- I spent the first week of
 September in a small village on the Croatian coast. For the fourth year we stayed in the same very basic, very simple pension – nothing to do except try all the local fish in one of the 3 brilliant local restaurants – and swim across this bay – great!
- Meanwhile, back in Battersea Latchmere Labour Party members re-selected Simon Hogg and myself as two of the three candidates for May’s Council elections. Strange to note that, with all the scare stories about how Corbyn’s Labour Party was going to “de-select” sitting MPs and councillors, this is the only time since 1971 when I have been re-selected without an interview!
- What about Wendy Speck, our third councillor?
 I hear you say. Wendy has decided to move on to other things and so members chose a new candidate, one Kate Stock. Here are the three of us in York Gardens, me on the left and Simon on the right. I will say more of Wendy, who has been a great partner for Simon and myself – probably in May next year, when she steps down.
- We were in York Gardens on 11th September at the Council’s Let’s Talk meeting. Some of you will have received flyers for this event from the Council, but, despite a very wide circulation, only about 40 members of the public turned up. It is clearly a “good thing” that the Council should “consult” with the public but the way we do it in Wandsworth doesn’t really work. The only lively point was when one of the public, probably reading this right now, weighed into my failure to solve everything wrong with his block of flats. PS However, since that meeting I have heard that one person, who came along and talked of potholes, actually got one fixed! The meeting at least made one difference!
- On 13th September, I looked into the Royal College of Arts exhibition of plans for its proposed development on the Howie Street, Parkgate and Battersea Bridge Roads site. One comment I found particularly interesting was how North Battersea is becoming the centre of the UK art world. Not only is there the Royal College of Arts, but the Royal College of Dance, currently in Battersea Square, is also being “re-developed” in York Road.
- On Sunday, 17th, I went with Marsha de Cordova, MP, to the Battersea Chapel service run by Pastor Leroy Burke. You may remember that Leroy organised a very impressive public meeting about knife crime. Pastor Burke’s intention is to keep the public interest focused on the horror of knife crime until we have got rid of it.
- The picture shows a sculpture
 done by Philip Dorman, a Providence House volunteer. It is called The Wall of Pain and has 185 model coffins, representing the young victims of knife crime in London, 2005-15. The three stand-alone coffins in the front represent the three young men killed in Battersea earlier this year.
- The following day I had a meeting with Marsha in the House of Commons, along with her office manager Tracy Smith-Robinson. We discussed a range of matters, such as where her Battersea office will be – her intention is that it should be in the heart of Clapham Junction – and her programme for Labour’s Conference in Brighton.
- On the 19th September, I had the Community Services Committee, when the Tory
 councillors decided to go ahead with their plan to demolish and reconstruct the Northcote Road Library. The Labour councillors opposed the proposal, not least because the 17 planned housing units in the new development are NOT expected to be either so-called “affordable” or socially rented.
- Within a week of that decision, Wandsworth Council cut down Tooting Common’s grand Chestnut Avenue. This fiercely unpopular action (you may have seen coverage of the destruction
 Chestnut Avenue on TV or radio) followed from a Community Services Committee’s decision a couple of months ago. But with both this and the controversial decision on Northcote Library being taken, within 6 months of the next Council Election, it leads one to wonder whether the local Tories have a death wish.
- On 20th September, I had the Planning Applications Committee, which for the second month running had no decisions to take of any significance, except to the applicants themselves and their neighbours.
- On Saturday, 23rd September, I went with Marsha de Cordova to Brighton for the Labour Conference. Marsha MC’d a reception for the London Labour Party, with guest speakers including London Mayor Sadiq Khan and Labour’s Deputy Leader Tom Watson. On the following day, she and I hosted a dinner for Wandsworth Party friends in one of Brighton’s popular Italian restaurants.
