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John Vane: Man kicks Lime bike

An unexpected assault on a mis-parked e-bike prompted a bout of random speculation
John Vane

I aimed a tut at it myself as I race-walked along Cricketfield Road, unimpressed by its obstructive presence on the pavement. But that was no rebuke at all compared with the violence that would follow.

The man had already stepped into my eye line, stepping off the opposite kerb, crossing the road on foot, wearing no coat, carrying no bag, apparently proceeding with no clear or urgent purpose.

There was something odd about him, but he was moving only in my vague direction, and I kept walking, unperturbed except for a tiny fear that he might seek to engage me in a random and baffling conversation.

I had passed the parked Lime bike by the time he reached it, but only just. That is why I registered the full force of his assault on the obtrusive e-bike, one moment insolently impeding the path of blameless pedestrians, the next brutally felled by a single kick of unexpected ferocity and force.

I mean, those things aren’t light. Heaving them upright when you find them sprawled across the slabs at the end your road or piled in chaotic heaps requires a fair amount of effort and strength. Dumped motionless and upright, they aren’t that easy to move aside. But this guy, not young, not tall and not big, had levelled one with one big swing of a little leg.

It was vicious. I heard him muttering as he contemplated his motionless victim. His tone was one of mixed scorn and satisfaction, but I can only speculate about specifics: “Eat shit, agent of Uber”, perhaps; or “stitch that, micromobility menace”. Mindful of the man’s sudden and very physical venom, I hastened on towards Dalston, in any case not wanted to be late for a planned close encounter with a dentist (the e-bike in my photo is from a different unhappy London scene).

I wonder what he did next. Was his e-bike assault a one-off, or was it part of an ongoing vigilante mission that would see a trail of delinquent Limes, Dotts and Zoomos flattened by the righteous sole of whatever he was wearing on his feet?

Are e-bikes his pet hate? Judging by how he was dressed, he hadn’t travelled far, raising the possibility that he lives close by and routinely surveys the view from his window, primed to unleash an avenging wrath. Or was he simply minded to vent his rage on any object on the street he could batter to cathartic effect?

The latter seems a bit more likely. After all, the angry man’s act did not rid the pavement of Lime litter, it simply rendered it horizontal and therefore even more of a nuisance than before. There is, though, one broad conclusion to be drawn – those revved up bicycles can excite strong emotions.

John Vane is a pen name used by Dave Hill, publisher and editor of On London for fiction and sketches. Buy his London novel Frightgeist: A Tall Tale of Fearful Times here or here.

Categories: Culture, John Vane's London Stories
Tags: Cricketfield Road, cycling, Dalston

Talk About London: An Earl’s Court update

The latest episode of the podcast hears from two leading lights of the development company that hopes to bring the wonder back to a famous part of inner west London
Dave Hill

Ambitious plans to rebuild, revive and rejuvenate a once legendary part of Earl’s Court were lodged with the neighbouring boroughs of Hammersmith & Fulham and Kensington & Chelsea last autumn. The mountain of documents sets out how the Earls Court Development Company (ECDC) intends to fill the 44-acre space formerly occupied by the famous Earls Court Exhibition Centre buildings, the eldest of them an art deco edifice that served as both a local landmark and as a beacon for culture and innovation known around the world.

The company hopes to secure planning consent in the coming months and to start work on the site next year. It is a scheme that aims to achieve a lot of different things and be a stand-out response to London’s new and future needs.

The guests for latest Talk About London podcast, a joint endeavour of On London and The London Society, are two of the ECDC’s leading lights: Rebekah Paczek, Director of Public Affairs, Social Impact and Community Relations, and Sharon Giffen, Head of Design. They spoke to me and Leanne Tritton about the site, the architecture, the open space, building bonds with the local people and generally bringing “the wonder” back to an area with a special place in London’s history. You can listen to the podcast here or watch it below.

All previous episodes of Talk About London are available here.

