Campaign leaflet Pic: Daniel O'Donnell

Local residents and councillors from Hackney are opposing an application by the Olympic Development Agency (ODA) to build a temporary basketball-training venue on Leyton Marsh as they argue it will drastically effect the area.

The plan for the Olympic Games facility comprises of two 11-meter high court buildings as well as a drop off area, car park and a perimeter fence.

The ODA chose Leyton Marsh as the site for their venue after their previous choice had been deemed unsuitable for wheelchair access and therefore would not be able to be used by the various wheelchair basketball teams competing in the Paralympics.

Notices publicising the application were posted on and around the site and letters were sent to residents in Waltham Forest and Hackney.

However local residents told EastLondonLines that they felt not enough had been done to let people know about the proposal.

Many are concerned about the effect the plans will have, if accepted by Waltham Forest Council, on the site and the neighbouring nature reserve, which is a site of Special Scientific Interest (SSSI)

The land is deemed Metropolitan Open Land and as a result should not be built upon unless it complies with certain conditions.

Though the Olympic Delivery Authority plans to build here due to the “very special circumstances” of one-off nature of the games.

The venue is not due to be open to the public at any time between it’s proposed time span of March 1 until October 15 this year.

A planning committee at Waltham Forest Council is to be held on Tuesday, Feb 7 at 6pm.

To find out the full story watch this video.

(Video by Ruth Edwards and Daniel O’Donnell)

To view the planning application click here.

Read the article here.

pic: Ruddhi Abhyankar

A consultation process on the potential merger of Southwark College and Lewisham College opened last week and will stay open until 21 February.

The Chief Executive of Skills Funding has called for comments from key partners, students, staff, local business and the local community.

The two southeast London based colleges plan to merge institutions, in the belief that combining the resources and strengths of both colleges will ensure growth. But creation of a new college, likely to be called ‘Lewisham and Southwark College’, still depends on government approval.

After Southwark College’s poor inspection result in 2008, it was decided that with a falling number of students and the economy worsening, the college needed an immediate expansion.

Lewisham College, in the neighbouring borough, is in sound financial condition, whilst Southwark College enjoys excellent contacts with major employers. Based on these factors, the colleges plan to work together and make best use of each other’s potential.

With the creation of the new college, the institutions aim at educating over 4,000 young people aged 14-19 and over 15,000 adults.

A statement on Lewisham College’s web site said: “Southwark College has faced a difficult time and its achievements fall some way short of its potential. It has, however, developed some excellent links with major employers in the local area and with the right resources this potential could be realised.

“We believe that by combining the resources and strengths of both colleges we can plan for growth. To do this we will work closely with employers, local authorities and schools to ensure that our offer makes a direct contribution to improving job prospects and increasing prosperity for the local community.”

When asked about the plan, 18-year-old Rebecca Hatchins, a catering student at Lewisham college said: “I support this plan because my course will benefit from it.  Jointly, two colleges are more likely to provide good cooking facilities for teaching.”

A college staff member who wishes to remain anonymous said: “Most of us don’t really care about this merger because it is not going to affect our jobs in a significant way.”

Miriam Lopes, a carer and a Health and Social Care student at the college, was not aware of the merger plan, but after being informed of the proposals told EastLondonLines that the merger would be beneficial because the colleges would jointly bring in better opportunities and facilities for students, as well as a greater number of courses.

The two colleges together occupy five major sites with excellent facilities. A detailed estates strategy will be developed for the college buildings.

If the two colleges successfully sail through the legal process, the merger plan will be presented by 1 June 2012.

Pic: Tillie Cox

Inspired by the success of previous designer and good cause collaborations, Hackney Council have commissioned some of London’s design talent to create bags for them.

The canvas shopping bags will be given to those who collect enough tokens from market stalls and independent shops. Every pound spent gets you one token, and you will need ten to redeem your bag.

