan, Schools, Stuart King, TfL, Transport | Tagged , , , , , , , , , , , | 5 Comments

Government orders councils to close covid emergency hotels

Posted on July 7, 2021 by insidecroydon

Local authorities across England, including Croydon Council, have been ordered by the government that they must close the hotels they used to house the homeless during the covid-19 pandemic, as a condition of the latest round of rough-sleeper funding.

The government is ordering councils to remove emergency housing provision for rough sleepers

Inside Croydon reported yesterday how the largest charity working with homeless people in the borough had recorded a 50 per cent year-on-year increase in demand for its services during the 2020 lockdown.

That spike in requests for help from the poor and vulnerable, as well as the homeless, came despite at least two town centre hotels being adapted for use for Croydon’s rough-sleepers, using  funding from government to get them off the streets and reduce the risk of their becoming infected with covid or spreading the virus.

Inside Housing has since reported that the Ministry of Housing, Communities and Local Government has written to councils stating that one of its “funding principles” was that councils should close their hotels and hostels by the end of June. Continue reading →

Posted in Charity, Croydon Nightwatch, Housing | Tagged , , , , , , | 2 Comments

Use MyT AI-enhanced analytics to help boost your business

Posted on July 7, 2021 by insidecroydon

A D V E R T I S E M E N T

Now live on Seedrs

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Council axes vital welfare rights service with no consultation

Posted on July 6, 2021 by insidecroydon

CROYDON IN CRISIS: The council cuts keep coming, as now an advice team for the poor and disabled has been deemed not to be ‘an essential service’. By STEVEN DOWNES

No benefit: council insiders have been left ‘speechless’ by the latest cuts

Thousands of Croydon’s poorest and most vulnerable seem certain to be hit by the latest cut-back at the cash-strapped council, after the decision to close down the welfare rights team.

Council staffers say they have been left “speechless” by the randomness and seemingly arbitrary nature of this latest cut.

This council team has been providing comprehensive advice and support to residents for more than 25 years. The small department provided a drop-in service (pre-covid), plus helplines for a range of common issues, including benefits claims, debt management, jobs and training.

It has been estimated that the welfare rights team helped Croydon residents to make claims to access more than £10million per year in benefits to which they are entitled.

Continue reading →

Posted in Adult Social Care, Croydon Council | Tagged , , , | 5 Comments

Homelessness charity reports 50% surge in demand for help

Posted on July 6, 2021 by insidecroydon

The volunteers at Croydon Nightwatch have witnessed much over the charity’s 45-year history, but the extra pressure of the past 15 months during the covid-19 pandemic has stretched them like never before.
SANJANA IDNANI reports

The annual report from Croydon’s largest homelessness charity suggests that the number of vulnerable, poor and those without a home in the borough may have increased by 50 per cent in the past year during the covid pandemic.

And further figures from Croydon Nightwatch support other evidence that homelessness numbers are continuing to rise, after it recorded the greatest ever demand for its help in the charity’s 45-year history.

According to the 2021 Croydon Nightwatch annual report, the number of poor, vulnerable, and homeless people that the charity made contact with increased from 14,000 in 2019 to almost 21,000 contacts in 2020.

Croydon Nightwatch also reported an increase in the numbers who were turning up for the nightly soup kitchen and help sessions that they hold at Queen’s Gardens. Continue reading →

Posted in Charity, Croydon Nightwatch, Jad Adams | Tagged , , , | 2 Comments

Pair charged with teenager’s murder to appear in court today

Posted on July 6, 2021 by insidecroydon

Camron Smith: killed in Shrublands last week

Two teenagers are appearing in Bromley Magistrates’ Court this morning charged with the murder of Camron Smith.

The police were called to Bracken Avenue in Shrublands at 0.45am last Thursday, where they attended with London Ambulance Service paramedics. They found a 16-year-old boy who had been stabbed. He was treated at the scene but was pronounced dead a short time later.

According to a statement issued by Scotland Yard this morning, “detectives have charged two people with Camron’s murder and with an additional charge of robbery”. Continue reading →

Posted in Crime, Knife crime, Shirley North | Tagged , , | 1 Comment

Regina Road Solidarity March, South Norwood, Jul 14

Posted on July 6, 2021 by insidecroydon

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Posted in Regina Road Residents' Support Group, South Norwood, South Norwood Community Kitchen, South Norwood Tourist Board | Tagged , , , , | 2 Comments

Job cuts see council’s business close to breaking point

Posted on July 5, 2021 by insidecroydon

CROYDON IN CRISIS: So many staff have been made redundant at Fisher’s Folly that they now don’t have time even to draft meeting minutes of the Town Hall’s £1.5bn pension fund. By STEVEN DOWNES

Creaking: staff are struggling to maintain the business of the council

When the council’s planning committee convened last Thursday evening, it was the first time it had met since April 22.

The planning committee, often dull and often controversial, usually meets every second Thursday.

With its agenda bulging with applications from profit-hungry developers eager to run rings around the sometimes confused or gullible councillors, often ably assisted by council officials’ dodgy reports and helpful interruptions from the chair or certain developer-friendly members of the committee, planning meetings often dragged on for nearly five hours.

But in the past 10 weeks – the first weeks of the “post-Paul Scott era”  of Croydon planning – there had not been a single meeting of the committee. Not one residents’association objection had been patronised by officers or dismissed by the committee.

And for nearly three months, not a single application had been brought before the committee and granted permission.

Continue reading →

Posted in Chris Clark, Croydon Council, Gareth Streeter, Heather Cheesbrough, Katherine Kerswell, Paul Scott, Planning | Tagged , , , , , , , , , , | Leave a comment