OnLondon.co.uk provides unique coverage of the capital’s politics, development and culture with no paywall and no ads. The vast majority of its income comes from individual supporters, who pay  £5 a month or £50 a year. Details HERE. Follow Dave Hill on Bluesky.

Categories: Analysis
Tags: Earl's Court, planning, regeneration

Charles Wright: Barnet FC loses stadium vote, but it isn’t full-time yet

The council's planning committee rejected an application to "bring Barnet back" but the "grey belt" planning goal posts could yet move
Charles Wright

On Monday evening Barnet Football Club’s bid to return to its historic High Barnet home stumbled at the first hurdle. It was rejected by Barnet Council’s strategic planning committee – predictably, perhaps – as “inappropriate development” within the Green Belt that would cause an unacceptable “loss of public open space and loss of playing fields”.

The Barnet team played its final game at its old Underhill stadium, its home for more than a century, back in 2013, going into exile in Harrow after clashing with the council over the future of the ground and failing to find a local alternative.

The decade away from their home borough hasn’t been positive, off the field at least. Attendances went down, with not enough fans travelling across the boundary. Coupled with lower season ticket sales and sponsorship, that was adding up to losses of a million pounds a year, threatening the club’s survival, even as on the pitch it regularly challenged for promotion and last season made a triumph return to the Football League.

A return to the borough too was always the club’s and its fans’ ambition, and plans for a new £14 million, 7,000-seat stadium on council-owned playing fields to the south of the old site – now filled by a secondary school – were submitted at the turn of the year. The scheme would ensure the club’s future and benefit a community in which Barnet FC has played a central role for generations, the club said.

Barnet had become renowned for defending of its extensive Green Belt. Long-standing Chipping Barnet MP Theresa Villiers, whose constituency included the Underhill site, was a front-line warrior in the battle against suburban development, dubbed by some the “patron saint of Nimbyism”. But her defeat in last year’s general election was widely seen as a sign that, even in the leafy suburbs, the tide was turning in favour of “builders, not the blockers”.

As a consultation on the club’s scheme began, that looked like the case. The Barnet Residents Association concluded that the scheme would be of “considerable value” to the community. There was “nothing intrinsically attractive” about the site, and there would be still be “sufficient green” for dog-walking and “other recreational purposes”, they said. Even the influential Barnet Society, defender of the Green Belt since 1945, added its qualified support.

After vigorous campaigning by the Bring Barnet Back and Save Barnet Playing Fields groupings, the final public consultation score was 1,274 comments supporting the club and 1,162 against. Local councillors Tim Roberts and Zahra Beg highlighted the divisions, with one addressing the committee in favour of the scheme and the other speaking against it. “The community is divided on this proposal”, Beg conceded.

In one of her final election salvos, Villiers had warned  there were “only five days left to save the Green Belt”. At the time that seemed apocalyptic, and in the end this week’s decision wasn’t close – six votes to refuse and three abstentions. Disappointed fans suggested online that not much had changed despite Villiers’s defeat and Labour taking control of the council in 2022, while LBC presenter Ben Kentish used his considerable platform to call the councillors “self-important Nimbys vetoing everything this country needs”.

Kentish, who grew up near the site, condemned the decision as a “self-indulgent” rejection of “almost £3 million of investment, dozens of new jobs, a new health centre and a community sports facility”, as well as leaving the club in a precarious state, all in the name of preserving “low-quality” land.

Planning decisions must be taken in line with national, regional and local policy though, and Green Belt status affords a high level of protection. Development can be justified only in “very special circumstances” where the benefits of a scheme are judged to clearly outweigh its harm to the Green Belt, as set out in the National Planning Policy Framework. The club argued that case, but in their 120-page report, the council’s planners disagreed.

The development, they said, would be a “significant urbanising intrusion” causing “substantial and irreversible harm to the openness of the Green Belt”. Proposed new landscaping would not mitigate that harm, and the scheme’s other benefits, including new jobs, local economic uplift and community engagement, while recognised, did not outweigh its harm to the Green Belt either, in the officers’ judgement.

