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What a load of rubbish: how I love the planet by refusing bags
CROYDON COMMENTARY: The mounting public concern about oceans full to the brim with discarded plastics has seen calls for grand, global solutions. But as Crystal Palace home-owner ALEX KLAUSHOFER has shown, we can all make a change, starting with our next visit to the shops
The unnecessary plastic packaging on this cabbage didn’t make it past the till
This was the superfluous plastic from my latest Aldi shop … an individually wrapped aubergine, a cabbage in a bag which fell off in the time-pressured transaction at the till, and one yoghurt without a plastic top.
All the rest had plastic tops and there were no “free” vegetables. I have tweeted Aldi letting them know I would be happier buying all these things with minimum wrapping, as I used to until a few years ago.
In January, I became a plastivist. An activist on plastics. It was my New Year resolution.
First, a confession. I never watched Blue Planet because I’m scared of fish. But sometime in the middle of the series, with so much talk about plastic use in the air, I came back from the supermarket and had a kind of negative epiphany. Continue reading
More police cuts on the way as borough commands merge
Another raft of police reorganisation has been announced and, like all such re-organisations, the change is not to make the service better, just cheaper. For once, there seems to be cross-party unanimity over the proposals, as no party appears to like the move, but there is likewise no political will to find the money to pay for the number of police officers London needs.
The thin blue line is about to get even thinner
Croydon’s borough command is to be merged with Bromley and Sutton, as part of the Metropolitan Police’s efforts to save £325million by 2021-2022.
The move has already been opposed by Bromley’s Tory MP and Sutton’s LibDem parliamentarian; Croydon’s Labour MPs have yet to make any comment on the reorganisation. Continue reading
Posted in Bromley Council, Crime, Jeff Boothe, London-wide issues, Mayor of London, Policing, Sadiq Khan, Steve O'Connell, Sutton Council, Tom Brake MP
Tagged Conservative, Labour, Liberal Democrats, London, London Assembly, Mayor, Metropolitan Police, Sadiq Khan, Steve O'Connell, Tory
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Pankhurst plays part in HMRC’s Suffrage Flag relay in Croydon
It took 56 members of staff, and their families, to relay the Suffrage Flag from East Croydon Station to the HMRC offices at Ruskin Square yesterday
A human chain of 56 people delivered the Suffrage Flag to Croydon yesterday.
HM Revenue and Customs staff – and some of their children on half-term holiday – joined the flag relay from East Croydon Station to the nearby office in Ruskin Square. They were marking the 100th anniversary of some women getting the vote in the Representation of the People Act of 1918. Continue reading
A three parks walk that takes you back through Croydon history
Ponds, brooks and moor hens feature prominently in this three-park walk
WANDLE WANDERINGS: Even within the densely populated parts of post-industrial Croydon, close to the source of matchday roars from Crystal Palace’s football ground, it is possible to take a stroll through meadows and parks, accompanied by moor hens and cyclists, all the way from Selhurst to Addiscombe, and with barely a car in sight, as KEN TOWL found out
Take a bus from Croydon town centre, the 75 or the 157, and get off at Selhurst Station. Of course, you could arrive by train, too.
Look out for the unpromising entrance to Heavers Meadow, just opposite the station and along the road a little. Continue reading
Now head of revenues and benefits leaves over ‘The Godfather’
STEVEN DOWNES reports on the latest high-ranking casualty of Croydon Council’s ‘Godfather Affair’
Gone: Karen Sullivan
Karen Sullivan, Croydon’s head of revenues and benefits, has become the third senior council employee in a month to leave their job at Fisher’s Folly as a result of an internal investigation sparked by Inside Croydon’s reporting into the “Godfather Affair”.
With the matter now having been reported to the police by at least one elected councillor, Jo Negrini, the council’s £185,000 chief executive, and council leader Tony Newman, are refusing to comment on the sudden departures of Sullivan, Graham Cadle and Harry Singh.
Inside Croydon approached Negrini and Newman on Friday, and they have failed to deny that Cadle or Sullivan may have received hefty “golden goodbye” payments, despite them both having broken the council’s code of conduct. Continue reading
How the ‘Witch’ of West Street showed true care for children
In Croydon, just after the Second World War, when the first flush of newborns brought hope and normality back, Margy was given away at birth to a woman whom local children called “The Witch On The Corner”.
