Get your teeth into a panto classic with Sanderstead club

The Sanderstead Dramatic Club celebrates its 110th year by staging a panto classic that offers tales of witches, wolves and dark, dark woods.

The cast hard at work in rehearsals for Sanderstead’s panto, Red Riding Hood, which opens in the New Year

Running from January 6 to 13 at the All Saints Parish Hall in Sanderstead, audiences will be transfixed by Red Riding Hood as she tries to escape the evil clutches and curse of Morgana, the Witch of the Woods.

With an original script by John Desbottes, SDC’s chairman and director, the fun-filled adventure features a live band of talented local musicians, choreography from local dance school Dance with Grace, and scenery designed by local artist Di Ralston and her team.

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Fishers has the chemistry right for business in Woodside

A chemists’ shop with a poetic tendency

The nice people at the South Norwood Tourist Board have flagged up this festive offering at the independent chemists’ shop, Fishers on Enmore Road.

They write: “Serving the community for over 100 years, this place is more an institution and catch up with yer neighbours than a regular pharmacy. You don’t get Boots, Superdrug or Lloyds giving such a personalised service, with customers each year getting a Christmas card with one of Mr Kurtz’s poems. Continue reading

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Wishing you all a happy and peaceful New Year

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Best wishes of the season to Inside Croydon’s loyal reader

That’s it from us for a few days.

It’s not that we don’t have loads more material to inflict upon our loyal reader. We just realise that you’ll not be bothering to log-on over the Yule log.

Christmas 6We’d like to thank our loyal reader for their massive support over the last 12 months.

Our loyal reader, and Tony Newman and Mario Creatura, have between them viewed this website more than 1.3million times in the past 12 months – the sort of browser history that even Damian Green could not explain away.

That’s nearly double the number of page views in 2016, and that, at the time, was a year of record-busting traffic for Inside Croydon. And all those pages have been seen by nearly 500,000 unique visitors – so maybe, loyal reader, you are not alone…

Thank you for all the reads, but also for the comments, and especially the emails, articles, commentaries, tip-offs and documents that you have sent through to us which have all contributed to making this a vibrant, much-read and much-noticed website.

Being picked up by or quoted by BBC London News, the Evening Standard,Morning Star and Private Eye in the last few months demonstrates how Inside Croydon is giving voice to residents and businesses in the borough. Continue reading

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Newman’s Christmas choice: more cuts or 6% Council Tax hike

Our political editor, WALTER CRONXITE, on the new ‘independence’ that Croydon’s leaders has been given to add £100 to Council Tax bills next year

On the town: Tony Newman with soon-to-be-ex-councillor Mark Watson. Artwashing Croydon won’t solve their Council Tax conundrum

Tony Newman, the leader of Croydon Council, and his deputy, Alison Butler, were out with other members of their council clique at Ronnie Scott’s jazz club in Soho last night, getting in the swing of things for their Christmas break.

However good the acts might have been, the £53,000 per year council leader must have had a thought or two about the problems which he and his fracturing and fractious administration will face in the New Year.

Because that now includes the real possibility of presenting the people of Croydon with a 6 per cent increase in their Council Tax, just a month before they go to the polls in the local elections on May 3.

Ofsted, Westfield, Fairfield Halls, the borough’s primary schools, Brick by Brick… Croydon’s Labour leader has got plenty on his plate before those Town Hall elections, but the not-entirely-unexpected local government finance settlement announced by Tory minister Sajid Javid this week has put Newman in a deep Council Tax hole. Continue reading

Posted in Adult Social Care, Children's Services, Council Tax, Croydon Council, Tony Newman | Tagged , , , , , , , | 4 Comments

‘Support black councillors who fight racism, don’t sack them’

CROYDON COMMENTARY: The sacking of Callton Young from his position as a deputy cabinet member at Croydon Council, according to LEE JASPER, is an example of how black councillors are intimidated from raising the issue of racism

Callton Young, right, out canvassing with Tottenham MP David Lammy

This is how black Labour councillors in London are bullied and intimidated from raising issues of racism. Meet Councillor Callton Young, who wrote a report about the Metropolitan Police closing down black clubs in Croydon and banning reggae and bashment music – the “bashment ban”.

