The “continuity council” that rarely meets and barely debates

Posted on July 13, 2015 by insidecroydon

WALTER CRONXITE welcomes a rare opportunity for Croydon’s councillors to meet at the Town Hall tonight

Croydon’s well-rewarded cabinet, the nine Labour councillors hand-picked for his top team by leader Tony Newman, get together in the council chamber at the Town Hall tonight. Make the most of it; this rare appearance will be the final Croydon Council cabinet meeting until late September.

Council leader Tony Newman, left, exchanges a joke with the CEO he appointed, Nathan Elvery. Are they still laughing now?

Council leader Tony Newman, left, exchanges a joke with the CEO he appointed, Nathan Elvery. Tonight’s cabinet meeting will be a rare chance to see them at work together

Indeed, it is just the second time that the council cabinet has managed to hold a public meeting since March.

“They get more holiday than teachers,” one disgruntled former Town Hall figure told Inside Croydon. In total, Newman and his cabinet receive more than £440,000 per year from the tax-payer in “allowances”.

But now, as well as being accused of having things a bit easy, Newman is criticised for not being open to questions from the opposition, his own back-benchers or the public. Continue reading →

Posted in Bernard Weatherill House, Boxpark, Croydon Council, Jo Negrini, Nathan Elvery, Planning, RIF, Tony Newman, URV | Tagged , , , , , , , | Leave a comment

Memories of Brenda Kirby help raise funds for cancer centre

Posted on July 13, 2015 by insidecroydon
Family and friends of Brenda Kirby gather at Heathfield House on Saturday

Family and friends of Brenda Kirby gather at Heathfield House on Saturday

It was Brenda Kirby Weekend in Croydon, with ceremonies for the former councillor at Heathfield House and fund-raising in New Addington for the Cancer Care Centre that carries her name.

Brenda Kirby died last year, her life celebrated with a civic service at a packed Croydon Minster.

Continue reading →

Posted in Charity, Environment, Heathfield, New Addington | Tagged , , , , , , | Leave a comment

Council caves in over enforcement action at The Ship pub

Posted on July 12, 2015 by insidecroydon

So this is how the local authority planning system works in Croydon in 2015.

1, A speculative developer submits a planning application to the council to turn a popular local amenity, it this case a pub, into a number of under-sized flats.

The Ship: has been home to seven flats for two months, without any enforcement action by Croydon Council

The Ship: has been home to seven flats for two months, without any enforcement action by Croydon Council

2, Planning permission is rejected. More than once.

3, The developer ignores the local authority and goes ahead and makes the flat conversion anyway.

4, Local residents offered to buy the property off the owner and create Croydon’s first Asset of Community Value, supported by the Labour chairman of the planning committee and the Tory London Assembly Member.

5, Residents express their outrage when the developer’s agents start renting out the flats, built without permission. They complain to the council, as the planning authority, who undertake to make an inspection.

6, The council decides to take no action against the developer who did the flat conversions without planning permission, and instead suggest its intends to grant planning permission retrospectively. Continue reading →

Posted in Croydon Council, Environment, Nathan Elvery, Norwood Society, Paul Scott, Planning, Pubs, South Norwood, South Norwood Tourist Board, Steve O'Connell | Tagged , , , , , , , , | 7 Comments

Sensible Garden first birthday community picnic, July 26

Posted on July 11, 2015 by insidecroydon

sensible birthday Continue reading →

Posted in Activities, South Norwood, South Norwood Tourist Board | Tagged , , | Leave a comment

How to gridlock Croydon in 100 million easy moves

Posted on July 10, 2015 by insidecroydon

CROYDON COMMENTARY: London’s Tory Mayor Boris Johnson, with Labour-run Croydon Council and through Transport for London, has earmarked more than £100 million for road schemes and to re-configure the tram system in the town centre, all for the sake of the Westfield and Hammerson redevelopment. VALERIE HUNTER has scoured the published planning documents and predicts traffic misery ahead

Shape of things to come: the plans for Westfield could make queuing in the underpass routine

Shape of things to come: the plans for Westfield could make queuing in the underpass routine

The council, the developers and speculators, the Mayor of London and Transport for London, the local MPs and various vested interests all speak warmly of “regeneration”. But what do the various schemes being proposed for Croydon actually mean for our future?

