'Go Home' Racist Van Meeting in New Cross

On July 22nd 2013, the Home Office sent its infamous 'Go Home or Face Arrest' vans out on the streets in parts of London, targeting undocumented migrants. The next day, a shopkeeper in Peckham (Sally from Persepolis) tweeted that a racist had shouted that she 'f*** off back home'

There's no surprize in this sequence of events, variations on 'Go Home' have been racist slogans par excellence for many years - used by the National Front in the 1970s among many others. And when the Government is legitimising the use of the phrase, it's hardly surprizing if racists on the streets feel emboldened to use it too. I'm sure Sally wasn't the only person to hear it in the past couple of weeks. No doubt many pointed out the same irony as she did:  'As she's from Essex she was wondering if she should do it after the rush hour'. I don't think Sally is any kind of migrant as it happens, she just runs a shop that sells Iranian produce. But as for actual undocumented migrants, many of them have been here for years too and this is their home. Indeed some of them were even born here, since bizarrely children born in the UK and living here permanently do not automatically become British Citizens.

Still the 'racist van' fiasco has at least made people sit up and take notice of the dubious practises of the UK Border Agency, including targeting people using public transport (not a new phenomenon - see this report from Transpontine last year on Immigration Fishing Expeditions).

The Refugee and Migrant Forum of East London (RAMFEL), the Migrants Rights Network (MRN), and solicitors Bhatt Murphy and Deighton Pierce Glynn have joined forces to run a series of workshops across London to support migrant and refugee community organisations, activists and interested individuals to campaign against the ‘Go Home’ campaign and the summer of attacks on immigrants.

They say that these short two hour sessions will 'provide an update on what has happened; explain the rights of those targeted by immigration checks and stop and search;  explain what groups and individuals can do to campaign on a local and national level, (including how to lobby elected members and decision makers to make sure anti immigration activity is monitored in your local area); how to respond to the current various national consultations that will affect migrants'.

The South London workshop will take place on Tuesday 20th August 2013, 6 pm to 8 pm, in  Room 144, Richard Hoggett Building, Goldmsiths College, Lewisham Way, SE14 6NW.

For more information contact Lucy Mercer on 0208 478 4513, event@ramfel.org.uk or Juan Camilo j.camilo@migrantsrights.org.uk

Lewisham Hospital Consultation Ignored

The 'Trust Special Administrator' appointed by the ConDem government to oversee changes to health services in South London has recommended proceeding with closing not just the accident and emergency department but maternity services at Lewisham Hospital. The recommendations were included in the original consultation document issued in late October 2012, and are reiterated in the final report to Tory Health Secretary Jeremy Hunt - who will have the final say on whether or not to implement the changes.

The final report ignores the results of the consultation which were overwhelmingly against the proposed changes to Lewisham Hospital. According to the official Ipsos MORI Independent summary of the consultation: 'The consultation ran for 30 working days and received a total of 8,224 responses from stakeholders, patients, the public and health professionals... Regarding the proposed changes to urgent and emergency care, many individual respondents opposed the changes (90%), while amongst Lewisham residents (who make up a large proportion of the consultation responses received), the level of opposition rose to 96%. Overall, there was limited support for these proposed changes (eight per cent). Amongst organisations and groups responding via the response form, the majority opposed the proposed changes to urgent and emergency care (24% support vs. 67% oppose)...

A large proportion of the free-text comments provided stated that University Hospital Lewisham (UHL) should keep its Accident and Emergency (A&E) department. The reasons underpinning this were good perceptions of the UHL service and not wanting to waste money from the refurbishment; the need for a large population to be served by an A&E; seeing it as unfair to penalise UHL when it is performing well; concerns about capacity at other A&Es; concerns about travelling to other A&Es, including travel times and their impact on safety'.

As well as generating the largest demonstration seen in Lewisham for at least a generation, the changes to the local hospital have been opposed by a wide range of public, political, professional and clinical opinion. If democracy did what it said on the tin there would be no question of the plan proceeding. The overwhelming majority of people living in a borough, and many beyond, are horrified by the plans.

GPs oppose the changes

Cleary the notion that the National Health Service should respond to the views of patients is just empty rhetoric, and so too is the myth that local GPs have real influence. The GP-led Lewisham Clinical Commissioning Group also opposed the cuts to services at Lewisham Hosptial. In their response they said:
'We have concerns that for the Lewisham population the outcomes will be poorer access, a reduction in overall quality and choice, poorer health outcomes and a widening of local health inequalities... Lewisham residents, Lewisham Council and Lewisham GPs have all voiced their opposition to these proposals very clearly... The draft proposals would lead to more expensive, complicated and longer journeys for Lewisham residents. Lewisham has a diverse population with pockets of particularly high deprivation across the borough. The issue of transport is a significant one for the population many of whom are dependent on public transport and have very limited incomes.

Lewisham residents are being hit hard by the financial crisis, mainly as a result of unemployment and loss of discretionary income primarily from benefit changes and increasing fuel prices. If acutely ill patients are no longer admitted to Lewisham Hospital, this will result in increased costs incurred by relatives and carers when visiting patients admitted to alternative hospitals.  As submitted by our Director of Public Health separately: residents from deprived communities in the three most affected postcode areas (SE6 4AN, 4TW, 2BY) will experience public transport price increases of £1.90, an 82% increase in the cost of travel. These costs cannot be reimbursed under the Hospital Travel Cost Scheme. Relatives and carers forced to use private hire transport will incur far greater price increases. Residents across deprived communities in SE6 and SE13 will experience price increases of between £5.30 and £16.60...

We do not believe that the claim that 77% of patients currently seen at Lewisham A&E will be able to be catered for at the new UCC [Urgent Care Centre]. Figures from other UCCs would suggest less than 50% and possibly as few as 40% of current attendees would have their needs met by this new unit. This has implications on patient flows with significantly more patients attending other units - chiefly from our local patient surveys during this consultation period, King’s College Hospital (KCH)'.

From this moment despair ends and tactics begin

It is no great surprize that the results of the consultation have been so comprehensively ignored. The reality of high profile consultation exercises is that a controversial proposal like this would never have been put in to  the public domain without prior agreement in principle that it is going to go ahead. The likelihood that nobody in Lewisham would like it would have been factored into the decision as a manageable risk - after all nobody in Lewisham votes Conservative anyway..