Being a Green Belt site, the scheme also had to be considered by City Hall. Its planners agreed with the council that the scheme would be “inappropriate development by virtue of harm to the openness of the green belt”, and that those “very special circumstances” required to shift that conclusion had not been demonstrated.

What about the new “grey belt” rules, effectively allowing building on previously-developed Green Belt sites or on those deemed not to be contributing “strongly” to three of the five statutory Green Belt purposes – checking urban sprawl, preventing neighbouring towns merging, and preserving the “setting and special character of historic towns”? The site fell short on that test, the club argued. But the council’s planners and the committee disagreed, meaning the “very special circumstances” test still applied.

This week’s vote isn’t the end of the matter. The club is “currently reviewing” the decision, its spokesperson said. An immediate option is an appeal to a planning inspector, where the Grey Belt issues as well as the appropriate weight to be given to the scheme’s harms and benefits would be considered afresh.

The decision this week by City Hall that Spurs could go ahead with plans for its elite women’s academy on former golf course Green Belt land in Enfield, close to its existing men’s facility, will be of interest. Its conclusion that the need for the centre and the lack of other suitable sites in the area in that case did amount to very special circumstances showed a different approach to the balancing act at the heart of all planning decisions.

Meanwhile, with all councillors supporting the club’s return – though not on this site – there was some confusion at the committee about alternatives. The club had investigated 51 locations without success, the committee heard, with planning officers suggesting it had not looked closely enough at possible previously-developed “brownfield” sites. “Three or four” had been suggested to the club, council leader Barry Rawlings told a recent full council meeting, but no information on that was available to the committee.

Initial disappointment for the club, then. But the decision left grounds for further argument, perhaps particularly around the grey belt policy, which has yet to be tested within London. The debate also provided more evidence of the strength of feeling behind the campaign to “bring Barnet back”, which the council might now be more inclined to support. The club’s stadium game, raising key issues around Green Belt development and attracting attention across the wider football community and beyond, is not over yet.

OnLondon.co.uk provides unique coverage of the capital’s politics, development and culture with no paywall and no ads. The vast majority of its income comes from individual supporters, who pay  £5 a month or £50 a year. They receive in return bespoke newsletters, bargain London event offers and much gratitude. Details HERE. Follow Charles Wright on Bluesky. Image from Bring Barnet Back.

Categories: News
Tags: Barnet Council, Green Belt, planning

Dave Hill: The populist Right exploits London crime

A dreadful killing in the capital is unsolved but when it comes to crime in the city the usual suspects think they know it all
Dave Hill

As I write this, the Met has said it is exploring a number of possible reasons why Blue Stevens, 24, was killed with a knife on a street in Knightsbridge last week. These include it resulting from an attempted robbery. A murder investigation has seen three men arrested. Detectives are saying it “may have been a targeted attack”. For now, that is all we know. Yet when it comes to crime in London, the usual suspects think they know it all.

Naturally, Nigel Farage, leader of Reform UK, reached for his megaphone as soon as the terrible news broke. “London is in a state of collapse,” he pronounced on kindred spirit Elon Musk’s X. “Crime is out of control.” And, of course, Susan Hall, well beaten in last year’s election for Mayor of London yet chosen by fellow London Assembly Conservatives to lead them, sounded off on the same note for LBC. “Nowhere is safe from the wave of lawlessness that has swept cross our city,” she raged, as if still running her hapless mayoral campaign.

Which spectacle is the least impressive? Farage’s opportunism, as gleeful as it is ghoulish, or Hall’s astonishing brass neck? Crime in London (or anywhere else) is a serious matter and its victims deserve better than being recruited to the causes of low charlatans and comedy avengers. Statistics about it need to be handled with great care, but those we have, with due caveats applied, are not consistent with portrayals of London as drowning in a tide of violence and theft.