Reviewing the various proposals being put forward, the consequences could include:

  • 9,000 new homes in the centre of Croydon, most with private parking, and mostly in the side roads to Wellesley Road, with minimal other access from the south for the cars, service and delivery vehicles for large and heavy items, which together with deliveries for present and future hotels, offices, restaurants and shops, will ensure lots more traffic on Wellesley Road.

Continue reading →

Posted in "Hammersfield", Addiscombe West, Boris Johnson, Business, Centrale, Commuting, Connected Croydon, Croydon Central, Croydon Council, Cycling, Duppas Hill Park, East Croydon, Environment, Fairfield, Gavin Barwell, Housing, Mayor of London, Parking, Planning, Property, Tramlink, Transport, West Croydon, Whitgift Centre | Tagged , , , , , , , , , , , | 17 Comments

Fear and loathing in Upper Norwood as an inspector calls

Posted on July 9, 2015 by insidecroydon
Lord Harris: carpet salesman turned educational carpet bagger

Lord Harris: would you want your school to be run by a carpet salesman?

Education correspondent GENE BRODIE on a gathering storm of controversy over a disputed Ofsted inspection at one of the secondary academies in the north of the borough

The Anti Academies Alliance, an organisation of teachers, parents and educationalists who oppose the privatisation of the state school system, has published the account, apparently from a member of staff at the Harris Academy Upper Norwood, which makes a series of shocking allegations, including that specialist staff were shipped in for an Ofsted visit a fortnight ago, that 1-in-10 of pupils were told to stay at home during the inspection, and that as many as 40 staff are quitting the school at the end of term.

“The tone of the letter suggests both fear and loathing,” the Alliance says.

The school had previously been the Westwood High School, run under the control of Croydon Council until an Ofsted inspection in 2012 put it under special measures and forced the governors to throw themselves at the mercy of an academy sponsor. Within a year of academisation, in September last year, the school was amalgamated with Harris Academy South Norwood. Continue reading →

Posted in Alisa Flemming, Crystal Palace and Upper Norwood, Education, Harris Academy South Norwood, Harris Academy Upper Norwood, Schools | Tagged , , , , , , , | 6 Comments

Croydon Roller Derby summer BBQ, Oval Tavern, July 11

Posted on July 9, 2015 by insidecroydon

Croydon Roller Derby Continue reading →

Posted in Addiscombe West, Pubs, Sport | Tagged , , , , | Leave a comment

What Is Autism? council session, Town Hall, July 17

Posted on July 9, 2015 by insidecroydon

autism flyer Continue reading →

Posted in Andrew Rendle, Croydon Council, Health | Tagged , , , | 1 Comment

Jamin’ summer sports club, Thornton Heath, Jul 28-Aug 6

Posted on July 9, 2015 by insidecroydon

JAM summer camp flyer side 1 Continue reading →

Posted in Activities, Sport, Thornton Heath | Tagged , , | Leave a comment

MP Philp: ‘Southern Rail’s service is totally unacceptable’

Posted on July 8, 2015 by insidecroydon

CHRIS PHILP, the MP for Croydon South, is promising commuters that he will continue to pressure the train operators to deliver an adequate service on lines into London

Croydon South MP Chris Philp points out where the rail problems are to minister Claire Perry

Croydon South MP Chris Philp points out where the rail problems are to minister Claire Perry

This morning I spoke in a Westminster Hall debate about the appalling performance of Southern Railway. The service has been totally unacceptable. Particular issues are lateness, cancellations, station skipping and short trains leading to overcrowding. Rails users in Purley, Sanderstead, Coulsdon and elsewhere are being short-changed.