The only way these proposals are going to be defeated is if the political risks to the Government spread further than they had planned.  The closure of Lewisham services needs to be raised as a national issue that shows what's really happening with the NHS, linking up with similar campaigns elsewhere such as those opposing A&E closures at Earling and Central Middlesex hospitals.

And people in other parts of South London, including in Southwark, Bexley, Bromley and Greenwich, need to be shown how the cuts at Lewisham will have a knock on effect on them by placing a greater strain on accident & emergency and maternity services in their area, as well as making them have to travel further for health care in many cases.  The Greenwich Clinical Commissioning Group response for instance notes that 'Lewisham relatives will need to visit acutely ill patients in Queen Elizabeth Hospital and Greenwich residents will need to visit patients having non-complex elective surgery in Lewisham hospital (as will Bromley, Bexley, Southwark, and Lambeth residents as the non-complex elective unit becomes more popular)'.

The next focus will be a lively protest in the lead up to the filming of BBC Question Time at Goldsmiths in New Cross this Thurday, starting at 5:30 pm.

Then there will be another Save Lewisham Hospital demonstration on Saturday January 26th, assembling at 12 noon at Lewisham Roundabout (by the station) and marching to Mountsfield Park. Details of how to get involved in building the demonstration here.

See also Crosswhatfields?; Evening Standard

Any Questions and Question Time in New Cross

The Dimbleby brothers are taking up residence in South East London next week with both BBC Any Questions (on Radio 4) and Question Time (on BBC 1) being broadcast from New Cross.

On Thursday 10th January, David Dimbleby chairs the first Question Time of 2013 at Goldsmiths in New  Cross.

The very next day, 11th January 2013, Jonathan Dimbleby will be presenting Any Questions from St Catherine's Church in New Cross (Kitto Road, SE14) with Deputy Leader of the Labour Party Harriet Harman MP, Deputy Leader of the Liberal Democrats Simon Hughes MP, John Cooper QC and Sir Malcolm Rifkind.

In the interests of political balance, tickets are distributed to local political parties as well as to the public via an application process. The search is on to find ten Tories in the borough of Lewisham to fill their quota!

Lewisham Keep Our NHS Public has called a protest at the BBC Question Time event to highlight the threat to health services at Lewisham Hospital and elsewhere in SE London. They are calling for people to meet at the Richard Hoggart Building at Goldsmiths from 5:30 pm onwards next Thursday 10th January.

Save Lewisham Hospital - it's on!

The day after Lewisham NHS Choir were seen by millions on BBC, the BBC has reported tonight that Lewisham's Accident and Emergency department will next week be recommended for closure:

'A London hospital trust which ran up debts of £150m should be divided up, a report will say next week. Spiralling debts led to South London Healthcare Trust becoming the first NHS trust to be put into administration. A government-appointed administrator will say on Monday its three hospitals should be hived off to nearby trusts...Lewisham Hospital's A&E unit has been earmarked for closure in the report, six months after it reopened as part of a £12m refit...

The Princess Royal is likely to be taken over by King's Health Partners in south London, Queen Mary's would be taken over by a mix of Dartford and Gravesham and Oxleas NHS trusts and the Queen Elizabeth is expected to join up with Lewisham Hospital'.

The rationale, such as it is, seems to be that Lewisham will merge with Queen Elizabeth in Woolwich, and as the latter has an A & E they won't need two! The whole point of casualty departments though is that they are close to the communities they serve so that people can get quick access to healthcare in an emergency (clue's in the name). For most people in Lewisham the far side of Woolwich Common might as well be the moon, especially if they are in distress, don't have a car, or can't drive it (yes sometimes people who need emergency care have been drinking). Increasing the journey time to hospital will put lives at risk.
It will also lead to a downgrading of Lewisham Hospital, paving the way for further closures in the future.

The Save Lewisham A&E Campaign is now officially underway. There's a Public Meeting on Thursday, 8th November, 6-8pm in Lessoff Auditorium at the Hosptial (Speakers: Jim Dowd MP, Heidi Alexander MP, Mayor Steve Bullock, Dr Louise Irvine, local GP and BMA council member and others).

A demonstration 'Hands Around Our Hospital' is planned for Saturday 24th November: 2pm, march from Loampit Vale roundabout to Lewisham Hospital, 3pm, link hands around Lewisham Hospital. Be there.

People Before Profit Housing Conference

Lewisham People Before Profit are holding a conference on the future of social housing tomorrow. They say: 'A housing crisis is engulfing Britain.  Housing benefit costs spiral; homelessness increases; private rents soar; council rents rising to 80% of private rents; squatting is criminalised; thousands of homes lie empty. All these issues will be addressed at next Saturday's conference, to be held from 11am to 5pm at All Saints Community Centre, New Cross Road, SE14 5DJ on corner with Monson Road.  Come along and give us the benefit of your ideas and experiences'.   

There will be workshops on 'Which option for Lewisham’s Council Housing? Changes to housing and

council tax benefit and the consequences of the new ‘Universal Credit’; Setting up a housing

co-operative; Property guardians; Combatting the new law on squatting; and much more!'

Bus, NHS and Workfare Protests

On June 22, New Cross bus garage was shut down by the London bus workers strike in support of a bonus for Olympic Games working comparable to other transport workers. Pickets were outside the garage and judging by the endless beeping were getting plenty of suppport from people driving past.

(picture from East London Lines)

Workers on some bus companies were stopped from striking by court injunctions, but a few days later  (on 27 June) buses were delayed at some of these by demonstrations by strike supporters. This included the London General bus depot on Mandela Way, SE1 - buses for the 1, 453, 507 and 521 routes operate from there. 

(picture from Willo31)

South London Healthcare Trust went into financial meltdown last week, with the Government threatening to put it into administration. NHS Trusts don't sell stuff, apart from some privileged services to private patients, so if they are losing money it generally means that they are not getting enough funding to provide health services. And/or, as in this case, they are paying millions of pounds out each week to private companies for the use of buildings built under the Private Finance Initiative (PFI) scheme.