London portions of the Crime Survey for England and Wales, which asks people about their experiences of crime and therefore captures those not reported to the police, are estimates compiled from quite small numbers of the sample’s interviewees. Approach with caution. That said, they do not suggest “spiralling” rates in recent years.

Offences recorded by the Met for April, May and June of this year show significant percentage falls in theft from the person, personal robbery and “knife crime” and a small drop in violence with injury across Greater London as a whole compared with the same three months of 2024. Not every trend has been in the right direction and the hopeful ones might not last. Again, though, the big picture is not consistent with that painted by Farage, Hall and their eager allies in the media.

How, then, do they justify screaming that the capital is a criminal hellhole? The question would be easier to answer if more journalists asked it instead of providing passive platforms for contestable assertions. But I think those politicians’ reasons are quite clear.

The contribution of “good old Nige” is easily explained – depicting London as “lost” and “fallen” is part of the populist Right’s wider strategy for winning national power, a barely-coded way of confecting a causal link between cosmopolitanism and decline – Farage is a Donald Trump fan, after all. The Tories, of course, are now a Reform tribute act, with Hall its seething personification. In attacking Sir Sadiq Khan because Met officer numbers might be reduced, her austerity amnesia is breathtaking.

There are, though, differences between the two. Hall has a long public history of dark enthusiasms that would be intolerable to a party of the mainstream centre-right if the Tories still matched that description. She is also rather funny in that distinctive, irksome way of people unable to see how ridiculous they are. I believe her indignation about crime and Khan is sincere. What she lacks is one iota of intellectual curiosity about the many reasons why crime rates fall or rise in different places at different times or why simply putting more “bobbies on the beat” isn’t a magic trick for forcing them down. She inhabits the iron bubble of “common sense” and has no intention of coming out.

Farage is more dangerous, and not only because the tainted brew of authoritarianism and nostalgia he peddles is currently more appealing to electors than the Tories’ tattered brand. As his notorious reaction to the Southport murders showed, he is more cynical than Hall and the colleagues who indulge her, more cunning too, and better placed than she, a London politician, to make a loudmouth display of depicting the capital in ways that work to his advantage, framing it for the country he aspires to lead as a once proud British city that immigrants have made dystopian.

The dreadful death of Blue Stevens has provided the populist Right with a new peg on which to hang that ugly old yarn about London – one they will keep telling for as long as they think they can profit from it. It misrepresents the city, harms it and does nothing to make it safer. But that won’t worry those for whom crime in London is not a problem to be solved but an asset to exploit.

OnLondon.co.uk provides unique coverage of the capital’s politics, development and culture with no paywall and no ads. The vast majority of its income comes from individual supporters, who pay  £5 a month or £50 a year. Details HERE. Follow Dave Hill on Bluesky.

Categories: Comment
Tags: crime, Metropolitan Police, Nigel Farage, Susan Hall

Dave Hill: Tighter e-bike rules can help, but renewing London’s street life will take more

Nuisance cycling is just one of the capital's public realm problems in need of concerted action
Dave Hill

London’s boroughs have welcomed government plans for tighter regulation of e-bike renting, a transport option that has transformed travel for the better for some in the capital but made pavements less pleasant and more perilous for many others.

Provisions in the newly-published English Devolution and Community Empowerment Bill owe much to the efforts of Rachel Blake MP, Brent leader Muhammed Butt and others. Assuming they become law, they can help with reversing the degeneration of too many of the capital’s streets. But getting a serious grip on the job is going to take more.

Nuisance cycling as a whole is indulged far too readily. The affluent young males who dominate the London cyclist demographic effectively receive a free pass to ignore rules and break the law, casually sailing through red lights and invading pedestrian space.

The more public money is lavished on their lifestyle choice, the more delinquent they become, routinely ignoring zebra crossings painted in vain on bus stop by-passes that penalise bus users and create real danger for some.

