- * Note: Now covering North Battersea and not just Latchmere, because of popular demand (!), but the Newsletter will continue to be largely Latchmere based.
- I didn’t get to the Katherine Low Settlement AGM on 5th October as I had a meeting of Planning Committee members with the Chairs of the Wandsworth Design Panel. Given comments some of you make about planning in Wandsworth, I realise that you will be astonished to hear that we have a design panel – but we do! There was a helpful exchange of views but the architects, planners and design experts on the panels clearly have a more pro-development attitude than do many residents – development is, of course, the developers’ job. The end result is, I think, that the design panel finds you (and me, perhaps) and the public, a bit too conservative in our tastes; it’s as though they want to wake up in the morning and see an exciting new “concept” building outside their front window, whereas most of us want the view to look tomorrow pretty much as it does today.
- The next day I went to a Reception given by the Covent Garden Market Authority. The Market is the site of one of the largest single developments in British history – I suspect as a single site it is even larger than the Power Station but maybe not. The planned amount of affordable housing included in it and, even more importantly, of “social rent” properties is lamentably low and some of us are for ever pushing for more and more of both. On this occasion, however, it was the Chair of the traders, who stole the show with a plea to safeguard the actual traders, who are of course the raison d’etre of the Market. Will his plea have any effect? I hope so, as a very high percentage of London hotel and restaurant food and nearly all the flowers that get into our shops come through the Market and its traders.
- Appropriately at the Council Meeting on 12th October one of the two main debates was about Nine Elms, the US Embassy, the developments and what the Tories like to call “Aspirations”. A central feature of the debate was the decision of Apple to move its UK headquarters into the Power Station.
- But the Tories seem to think that “aspirations” equates to expensive housing developments and the presence of a Waitrose. They don’t give the impression of caring what is happening to much of the local Battersea community or to the housing aspirations of the many lower paid staff, who will service these developments.
- And as for the Power Station itself! It certainly is looking a mess, but, perhaps more worryingly, given the size of the new blocks of flats around it, the only chance to see the Power Station itself, will be from the new flats, the Chelsea Embankment or from a plane flying into Heathrow! (see Aydin picture below)
- The other debate at the Council Meeting was about the very worrying financial chaos that surrounds St. George’s Hospital. With more than half of NHS Trusts now facing financial difficulties, it must be the case that either all administrators in the NHS have all become incompetent overnight (which is unlikely) or this Government is starving them of funds – which is more likely as I, and recently members of the House of Commons Health Select Committee, suggest.
- Monday 17th was an interesting day. A few weeks earlier,
 I had been asked by email if I was prepared to take part in a Brains’ Trust circuit touring universities. It was all very vague as to what it was about and who it was for, but I volunteered 2 dates anyway. The 17th was the first date, but when Monday arrived I had heard nothing and expected “it” not to happen – whatever it was. But when I looked at my email that morning there was a rail ticket to Norwich for that afternoon.
- I got to Norwich at about 5 pm and discovered that the four of us (in the picture here) were there to be taken by taxi to speak at “The Great Debate, 2016” (#gtd2016), organised by the Afro-Caribbean students at East Anglia University. There were 50 people at the debate and my guess is that I was the only one over 30 years’ old. I was certainly the only white “Brit” there – there were a couple of Bulgarians. The debates were about “Getting a job”, Brexit and Black Lives Matter.
- The students were very bright, mainly Londoners; the debate was lively, and very “respectful”. It was fascinating and gave me a slightly different perspective on these issues. For example, the students seemed much more materialist in terms of their career expectations than my generation of students had been; they were almost unanimously horrified by Brexit; and they were, not surprisingly, very much more “angry” about the recent spate of US police killings of black men than the average “Brit”. I think the average Brit is not really very conscious of how close many Caribbean Brits are to many black Americans, who may well have come from the same families back in Jamaica or elsewhere.
- On the 19th I had the Planning Applications Committee. There was only one application of really direct interest to Latchmere and that was for 105 Meyrick Road. The application was to demolish what used to be the Duke of Wellington pub and to replace it with a 10-storey block of flats. The application was refused, much to the pleasure of both current residents and some neighbours.
- There were two more applications for large developments in t
 he Nine Elms Lane area – one of them including 25% “affordable” housing, more than the average. “Affordable” housing is, of course, a bureaucratic invention and means a property affordable to the average person on £75,000 a year – which of course is not very average!
- Rather more interesting perhaps was an application from Tesco to convert the Prince of Wales pub at 186 Battersea Bridge Road into a convenience store. We turned that down, against the planning officers’ recommendation, for two main reasons. First, we felt that there are completely inadequate facilities for loading and delivery from Tesco lorries at this tight corner site, and secondly, we thought that a Tesco at this corner, however popular it would be to some, would undermine local shopping in Battersea Park and Battersea Bridge Roads.