Christine (left) and Martina, the author’s sisters, in the churchyard of St Andrew’s, just across from 21A West Street, where much of the book is set
Nell Williams lived at 21A West Street, an old widow, suffering terribly from arthritis. With a birthmark on her face and a broken nose, poor Nell was cruelly nicknamed “The Witch”.
Yet she provided homes and care for local children for decades in a rapidly changing Britain, including for Margy and her sisters Martina and Christine. It is this story which is told in a new book from Margaret Sharpe Bermudez, written with Stephanie Mason.
The Shadow of the Teapot is a touching memoir of events that took place in Croydon between the late 1940s and the mid-1970s, principally at 21A West Street, opposite St Andrew’s Church. Continue reading
Free drink for parents at Turtle Bay during half-term week
Turtle Bay, the Caribbean-themed restaurant and bar in the town centre, is offering a free adult drink for every kids’ meal ordered this half-term holiday week.
Welcoming and sociable, Turtle Bay’s warm and laid-back atmosphere is the perfect family haven this half-term, as “Little Turtles” can enjoy their own menu while the grown-ups soothe any holiday headaches with a free drink.
The kids’ menu has been specially created with those “Little Turtles” in mind. Dishes include burgers, flatbreads and grilled chicken breast with Caribbean slaw. All dishes cost £4.50 each and are served with a choice of fries, sweet potato mash, rice ‘n’ peas or salad. Plus, the menu doubles up as a colouring-in sheet, so kids can get creative at the table with crayons provided too.
Long-delayed masterplans for borough’s parks get parked
KEN LEE, our green spaces correspondent, on an expensive waste of time
After a consultation process that has taken almost two years and cost Council Tax-payers approaching £100,000 in fees to consultants to produce hundreds of pages of (virtual) glossy brochures, Croydon Council has been forced to admit this week that it actually doesn’t have the cash to carry out any of the schemes proposed.
Happy Valley: the council’s masterplan offers obvious ideas, but no money
But at least they appear to have dropped the daft suggestion of turning Happy Valley into some sort of new-age camp site. So it’s not all bad.
The masterplans, drawn up for only six of the borough’s 127 parks and open spaces, have been a long time coming. A facile and patronising council “consultation”, which engaged with just 1 in 500 Croydon residents, was conducted in 2016. Inside Croydon described it then as effectively “the groundwork for a privatisation-by-stealth of some of the borough’s open spaces”.
Or as the Labour-run local authority put it in its own press release issued this week, “the council has been exploring different ways to fund and run its parks”. Continue reading
Posted in 2018 council elections, Croydon Council, Croydon parks, Environment, Friends of Lloyd Park, Lloyd Park, Timothy Godfrey
Tagged Ashburton Park, Coulsdon, Croydon, Croydon Council, Happy Valley, Labour, Lloyd Park, London Borough of Croydon, Park Hill, South Norwood, Timothy Godfrey
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Festival organisers seeking £4,000 help from Tesco shoppers
Crystal Palace’s annual festival is celebrating receiving almost £40,000 in grants – but wants the help of Tesco shoppers to further boost its funding ahead of the 2018 event, which is being staged on June 11 to 17.
Last summer, after a one-year hiatus, the festival returned and was staged in Crystal Palace Park for the first time, attracting 28,500 visitors to the park and thousands more attending community events across the festival week.
For 2018, the festival has dropped “Overground” from its title.
It’s “just Crystal Palace Festival from now on”, the organisers say. “We continue to work with London Overground to bring thousands of visitors to the event.
“The refreshing of the festival’s look has been designed to ensure you can easily see just how much is going on in Crystal Palace Park and across the whole area – mainly for free!” Continue reading
Glamorgan owners to meet campaigners with new plans
Residents living on or near Cherry Orchard Road and the wider East Croydon area who started the Save The Glamorgan campaign to keep a historic local boozer as an Asset of Community Value are staging a key meeting on Monday.
Under threat: the Glamorgan pub
At the meeting, the owners of the building – which closed as a pub last year – will being holding a presentation of revised plans for the site.