The City Corporation stands alone among London governance bodies in taking serious action against the pelotons of bicycle boy racers who think themselves entitled to ignore the social contract about street behaviour that the majority honour and depend on.

That contract is besieged in many ways and from many quarters. On Politics London, Kensington & Chelsea leader Elizabeth Campbell has contemplated with despair the further damage that could be done to London local government finances by the latest national government funding formula.

Different boroughs stand to be affected in different ways, and some, as Hornchurch & Upminster MP Julia Lopez MP said of Havering, may fare better than others. But more funding cuts risks more, to borrow Tony Travers’s term, “grotification” of London, as boroughs struggle to pay for cleaning and other maintenance.

Neighbourhood street environments really matter in people’s lives, providing close-to-home communal spaces where we not only consume but also mix, linger and relax. When they are tranquil, welcoming and clean, these forms of public realm make us feel good, enhancing our lives. When they are hazardous, edgy and grubby they disturb us and bring us down, feeding feelings of helplessness and gloom.

Uncollected rubbish, antisocial attitudes, rough sleepers and people begging for spare change foster feelings of a city going backwards and an impulse to stay in and withdraw.

These problems are far from unrecognised. The Mayor is seeking to boost post-Covid recovery, announcing last week that 50 grand of City Hall cash will go to each of a dozen London high streets, in line with London Growth Plan ambitions. Councils, charities, the Met and others wrestle with them all the time, but the struggle can feel steeply uphill when the needed resources are scarce. Persuasive, high-profile leadership can help too.

As Campbell remarked, more scope for raising Council Tax would help, but the property value bands put in place, incredibly, way back in 1991 are still judged too politically scary to reform, even though property values themselves have soared. Community empowerment does not, it seems extend to enabling communities’ elected representatives to raise more from those who can afford it.

London’s streets are places where good vibes and bad compete to define how Londoners’ feel about the parts of the city they live in and the capital as a whole. They are key influences on its spirit and on how others perceive it. The stuff of making streets better can seem parochial and small. Yet it is vital to creating the Good City.

OnLondon.co.uk provides unique coverage of the capital’s politics, development and culture with no paywall and no ads. The vast majority of its income comes from individual supporters, who pay  £5 a month or £50 a year. Details HERE. Follow Dave Hill on Bluesky.

Categories: Comment
Tags: crime, cycling, Rachel Blake

News: Londoners’ second preference mayoral elections vote set to return

The government's English devolution bill prepares the ground for the historic right removed by the Tories to be restored
Dave Hill

Londoners are in line to have their right to cast both first and second preference votes for Mayor restored under provisions of the government’s newly-published English Devolution and Community Empowerment Bill.

The Conservatives did away with second preference votes as part of their Election Act (2022), using clauses inserted at the committee stage of the parliamentary process to abolish the use of the Supplementary Vote (SV) system that had been used since the very first mayoral election in 2000 and replace it with the single vote First Past The Post (FPTP).

Guidance published with the Bill (page 61) states that it “makes provision for the use of the supplementary vote system in elections of mayors and police and crime commissioners (PCCs)”, a change that will apply to all of England,

The Conservative government’s change was widely interpreted as a ploy for improving the chances of Tories winning mayoral and PCC elections, as the support of centre and Left-leaning electors was more likely to be split between Labour, Green and Liberal Democrat candidates.

The late Bob Kerslake, a former head of the civil service, wrote at the time that it was “hard to see any other reason for them doing this other than perceived electoral advantage” and the Electoral Reform Society has calculated that the switch to FPTP could have enabled as many as 12 PCC elections to be won by Tories that candidates from different parties would have won under SV.

The SV system in London means that second preference votes cast for either of the two candidates with the most first preference votes are added to those candidates’ totals, meaning the eventual winner has a significantly larger mandate than under FPTP.

Green Party London Assembly member Caroline Russell described the Labour government’s move to bring back SV as “a vital step in restoring democratic legitimacy” which would allow Londoners to “express real choice” and encourage candidates to “appeal to a broader base”.