Train punctuality is down to 82per cent on Southern, the worst in the UK and compares terribly to the 95 per cent on London Overground. Some 5 per cent of trains are cancelled or are seriously late. Southern’s targets for improvement are currently too low. Continue reading →

Posted in Chris Philp MP, Commuting, Coulsdon, Croydon South, East Croydon, London-wide issues, Purley, Sanderstead, Transport, West Croydon | Tagged , , , , , , , , | 5 Comments

Rejects and nightmares that Palace’s Pardew must avoid

Posted on July 8, 2015 by insidecroydon

Yesterday, GOLDIE listed the five players who he would like to see Palace sign (or at least not sell), during the summer. Here, he let’s us in on the players he really never wants to see in a Palace shirt – plus one current squad member he believes manager Alan Pardew should cash-in on

Alan Pardew: let's hope he gets his signings just right

Alan Pardew: let’s hope he’s reading this

There are, it’s fair to say, plenty of journeymen players out there who you really never want to see driving up to the Palace training ground in their shiny, footballers’ edition sports car with the cherish plates, for a medical and contract negotiations.

So for the purposes of this exercise, I’ve limited the shit-list to those players who have been linked with Palace already this summer, and to those players who have over recent weeks had me waking up in a cold sweat in the middle of the night, such has been the nightmares they’ve summoned up.

I just hope, for the sake of my sleeping patterns, Alan Pardew is reading this, because here’s my list of players who we shouldn’t be touching with the a very long stick… Continue reading →

Posted in Crystal Palace FC, Football, Goldie, Sport | Tagged , , , , , | Leave a comment

Costs mount on council’s rubbish MyCroydon app

Posted on July 8, 2015 by insidecroydon

A tech worker who carried out work on the MyCroydon app has told Inside Croydon that the company which was given the contract by the council, “is not really an ‘app developer’ or ‘software developer’. All it has done is win a contract from Croydon Council and then outsource that work at rates as cheap as chips to India, with people like myself trying to manage the daily issues.”

Croydon app picsCroydon Council has so far paid tens of thousands of pounds to a company, Sensemble, to  “develop” the MyCroydon app, when in fact the application is nothing more than the “re-skinning” – or re-packaging – of existing smart phone technology.

The Croydon Council contract for the MyCroydon app was never put out to competitive tender.

“In the end, what Croydon has is a poor app, full of bugs, while the company which got the contract is keeping a large slice of the pie as ‘profits’,” the Sensemble whistle-blower said.

“This is a fake-it-till-you-make-it company. Working for them was the worst experience of my entire life.”

Croydon Council awarded the contract to develop and run the MyCroydon app in November 2013 to a company called Sensemble. At the time, Sensemble was run from a Battersea flat by Harwinder, or Harry, Singh. The company was only registered with Companies House a fortnight before the MyCroydon app was launched – that is after someone at Croydon Council must have determined that they were the best company to provide such expertise. Continue reading →

Posted in Business, Capita, Croydon Council, Fly tipping, Graham Cadle, Phil Thomas, Refuse collection | Tagged , , , , , , , | 2 Comments

Croydon College free school proposal gets fobbed off by DfE

Posted on July 8, 2015 by insidecroydon

GENE BRODIE, our education correspondent, reports on the surprising reasoning given by Whitehall to block expansion plans around College Green

It’s official: according to the Department for Education, there is no school places crisis in Croydon.

No demand: of all the reasons given to Croydon College for turning down their application to open a new secondary school, the DfE's is the most surprising

No demand: of all the reasons given to Croydon College for turning down their application to open a new secondary school, the DfE’s is the most surprising

That was the reason given yesterday by Tory Education Secretary Nicky Morgan’s DfE for refusing Croydon College’s application to open a free school on their central Croydon site.

It wasn’t because the idea of Croydon College running a secondary school on top of their current responsibilities is crap (which it is).

It wasn’t because of the poor (if improving, slowly) educational record of Croydon College.

