Fancy a bit of eclectic Banter? Then make for The Oval Tavern

Posted on February 27, 2019 by insidecroydon

Simon Care, the star of The Albion Band and Edward II, brings his new band, Banter, to play at The Oval Tavern on March 7.

Banter: soon to be seen at The Oval

Although they’ve graced stages at huge festivals such as Costa del Folk and Sidmouth Folk Festival, the Croydon gig is part of their first ever UK tour, and they are looking forward to being part of The Oval Tavern’s music programme.

Organiser Carol Whinnom, of local promoters, The Ukulele and Other Machines, couldn’t say no when the chance arose to host one her musical heroes. “After being in a wheelchair following serious foot surgery, the first time I was able to dance again was at a wonderful Edward II folk-reggae gig, which made me love Simon’s melodeon playing even more,” she said. Continue reading →

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Co-op dish up food ideas to help Lloyd Parkrunners keep fit

Posted on February 27, 2019 by insidecroydon

Lloyd Park’s Parkrun runners – at least those who had not scooted north to Leeds for the National cross-country – had a special treat on Saturday as Co-op, the local community retailer, handed out free recipe boxes containing healthy food products.

Runners at Saturday’s Lloyd Park Parkrun went home with food boxes and recipe ideas, thanks to the Co-op

Last Saturday, 217 people, and friends of Oscar-winner Olivia Colman, ran, jogged and walked the course. Of those, 43 were first-timers and 24 recorded personal bests around the five-kilometre course which, because of its hills and stubborn muddiness, has been rated as the toughest Parkrun inside the M25.

As they all got their breath back, every runner and all volunteers received recipe advice and food inspiration in a bid to create a healthier and happier community through physical activity, food and lifestyle.

Co-op Food is the first retail supporter of Parkrun UK, which supports volunteers in more than 520 communities around the country to coordinate the free, timed, 5k events every Saturday morning. Continue reading →

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Norbury Green Residents’ Association AGM, Mar 19

Posted on February 27, 2019 by insidecroydon

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House-builder Brick by Brick asks for extra £78m council loan

Posted on February 26, 2019 by insidecroydon

Our housing correspondent, BARRATT HOLMES, on how the failure to seal a property deal with Croydon College and ‘Brexit uncertainties’ have caught out the geniuses running the council-owned house-builders

The council’s Alison Butler with Labour’s shadow housing spokesman, John Healey MP. Croydon won’t build a single council home in eight years

Brick by Brick needs another £78million loan from Croydon Council to continue with its home-building programme, it has been revealed.

The council-owned development company, which was set up in 2015, has yet to complete a single housing unit for occupation by any Croydon Council Tax-payer.

Of the first homes due to be completed by Brick by Brick, using council property and paid for with millions of pounds of public cash, 71 per cent of the units delivered in 2019 will go for private sale or rent.

Under Brick by Brick’s plans, Croydon’s Labour-run council will not have built a single new council home between 2014 and 2022.

Last month, Brick by Brick – whose managing director is the council employee Colm Lacey – deliberately withheld vital financial details and news of director resignations and replacements when reporting to a scrutiny meeting formed of elected councillors.

Now that its 2019-2020 Business Plan has been finalised, it’s easy to see why Lacey and his boss, council CEO Jo Negrini, were so shy about unveiling the horrible truth about the venture. Continue reading →

Posted in Brick by Brick, Business, Colm Lacey, Croydon Council, Housing, Jo Negrini, London-wide issues, Mayor of London | Tagged , , , , , , , , , | 3 Comments

Twycross hits out at Tory Government’s ‘reckless’ police cuts

Posted on February 26, 2019 by insidecroydon

The Mayor of London’s budget was passed at the London Assembly yesterday

Fiona Twycross has hit out at the Conservative Government for its continuing cuts to police funding in London, saying that the budget cuts – begun when Theresa Mayhem was the Home Secretary – and the “reckless austerity agenda” is risking “undermining our ability to keep Londoners safe”.