Socialist Party supporters protested outside Queen Elizabeth Hospital in Woolwich on Saturday, proclaiming 'Scrap PFI, cancel the debt'.

Next weekend (Saturday 7 July), there will be another anti-workfare protest at Blackheath Holland & Barrett shop, meeting at 1 pm  (see reports of previous actions here). Further details on facebook.

[update 7 July - the Blackheath protest has been cancelled after Holland & Barrett announced yesterday that they were pulling out of the workfare scheme]. 

History Corner: Resisting the National Front 1980

In 1977, the famous Battle of Lewisham occurred when a march by the extreme right wing racist National Front from New Cross to Lewisham centre sparked fighting between anti-fascists, the NF and the police. But sadly this was not the end of the NF in South London. In 1980 there were two marches in quick succession, one in Southwark and one in Lewisham.

The NF march in Southwark took place on Sunday 2 March 1980, despite an earlier unsuccessful attempt by Southwark Council to get it banned. 'Around 1,000 Front supporters took part in the march from Wyndham Road, along Camberwell Road, to Camberwell Green, turning left in to Peckham Road, along Lyndhurst Way to residential Holly Grove [in Peckham] for an open air rally. The marchers - mostly teenage skinheads... chanted "National Front is the white man's Front, join the National Front". There were roars of "N---er Lovers" and "Kill the reds" whenever the few onlookers - mainly from windows - shouted anti-Front slogans' (South London Press 4 March 1980). The leader of this motley crue of racists was then NF Chairman Andrew Brons, who spoke at the rally at the end. He is now a BNP Member of the European Parliament.

The NF speak outside derelict house in Holly Grove 1980,
© Jim Rice, www.londonphoto.co.uk

A similar number of anti-racists turned out to oppose the march, with the counter-demonstration called by Southwark Campaign Against Racism and Fascism (SCARF)*. But they were prevented by the police from getting near to the NF: 'Hundreds of officers threw a cordon around them as they gathered outside the London College of Printing, Elephant and Castle... The organisers were informed of the progress of the march by motorcyclists riding between the two rallying points... Some marchers headed for New Kent Road only to be turned back by lines of police'.  Police also cordoned off all side roads along the route, banning pedestrians and traffic. There were ten arrests (SLP 4 March 1980). At one point 'A group of demonstrators started running, trying to get ahead of the escorting police, and scuffles broke out. Several policemen were bowled over' (Times 3 March 1980).

'Keep Britain Two Tone - Demonstrate Against National Front March' (Rock Against Racism)

The Lewisham March

On Saturday 12 April 1980, 100 NF marched from Clapham Junction to Wandsworth High Street. The following weekend they moved on to Lewisham. The march there has been called after Lewisham Council refused the NF permission to use a Council building for a meeting during its Greater London Council election campaign for its West Lewisham candiate Lynda Mirabita.

The route of the NF march on Sunday April 20 1980 was kept secret until the last minute - it went from Forest Hill to Catford where 'A rally was held in a confined areas bordered by Catford greyhound stadium, a railway embankment and bridge, a second railway line and a canal' (Times 21 April 1980). According to the South London Press (22 April 1980):  'Estimates varied between 250-700 NF marchers - mostly young skinheads - against 1,000 counter marchers. Marquees were put up in Hilly Fields for the 4,000 police drafted in for the day'. The police used similar tactics to those employed in Southwark: 'The Anti Nazi League grouped its supporters by Lewisham Town Hall but they were unable to reach their target because police had cordoned off all side streets along the route... mounted police prevented counter-demonstrators breaking through a cordon at Holbeach Road. About 50 protestors tried to reach the Front marchers by cutting across the Private Banks Sports Ground and a football match was temporarily halted as police rugby tackled the demonstrators on a pitch... Another group, armed with spanners patrolled the streets in a car searching for Front members'.

The St Pauls riot in Bristol had taken place just before the Lewisham march, and The Times reported (21 April 1980): 'After the march several hundred of the Anti-Nazi League counter-demonstrators suddenly turned and charged down Lewisham High Street. A few bottles broke against windows to cheers and a brick smashed a tailors shop window. Some youths, mainly black, changed 'Bristol, Bristol' as they ran... Mounted policemen were sent through back streets to cut of the charging youths.' Five people were arrested when police found four petrol bombs in a car in Lewisham High Street, and in a trial later that year four teenagers were jailed for six years each for possession of the petrol bombs which the prosecution claimed they had intended to use against the National Front (Times October 22 1980).

In total 72 people were arrested on the day of the demonstration, the majority of them counter-demonstrators. The police tactics were criticised by Christine Trebett of the All Lewisham Council Against Racism and Fascism: 'Police were present in enormous numbers and prevented the counter-demonstrators reaching the National Front by sealing all routes to the march and threatening arrest to those who tried to break through; counter demonstrators in Brockley Rise were lined up against the wall and people leaving the local public house were prevented from going home. At about 4.00 pm the National Front were diverted into the Catford stations and the counter-demonstrators started to march towards Lewisham. The police lost control and started to run along the main road, driving vans fast along both sides of the carriageway; the police then formed up and drove back the demonstrators, kicking and knocking down any who resisted and making arrests. The police were particularly violent towards the women demonstrators' (report to West Lewisham Labour Party, 1980, included in 'Modern Britain since 1979: a reader', ed. Keith Laybourn and Christine Collette, 2003).

A racist GP in New Cross

Shockingly, a local GP addressed the NF march at the end: 'Dr Robert Mitchell, who has a surgery in Queens Road, said yesterday he would advise his patients against mixed marriages only if asked for advice. He also believed in repatriating black people. Dr Mitchell polled 1,490 votes when he stood as National Front's Parliamentary candidate in Deptford last year'. Lewisham Labour Councillor David Townsend said 'We must take an urgent look at how a doctor with such appalling views can be allowed to practice in such a racially sensitive area as New Cross' (SLP 22 April 1980).

The following March, the NF proposed to hold a provocative march past the scene of the New Cross Fire but this, and a planned counter-demonstration, was banned by the Home Secretary (Times, 5 March 1981).