- Unfortunately, I wasn’t feeling too well and came back from Brighton on Monday morning, but the Conference was clearly a great success and left most of us in good heart. There are obviously serious problems facing Labour, with, for example, our stance on the European Union being to say the least – woolly. But, if our position is woolly, the Government’s confusion and divisions are simply untenable.
- You may remember that last month my bike was stolen in Este Road. Well on the 29th I was rung by the police. They told me that they had caught all three “villains” and that it was now up to the Crown Prosecution Service to decide whether to press the case to court. The police officer told me a little about the three youths, most of which I can’t repeat in public, but the salient point was that it looks very possible that this is the start of a downhill path, which may well result in three wasted young lives, unless society takes immediate remedial action. We really do need a better and stronger Probation Service and not just the shattered remains of a privatised system.
- I could get really angry at this point but then something wonderful happened. A Battersea resident, Joel is his name, gave me his bike – see below!
- I went to an afternoon charity
 Coffee Party on behalf of McMillan nurses at Battersea Fields Residents Association clubroom on 29th of the month – not sure how much was raised but younger members of the community had a rousing game of table soccer. I kind of remember when the participants would claim to be Bobby Charlton or George Best – nowadays the screams were all for Messi and Ronaldo!
- Finally, on Saturday 30th September, there was the funeral of Tory Cllr Jim Maddan. Jim was elected Mayor of the Borough as recently as May. Some of you will have met him but he was best known in Putney, where for many years he was not only a councillor but also the street bobby. Popular across communities and politics, his funeral in St. Mary’s Church Putney was a big occasion.
My Programme for October
- On 9h October, I will be on the platform at Shaftesbury ward’s version of the Council’s Let’s Talk meeting – but as a stand-in for Labour Leader, Simon Hogg, who has to be elsewhere.
- On 11th October, we have a Council Meeting. Nowadays these are as rare as hens’ teeth – the old model of local government desperately needs a re-think. Currently, it is just not operating other than as a once every four-year plebiscite on who should run the place – this party or that one.
- In the week of the 16th I have two interesting viewings: first on 16th itself when I am going to get better acquainted with the design, work and looks of Battersea Park’s new tube station rapidly taking shape alongside the Dogs’ Home; and then two days later I am visiting the Tideway Thames Tunnel works. This major infrastructure development, perhaps only second to Crossrail, promises to solve some of London’s sewage problems, taking tons of sludge away from the Thames.
- The October meeting of the Planning Application Committee is on the 18th.
Opinion Piece
This is NOT an original observation but my caseload as a councillor more and more reveals just how bad the housing crisis in London is. Housing problems have always topped the list of issues brought to me as a Latchmere councillor, but this year there has been a significant increase in both the number and seriousness of the issues people are facing. The most desperate cases are frequently very young families coming from broken relationships, and usually with no job and no income and very little in the way of personal belongings. The shortage of cheap, rented accommodation – council housing – is desperate but meanwhile we continue to see luxury flats, often built as an investment and not an answer to a housing shortage, springing up in North  Battersea.
This Council development of 6 council flats in Rowditch Lane is one very small exception to the trend. This block is intended for re-housing folks displaced by the Winstanley Estate regeneration. It’s a small step in the right direction but we need a new building programme numbered in hundreds, not in tens,
Do you know?
I mentioned Joel above. He had read my last newsletter, about the bike theft, and so he emailed me to say that he had a spare bike that he kept on his houseboat (pictured here), moored near Vicarage Crescent – and I was welcome to have it. I went and picked it up the other day and had a nice chat with him and Rosie, who is joint owner of the boat. They tell an interesting story about buying the boat (as cheap as you can imagine) and buying a mooring (more expensive than I could have imagined) and doing up the boat themselves – well pretty much – including taking it downstream to Greenwich for large-scale welding repair jobs. The boat has the interesting, original, name of Ringvaart III.
So, my question is “What does that tell us about the boat’s history and where does the boat come from?” A new fixture on the Battersea scene with, no doubt, its own interesting story. |
Tony Belton
Tony Belton 