Tory members of the London Assembly, including “Silent” Steve O’Connell, the Conservative AM for Sutton and Croydon, and Shaun Bailey, the Conservative candidate for London Mayor in 2020, yesterday voted against the Mayor of London’s budget for 2019-2020. Continue reading →

Posted in Fiona Twycross, London Assembly, London-wide issues, Mayor of London, Policing, Sadiq Khan, Shaun Bailey, Steve O'Connell | Tagged , , , , , , | Leave a comment

St Chad’s children see their charity collection heading to Africa

Posted on February 26, 2019 by insidecroydon

Pupils from St Chad’s primary in South Norwood paid a visit to the offices of the African Child Trust last week, with gifts collected during the school’s Christmas Shoebox appeal.

Pupils from St Chad’s reading about how children of their age benefit from their help

The charity collection was tied in to the children studying about what it is like growing up in eight countries across Africa.

The appeal was organised for ACT-supported children of Ipaja community in Nigeria. Across St Chad’s, an estimated 20 per cent of pupils are of Nigerian heritage, and those who helped collect and present the 40 packages were treated to a special presentation about the work of ACT in Nigeria and beyond.

The presentation started with the children playing ACT’s very own board game, “Heads or Tails”. This game was created by ACT with the intention of encouraging children to put themselves in the shoes of their counterparts in Africa. Continue reading →

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Queen’s Hotel planning inquiry is a case of David v Goliath

Posted on February 26, 2019 by insidecroydon

Whose side is Croydon Council on? As JOE PAXTON reports from the Town Hall, Crystal Palace Council Tax-payers face a four-day public hearing having had little support from their own local authority

A David v Goliath battle commences at the Town Hall this morning, with a planning appeal brought by the owners of the Queen’s Hotel at Crystal Palace.

The fate of the Victorian-built Queen’s Hotel at Crystal Palace is subject of a public inquiry this week

The public inquiry run by the government’s planning inspectorate could last up to four days, with lawyers, planning experts, councillors and ordinary residents called to give evidence.

The hotel owners have twice had their expansion plans rejected by the local planning committee, as councillors rebelled against the edict of the council’s planning officials and committee chairman to reject the multi-million-pound overdevelopment.

As the public inquiry gets underway this morning, the battle lines are clearly drawn up.

On one side is big business, which has overt backing in the past from Croydon Council’s planning department and the erstwhile planning committee chair, Labour councillor Paul Scott. The hotel owners, Euro Hotels, have run a campaign to get the £10million scheme pushed through regardless of the impact it might have on a conservation area. Leading that campaign for has been PR consultant and Labour councillor from Lambeth, Jim Dickson.

On the other side are the residents, who have scrambled together the cash to be able to get representation by a barrister in an effort to defend their homes and neighbourhood. They have had public support from Dickson’s former boss at Lambeth Council, Steve Reed OBE, now the MP for Croydon North, as well as their ward councillors.

But Crystal Palace and Upper Norwood councillors Stephen Mann and Pat Ryan have been unable to be interviewed by Inside Croydon about the important public inquiry, however, because their Labour group leader, Tony Newman – a long-time close pal of Scott – has banned them from speaking to this website, in what some suggest is an abuse of power, and others portray as a deliberate attempt to gag the residents’ case. Continue reading →

Posted in Business, Community associations, Croydon Council, Croydon North, Crystal Palace and Upper Norwood, Crystal Palace Community Association, Norwood Society, Pat Ryan, Paul Scott, Pete Smith, Planning, Stephen Mann, Steve Reed MP, Tony Newman | Tagged , , , , , , , , , , | 2 Comments

Croydon Healthy Homes advice session, Norbury, Feb 28

Posted on February 26, 2019 by insidecroydon

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Honeywood Mini Explorers, Kings and Queens, May 28

Posted on February 26, 2019 by insidecroydon

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Croydon Mencap Down syndrome support group, every Wed

Posted on February 26, 2019 by insidecroydon

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Tories’ male, stale and, mainly, pale shortlist for selection

Posted on February 25, 2019 by insidecroydon

Our political editor WALTER CRONXITE reveals the Conservative shortlist for the candidate to stand in next year’s London Assembly elections in Croydon and Sutton

Stephen Carr: former Bromley council leader with ‘friends’ in high Tory places

The local Tory Party, which has held the Sutton and Croydon constituency at the London Assembly since it was formed in 2000, has opted for a shortlist of four losers following a selection panel meeting last night.