Racist attacks

Marching wasn't the only thing NF activists were up to at that time. In May 1980 the sometime chair of Southwark NF, Kenneth Matthews, was jailed for six years for a plot to burn down Union Place Resource Centre. This workers co-operative printshop was on Vassall Road near the junction with Camberwell New Road (next to the Union Tavern pub), and printed lots of radical literature.

Matthews(aged 44) lived in Lorrimore Square SE17 and worked for Southwark Council as a dustcart driver. Stephen Beales, another NF member, was jailed for 3 years for the same offence and for petrol bombing a club used by Irish people in Lorrimore Sqaure. A third member of the gang was sent to Borstal (South London Press 22 May 1980). They had been caught outside Union Place with petrol, thunder flashes, and wires intending to make an electronically-detonated petrol bomb (Times 23 May 1980).

Not long afterwards, three other men were jailed for a violent racist attack on a black van driver at East Greenwich service statin (SLP, 10 May 1980)

*The Ruinist found some SCARF graffiti from that period still visible in 2009 in Amelia Street, Walworth - can you still see it?:

Last updated December 2023, added RAR image.

Pensions Strike

Today saw civil servants, health workers and other public sector workers taking action against deteriorating pensions - changes which can be summed up as 'pay more, work longer, get less'. It wasn't as big an event as the strike last November which also included teachers, local government workers and university staff, but nevertheless up to 400,000 people are estimated to have taken action. 

I came across pickets at Kings hospital in Camberwell (pictured) and the Equalities and Human Rights Commission in Tooley St SE1; I gather there were also people out at Lewisham College, Catford Job Centre, the Kaleidoscope child development centre (Rushey Green Road) and no doubt many other places in SE London. A demonstration headed into central London from St Thomas' Hospital.

Elsewhere in a not entirely unrelated protest up to 30,000 police officers marched against cuts - police sergeant tweeter Rob Jackson reported last night that 'Over 100 Lewisham officers will join other Met Colleagues for the March against police cuts'. Hardened strikers and protesters with experience of being pushed around by the police can be forgiven some schadenfreude, and may not feel inclined to rush to support them. But whether we like them or not, we shouldn't lose sight of the political significance of  the police marching against the policies of a Conservative government on the same day as other public sector workers.

It sometimes feel sthat we are living through a re-run of the 1980s. The Thatcher Government of that period destroyed industries, threw millions on to the dole and ruthlessly deployed its forces against opposition. But however much it was hated by many, it also maintained its domination by winning the active support of parts of the population including many working class and  middle class people who felt their living standards were rising. The police were obvious beneficiaries, but they weren't the only ones. The difference this time round is that there is virtually no 'positive buy in' to the Government. Hardly anybody feels that they are better off, the most the Government can rely on is a widespread despair about alternatives and fuelling a brooding resentment against 'better off' public sector workers. Even it were true that public sector pensions are better all round (they are for some, but not for everybody), making them worse won't help people working in the private sector. In fact the worse conditions are for public sector workers, the less private sector employers will have to do to compete and attract staff - so conditions are likely to deteriorate all round.

(if you've got any other South London strike/protest news, please comment)

(Brixton Blog covers the strike in Lambeth, Big Smoke has pictures of London protests, Lewisham teacher Martin Powell-Davies covers some local action; Harpy Marx has pictures of the demo at St Thomas')

Heaven, Baby

The Harts Lane Community Studio is an empty garage in the road next to Sainsburys in New Cross, one of the vacant Lewisham Council buildings recently occupied by People Before Profit.

Yesterday they had a one day Pop-up Arts Show there ('Heaven, Baby'), along with an impromptu street party complete with food and bands playing on the roof just like The Beatles' last gig.

Work by Andrew Clarke

I only caught the end of it, but there was some strong work on display. It wasn't labelled so I'm not quite sure who produced what  -so if I've got any of the attributions wrong please let me know.

A Rachel House piece - punk icons Patti Smith, Ari Up and Poly Styrene:
 'To be normal is not a healthy aspiration'

Installation by Katie Surridge

Painting by Boudicca Collins

If nothing else, the event highlighted how empty buildings can be quickly transformed into interesting social spaces with a bit of imagination and daring.

People Before Profit Occupations

People Before Profit are continuing their occupations of empty council housing, with their first action of this kind in Greenwich. They say:

'Supporters of Greenwich People Before Profit have occupied a huge house that has been left empty and neglected by Greenwich Council for two years. All the families living in the house – at 88 Eltham Road near the western border of the borough – were evicted by the council. As far as we know, the evictions took place after the leaseholder couldn’t afford to renew or extend the lease. The building had been half-heartedly secured, so it was not difficult for campaigners to gain access. We found that the overall condition of the house was good – although there is work to do, with wires and copper piping severed, floorboards lifted and a section of ceiling down. Previously the house was divided into seven flats and we will try to make as much of it as possible habitable.

If anyone would like to help work at the house, or give support in other ways, please come to our next meeting on Saturday 14 April at 2.00 p.m., at 88 Eltham Road, or email greenwichhousing@peoplebeforeprofit.org.uk

Greenwich People Before Profit is following the example of our counterparts in Lewisham, who occupied five long-term empty council houses in February. They are refurbishing them for homeless families to live in. Given the need for social housing in the borough, and the particularly serious housing problems for young people, it is scandalous that this property has been empty for two years. We want to make it habitable.

Homelessness is rising again. Government figures show that in the last quarter of 2011, homeless applications were up by 18% across England and 36% in London. London rents are unaffordable. We hope everyone in Greenwich, including the council, will support our action. The Empty Homes research group says that Greenwich has 3416 empty homes: 362 belong to the local council, the rest to housing associations and private landlords. Why can’t these properties be put back to use?'

Lewisham

Meanwhile Lewisham People Before Profit have extended their campaign to target empty social housing belonging to other landlords:

'tipped off that London & Quadrant Housing Association was selling off houses at auction we decided to investigate. We visited 34 Hazeldon Road, Crofton Park, at viewing times and found two purpose built flats in need of redecoration but in perfectly good structural condition. The auctioneers' catalogue showed a guide price of £275,000 to £300,000 for the whole building, not giving first time buyers the option of buying just one of the flats.

We occupied the flats on Tuesday 27th March, shortly after the last viewing had been held and have cleaned the flats thoroughly, changed the locks and had the steel security doors removed. We have written to L & Q asking them to make the flats available to families from Lewisham's housing waiting list and are awaiting a response. We have had several enquiries and the first family is moving in this weekend'.