The Glamorgan, which dates back to the 1880s, is surrounded by new-build flats, built as part of Menta’s very slow-progress Morello development along Cherry Orchard Road.
Meanwhile, the owners of the Glamorgan want to replace the pub with… more flats. Continue reading
Dog Awareness Morning, Norwood Grove, Feb 28
Posted in Croydon parks, Norbury, Thornton Heath
Tagged Norbury, Norwood Grove, Thornton Heath
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Tories accused of breaking their own rules over selections
Political editor WALTER CRONXITE on complaints of undemocratic interference in the candidate selection process, and too much influence from the local party leader in those allowed to stand in May’s Town Hall elections
Deselected: Mike Fisher
At least four of Croydon’s longest serving councillors, including Mike Fisher, the former leader of the council, were forcibly deselected by the local Conservatives in what has been described as a “farce” of a process, and one which broke their own party rules.
Officially, Croydon’s Tories have said that, ahead of the local elections on May 3, Fisher, a councillor for the current Shirley ward, together with Sue Winborn (Fairfield), Donald Speakman (Purley) and Chris Wright (Coulsdon East), are “stepping down”, implying that it is their choice to do so.
But our mole in the garden of the Tories’ semi-detached HQ in Purley says that there were some heated exchanges during the selection process, as well as since. Party officials have claimed that they are “carrying out orders from above”, the suggestion being that Tim Pollard, the leader of the Tory group on the council, had influenced the process. Continue reading
Posted in 2018 council elections, Chris Wright, Coulsdon, Coulsdon East, Coulsdon Town, Croydon Central, Croydon Council, Donald Speakman, Fairfield, Helen Pollard, Ian Parker, Mike Fisher, Purley, Shirley North, Steve Hollands, Sue Winborn, Tim Pollard, Vidhi Mohan
Tagged Chris Wright, Conservative, Coulsdon, Croydon, Croydon Council, Donald Speakman, Gareth Streeter, Ian Parker, London Borough of Croydon, Mike Fisher, Sue Winborn, Tim Pollard, Tory
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Museum of Croydon gets its suffrage banners on parade
Croydon residents are showcasing their craft skills at the Museum of Croydon in a London-wide project celebrating 100 years of votes for women.
Suffrage groups took great pride and identity in their banners a century ago
They have joined museums, archives and arts organisations across the capital taking part in the 100 Banners project. Funded by Heritage Lottery and created by Digital Drama, the project commemorates the suffrage movement and the centenary of the Representation of the People Act 1918.
Working with community groups, museum visitors and school pupils, Museum of Croydon staff have created a series of banners inspired by the borough and its history. Continue reading
Posted in Art, Croydon High, Education, History, Museum of Croydon
Tagged Croydon High School, Museum of Croydon
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GPs need to do more to help health of homeless, says report
Croydon’s family doctors need to do more to help the homeless, according to report published this week by Healthwatch Croydon.
The study, Experiences of Homeless People Using Health Services, recorded the experiences of homeless people who were referred by the council into support hostels in November 2017. It found that adult homeless, particularly those with complex needs, were not supported by GP practices as well as younger homeless in similar accommodation.
There are nearly 2,300 people in Croydon either homeless or in temporary housing, according to council figures. Healthwatch Croydon, the local champion for better health and social care, focused on those who are homeless but are in support hostels. Continue reading
Posted in Charity, Croydon CCG, Evolve, Health, Healthwatch Croydon
Tagged Croydon Healthwatch, NHS Croydon CCG
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Business, police and council unite for knife crime events
The schools’ half-term break will see the start of a three-week programme to raise awareness of knife crime and the impact it has on the community.
The council, BID and police are working on a three-week programme of events dealing with knife crime
The council’s youth engagement team joins forces with Croydon Business Improvement District (BID), Croydon College, Croydon police, faith groups, London Ambulance Service, school pastors, Victim Support, and Croydon’s young people’s outreach and counselling service, CDI, to host a range of town centre events. Continue reading
Councillor to report Croydon’s ‘Godfather Affair’ to police
STEVEN DOWNES on the backlash from senior figures at the Town Hall to the secrecy and cover-up over the sudden departure of a council director
Councillors want to know if CEO Jo Negrini reported Cadle’s conduct to the police
Senior councillors in Croydon have expressed mounting anger over the council’s “Godfather Affair”, where executive director Graham Cadle was able to pay a family friend £787 per day but failed initially to declare the relationship.