“Silent” Steve O’Connell, the Assembly Member for Sutton and Croydon, has announced that he will not stand for re-election at the City Hall elections in May 2020, having established a legacy of… well, not much at all.

And with Shaun Bailey as the Conservatives’ underwhelming choice as candidate to challenge Sadiq Khan to become London Mayor, the unmistakable sound of barrels having their bottoms scraped could be heard from Wallington to Purley on Sunday night, as the local Tories pitched around to find a suitably male, stale and, mainly, pale replacement for O’Connell.

The less-than-dynamic foursome shortlisted are Simon Hoar, Joseph Lee, Stephen Carr and Neil Garratt. All have a record of losing, in most cases elections, in one case his job, but not just for the Tories. One of them has been an election loser when wearing LibDem orange as well as Conservative blue. Continue reading →

Posted in 2021 London elections, Bromley Council, Joseph Lee, London Assembly, London-wide issues, Mayor of London, Neil Garratt, Sadiq Khan, Shaun Bailey, Simon Hoar, Stephen Carr, Steve O'Connell, Sutton Council | Tagged , , , , , , , , , , | 1 Comment

Hammerson raise more fears for £1.4bn Croydon scheme

Posted on February 25, 2019 by insidecroydon

Hammerson, the owners of Centrale, and one corporate half of the “Croydon Partnership” which was supposed to be starting work on the £1.4billion redevelopment of the Whitgift Centre in central Croydon this autumn, has this morning announced that it has put all its major construction projects on hold, and is instead focusing on flogging off more than £500million of property assets to pay down its company debts while the values of its properties continue to fall.

The company’s 2018 results make grim reading, especially for anyone – such as Jo “We’re Not Stupid” Negrini, the council chief exec in Croydon – who had staked so much on the regeneration of the town centre.

“We are currently reviewing the scheme to ensure it responds to changing retailer requirements and is appropriate for the future,” Hammerson’s report said of their involvement in the Croydon project, which is appearing increasingly doomed. Continue reading →

Posted in "Hammersfield", Business, Centrale, Croydon Council, Jo Negrini, Tony Newman, Whitgift Centre | Tagged , , , , , , , | 6 Comments

Council bid for anti-knife crime funding rejected as ‘unrealistic’

Posted on February 24, 2019 by insidecroydon

Croydon anti-knife crime projects have missed out on around £500,000 in Government funding because of an unseemly tug-of-war between Whitehall and Croydon Town Hall.

Croydon had the third-worst rate of knife crime in London in 2017

On Friday, the Department for Housing, Communities and Local Government announced nearly £10million-worth of funding, allocated to 21  projects around the country through its Supporting Families Against Youth Crime fund, intended to help those vulnerable knife crime and gang culture.

Half the projects awarded cash are in London boroughs, many of which were given sums of around half a million pounds. The biggest single grant made under the scheme was £1.3million.

But not a penny was granted to Croydon, even though the borough has some of the worst knife crime issues in the country. Prominent anti-knife crime organisations, such as the charity Lives Not Knives, were not even made aware that such grant aid might be available to the right projects.

A Whitehall source has told Inside Croydon that the council did make a bid, but it was rejected. Continue reading →

Posted in Charity, Chris Philp MP, Crime, Croydon Council, Croydon South, Jo Negrini, Knife crime, Lives Not Knives | Tagged , , , , , , , , | 4 Comments

Greenpeace activists take pointless plastic back to Sainsbury’s

Posted on February 24, 2019 by insidecroydon

Greenpeace volunteers yesterday handed back a shopping trolley full of customers’ unwanted plastic packaging to the Sainsbury’s store on the Purley Way.