After writing his report accusing the Met of racially targeting black clubs in Croydon, the report has been withheld for months, and now he has been sacked from his position by the council leader, Tony Newman.

The number of black local councillors nationally and within the Labour Party has halved in the last 20 years, dropping from a high point of in late 1990s of 3.9 per cent to 1.2 per cent today. The number of Asian councillors, meanwhile, has increased dramatically. Continue reading

Posted in Callton Young, Lee Jasper, Tony Newman | Tagged , , , , | 1 Comment

Council withholds Brazil’s report on failing children’s services

Town Hall reporter KEN LEE on the somewhat partial announcement from Tony Newman’s propaganda department that ‘you’re all doing very well’

On a ‘journey’: Tony Newman

As they wind down before Christmas, Croydon Council’s press office this lunchtime issued the latest “You’re all doing very well!” message from council leader Tony Newman, channelling his inner Young Mr Grace.

The attempt at news management is blatant, as Newman and his Labour administration has tried to put a positive spin on the council’s efforts to dig itself out of the hole of its own creation, with a children’s services department rated as “inadequate” by Ofsted inspectors earlier this year.

But the council refuses to publish the commissioner’s latest report, or the full text of a letter from a junior minister in Whitehall which, they claim, endorses Croydon’s efforts since September to improve their children’s services department.

Social workers working in Croydon say that despite Newman and the council throwing £2million at the department to recruit more staff and bribe those who stay with a £1,500 Christmas “bonus”, they are still having to cope with twice the usual workload of cases, and do so without much in the way of managerial support. Continue reading

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From Dunkirk to witchcraft, via the global refugee crisis

Screen25, the freshly re-branded film club in South Norwood, has put together another fascinatingly eclectic selection of movies to start 2018.

Opening with the blockbuster that is Dunkirk, January’s screenings, now all at the new home of Harris Academy South Norwood, the club has also lined up Ai Wei Wei’s examination of modern-day refugees, Human Flow, and the rom-com, The Big Sick.

The screening of the though-provoking I Am Not A Witch on January 17 will be followed by a panel discussion – the latest in a series arranged by Screen25, this one staged in conjunction with the charity AFRUCA, Africans United Against Child Abuse. Continue reading

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#SouthernFail: Rail closures promise Boxing Day chaos

Southern’s apology for a rail service looks set to create traffic chaos on the roads in and around south London on Boxing Day and in the week following, when Brighton supporters drive up from the south coast for their game against Chelsea, and when thousands of Arsenal fans struggle to get to Selhurst Park for their club’s Premier League match against Crystal Palace on December 28.

Because on Boxing Day, next Tuesday, December 26, there are no Southern train services into Victoria.

Under the guise of “essential engineering works”, Southern’s decided to force football fans and January Sales shoppers into their cars for the post-Christmas Bank Holiday.

There are also scheduled rail works going on at London Bridge, as Network Rail looks to complete – finally – the £1billion reworking of junctions and tracks in and around the Thameslink line – which all started back in 2009. Works are due for completion in the spring, but in the meantime, there are closures from this weekend until January 1.

None of which will make it any easier for Croydon residents to travel in to central London. Continue reading

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Newman could face legal challenge over councillor sackings

WALTER CRONXITE reports on the latest twist to the sackings of two Labour councillors over the borough’s licensing policy

Tony Newman, the council leader (right), campaigning with MP Steve Reed OBE (left) and Callton Young. Newman has sacked Young for ‘voting with the Tories’

Tony Newman, the leader of Croydon’s Labour-run council, may face a legal challenge to his decision to strip councillors Callton Young and Andrew Pelling of their cabinet and committee positions because they called for legal advice before making any decision on licensing policies.