The project is in a long line of similar collaborations: Uniqlo, Topshop and Marc Jacobs have all sold clothes for charity projects. There is also Anya Hindmarch’s ‘I’m Not a Plastic Bag’ canvas shopping bag, which sold out of stores nationwide in under an hour, going on eBay for hundreds of pounds a pop. The project was about raising awareness of an issue; in that case the number of plastic bags we use and then chuck away to landfill. Hackney Council’s latest drive to get people visiting its markets, as part of its ‘Love Hackney, Shop Local’ campaign, is on a much smaller scale.

Designers Mark Fast and William Richard Green are responsible for the first wave of bags up for grabs, which can be found this weekend at Ridley Road and Hoxton markets. Discussing his motivation for getting involved, Green explained: “I’ve had my studio in Hackney for 3 years so feel part of the community, and as a small business myself I really understand the driving force behind the campaign.” Two further bags by Atalanta Weller and Simone Rocha will be available in September.

Last weekend saw the first bags going out to visitors of Broadway and Chatsworth Road markets in the east London borough. By lunchtime, the 500 canvas totes given out from a small council trailer had gone. Stall holders were all surprised, if not slightly bemused, by how many people had inquired about the tokens. Anabela Osan, who works on a cake stall, said she couldn’t believe how soon her vouchers went.

Inés Sordo, 21, who lives in fashionable Shoreditch, had read about the bags in the council’s newsletter. Though she periodically visits Broadway market, she had come down specifically that day to get a William Richard Green bag, a designer she likes but can’t usually afford. She explained: “Unlike normal designer collaborations which tend to be for big charities, I like that 100% of my money is going to stall holders. I love Broadway market, it’s an important part of the neighbourhood”.

Like Hindmarch’s bag, the environmental factor is also important in this project. Feryal Demirci, Cabinet Member for Neighbourhoods for Hackney Council, explained that the bags were not just a means to get people to the markets, but also a way to encourage sustainable shopping: “reusable bags for shoppers to use instead of plastic bags”.

The bags tap into the modern day conscience perfectly: save the environment and the British high street in one go. As shoppers at Broadway market stashed freshly baked bread, packages of smoked salmon, olives and all the other treats that complete a lazy weekend shopping trip into the canvas bags, it was clear that another successful designer collaboration had taken place. Though naturally in this trendy part of London, there was no accompanying frenzy.

You can find the bags at Ridley Road Market on February 3 and Hoxton Market on February 4.

Pic. Kikishua

The BBC today confirmed the dates for the Radio 1 Hackney Weekend and announced performances from Ed Sheeran, Michael Kiwanuka, Jessie J and  Professor Green.

The two-day Hackney Marshes event will take place on 23 and 24 June and 100,000 tickets have been made available. The event is set to feature over one hundred UK and international artists. The full list of artists performing can be viewed here:

Jules Pipe, Mayor of Hackney said: “Radio 1 are bringing the biggest event in their history to Hackney and we’re playing our part to make it the best ever. The line-up is impressive and, with much more to come, the Hackney Weekend will be at the top of the list for music fans this year.

The BBC couldn’t have made a better choice – the Hackney Marshes is a unique venue, there’s a huge level of local enthusiasm and, with the Olympic Games in Hackney, we’re better prepared than anyone to host the event”

Professor Green said: “Hackney is a great place, so events like this and the Olympics will help showcase the borough in a positive light. It’s going to be an amazing weekend and I’m delighted to be a part of it.”

Radio 1 will carry out outreach activities in east London ahead of the main event. This will includes the Radio 1 & 1Xtra Academy, which will open on 1 June. Young people from Hackney will be invited to attend and take part in workshops and sessions on a range of subjects including business, the arts, career development and media skills, including radio production and journalism.

Hackney born Radio 1 & 1Xtra DJ Trevor Nelson said: “It’s not just the main event that will have a lasting impact in Hackney and the area – but the exciting projects that we are doing beforehand – like the Academy. I’m proud to be an ambassador for this event and I can’t wait until June!”