Five Council homes put up for auction by Lewisham Council remain occupied (see previous report at Transpontine), as well as a vacant garage on Hart's Lane, New Cross (next to Sainsburys). The latter was originally offered up for auction with the five houses - there are plans to convert into a temporary community/arts space.

Freedom for Tooting

Some friends of mine have recently moved from New Cross to Tooting, so as a parting gift Transpontine will take a rare roam into the western lands of South London to offer up some nuggets of cultural history from Tooting and Balham.

Tooting Popular Front


In the late 1970s comedy TV series Citizen Smith, the Tooting Popular Front was a fictitious South London revolutionary group with slogans including 'Freedom for Tooting' and 'Power to the People'.

In real life, Balham was arguably the birthplace of British Trotksyism. In the early 1930s, a group of South West London socialists were expelled from the Communist Party for their opposition to Stalin's policies. Their ranks included Hugo Dewar from Tooting CP, Reg Groves and Harry Wicks and they constituted themselves as the Balham Group of the International Left Opposition operating from 79 Bedford Rd, SW4; Groves later wrote a biography of the 'red priest' Conrad Noel, and indeed some of the Balham Group had been close to Noel's Anglo-Catholic socialist 'Catholic Crusade'.

Punk and stuff

Charlie Harper of punk band UK Subs was a hairdresser on Tooting Broadway when the band started out in 1977. Guitarist Nicky Garratt recalls: 'We based ourselves out of Charlie’s hairdressing salon... where we stored our battered Marshall P.A. system in the back room along with drums, amps, baskets of towels and a huge supply of hair care products. The Salon, became both meeting place and hang out over the next year mostly because it was one of the few places where Charlie could be found with any degree of certainty'. In Julien Temple's film Punk Can Take It (1979), based around the band's music, there a scene with Charlie Harper in the hairdressers.

Other musical connections include:

- Marc Bolan (T-Rex) went to Hillcroft School in Beechcroft Road, Tooting (now known as Ernest Bevin College) - as a teenager he lived in Sun Cottages, Summerstown;
- Captain Sensible of The Damned was born in Balham;
- Kirsty McColl started out in a band called The Tooting Frooties;
- Kitchens of Distinction did a song 'On Tooting Broadway Station':

Angela Carter

Writer Angela Carter grew up in Balham - her favourite building was the Granada Cinema in Tooting, where she went as a child with her father, as recalled in a 1992 BBC documentary: 'This cinema, with its mix of the real and false - real marble hugger-mugger with plaster, so you have to tap everything to see if it sounds hollow or solid - this apotheosis of the fake. There was a functioning cyclorama, in my day, clouds, stars, a sun, a moon, drifting across a painted sky. I held my breath in the gallery of mirrors - anything might materialise in those velvety depths, monsters, beauties, my own grown self. I would have been seven or eight. This was the first great public building that ever impinged on me - and even though it was then jam-packed with queues, the marble steps polished by uniformed ushers, all the same, from outside it was just a concrete bunker. So there was always the element of surprise. It was, like the unconscious itself - like cinema itself - public and private at the same time... I fell in love with cinema although I scarcely remember the movies I watched with my father, only the space in which we sat to watch them, where we sat with all those wonderful people waiting in the dark'.

World War Two

In October 1940 at least 66 people died while sheltering at Balham tube station during a German air raid. The tunnel was flooded after a bomb fractured water mains. The incident features in Ian McEwan's novel Atonement, and in the film version of the book.

Lewisham Keep Our NHS Public Protest in the Blue

Lewisham Keep Our NHS Public has called a lobby in Bermondsey at the office of Lib Dem MP Simon Hughes to call on him to oppose his Government's Health and Social Care Bill.

It will take place on Saturday 25th February at 12 noon by 4 Market Place, off Blue Anchor Lane, SE16 3UQ  (facebook details here). They promise a sound system and a choir.

Local Currency Conference in Deptford

Utrophia Project Space (Deptford High Street) is hosting a Local Currency Action Conference on Saturday 18th February (11 am to 7 pm). They say: 'The Local Currency Action-Conference will look at the role of money in an economy, and how a local currency can be harnessed to promote small businesses, entrepreneurship and a stronger local economy and identity... The aim of the action-conference is to provide an informative and lively introduction to community finance to those interested in listening, and then developing a concept of a local currency that could be rolled-out in Deptford and New Cross for those interested in doing. At the end, it is hoped that we will have a blue-print to start working on making a local currency a reality'.

Previously Utrophia artist Stephen Molyneux has designed a prototype Deptford Pound to get people thinking about this.

Local Pounds for Local People?

Molyneaux's 'Deptford Pound' talks of 'Helping small businesses and a strong local economy in times of global economic meltdown'. I do understand that in a world where many people's livelihoods feel threatened by impersonal global economic forces there is an attraction in apparent local solutions. Personally though I am sceptical about some of the radical claims made for currency reforms and local currency schemes and would like to see more debate about some of the underlying premises. For instance:

- is there really such thing as a discrete local economy? - currency schemes seem to posit a shopkeeper utopia of small businesses trading with each other in the local area, but this can obscure the real economic relations that underpin the 'local' economy. Even the simple cup of coffee sold in the local cafe is the end product of the labour of countless people on farms in Latin America, on ships crossing the oceans, in roasting factories, packaging plants and warehouses in Europe.

- is keeping it local necessarily a good thing? - isn't there something rather selfish about the desire to keep money circulating in limited areas amongst comparatively privileged people (e.g. small business owners). When I go to my local corner shop I know that some of the money I spend there is probably going to help relatives in Sri Lanka, and indeed money sent home by migrants (remitttances) constitutes a major financial inflow to many of the poorest parts of the world. A lot of the money spent in shops, restaurants and takeaways in South East London goes to other parts of the world in this way - good thing too.

- are small businesses intrinsically more socially beneficial than larger ones? Do they always treat their staff better for instance, pay better wages, recognise unions... Anyway today's small business may be tomorrow's big one - after all Tesco's started out as a market stall in Hackney.