There is a suggestion that members of Newman’s inner circle have been briefing against Young and Pelling since their sackings, claiming that they had failed to attend important pre-committee briefings ahead of the licensing meeting held on November 23.

Both councillors maintain that this is untrue, something which raises the possibility of a serious legal challenge with claims of malicious falsehood. 

“Tony Newman has opened the council or himself up to justifiable litigation,” one Town Hall veteran warned today. Continue reading

Posted in "Hammersfield", Andrew Pelling, Boxpark, Business, Callton Young, Croydon Council, Jane Avis, Music, Pubs, Tony Newman | Tagged , , , , , , , , | 3 Comments

Parks football teams in line for £5m Premier League boost

Purley Way Playing Fields could benefit from Premier League funding for grassroots football

Billionaire clubs like Manchester City, Chelsea and Arsenal could soon be contributing towards improved facilities for park football in Croydon.

Croydon has made a successful preliminary bid to Sport England and the Football Association for schemes at Ashburton Park and Purley Way Playing Fields under a project called Parklife, which is being funded with money generated by the £5.1billion Premier League TV rights deal. Continue reading

Posted in Croydon Council, Croydon parks, Football, Greenwich Leisure, Leisure services, Purley Way, Sport, Timothy Godfrey | Tagged , , , , , | Leave a comment

Council admits Fairfield Halls refurb is at least six months late

Croydon Council today admitted that its £30million refurbishment project at the Fairfield Halls is running at least six months over schedule. It means that any further delays could jeopardise the flagship venue’s part in plans for Croydon to be London’s “Borough of Culture” in 2019.

The wrecking crew has been let loose on the Arnhem Gallery this week – but the £30m Fairfield refurbishment is already six months behind schedule

Croydon’s internationally renowned arts centre and sometime home to Kent Walton, Mick McManus and professional wrestling, has been closed since July last year for the first significant modernisation since it was opened by the Queen Mother in 1962.

When announcing the closure, Croydon Council was adamant that by not phasing the project, it could all be completed more speedily, and re-open within two years.

But today the council described the Fairfield Halls re-opening date as “in almost exactly a year”, wallowing in the oxymoronic quality of “almost exactly“.

If so delayed, at least until December 2018, it risks ruling out the profitable Christmas season and annual pantomime at the Fairfield Halls, Ashcroft Theatre and Arnhem Gallery venues for a third year. Continue reading

Posted in Art, Fairfield Halls, Music, Timothy Godfrey, Tony Newman | 12 Comments

81% BME carers given inadequate advice by GPs, report finds

Croydon’s family doctors need to recognise the roles of black and Asian carers and support them more by referring them to relevant services, according to research published today by Healthwatch Croydon.

Among its findings, the Healthwatch report found that fewer than 2 in 10 BME carers were given full advice about the support services available to them by their GPs.

Healthwatch’s survey found that 81% of black and Asian carers were not given advice on available support by their GPs

The study, Black and Minority Ethnic Carers and their experiences of GP Services in Croydon, looked at issues such as recognising the caring role, carer’s health and the impact of caring on their health, cultural issues, access and confidence of the GP.

There could be as many as black and Asian 15,000 carers in Croydon, based on the known number of registered carers in the borough (33,000) and the proportion of Croydon’s population that is from BME communities. Continue reading

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#SouthernFail: Victoria night services to be axed permanently

JEREMY CLACKSON, transport correspondent, on the latest, inevitable erosion of rail services by stealth for Croydon

Southern Railway’s effort to reduce services out of Victoria on the Brighton line, via East Croydon, will take another big step forward at noon today when their barely publicised public “consultation” on their night-time services closes.

Southern wants to make permanent its withdrawal of its week night services between Victoria, East Croydon, Surrey, Sussex and Brighton, with no trains operating out of the mainline terminus after five minutes past midnight from Sundays to Thursdays until commuter services resume.