Tickets for the event are free, but a small fee of £2.50 per ticket will be charged in order to cover ticket handling and administration costs. People interested can register at http://www.bbc.co.uk/radio1/hackneyweekend/2012/tickets/ but registration does not guarantee a ticket. After registration, they are welcome to apply for a ticket at 11am Sunday March 25 and 4 pm on Monday March 26. Most of the tickets are reserved for Hackney and the remaining five Olympic boroughs will have first come first serve basis.

East London Lines had previously reported that Hackney Council is calling for people to volunteer at the event.

Pic. Duygu Saykan

A ‘Creativity in Mental Health’ event involving Tower Hamlets Council and a wide range of east London charities was held in Mile End yesterday.

The event was organised by Community Options, a support, advice and recovery service for mental health patients, and took place in the Mile End Ecology Pavilion.

Under the motto ‘Your Say, Your Day’, the day got under way with a dance and music workshop followed by songs by the Harmony Choir. In the afternoon, east London charity organisations including Family Action, Empower Youth, Studio Upstairs, Sam Shakes, Squeaky Gate and Social Action for Health presented their services for people sufering from mental health issues.

Food and drink was provided as mental health patients got involved in a variety of art and music therapy workshops. Attendants also were given the opportunity to perform a piece of music. The Council’s mental health workers were present to answer questions from patients.

Community Options keep a database of all Tower Hamlets mental health patients who have been discharged, aims to maintain contact with them and provide weekday activities.

Jeff Parkinson, 54, who ran a workshop on Chinese Art said: “I run a variety of art work shops and I usually work with people in their 70’s or 80’s and try and get them enthusiastic about art. I have been doing this for about 15 years, providing art workshops for mental health patients.”

Shirin Mustafa from Community Options said: “We are working on the Involvement Project, which aims to stimulate a positive dialogue between commisioners, service providers and service users. This team is about stimulating patients’ creativity, and we cover drugs and alcohol abuse, personal development and relationships – all of the areas that affect a person’s mental health.”

Simon Guntan from Squeaky Gate spoke after seeing a thirty minute concert given by patients in the event: “The majority of the people who performed today are our patients. The lyrics of the songs are written by them entirely based on the things that matter to them. The song we just heard was about homelessness. It was  hard work getting them to perform, as you could see some are still shy while singing. But it is a great achievement. Since they are homeless, they want to keep eveything they have got, including their artistic talents. We encourage them to work together, to encourage each other, there is real team spirit. It takes time but when they took to the stage they showed us real rewarding results.”

The Creativity in Mental Health event takes place every three to four months. The next event will take a place on Thursday May 3.

The lyrics to the song performed by mental health patients yesterday are as follows:

IT’S MY HOME

Sitting here in this dirt Street

Just watching people walk on by

Looking at their faces

Makes me feel like I wanna cry

Knowing their going back to

A place they know so well

Everything is kind od rosy

Everything is kind of swell

(Colin Rapth, 2010)

Pic: Virador

A controversial waste plan that could see an incinerator built on Beddington Lane, was approved by Croydon Council on Monday in spite of concern from local people and Green councillors.

Croydon Council said that a contract has not yet been signed  and that planning permission has not yet been applied for.  However, waste company Viridor was previously selected as the preferred bidder for an incinerator on Beddington Lane by The South London Waste Partnership (SLWP). The SLWP  provides waste management for Croydon, Sutton, Kingston and Merton councils.

If the plan goes ahead, the incinerator could become operative by 2015.

The proposal has caused concern among local residents in Croydon area. Jerry Wood, 35, told Eastlondonlines: “I think is not a good idea to choose Beddington Lane as the incinerator site. As we in Croydon live downwind, there is no doubt that we will be the recipient of air pollution”.

But Croydon Council said the proposed facility would be eco-friendly and safe: “If planning permission is granted the Energy Recovery Facility proposed for Beddington would use the latest technology to thoroughly clean any emissions before they leave the facility. The proposed facility would also have to operate under an Environmental Permit issued and regulated by the Environment Agency which will ensure that local air quality is not compromised.