Well I could go on,  I 've been reading Marx's Capital alongside attending John Hutnyk's lectures on this at Goldsmiths, which are open to non-students like myself. The interesting thing is that around 100 people have been attending most weeks, the majority of them out of personal interest rather than for course credits. There is clearly a thirst to understand what's happening in the world economy, even if the reading is sometimes hard work.  Trying to get to grips with what money is and what it does is complex but important, so thinking about what it all means for an area like Deptford may be good. But can global problems be solved at the local level, or even the national level?

History Corner: The Indian candidate for Deptford, 1885

The latest edition of Lewisham History Journal (no. 19, 2011) includes an interesting article by Ray Thatcher on ‘Lal Mohun Ghose and Politics in Victoria India and Deptford’. Ghose fought two election campaigns in Deptford as a Liberal Party candidate in 1885 and 1886, standing on a moderate Indian nationalist platform of greater self-rule for India within the British Empire as well as supporting Home Rule for Ireland.

Funds were raised in India to support the campaign to secure the election of Indian representatives to the British parliament from British constituencies on the basis that while the British government ran India, Indian voters had no vote in elections. Deptford appears to have been selected as the battleground because its radical working class base were thought more likely to be sympathetic (this was before the formation of the Labour Party of course, when there was still a radical liberal current). His supporters included Florence Nightingale, who met him and invited his wife to her house.

Ghose was a figure at national Liberal gatherings in this period, including meeting Prime Minister Gladstone as part of an Indian delegation, and he took part in a mass meeting in Piccadilly against Britain's war in Sudan (Times April 3 1885). He was originally selected as a prospective candidate for Greenwich before switching to Deptford in time for the 1885 election.

In the 1885 general election campaign, Ghose attended many meetings across the area, ‘Accompanied by his son and daughter and brother’. He ‘spoke at a large open-air meeting in a field opposite New Cross Gate Station in June, presided over by Mr Osborne Morgan MP, who, according to Reynold’s Newspaper “referred to the fact that he was the first native Indian gentleman who had ever aspired to win… an English constituency"’ (Thacker). Other meetings took place at the New Cross Public Hall, St Peter’s Hall in Brockley, the Lecture Hall in Deptford High Street, and at Deptford Green.

Hundreds of people gathered outside the count at the St Paul’s Vestry Offices in Tanners Hill, where it was initially announced that Ghose had won. However in the final count he narrowly lost, securing 47.5% of the vote against the victorious Conservative candidate Evelyn (52.5%). In 1886, he again polled well with 3,055 votes (45.3%) against Evelyn’s 3,682 (54.7%). This was a very respectable result given the nature of the campaign against him, with the local paper arguing: ‘We retain all the objections we have ever expressed to the intrusion of this Oriental gentleman into our home politics and we know that his birth and religion [he was a Hindu] form a strong and natural objection in the minds of a large number of intelligent Christians in this country to his assuming a position of a parliamentary representative’. Never mind he intrusion of Britain into Indian home politics!

The Graphic reported (10 July 1886) that the victorious Conservative candidate received an 'ignomious reception' on the streets: ‘Our forefathers would have been rather astonished, not to say scandalised, at the idea of men with dusky complexions, and non-Christian religious views, putting up for seats in the House of Commons. But nowadays we are accustomed to all sorts of queer things, and so our equanimity is not disturbed by the fact that our Indian fellow-citizens have on two occasion during the present election tried to scale the walls of St Stephen’s… The peculiarity about the Deptford election, as witnessed by our artist, was that Mr Evelyn was apparently less popular than his Asiatic rival, the former, though a winner, being pelted; the latter, though a lose, being cheered. Perhaps it was a case of the classes against the masses’.

Ghose returned to India in January 1887 following a big meeting at the New Cross Public Hall (Times, 8 December 1886). Technically he may not have been the first person of Indian descent to stand for parliament - Ochterlony Sombre, of mixed Indian and Scottish descent, was elected to parliament in 1841. But Ghose was the first fully Indian candidate to stand for the British parliament. While he was unsuccessful he paved the way for the election of the first Indian MP, Dadabhai Naoroji, who pursuing the same Indian nationalist strategy was elected as Liberal MP for Finsbury Central in 1892.

Interestingly William John Evelyn, who defeated Ghose in 1885 and 1886, himself resigned as  Conservative MP for Deptford in protest against the 'execrable tyranny' of coercive British rule in Ireland. And in the 1888 general election the Conservative candidate came within a few hundred votes of being defeated by another radical liberal candidate, Wilfrid Scawen Blunt, who was in prison in Ireland for his Home Rule activities. So perhaps in contrast to any assumptions about the xenophobic patriotic masses in Victorian London, half the population in Deptford voted for an Indian nationalist and then a pro-Irish prisoner in three successive elections in the 1880s.

Illustrations from The Graphic, 10 July 1886. See also a previous post on this episode at Caroline's Miscellany.


Lewisham History Journal is published by Lewisham Local History Society. It isn't available on-line but you get copies if you join the society - or you can read it in most Lewisham libraries.

Lewisham houses occupied

Lewisham People Before Profit has occupied 5 houses which Lewisham Council was planning to sell of at auction today. They say:

'In a bid to stop 5 family houses being sold off at auction today (Monday 13th February) activists entered and peacefully took control of the houses earmarked for "disposal" by Lewisham Council. All of them would be suitable for family's to rent if they were refurbished, one only needs a lick of paint and the installation of a bath or shower - someone could move in there tomorrow!

There are around 50 families in Bed & Breakfast accommodation at the moment, paid for by us, the council tax payers. A further 350 are in hostels and around 1000 families are in temporary accommodation here in the borough of Lewisham. With such a shortage of affordable homes for rent is it a disgrace that the council is considering selling off these homes, and with reserve prices way below current market levels.

The Auction catalogue can be viewed here,  and the affected houses are lot numbers 41, 64, 84, 85 and 123. If the council won't live up to its responsibilities in refurbishing them Lewisham People Before Profit will consider taking on that task, employing and training unemployed young people from our borough to fit new bathrooms and kitchens where necessary. There will also be carpentry and plastering work. All the roofs are in good repair'.