The withdrawal of the service will be a massive blow to night-time and shift workers who live in and around Croydon and need to get home from the city centre, as well as West End theatre-goers and diners, who will have many fewer options when planning their homeward journey.

It is also likely to adversely impact any efforts Croydon makes to improve its night-time economy, deterring visitors from south London and the south coast to stay late in the town centre when their public transport options have been removed. Continue reading

Posted in Commuting, East Croydon, TfL, Transport | Tagged , , , , , | 4 Comments

Mayor’s recycling targets go up in smoke at Beddington

London will edge ever closer to burning 50 per cent of its waste when the Beddington Lane incinerator, operated by Viridor, fires up in anger next year.

That’s according to figures from London Assembly Member Caroline Russell, whose question to London Mayor Sadiq Khan elicited the response that it is against his policy for there to be more incineration in the capital.

Khan’s environmental strategy demands that by 2030, 65 per cent of all London’s municipal waste should be recycled.

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Posted in Business, Caroline Russell, Environment, London Assembly, London-wide issues, Mayor of London, Refuse collection, Sadiq Khan, Stuart Collins, Waste incinerator | Tagged , , , , , , , , , , | 4 Comments

Newman sacks two councillors over bashment ban debate

WALTER CRONXITE on the latest power move by Labour’s council leader

Sacked: Callton Young

Tony Newman, the leader of the Labour-held council, with Soprano-esque savagery, has sacked two councillors in the festering dispute over the implementation of a new licensing policy to favour Westfield when (or if), it ever opens.

Newman has removed Callton Young from his position as deputy cabinet member for communities, while Andrew Pelling has lost his role as chair of the council’s pensions committee. Both have been stripped of their positions on the licensing sub-committee, too.

At a licensing meeting last month, the two Labour councillors (Young represents West Thornton ward, Pelling the marginal Waddon ward) had voted to defer a decision on the council’s new licensing policy until legal advice was made available, after the committee chair, Jane Avis, had raised the matter of Young’s report on the state of the night-time economy and the police’s “bashment ban”. Continue reading

Posted in "Hammersfield", Alison Butler, Andrew Pelling, Boxpark, Business, Callton Young, Croydon Council, Dance, Jane Avis, Music, Tony Newman | Tagged , , , , , , , | 9 Comments

Tories back candidate who is banned from talking at Town Hall

Croydon Conservatives either do not realise or are trying to ignore strict Civil Service rules which prohibit one of their councillors from voting or speaking at Town Hall meetings.

Very important: Mario Creatura

Coulsdon West councillor Mario Creatura has landed himself the plum job as tweeter-in-chief for the Prime Minister, Theresa May. It was a classic piece of who-you-know-not-what-you-know recruitment, as at No10 Downing Street, Creatura teams up again with his old boss, Gavin Barwell, whom he worked for when MP for Croydon Central. Barwell is now May’s £140,000 per year Chief of Staff.

And according to the Cabinet Office, Creatura is on a salary of up to £70,000 (on top of the 18 grand he trousers for being a Croydon councillor) as a Special Adviser, or SPAD.

Special Advisers are temporary civil servants, and therefore subject to a very strict code of practice. Continue reading

Posted in Coulsdon Town, Mario Creatura, Tim Pollard, Uncategorized | 1 Comment

Council fails to publish papers for Boxpark licensing meeting

The council’s administration of its public meetings has again fallen short, ahead of a licensing sub-committee due to be held at the Town Hall tomorrow morning.

Boxpark: council’s failed to shine a light on its licensing application

The last licensing committee meeting has become a matter of controversy because neither the chair, Labour councillor Jane Avis, nor the committee clerk, council official James Haywood, had ensured that a member of the council’s legal department was on-hand to provide advice. A decision on the proposed new licensing policy, which needs to be implemented by 2019, was therefore deferred until January.