“Viridor’s proposal is a safe, environmentally sustainable and cost-effective way of dealing with household waste,” Bownas added. “Instead of being buried in the ground, this waste would be turned into 26 megawatts of electricity. It is enough to power the facility itself and supply 30,000 homes. The facility would also enable the work to restore the existing landfill site to amenity parkland for the Beddington Country Park and Wandle Valley Regional Park to be accelerated.”

According to Croydon Council, Viridor is planning to do an Environmental Impact Assessment to ensure the safety of the new facility.

Viridor will also undertake a public consultation in February this year to gather feedback from local residents about the proposed development.

In recent weeks, environmental campaigners questioned the SLWP’s decision to build a new incinerator on the Croydon/Sutton border instead of using an existing facility. And local campaign group Stop The Incinerator say the proposal does not sit well with Croydon Council’s aim to achieve a 70 per cent recycling rate in the borough.

pic: Albert Steinberger

Lewisham Council has launched an online survey asking residents for their views on safety in the borough.

Residents have the opportunity to respond until February 22.

According Metropolitan Police statistics, the crime rate of Lewisham is on par with the London average. Lewisham ranked 18th out of 32 London boroughs in December of last year, with 2040 registered criminal offences.

The areas Lewisham Central and New Cross present higher crime rates. Both wards together are responsible for 20 per cent of crime recorded in the borough.

Anti-social behaviour is the most common crime in Lewisham. Violence against the person, residential burglary and cars thefts appear as the most frequent criminal offences recorded.

According to the Council’s Safer Lewisham Strategy 2011-2014, the high anti-social behaviour figures are due to the large amount of youngsters on the borough.

The document, published last year, states: “As a statistically ‘young’ borough Lewisham has a much higher number of young people compared with adults, and young people tend to be more criminogenic between the ages of 15-21. There is an ongoing challenge of tacking Personal Robbery, Knife Crime and Youth Violence – the number of these offences tends to be higher in Lewisham than for its statistical neighbours.”

The survey also raised concerns about a large number of crimes going unreported.

According to Lewisham Council, the survey’s results will be used by The Safer Lewisham Partnership to set its priorities of the coming years. The partnership includes the local authority, the police, probation and fire services, and a number of health and voluntary organisations.

pic: women connect

Elevating Success, which offers educational training programmes to local individuals, finished their first enterprise programme in December. Eight out of the ten trainees who made it to the final stage were women. These successful candidates are now embarking upon their first entrepreneurial venture, marking the increasing influence of women in business today. One of them is Maired Gorman.

When the bell sounds, Gorman finishes teaching history at a Croydon secondary school but her day in the classroom is not yet over. The next stop is a local housing development space in West Croydon, where she runs ‘education2excel’, a homework club she has recently set up for local primary school children.

Gorman told EastLondonLines: “I have been teaching for 20 years and I wanted to use my teaching skills to start something of my own. I am currently juggling my work as a supply teacher with getting my homework club of the ground and I hope one day it will grow to something I can dedicate all my time to.”

Research carried out by the Professional Boards Forum found that 14.9 per cent of UK directors at Britain’s 100 largest public companies are women, up from 12.5 per cent in 2010. The increasing numbers of female owned businesses is also reflected on a local level as more and more women are starting entrepreneurial ventures that support their community. Andrew Brown, the director and founder of Elevating Success,said: “There has been a definite increase in the numbers of women going into business. We have found that many of the successful women entrepreneurs in our area know the local people, know what the community needs and have been able to start a business that has been both popular and supportive.”

Elevating Success is part of a growing number of organisations that equips people with skills necessary to start a business, including legal know-how, market research skills, financial management, and client relationship development. Out of the 47 who began the trainee course, 36 were female, which suggests that increasingly, women are seeing starting their own business as a career option.

Maired said: “I went along to the course just out of interest. I had an idea of running a homework club for a while but doing the course showed me how to put my idea into practice. It has really energised me.”

Starting a business has become a more desirable career move for many women, who struggle to fit their jobs around family responsibilities or have found that restrictions at work have prevented them from excelling.