The properties concerned are:

- 58 Friendly Street, SE8 (complete with an old WW2 shelter in back garden);
- Angus Street, SE8  (the ex-Deptford Green caretakers house);
- 81 Etta Street, SE8

- 128 Albyn Street, SE8
- 61 Lampmead Road, Lee Green, SE12

Lewisham Fuel Poverty Protest Report

I posted earlier this week on the issue of fuel poverty, noting that around 100 people die each year in the borough of Lewisham from cold-related causes. The latest available Government figures, as discussed in Parliament in November 2011, show that in 2008 an estimated 83,000 households in South East London were unable to afford to keep themselves warm in cold periods. With rising fuel prices and decreasing incomes, the position has no doubt got worse since then.

On Friday evening a protest took place at Lewisham Town Hall in Catford as part of a Fuel Poverty Action weekend of action.



'Bring down the Bills! Energy for our needs! Not corporate greed'
Banner at Lewisham Town Hall

They report: '30-40 activists and residents from Lewisham occupied and warmed-up inside Lewisham Town Hall. They staged a peoples’ forum inside, where people shared their experiences of unaffordable energy bills and expressed their anger at the profiteering energy companies and complicit government. People discussed the many examples of community controlled renewable energy projects across the country and how we might transition Lewisham and, more broadly, the UK, to a democratic energy system that works for people’s needs, not for corporate greed. After the peoples’ forum, people moved outside and got even more toasty around a bonfire of burning energy bills'.

See also report at East London Lines.

 

For information on support available from Lewisham Council see here.

Fuel Poverty in Lewisham

It is a shocking fact that in Lewisham each Winter around 100 people die as a result of the cold. Many if not most of these deaths are preventable, with a signfiicant factor being fuel poverty. An increasing number of people simply cannot afford to keep themselves warm, with a direct impact on their health and well-being. According to the government-commissioned Hills Poverty Review,  at least 2,700 people will die this winter in Britain as a direct result of being ‘fuel poor’.

Tomorrow evening (6 pm, Friday January 27th) there will be a protest at Lewisham Town Hall in Catford as part of the Fuel Poverty Action Winter Warm-Up Weekend 'to demand democratically controlled and accountable energy, decent fuel-efficient housing, and an end to deaths caused by fuel poverty'.  Community Action Lewisham say: 'Poverty, poor housing, no insulation, social isolation, debts...all these conditions affect our ability to pay the bills. None of them are accidental. With six energy companies controlling 99% of our energy supply in the UK, giving us the 'choice' of over 400 different tariffs, whilst hitting us with price hikes of over 15% last year, it's clear we have no power to decide where our energy is sourced and how much it costs. This has to change. Access to warmth, decent housing, and health should be rights not a privilege. At the moment, government and energy companies are preserving the market over peoples' needs and our environment'.

The event will include 'a Peoples' Forum, a burning of bills to keep warm, and a sharing of tea and information on how to bring down the cost of heating. Fire Eaters are also expected' (facebook event details here)

Lewisham report 

A report published by Lewisham public health in 2010 as part of the local Joint Strategic Needs Assessment explores the local extent 'of seasonal excess deaths, which relate to the difference between the number of deaths during the four winter months (December to March) and the average number of deaths during the preceding autumn and summer (April - November).  These deaths are of those people who would not have been expected to die anyway due to illness or old age in the next few weeks or months. Many of these deaths are amongst older people, especially women, and those with underlying health problems. People living with underlying heart, circulatory or lung disease are at the highest risk...'

'Each one degree Celsius decrease in average winter temperature results in 8,000 additional winter deaths in England... However, these deaths are preventable; some countries with more extreme weather conditions than the UK experience fewer winter-related deaths. For example, Finland has 45% fewer winter deaths than the UK... In Lewisham there was an average of 105 excess winter deaths per year between August 2004 and July 2007. This equates to an excess winter mortality index (EWMI) of 18.9 for Lewisham (i.e. there was an 18.9% increase in deaths during the winter months'.

The report highlights that fuel poverty is a significant factor - 'Fuel poverty is when a household needs to spend more than 10% of its income on total fuel use to heat its home to an adequate standard of warmth. Fuel poverty frequently affects people from vulnerable groups that already experience a disproportionately higher level of general poverty and deprivation. These groups include older people, households containing children (including lone parents), households with large adult populations, vulnerable groups (including disabled people), and single person households.In Lewisham in 2007, an estimated 5.5% of households were at risk of fuel poverty. By ward, this varies from 4.9% in Blackheath to 6.3% in Catford South'.

Between 2003 and 2007, fuel poverty in England rose from 5.9% to 13.2 % of households, representing an increase from 1.2 million to 2.8 million households. The increase in fuel poverty since 2004 can be largely attributed to increases in fuel prices. The overall effect of fuel price rises since 2004 has far outweighed the impact of increasing incomes and energy efficiency'.

(Source: Lewisham JSNA: Seasonal Excess Deaths, Lewisham PCT, 2010)

(update 29.1.2012: see report and pictures of Lewisham protest: http://transpont.blogspot.com/2012/01/lewisham-fuel-poverty-protest-report.html)

Racist Murder in SE London

Everybody now agrees that the killing of Stephen Lawrence in Eltham  on 22 April 1993 was a terrible racist crime and two men have been jailed for his murder. Back in 1993 it was very different - Government and media indifference (with some exceptions) and police hostility to those campaigning against racist attacks.

It was a terrible time in South East London, when the borough of Greenwich was named by some as 'Britain's racist murder capital' (Independent, 12 June 1993).  In February 1991, 15-year-old Rolan Adams was killed on the way home from a vist to the Hawksmoor youth club in Bentham Road, Thamesmead.

The Rolan Adams banner on a march to the BNP HQ in February 1992

In July 1992, 15 year old Rohit Duggal was stabbed to death outside the kebab shop in Tudor Parade, Well Hall Road. A white youth named Peter Thompson was later jailed for his murder.

Relatives of Rohit Duggal on a November 1992
demonstration to the BNP HQ in Welling

Then came the murder of  18-year-old Stephen Lawrence in April 1993, also in Well Hall Road in Eltham. As with the Adams and the Duggal cases, the police and Crown Prosecution Service tried to deny the racist aspects of the murder.