The council has a legal duty to publish the agendas of all its public meetings at least seven days in advance. By this morning, there was still no published agenda available for the licensing sub-committee. Continue reading

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MidWives deliver to set-up top-of-the-table derby clash

Surrey 1 – which includes four clubs based in or near Croydon, including Old Mid-Whitgiftians (in the dark blue), is proving super competitive this season

RUGBY ROUND-UP: Halfway into the 2017-2018 rugby season and it’s clear that in Croydon this winter, Surrey 1 is where it is at.

And after the break for Christmas – no one likes to fill-up the local A&Es with broken collar bones or concussions suffered on the rugby pitch during the festive period – there promises to be a decisive derby battle at Lime Meadow Avenue, when Old Mid-Whitgiftians take on their fiercest rivals, Old Whitgiftians, in a top-of-the-table clash. Continue reading

Posted in Croydon RFC, Old Mid-Whitgiftians/Trinity RFC, Old Walcountians, Old Whitgiftians, Purley-John Fisher, Rugby Union, Sport, Streatham-Croydon RFC, Warlingham RFC | Tagged , , , , | Leave a comment

St Helier Hospital charges nurses £1,200 to park at work

Hard-working and under-paid NHS staff at St Helier Hospital are forced to pay more than £1,200 a year just to use the hospital car park when they go in to work.

Hospital car parking charges see nursing staff at St Helier have to pay £1,200 per year

St Helier is ranked second on a national list of shame of hospital trusts, some of which use private car parking companies and which rake in profits at the expense doctors, nurses and other hospital staff.

A report based on Freedom of Information requests to NHS trusts across the country, compiled by hospital workers union the GMB, found that University Hospitals Bristol charge £1,300 per staff member per year for using its car parks, while the Epsom and St Helier hospitals trust charges £1,248.

“Hospital workers who care for us when we’re sick deserve a medal, not to be charged for the pleasure,” the GMB’s Tim Roache said.

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Tory MP told to apologise after bad joke about road safety

A Tory MP was forced into an embarrassing U-turn last night, after an attempt to score petty party political points over road safety.

Philp’s ‘joke’ tweet that he’d rather you did not see

Chris Philp, the Conservative MP for Croydon South, was widely criticised on social media after he tweeted a picture of a car which had crashed into and damaged a 20mph road sign in the borough, part of the Labour council’s policy to make Croydon’s streets safer.

The photograph Philp used had been provided by Andy Stranack, a Tory councillor for Heathfield ward.

“Looks like Croydon Council’s 20mph limit is not working out as planned,” Philp wrote on Twitter.

The sly, off-hand attitude to road safety was roundly condemned, first by members of the public, and later by Labour councillors..

“What a deeply irresponsible tweet, especially from someone in a position of authority,” Stuart King, the Labour council cabinet member in charge of road safety who has steered the 20mph policy in throughout the borough. Continue reading

Posted in Andrew Stranack, Chris Philp MP, Croydon Council, Croydon South, Heathfield, Sean Fitzsimons, Stuart King | Tagged , , , , , , , | 8 Comments

Croydon’s social workers having to deal with double case work

WALTER CRONXITE on the anxious wait at the Town Hall for the latest update on the council’s children’s services department

Tony Newman: he thinks the Ofsted update is encouraging

Tony Newman, Croydon’s council leader, was described as “channeling his inner Young Mr Grace” at a meeting of his close circle of councillors last week when he gave his verdict on the latest update report on the state of the borough’s children’s services department.

“He didn’t quite use the words, ‘You’ve all done very well’,” our Katharine Street source said, “but that was his message.”

Our source was referring to the catch-phrase of a character in the 1970s sit-com, Are You Being Served, where the department store’s owner would arrive on set in the midst of some calamity or chaos, smile benignly, and then leave none the wiser, with a cheery wave. It may be an apt analogy.

At the meeting of the Labour council’s political cabinet, Newman was rallying his troops’ morale by giving his verdict on the latest report from Eleanor Brazil, the government inspector appointed in September after Ofsted decreed that Croydon’s children’s services department is “inadequate”.