OnLondon.co.uk provides unique coverage of the capital’s politics, development and culture with no paywall and no ads. The vast majority of its income comes from individual supporters, who pay  £5 a month or £50 a year. They receive in return bespoke newsletters, bargain London event offers and much gratitude. Details HERE. Follow Dave Hill on Bluesky.

Categories: News
Tags: Conservatives, Labour

Julie Hamill: A wholesome birthday adventure

Pottery, a pub quiz and an abundance of comforting Italian food all within easy reach from the front door
Julie Hamill

My daughter Sadie had a big birthday a couple of weeks ago. She suggested we celebrate it with a tour of local providers of food, drink and entertainment, some of which we knew and some we didn’t. We were all up for the adventure she had in mind.

We started at our neighbourhood Italian restaurant, where we’ve been dining as a family since 2010. It’s only ten minutes from home and barely has your nose turned the corner into Station Parade NW2 than it is greeted by beautiful, comforting aromas followed by a warm welcome.

Sanzio’s was named after Italian painter and architect Raffaello Sanzio da Urbino, better known as Raphael (1483-1520). An illustration of a painting by him of his mistress, Luti – also known as “La Fornarina” – forms the menu backdrop. The food is consistently tasty and everything on the menu, like Luti, perhaps, is tempting.

I had nipped in earlier to ask the staff to tie balloons to Sadie’s chair and scatter “21s” all over the table. This was good, because she arrived first with her boyfriend Zach and on seeing the balloons her facial expression landed somewhere between cringe and love – the reaction a parent gets when they’ve done the right thing.

Like any good student who’s home from university and out for a nice meal that their parents are paying for, Sadie’s 18-year-old brother, Archie, combed the cocktail menu and ordered a margarita for his first drink.

As the starters came out and a few more cocktail sips were taken, the young adults divulged a few of the stories they usually keep in the no-parent restricted section, those of house mates, nights out and uni gossip – the good stuff. Being privileged, we had to be careful not to act too keen, hungry or judgy about the juice. Asking too many questions can lead to a slamming shut of the yarn door.

After the meal, when we were all stuffed with good food and conversation, the staff brought Sadie a vanilla ice cream with a candle and we all joined in with Happy Birthday in one of those aren’t-we-all-having-a-good-time-yes-you-must-tolerate-embarrassment-til-we-reach-the-end-of-the-song, nicely stretched out with me doing one too many “Hip-hip Hurrahs..!”

After dinner, we headed to The Black Lion in West Hampstead for the Sunday night pub quiz. We love quizzes. A few weeks prior, Sadie and I came second in a really fun music quiz at The Lexington in Islington. The 1% Club on telly is one of the only shows, if not the only one, that the four of us sit down in the same room to watch. One of us usually gets the last question right (as long as the screen is on pause :-).

The Black Lion quiz tests general knowledge, making it ideal for a family team, with Mum, Dad, son, daughter and Zach providing a wide breadth of expertise across sport, politics, music and science. In addition, my son has that rare, enviable skill of being able to recognise celebrities from childhood pictures of them. He was right – it was a young Lady Gaga.

During the question-calling, the quizmaster’s mic or speakers (or something) didn’t work, causing the older ones to shout, “WHAT DID YOU SAY MATE?” or “COULD YOU REPEAT QUESTION NINE?” at uncomfortable volumes, resulting in major telling-offs in vicious stage whispers: “Mum! You cannot shout like that! Dad! Stop shouting!” These didn’t work because we are the parents, after all.

After an enjoyable (and argumentative) few rounds, our team came fourth out of 20, narrowly missing the bronze. We cooled down in the pub’s breezy beer garden, where Archie paid a rare compliment to his sister and her boyfriend, calling them a “most wholesome couple”, just to get them to buy him an extra bag of crisps (result).