Stephen Lawrence's parents at a vigil in May 1993

There were other murders too elsewhere in South London. Ruhullah Aramesh, a 24 year old Afghan refugee, was beaten to death in Thornton Heath by a gang armed with iron bars in July 1992. In October of that year Sher Singh Sagoo, a Deptford market trader, was attacked and killed. And murder was just the tip of the iceberg - between August 1990 and May 1991, 863 incidents of racist attacks and harassment were reported to the Greenwich Action Committee Against Racist Attacks alone.

I went on many demonstrations at that time, usually led by the families of murder victims. There was the Anti Racist Alliance demo in June 1993 from Norbury Park to the scene of Ruhullah Aramesh's murder.

There was the march against the British National Party's 'Rights for Whites' demo in Thamesmead in May 1991, provocatively called a few months after the murder of Rolan Adams in the same area where he was killed. The police mobilised their forces included mounted police to stop the anti-racists who outnumbered the BNP ten to one (roughly 1200 to 120).

I remember seeing riot police baton people's heads out of sight of the cameras in a car park between housing blocks on the estate. I took a friend with a head wound to Kings hospital in Camberwell as we didn't think the local casualty department would be a safe place to go.  Incidentally Stephen Lawrence (then at Blackheath Bluecoats School),  took part on the anti-BNP demo that day too.

'Horseback police in riot gear charged hundreds of screaming demonstrators as a protest ended in violence. Policy carrying batons and wearing protective visors waded into demonstrators in Thamesmead on Saturday. About 20 protesters were arrested and one PC injured as campaigners tried to block a march by the right-wing British National Party. More than 150 BNP members had intended to march from the Hawksmoor Youth Club to Bentham Road – just a few feet from where 15 year old Rolan Adams was stabbed to death in February. But police changed the route after discovering more than 3000 anti-racists were to stage a counter demonstration. The anti-BNP marchers, led by the Greenwich Action Committee Against Racist Attacks, became angered when they realized they would not be allowed anywhere near the right-wingers… as a breakaway group ran down a cul-de-sac guarded by  police horse riders, trouble flared. Police reports claim bricks and missiles were thrown at officers… An eyewitness saw three members of the crowd trampled underfoot by horses’ (Erith and Crayford Times, 30 May 1991).

Welling demonstration, October 1993

Increasingly the headquarters of the BNP in Upper Wickham Lane, Welling, became the focus of demonstrations. The point wasn't that the racist murders were being explicitly organised by them, but that they were spewing out racist poison that was legitimising these attacks.

The biggest demonstration took place on 16th October 1993.  Anti-fascist magazine Searchlight estimated 40,000 people attended, the Independent 25,000 and Socialist Worker 60,000. Either way it must have been one of the biggest demonstrations ever seen in South East London. The Unity demo against the BNP started off with a massive rally on Winns Common, before heading off towards Welling.

Auschwitz survivor Leon Greenman leads the march

According to Searchlight (November 1993), 'the marchers arrived at the crossroads where one road went to the nazi headquarters and the other [Lodge Hill] was the route imposed by the police. At this point the Unity banner at the head of the march was facing into the road leading to the BNP headquarters. The stewards and Leon Greenman, an 82 year old survivor of the Nazi death camps, tried to negotiate passage through the police line. When it was refused, some of the marchers sat down'. Riot police, including some on horseback, charged the crowd and there were riotous scenes with smoke bombs,  flying bricks, snatch squads and 3,000+ police. At least 56 demonstrators were injured and 31 people were arrested on the day' (Sunday Times, 17 October 1993). Personally I didn't even see any of this until I got home on TV as I had been trapped in the crowd by Plumstead cemetery - like much of the crowd unable to move because the police had blocked both Upper Wickham Lane (towards the BNP HQ) and Lodge Hill (the route the police had earlier said the march would have to take).

One woman reported at the time 'I was sitting on a wall, just trying to avoid the police. A policeman pushed me off. The police charged from a side street. I tripped over a bush and four police just laid into me with truncheons.  I was on the floor and one of them was kneeling on me, just hitting me. Later I saw a man in a wheelchair. The police charged again and again and just knocked him over. He fell out of his chair. My friend - she's 16 - tried to help him up and the police started hiting her' (Socialist Worker, 23 October 1993) 



Anti-Nazi League chief steward Julie Waterson
bleeding after being batoned by police in October 1993

The BNP HQ finally closed in 1995, following action by Bexley Council.

See also: Bob from Brockley, pretty much summing up what I think about the whole affair; 853 - thoughts of a SE London contemporary of Stephen Lawerence, and a reminder  'that it was the community in Eltham who gave up the names of Dobson and Norris in the first place. It was the local Metropolitan Police who decided that the death of a black man wasn’t worth investigating properly, not the people of Eltham'; Ian Bone points out that one of the police officers who mismanaged the original Lawrence investigation became a Croydon Conservative councillor - David Osland wrote to his superiors in September 1993 that 'Our patience is wearing thin on 3 Area (south-east London)... with the Lawrence family and their representatives'.

[update 11 January 2012 : 'The dad of Stephen Lawrence has passed potentially crucial new evidence on his son's murder to cops, he revealed yesterday. Neville Lawrence, 69, was told a suspect had now confessed to being at the scene of the murder.The development comes after two men were jailed for life last week for the gang murder of Stephen in 1993. Mr Lawrence said: "After the verdict, I met two people in Brockley, London, on Saturday who knew one of the guys that was part of the gang. They mentioned the boy confessed that he was there on the night. They gave me their names and addresses and I passed them on to the police." Mr Lawrence called on the racist pair to tell cops where the knife used to stab his son is hidden. He added: "There is forensic evidence on that knife to convict somebody else.". His plea came as a burger bar worker claimed Norris was involved in a brutal attack on him six weeks BEFORE Stephen was murdered. Gurdeep Bhangal, 41, said he confronted the yob after he banged on the window of the Eltham branch of Wimpy. He said: "I got hold of him and was stabbed by another person." No one was arrested, [The Sun, 10 January 2012]

As Bob from Brockley reminds us in the comments, while failing to find evidence against the killers the police were deploying resources in infiltrating anti-racist groups - and indeed a former police spy has admitted to taking part in attacks on police lines in Welling (see Bob's post on this affair).