One councillor, who only found out about the matter by reading Inside Croydon, is now reporting it to the police for possible investigation into whether there has been a misappropriation of public funds.
Other councillors are asking whether Cadle, who had worked in Croydon for a decade and was on a salary of £150,000, received any “golden goodbye” pay-off, and how much.
“Jo Negrini, the council’s chief executive, or the Borough Solicitor ought to have taken this to the police last April, when a member of staff acted properly as a whistleblower to highlight the close relationship between Harry Singh, Karen Sullivan, the head of revenues and benefits at the council, and their child’s godfather, Graham Cadle,” one councillor said tonight. Continue reading
South Norwood pensioner wins Shard legal battle with Qataris
PERRY MASSON, our court reporter, on an extraordinary turn of events at the Royal Courts of Justice today
Power to the people: Ian Bone, with partner Jane Nicholl at the Royal Courts of Justice today, after facing down legal threat from the Qatari royal family
Ian Bone, the South Norwood pensioner threatened with a High Court injunction by lawyers acting on behalf of the uber-rich Qatari royal family, today emerged from the Royal Courts of Justice on the Strand claiming victory for the common man, freedom of speech and common sense.
Bone stood to pay the Qataris’ legal costs and ultimately risked even losing his home in a dispute over whether he has the right to protest at The Shard.
But in a dramatic turn of events last night, lawyers for the Qataris withdrew the threat of the injunction from a High Court judge.
Instead, Bone only had to appear at the court today to agree not to enter The Shard. “And that is no problem for me,” the working class hero told Inside Croydon exclusively from the saloon bar of the nearby Wig and Pen public house. “Never wanted to go inside that place anyhow.” Continue reading
Signs of the times: Watson’s whim is now back on message
It has not been in position for two months yet, but Councillor Mark Watson’s whimsy on the newly pedestrianised bit of the High Street has now got a second sign.
The council has done a ‘reverse ferret’ for its sign for Watson’s whimsy
The art-installation seating, which looks as if it was made from some off-cuts from Ikea, was plonked just outside town centre bars and night clubs just before Christmas.
It was suggested that a legal genius at the nearby Town Hall had suggested that by attaching such a sign, the council could waive all responsibility and avoid the possibility of Council Tax-payers having to foot the bill for any injury or damages suffered by members of the public falling off the eyesore.
But that sign has now been removed, to be replaced by a new message, intended, perhaps, to be more welcoming. The move is what is often known as “a reverse ferret”.
“Please enjoy me to sit on and relax!”, states the new sign, in bold white type on an eye-catching red background. It adds in slightly smaller text – probably also on advice from the council’s legal department – “Please use with care”. Croydon: a kinder, gentler kind of council. Continue reading
Posted in Croydon Council, Mark Watson
Tagged Croydon Council, Croydon High Street, Labour, London Borough of Croydon, Mark Watson
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Twycross is appointed as London’s Deputy Mayor for Fire
Fiona Twycross is to be London’s first Deputy Mayor for Fire and Resilience when responsibility for the London Fire Brigade passes to City Hall next month.
London’s firefighters are about to get a new deputy mayor
Croydon resident Twycross has been the Labour’s lead Assembly Member on the London Fire and Emergency Planning Authority (LFEPA), and her appointment means that Croydon will now have two deputy mayors. Val Shawcross, the former leader of Croydon Council, is Mayor Sadiq Khan’s deputy for transport.
LFEPA will cease to exist from the end of March, with the Mayor becoming responsible for the brigade’s executive oversight, in the same way that the Mayor’s Office for Policing and Crime was set up in 2012.
The abolition of LFEPA follows a number of clashes between the body and Boris Johnson when he was Mayor. Johnson overruled the authority to order the closure of fire stations and the axing of a number of the capital’s fire engines. He then insisted on the sale of the fire station real estate at below market value.
Beulah Hill’s ‘Electric House’ and history of recorded sound
The Norwood Society’s next local history meeting next Thursday is “Colonel Gouraud: The man who brought recorded sound to England”.