The reason given by the DfE officials was “there is not a strong case of need for a new school in Central Croydon up to 2018/19 and beyond”. This, of course, flies in the face of the evidence, most of it valid, used to justify the development of all sorts of new secondary establishments elsewhere in the borough, from building on Metropolitan Open Land at the Arena, to pushing through with a neo-grammar school in the south of the borough. Continue reading →

Posted in Croydon Central, Croydon College, Education, Richard Ottaway MP, Schools | Tagged , , , , , , , | 1 Comment

Cabaye tops the Palace wish-list: the five to sign this summer

Posted on July 7, 2015 by insidecroydon

As the squad begins pre-season training, our irregular Crystal Palace correspondent, GOLDIE, has hawked to us his football version of “Snog, Marry, Avoid”, identifying the players that he would really like to see signed up to play at Selhurst Park in the 2015-2016 season. And those he wouldn’t touch with a very long barge pole

Remember the summer when Ian Holloway went into the transfer market, under-funded and, it seemed, without any plans for life in the Premier League?

Fantasy football: French international midfielder Yohan Cabaye would be a "massive" signing for Palace

Fantasy football: French international midfielder Yohan Cabaye would be a “massive” signing for Palace

Or last summer, when Tony Pulis was caught between a rock and a hard place over the club’s direction (can it really only be 11 months ago since he walked out)?

It all means that since the last day of the season, with Premier League status long-before secured under Alan Pardew, the backroom staff at Crystal Palace have had the prospect of the first real dabble into the summer transfer market for three years. Properly planned. Properly funded. And Pardew-managed. Continue reading →

Posted in Crystal Palace FC, Football, Goldie, Sport | Tagged , , , , , , , , , | 1 Comment

Cats Protection League Croydon homing show, July 11

Posted on July 7, 2015 by insidecroydon

Cats event Continue reading →

Posted in Charity, Sanderstead | Tagged , , , | 1 Comment

MP Reed’s endorsement of ‘lunatic’ column causes anger

Posted on July 6, 2015 by insidecroydon

Steve Reed OBE, MP for Lambeth South (the parliamentary seat formerly known as Croydon North) has caused outrage among Labour supporters in the borough after his overly enthusiastic support of Liz Kendall in his party’s leadership contest has seen him resort to spreading personal abuse against one of his Westminster colleagues.

Steve Reed OBE: overly fond of articles in the Torygraph

Steve Reed OBE: fond of “spot on” articles in the Torygraph

Reed is the former Lambeth Council leader who is now vice-chairman of the overly influential Progress group, a Blairite party-within-the-party.

He attracted the ire of many Labour figures, including Croydon councillors and General Election candidates, when he used social media to post a link to a Conservative-supporting columnist in the Torygraph who decried the inclusion of left-winger Jeremy Corbyn in the leadership race under a headline that said “the lunatic wing of the Labour Party is still calling the shots”.

Reed has never lived in his parliamentary constituency, preferring instead to live in a house valued at £900,000 in the Shirley Hills, which he moved to following his election to his £67,000-plus-exes job as a man-of-the-people Labour MP.

He has 18,000 Twitter followers and, most importantly, a parliamentary majority of  21,000 votes. Or what ordinary, hard-working folk might describe as “a cosy job for life”.

The newspaper column Reed linked to was written by Dan Hodges, a former Blairite who, after Ed Miliband was elected Labour leader, decided to show his true colours… “Batshit crazy Labour is alive and well,” Hodges wrote, adding that Corbyn was “to the left of Karl Marx and guaranteed not to win the contest”.

Reed recommended the article by writing: “It took years for Labour and councils like Lambeth to recover from the toxic legacy of the hard left in the 1980s. Now 36 of my colleagues have given them a platform to try and make Labour unelectable again. Dan Hodges is spot on in this article.”

Continue reading →

Posted in Croydon North, Steve Reed MP, Timothy Godfrey, Tony Newman | Tagged , , , , , , | 1 Comment

Fairness Commission’s iPad prize struggles to get response

Posted on July 6, 2015 by insidecroydon

When the crunch comes in Croydon over Tory Chancellor Gideon Osborne’s cuts, Council Tax-payers may be less than delighted to find that the £200,000 being spent on the borough’s Opportunity and Fairness Commission is going largely on a contract with a local PR agency, and that they have resorted to dangling a £400 iPad mini and additional prize vouchers to try to get youngsters involved.

ipad miniEven that generosity, apparently out of public funds, appears to have had little impact, as the youth of the borough are failing to engage with the “Share What’s Unfair” competition.