Copies of Brazil’s submission to the Secretary of State for Education were not distributed to councillors at the meeting. They just had to take Newman’s word for it. Continue reading

Posted in Alisa Flemming, Barbara Peacock, Children's Services, Croydon Council, Jo Negrini, Tony Newman | Tagged , , , , , , | Leave a comment

Cage-fighting councillor pays up for LibDem fighting fund

Our Sutton reporter, BELLE MONT, has gone digging into the 10,500 probable reasons behind the prolonged absence from council meetings of LibDem cage-fighter Callum Morton

Forgetful: Ruth Dombey

With local elections less than five months away, the Liberal Democrats, who have enjoyed the benefits of a virtual one-party state in Sutton for 20 years, have been counting the possible costs of defeat.

Having lost their previously iron-like grip on one of the borough’s parliamentary seats, Ruth Dombey, the LibDem council leader, knows that it is essential for her party’s political future in the borough to retain control of the council for another four years, and with it around £3.3million of public money doled out over a four-year term to councillors in the form of “allowances”.

And Dombey also knows that by-elections, even in the LibDems’ safe wards, are not something which will necessarily help that cause. Continue reading

Posted in Nick Mattey, Ruth Dombey, Sutton Council, Tom Brake MP | Tagged , , , | Leave a comment

Grange Road residents count the costs of speeding drivers

Another winter’s night, and another car crash on Grange Road in South Norwood.

Near-misses and full-on collisions are commonplace on Grange Road, as this incident last night showed

Pictured left is the scene outside 227 Grange ​Road  at 11pm last night​.

The incident was attended by two ambulances. The young driver involved in the incident, who was driving on the correct side of the road, is not thought to be too badly hurt.

But those residents of Grange Road, who park their cars near their homes, are counting the mounting costs of prangs, scratches and out-right smashes, which are costing them dear, and seeing their insurance premiums soar. “I really do not want someone to die before anything constructive is done,” one worried resident said.

The loyal Inside Croydon reader says that they have had four cars parked outside their house written off as a result of driving incidents. “Both my ​​neighbours have also had cars written off or crashed into on more than one occasion. It used to be mainly when they were parked on the park side of the road; cars parked outside the houses were relatively safe.

“But since the introduction on the new speed check at the top of the road this has changed considerably.” Continue reading

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Tories’ reward for failure: ex-MP Barwell gets £31,000 pay hike

A 22% pay rise, plus winding-up expenses, jobs for the boys (and girl), resettlement grants and a very generous redundancy package means that one Croydon Conservative has never had it so good. And all at your expense, as WALTER CRONXITE reports

When Gavin Barwell was rejected by the voters of Croydon Central as their MP in June, what most will not have realised at the time was that they had just helped the former councillor and sometime junior minister to hit the jackpot – and all funded by the tax-payer.

PM Theresa May explains to Gavin Barwell the size of his pay hike for working in No10

For a start, Barwell was handed a salary of £140,000 per year by Prime Minister Theresa May when she took pity on his plight and gave him the job as chief of staff (“He can’t do any worse than the previous pair,” as someone might have remarked at the time, not realising Gav’s gaffe-prone reputation).

But Barwell’s generous rewards for the failure of his political career don’t end there.

Hired as the PM’s new chief of staff, Barwell is now travelling first class on the Tory Government’s gravy train, and he’s taking some of his closest chums in politics along for the ride, too.

The pay figures for the Government’s bloated squad of special advisers emerged last night, as it was revealed that May’s administration doesn’t practice what it preaches about the gender pay gap. Barwell and other men hired by Downing Street in special adviser roles are paid £15,000 a year more than women who did similar level jobs.

Continue reading

Posted in Croydon Central, Gavin Barwell, Mario Creatura, Nero Ughwujabo, Sara Bashford, Selsdon & Ballards | Tagged , , , , , , , | 1 Comment