- On the 20th I went to the Council’s Heliport Consultative Committee. There was not a lot of general interest except that we were told the good news that the newer generation of choppers coming out in the next 10 years or so will be 30% less noisy than today’s models. Of much greater interest, however, was the announcement that the Government intends to press ahead with Heathrow’s Third Runway. Wandsworth Council is very much against this development and may, with other local authorities, take legal action to try and prevent it. One local MP, Zac Goldsmith (Richmond Park) has resigned and is forcing a
 by-election. Our MPs are against it, but actually in my many years as a Latchmere councillor I have only ever had a couple of complaints about aircraft noise. Please, let me know what you think. Why not just hit reply NOW and say “I am against the third runway” or “I think a third runway would be good for London”?
- I spent 22nd/23rd weekend at my brother-in-law’s at Westcliff-on-Sea. So! I hear you say, but just take a look at this sunset over the Thames in late October – almost sunbathing weather at Southend.
- I was invited to meet North Battersea residents’ associations on 25th October at the Kambala
 club-room – pictured here, with Kambala Chair, Donna Barham. There were, maybe 20 tenants and leaseholders from the Kambala, York Road, the Doddington, Surrey Lane and other estates. They wanted to tell me their complaints about cleaning on estates – or the lack of it – and the Council’s inadequate response to resident complaints. I intend to take up their problems but the question is, “Will I get any effective response from the Council?” Watch this space for further developments.
- Some of you have asked about the quince and
 my attempt to make quince jelly. I am afraid it never set! Still I have been using it as a sauce – goes well with pork.
- And finally, on October 31st guess what I saw on a Battersea house! And did I see it moving?
My Programme for November
- On 1st November, the Battersea Society has organised a debate at York Gardens Library on Affordable Housing. The speakers are Lord Bob Kerslake of the Peabody Trust and Councillor Paul Ellis, Wandsworth’s Tory Cabinet Member (that’s Wandsworth’s Cabinet and not the real Cabinet – how I dislike that pompous bit of nomenclature!) for Housing. I know Ellis, of course – he is a Wandsworth councillor, but funnily enough I also know Bob quite well as years ago we worked together at County Hall for the GLC (Greater London Council). I look forward to seeing them debating this important issue.
 Winstanley Estate
- You may remember that last month I featured William Mitchell, the sculptor who did the concrete sculptures on the Winstanley estate and on Badric Court. I said that his work will feature in the forthcoming Winstanley News. Well, I am going to visit him on 4th November – that should be fascinating.
- I intend to go to the Share Community Annual Awards on 8th November and on 9th November, I will be representing the Labour councillors at a public meeting being held at Bolingbroke School.
- The Queenstown ward by-election will take place on
 10th November and so that will keep me busy, especially on the day. Our candidate, pictured here, is Aydin Dikerdem, a 26-year old, Battersea born and bred lad of Turkish extraction. The previous Labour councillor Sally-Ann Ephson had a majority of only 75 and so it will be a tough fight for Aydin holding off the Tory challenger, but if he wins I am sure he will add vigour and enthusiasm to the Labour group of councillors.
- On 12th November, I will be attending a fund raiser at Providence House, Falcon Road. Providence House is the most important youth club in Clapham Junction and the evening should be fun.
- But perhaps not quite as much as taking my grand-children to London Zoo on Sunday 13th.
- On the 14th I have the Conservation Area Advisory Committee and 2 days later the Planning Applications Committee. I suspect that the application at the corner of Culvert and Battersea Park Roads, which I featured last month and is pictured here, will not be considered. It is more likely to be in December or January. But please let me know what you think of this application – again hit “reply” and tell me what you think.
- On the 26th I have the so-called London Summit. It is when Mayor Sadiq Khan invites all London’s councillors to discuss his and others’ plans for the next couple of years. You may recall that Sadiq was my deputy as Labour Leader on Wandsworth Council for several years up to 2005. It will be great to hear his ideas for our city.
Do you know?
Last month I asked you, whether you knew the connection between Christ Church School, at the end of Este Road, and the nearby Shillington Old School Building? And can you name one of its early pupils? The answers are – the local parish started Christ Church school in about 1864. But the parish couldn’t maintain the school in competition with the new state school, the London Board School of Este Road. In 1883 that school moved into the Shillington Street site, now flats, and the Batten Street site reverted to being Christ Church – and that was the connection. As for the pupil, it was the later famous John Burns.
This month let me ask you, “Who was Hilda Hewlett, commemorated by a plaque on a Battersea house and one time resident of Park Mansions, Prince of Wales Drive? Was she the first woman:
a) Licensed pilot in the UK?
b) To run 100 yards in 13 seconds?
c) To star opposite Lambeth born star Charlie Chaplin?” |
Tony Belton
Tony Belton 