The Fairness and Opportunity Commission had its first meeting in January, much later than had been scheduled. Chaired by the Bishop of Croydon, Jonathan Clark, the commission quickly lost one of its hand-picked commissioners, and soon afterwards, it lost the interest of much of the rest of the borough, too. Continue reading →

Posted in Bishop of Croydon, Croydon Council, Education, Fairness Commission, Schools, Tony Newman | Tagged , , , , , , | 3 Comments

Morgan’s rum conduct raises suspicions over 20mph survey

Posted on July 6, 2015 by insidecroydon

A complaint has been filed with Croydon Council over the conduct of Coulsdon resident Peter Morgan, accusing him of using multiple aliases and bogus addresses to register a greater volume of opposition to the recently conducted 20mph zone consultation.

Peter Morgan: kicked out of UKIP

Peter Morgan: kicked out of UKIP

Morgan is a member of the road lobby group the Alliance of British Drivers. He had his party membership of UKIP suspended – and eventually revoked – in part, at least, for running a string of Twitter accounts under multiple aliases, some ostensibly official party accounts, but without approval or sanction.

Previously, Morgan was kicked out of the Croydon Conservatives when he was discovered to be a member of UKIP, without declaring this split loyalty, breaking party rules.

Now Morgan has been accused of acting anti-democratically, by submitting multiple objections to the 20mph zone consultation using false identities or by impersonating individuals without their permission.

The complaint was filed with council officials by activists from the Croydon Cycling Campaign, strong advocates for better-policed speed limits on London’s roads. Continue reading →

Posted in Commuting, Coulsdon, Croydon Council, Croydon Greens, Croydon North, Cycling, Environment, Fairfield, Norbury, Norbury Green Residents' Association, Norbury Village Residents' Association, Old Coulsdon Residents' Association, Thornton Heath, Transport, Vidhi Mohan | Tagged , , , , , , , , , | 26 Comments

Residents’ concerns at scheme to undermine Purley Town Hall

Posted on July 5, 2015 by insidecroydon
The old Town Hall Purley: developers want to increase the number of flats on the site by 25 per cent

The old Town Hall Purley: developers want to increase the number of flats on the site by 25 per cent

The owners of the old Purley Town Hall want to dig underneath it to create eight new flats.

The building, which has listed status, is home to around two dozen apartments already.

The development proposals, submitted in May by Herald Holdings, are thought not to be widely known – as a result of some of the initiatives from “Big” Eric Pickles when he was running the local government department in Whitehall, local planning authorities, such as Croydon Council, are no longer required to send letters to owners of neighbouring properties which might be affected by a development when it applies for planning permission. These days, the council gets by with a mere sheet attached to a lamp post near the property in question.

As a consequence, even some of the current residents living in the old Town Hall were unaware of what their landlords propose to do with the building.

One contacted Inside Croydon after happening on the notification almost by chance. “I only found out end of last week about this when I saw the note on the lamppost swinging in the wind and was curious what it said,” they said.

“After looking at the plans online, in my opinion this will ruin this beautiful building. Every day I admire the character of the building. Continue reading →

Posted in Chris Philp MP, Coulsdon, Coulsdon Town, Croydon Council, Croydon South, Environment, Housing, Jeet Bains, Mario Creatura, Planning, Property, Purley | Tagged , , , , , , , , | Leave a comment

Put River Wandle in the picture for chance of £600 first prize

Posted on July 5, 2015 by insidecroydon

River WandlePhotographers are being encouraged with a £600 first prize to capture the essence of the River Wandle.

The Wandle Valley Regional Park Trust is running the competition, which will provide images of the river for its website. Continue reading →

Posted in Activities, Environment, Wandle Park, Wildlife | Tagged , | Leave a comment

Car-free cul de sac lifestyle adds value to your house price

Posted on July 4, 2015 by insidecroydon

CROYDON COMMENTARY: Creating cycle Quietways throughout London, including Croydon, offers numerous, unexpected benefits, according to KRISTIAN GREGORY

Live on a busy rat run? How would you like to live on a quiet cul-de-sac instead, without having to move home?