A Gouraud recording session in 1888. Find out more at next week’s Norwood Society talk
The speaker will be Howard Hope, a lifetime specialist in the history of recorded sound, and he will talk about the Colonel and his Norwood house Little Menlo – otherwise known as “The Electric House” – and all the amazing things that happened there in the decade from 1888 after he arrived from America and bought it.
Little Menlo was a beautiful house on Beulah Hill that fell into neglect and was demolished. Today, it would have been listed and a blue plaque would adorn the walls to celebrate the importance of Gouraud and his pioneering work. This talk is not to be missed and compliments the free exhibition at the British Library – “Listen: 140 years of recorded sound”.
As can be seen in this photograph, of a recording session from December 1888, that conditions were very different from the recording studio of today. Continue reading
Council in cover-up over departure of £787-a-day consultant
STEVEN DOWNES reports on the abrupt exit of the man behind Croydon’s ‘crap app’, following a serious breach of the Town Hall’s code of conduct
Cheers: Harry Singh won’t be getting £787 per day from Croydon’s ratepayers any longer
Harwinder “Harry” Singh, Croydon Council’s £787-a-day “fake-it-till-you-make-it” IT consultant, is no longer working for the authority.
Singh fell off the council-funded gravy train soon after Graham Cadle, the godfather to his child, left his job as the council’s “director of corporate service” last month.
The council has made no public announcement regarding the sudden exits of such senior staffers, but confirmed Singh’s departure last week.
The council has refused to answer questions regarding any pay-offs which might have been made to Cadle or Singh. Although the matter has been going on under his nose for four years, Tony Newman, the leader of the council, has remained silent on the matter and refused to answer any enquiries on the affair.
The twin departures of Singh and Cadle, who for a time was described as Croydon’s assistant chief executive and who was on a salary of £150,000 per year, follow a lengthy investigation by Inside Croydon, after senior council officials had covered up the outcome of its own enquiries into their undeclared friendship. Continue reading
Nothing for sprinklers, but Tories give £10m to Tory donors
The Tories have shaken the Magic Money Tree for a public subsidy to Westfield which might just secure a John Lewis store in the town centre. BARRATT HOLMES reports
Croydon’s Westfield: receiving a £10m taxpayer subsidy
Croydon South’s Conservative MP, Chris Philp, is claiming credit for getting the Conservative Government to shake the non-existent Magic Money Tree to find £10million-worth of “Housing Infrastructure Funding” to provide a public subsidy for Tory Party donors Westfield and their residential and retail scheme in Croydon town centre.
The money for Westfield is coming from the department run by Sajid Javid, the Secretary of State for Housing, Communities and Local Government.
This is the same Javid who has refused to provide any public subsidy whatsoever towards the £10million cost of installing life-saving sprinklers in Croydon Council’s residential tower blocks, a move taken by the Labour-run local authority following last year’s Grenfell Tower tragedy.
But the £10million of public cash might finally secure a John Lewis department store as the anchor tenant for the development by Westfield and partners Hammerson. Which is nice. Continue reading
Croydon to publish viability reports – just not for Westfield
BARRATT HOLMES on a move towards openness and transparency over planning applications – though one that has come too late to provide insight into the biggest development scheme in the borough for a generation
The viability report on Westfield’s 967 flats was never made public
Did you hear that very loud slamming sound coming from Fisher’s Folly, the Croydon Council offices?
That’ll be the sound of the closing of the stable door after the Westfield horse has galloped over the horizon.
Last month, Westfield and Hammerson’s £1.4billion retail and residential town centre scheme was given a green light by the Mayor of London, Sadiq Khan.
Just a few days later, Croydon Council announced that all future developments in the borough would have their developers’ viability assessments published as part of their planning application.
That announcement came just too late for the public to get a sight of Westfield’s viability assessment on the 967 homes that they want to build on the site of the Whitgift Centre. Coincidence? Continue reading
Posted in "Hammersfield", Alison Butler, Brick by Brick, Business, Croydon Council, Housing, London-wide issues, Mayor of London, Planning, Property, Sadiq Khan, Whitgift Centre, Whitgift Foundation
Tagged Alison Butler, Hammersfield, Hammerson, Labour, London, Mayor, Sadiq Khan, Westfield, Whitgift Centre, Whitgift Foundation
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