Single-use plastics are killing the planet, one piece at a time

The store manager was presented with a trolley filled with 131 pieces of single-use packaging, the major contributor to the plastic pollution that is having a devastating impact on our rivers and oceans. Supermarkets in Britain are estimated to generate more than 800,000 tons of plastic packaging waste every year.

Greenpeace in Croydon had collected the plastic from Sainsbury’s customers, who also wrote personal messages to the supermarket telling them to ditch single-use plastic.

Among the plastic that customers returned, there were 12 plastic trays from vegetables, eight pieces of shrinkwrap from cucumbers, 12 wrappings from apples, bananas and oranges, as well as 29 bags from assorted lettuces, cabbages, tomatoes and potatoes.

Clive Farndon, a volunteer with the Croydon Greenpeace group, said: “Plastic is such a useful material but we really need a mindset change, to stop seeing it as a disposable one-use material. Continue reading →

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Palace For Life DJ course, Thornton Heath, starts Feb 26

Posted on February 24, 2019 by insidecroydon

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FTI Croydon knife crime discussion, Braithwaite Hall, Feb 28

Posted on February 24, 2019 by insidecroydon

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READER OFFER: Join us at the Observatory and see the stars

Posted on February 23, 2019 by insidecroydon

This image was photographed by CAS member Graham Cluer. With a clear night, those coming to the star-gazing evening at Kenley Observatory might see something similar

Fifty years since man first stepped on to the moon, and Inside Croydon’s intrepid explorers are invited to join us for an evening of star gazing at Kenley Observatory on Saturday March 16.

We are delighted to be teaming up with the Croydon Astronomical Society to give our loyal reader a personal introduction to astronomy, and to the Kenley Observatory, which this year celebrates its 40th anniversary.

Numbers for this event are strictly limited, and places will be allocated on a first-come, first-served basis, with priority being given to Inside Croydon’s Patrons. Children are welcome, but each child under-16 must be accompanied by an adult.

UPDATED Mar 1: Places for this visit are now fully booked. Any applications received after midday on March 1 can only be held on standby, on a waiting list in the case of cancellations. Thank you for all your interest in this so far. We may consider organising another visit in due course.

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City Hall finances means no happy ending for trams fairy story

Posted on February 23, 2019 by insidecroydon

There was a time, not so long ago, when London had a well-funded, well-thought-out public transport network. Or was it just a fairy story?
Following yesterday’s exclusive Inside Croydon report about how capital works on the tram network are to be axed, JEREMY CLACKSON, our transport correspondent, explains  what’s gone wrong with TfL finances. Now, are you sitting comfortably..?

Once upon a time, not-so-long-ago, in a not-so-far-away land there lived a king, of sorts. We’ll call him Ken.

And Ken ruled all he surveyed in a great silver city.

In his city, Ken had a little railway set, with little trains which ran backwards and forwards, forwards and backwards, all day long. The people liked the train set, and Ken liked his train line so much, he saved up extra money ready to go to the shops and buy some more track so that his trains could trundle all the way up the hill to the great flashing tower.

But one day, along came a baron who did not like Ken. Let’s call him Boris. And Baron Boris kicked old Ken out of his shiny castle, and took over. Continue reading →

Posted in Boris Johnson, Ken Livingstone, London Assembly, London-wide issues, Mayor of London, Sadiq Khan, TfL, Tramlink, Transport | Tagged , , , , , , , , , | 5 Comments

Visit My Mosque Day, Norbury Muslim Centre, Mar 3

Posted on February 23, 2019 by insidecroydon

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Tory Government’s £10m anti-knife crime fund ignores Croydon

Posted on February 22, 2019 by insidecroydon

The Tory Government has this morning announced £9.8million of grants to projects supporting children and families vulnerable to knife crime and gang culture around the country.

Yet not a single penny has been allocated to any such scheme in Croydon, one of the worst places in London for knife crime.