Local children help planting up one of the new planters installed a week ago on Norbury Avenue

Local children help planting up one of the new planters installed a week ago on Norbury Avenue

This is the question residents of Norbury Avenue have been asked, and to help them decide they’ve been given three months to live that reality to see how they like it.

It isn’t a new concept, but it’s new to Croydon. You take a residential road that is carrying far more motor traffic than it is designed for and put heavy planters in the road. These planters are then filled with soil for growing flowers, herbs, vegetables or whatever else the residents want. The planters stay in place long enough for drivers to get used to the new layout, and for residents to experience the benefits of a home in a cul-de-sac. If they don’t like it, it can be re-opened to traffic.

Continue reading →

Posted in Commuting, Cycling, Environment, Norbury, Parking, Property, Thornton Heath, Transport | Tagged , , , , | 3 Comments

Trams and Rams face friendly summer start to their cup runs

Posted on July 4, 2015 by insidecroydon

Wimbledon tennis is barely half-done. The Ashes cricket Tests don’t start until next week.

fa cupYet football’s about to get underway again, marked with yesterday’s draw for the preliminary rounds of the FA Cup…

AFC Croydon Athletic, the phoenix club, returned to their Mayfield Road ground last season and won the London Senior Trophy, and for the 2015-2016 season they move from the Combined Counties League to the Southern Counties East League – the old Kent League – where they will have two derby fixtures against Croydon FC, who have not fared so well the past couple of seasons. Continue reading →

Posted in AFC Croydon Athletic, Croydon FC, Football, Sport | Tagged , , , , | Leave a comment

London Road Carnival, July 19

Posted on July 4, 2015 by insidecroydon

London Road Carnival Continue reading →

Posted in Activities, Broad Green, Thornton Heath | Tagged , , , | Leave a comment

Council considers three-weekly bin collections as cuts bite

Posted on July 3, 2015 by insidecroydon

The leadership of Croydon’s Labour-run council is considering moving to a schedule of residential refuse collections of every three weeks as a way of saving money from a borough budget that faces losing £90 million from its grant from the Conservative government.

This is what residents' bins look like with Croydon opting for fortnightly collections, says MP Steve Reed OBE

This is what residents’ bins look like with fortnightly collections. Are there bins big enough to cope with collections once every three weeks?

Tory Chancellor Gideon Osborne is poised to deliver his Budget next week, and he is widely expected to revel in announcing another round of dogma-driven “austerity” measures.

This includes passing the political buck for cuts down the line to local authorities, including Croydon Council where the annual grant from central government is set to be reduced even further, despite the borough’s growing population and increasing demand for a range of locally delivered services.

Council leader Tony Newman is taking his 39 Labour councillors off on a group “awayday” tomorrow – only as far as Heathfield House – to discuss the unappetising options available to them as they struggle to make the borough’s budget balance.

According to a very senior Town Hall source, someone who is close to the leader, these measures include reducing the frequency of domestic bin collections to once every 21 days.

Continue reading →

Posted in 2016 London elections, 2018 council elections, Croydon Central, Croydon Council, Environment, Fly tipping, Refuse collection, Sarah Jones MP, Stuart Collins, Tony Newman, Waste incinerator | Tagged , , , , , , , , | 10 Comments

Lend Lease land £40m deal to build Metro Bank HQ

Posted on July 3, 2015 by insidecroydon

landscape office image Ruskin SquareBuilders Lend Lease have been given the £40 million construction contract to build the first office block at Ruskin Square, the site alongside East Croydon Station.

The building will be the headquarters office for Metro Bank, who are moving from Holborn in one of the largest office lettings in Croydon.

The Lend Lease appointment follows the fast-progressing work on the Vita residential block and the beginnings of the Boxpark retail area, which is set to open for business next summer.

Lend Lease are already on the site, working on what is the first of five office buildings to be developed at the Schroder and Stanhope-owned Ruskin Square. Continue reading →

Posted in Boxpark, Business, East Croydon, Property, Ruskin Square | Tagged , , , , | 3 Comments