Andrew Brown said: “We have a lot women who have reached a certain point in their careers and have said to themselves, ‘I have had enough of that. I’m doing it myself’ and many do not believe in the possibility of career progression in their jobs.”

Brown also said there have been a lot of mothers who are still looking after their children and need to earn a living that will work around their families. One such example is Sharon McLean, who has been running her own business for ten years and finds being her own boss has made being a dedicated mother to her four children more manageable.

McLean told Eastlondonlines: “If my child has an assembly in the morning I know I can shift things round and make it.”

Before starting ‘Business with excellence’, which offers mentoring and advice to small companies, Sharon had been working for ten years as a financial manager for a bank, where she worked from 9-5 and then often had appointments afterwards. “My previous job was often really long hours and spending time with my children was not always easy. Childcare is also really expensive so I wanted a job I had more control over so after my second child I decided to start something new.”

Andrew is now running his second, smaller business start-up course where nine out of the ten people are women. “The people who have come to us are really exciting and full of ideas and I’m enjoying running the course for a second time.”

Recent research from the Institute of Leadership and Management has shown that as pay cuts and job losses continue, many women have found that the glass ceiling has become harder to break. Out of nearly 3,000 managers questioned, 73% of women agreed that many female workers still faced barriers in the workplace whereas only 38% of males felt this was the case for men.

Pic: Milennial Myth

Tower Hamlets activists will kick off LGBT History Month tonight with a talk held at the Tower Hamlets Local History Library & Archives on Bancroft Road.

Author and human rights campaigner Roz Kaveney will share a platform with Jack Gilbert, co-chair of local forum Rainbow Hamlets, which is hosting the event.

The talk will begin a month-long celebration of lesbian, gay and transgender history. LGBT History Month is a annual event that began in 2005 after the abolition of Section 28, a controversial statute forbidding local authorities to “promote homosexuality”.

Gilbert said the talk would not only bring activist together but be “a prime opportunity for the general public to learn about the untold stories of the area.

“The press is often full of stories about problems between communities in Tower Hamlets, but the point about what we’re doing is about building community life and building understanding between communities.”

Kaveney, who at the event will describe her involvement with the Gay Liberation Front in the 1970s and time as a deputy chair of human rights group Liberty, said east London played a key but often neglected role in LGBT history.

“People often forget the working class roots of parts of the LGBT community – it’s always been a place where the more impoverished sections of the queer community lived. I ended up in the east end when I transitioned – because I was poor!”

The author, who has lived on the border of Hackney and Tower Hamlets for 40 years, writes on her website: “I was reared Catholic but got over it, was born male but got over it, stopped sleeping with boys about the time I stopped being one.”

Robert Thompson, chair of the Lesbian and Gay News Media Archive, will also give a speech. LAGNA compiles articles and news clippings to keep track of the changing perceptions of gay and transgender people through time.

Management committee member Peter Kelley said: “The purpose of LGBT history month is to celebrate histories that have been outside of mainstream of history and hidden. It’s just as much about the present as the past.”

Gay rights groups clashed with the EDL and Muslim activists last year over stickers posted across Tower Hamlets that read “Gay Free Zone”. 18-year-old Mohammad Hasnath was fined £100 in June for a public order offence in relation to the stickers.

Kaveney told EastLondonLines such conflicts were regrettable but distracted from the question of “the real enemy”, which she identified as fascist groups.

“East End residents were prominent in the fight against Mosely and his fascists throughout the 40s and the 50s. Even when they haven’t been able to rule the streets of the east end, east enders have remembered that they are the enemy and fought them elsewhere.”

Gilbert believes there is still work to be done, citing many homophobic incidents that are reported without leading to police action, but said the situation had improved in the last 20 years.

In January Tower Hamlets council ranked first among London boroughs and 16^th in the country on a list of gay-friendly employers compiled by gay rights charity Stonewall.

For more information, visit the Rainbow Hamlets webpage. The talk begins at 6pm and continues until 8:30.