The grants have been made under what the Department for Housing, Communities and Local Government calls its Supporting Families Against Youth Crime fund. The fund started to receive grant funding applications, mainly from local authorities, in October.

Anti-knife crime charities based in Croydon, such as Lives Not Knives, the council and police do not feature among the 21 schemes allocated funding.

Those that do include Enfield (£492,000), Lambeth (£500,000), Brent (£480,000), Greenwich (£498,000 through a mentoring project run by Charlton Athletic), Haringey (£388,000), Islington (£184,000), Tower Hamlets (£499,000), Hammersmith and Fulham (£360,000) and Newham (£335,000).

The biggest grant is £1.3million for a county-wide scheme in Kent, operated out of Medway.

But nothing for Croydon. Continue reading →

Posted in Chris Philp MP, Community associations, Crime, Croydon South, Jeff Boothe, Knife crime, Lives Not Knives, Policing | Tagged , , , , , , , , , | 1 Comment

Jones secures £1.5m Government funds for tram safety board

Posted on February 22, 2019 by insidecroydon

MP Sarah Jones: has forced Government to release funds for a new safety body

Campaigning by Croydon Central Labour MP Sarah Jones has managed to secure the £1.5million government funding required to establish a Light Rail Safety Standards Board, one of the main improvements recommended by accident investigators following the Sandilands tram crash in November 2016.

“Families and loved ones of the victims of the Croydon tram crash deserved to see urgent work from Government to prevent another tragedy,” Jones told Inside Croydon today.

“But for far too long, our calls for change fell on deaf ears. I’m glad we have finally seen some action from Government and I hope this new body will mean tram safety improvements finally pick up pace.” Continue reading →

Posted in Croydon Central, Sandilands derailment, Sarah Jones MP, Tramlink, Transport | Tagged , , , , , , | 1 Comment

TfL’s budget crisis forces it to axe tram improvement projects

Posted on February 22, 2019 by insidecroydon

JEREMY CLACKSON, our transport correspondent, is holding on tight for a bumpy ride over London’s public transport finances

The Croydon public was never loopy about the proposed Dingwall Road tram loop

According to an internal Transport for London report obtained by Inside Croydon, the Mayor of London has been forced to abandon all major tram infrastructure projects for the foreseeable future.

The only planned capital spending on the tram network will be on essential safety work arising from the Sandilands tram crash.

The report, compiled by TfL officials, was circulated at City Hall this week, and categorises the transport authority’s projects by the four categories used in their business planning, from “Critical – Needed to maintain current safety level; or legally required to be safe and operable”, to “Deprioritise – Projects that could be deprioritised and are more discretionary in nature”.

Works arising as a result of the Sandilands crash remain listed by TfL under “Critical” capital projects.

Listed as “Deprioritise” is the loopy Dingwall Loop project, originally devised to make it easier for cars to drive into the giant new Westfield supermall. Improvements and extensions to the platforms at Elmers End tram stop are also deferred, seemingly indefinitely. Continue reading →

Posted in London-wide issues, Mayor of London, Sadiq Khan, Sandilands derailment, TfL, Tramlink, Transport | Tagged , , , , , , , , , , , | 2 Comments

READER OFFER: See guitar masterclass at The Front Room

Posted on February 22, 2019 by insidecroydon

Inside Croydon readers can get a special pass to a special concert at The Front Room on Apr 5

Inside Croydon readers who buy tickets to see the acoustic guitar concert being given by virtuosos Jon Hart and Billy Watman at The Front Room on April 5 will be able to get behind-the-scenes access, before doors open to the rest of the audience.

In an exclusive arrangement agreed by Hart and Watman especially for Inside Croydon, a select few readers of this website who buy a ticket for the gig will be given a password to be able to attend the soundcheck and witness a guitar masterclass. Continue reading →

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Ecology Centre annual meeting, Heathfield House, Mar 23

Posted on February 22, 2019 by insidecroydon

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Unexpected Treasure history talk, Honeywood Museum, Sep 26

Posted on February 22, 2019 by insidecroydon

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