The next day, the actual birthday, we headed to Art 4 Fun on West End Lane to paint ceramics. The basic set-up is you select a bowl, plate, cup, egg cup, ornament or, in my case, a tiny teapot, and sit and paint it. Afterwards, it goes into the kiln, and the results can be collected a couple of days later.

We weren’t sure what to expect, but after the pub quiz and buzzy meal, Art 4 Fun was a calming, mindful activity, and I didn’t realise I hadn’t looked at my phone for two hours. We chatted quietly about nothing in particular.

Sadie’s Greek art painting of Achilles and Ajax playing a board game was super impressive (that GCSE Art wasn’t wasted) and Zach’s seascape-painted bowl was also truly wonderful. As for Mum and Dad, well…we did our best.

Archie took a more abstract approach, pouring the contents of his brain into his painting. The result was a hilarious and brilliant bowl covered in explosions, snakes, portraits of Sadie, Zach, himself, Super Mario, a flower and, of course, a Bart Simpson’s invitation to “Eat My Shorts“, which surely must reside in a corner of every person’s mind.

Art 4 Fun was the highlight of Sadie’s 21st for me, and a genius idea by her to have the family together, doing something we wouldn’t normally do, wiling away the time by dipping brushes in each other’s water and sharing paint colours.

We ended the birthday excursion with an incredible gelato from Amorino – I recommend the chocolate sorbet – and ate it in the sunny NW6 street, transporting ourselves back to Rome, where Sadie and I had enjoyed a gelato in the sun six months prior.

A few days on, we collected the ceramics from Art 4 Fun and laid them out on the table. I felt an immediate affection for these priceless little family gems. Created by the people closest to Sadie, they are practical 21st mementos that she can cherish (and use!) for years. It really was a special 21st adventure, arranged by the most mature grown-up in the family.

Julie Hamill writes novels, appears on Times Radio and does lots more. Follow her on Instagram.

OnLondon.co.uk provides unique coverage of the capital’s politics, development and culture with no paywall and no ads. The vast majority of its income comes from individual supporters, who pay  £5 a month or £50 a year. They receive in return bespoke newsletters, bargain London event offers and much gratitude. Details HERE.

Categories: Culture
Tags: West End Lane, West Hampstead

Can’t Kill The Spirit: A play about protest, politics and relationships

Running at the Waterloo East theatre, this drama about climate change action and the legacy of the Greenham Common peace camp is full of human insights and contemporary relevance
Dave Hill

Can’t Kill The Spirit is a play promoted by the Waterloo East theatre, where it will run until 13 July, as “a timely reminder of the need for upstanders in a world of bystanders”.

With a cast of three, minimal furniture and set mostly in a remand centre, it tells the story of a woman called Chloe, played by Lisa Day, who, 40 years earlier, had been involved in the women-led Greenham Common protests against nuclear weapons. She finds those old fires rekindled by today’s climate change direct action, which her son Joe (Sam Ebner-Landy) is also immersed in.

The play itself, written by Lisa’s husband Robert Gordon Clark, a good friend of and contributor to On London, largely explores the implications for her personal life of Chloe’s decision to put her moral and political convictions ahead of the desire of her husband Mark (Roger Beaumont) for a more tranquil domestic existence as the couple move deeper into middle age, and Joe and their other child enter adulthood.

But it also valuably recalls the big impact Greenham had on British life and public opinion at the time, not only as part of the fraught debate about nuclear proliferation and the presence of US missiles on British soil, but also about womanhood and society.

Criticism of the Greenham women and their “peace camp”, set up around a Royal Airforce Base in Berkshire, often included direct or implied rebukes for their failure to conform to an idea of femininity tied tightly to mothering, the home and certain codes of conduct and appearance. Greenham women were independent, insubordinate and muddy. For some, this alone was too much to bear.

The performance of Can’t Kill The Spirit I saw, last Thursday, was followed by a discussion chaired by Anthony Biggs involving Robert, Lisa, director Lucy Aley-Parker and two Greenham veterans: Rebecca Johnson, these days director of Acronym Institute for Disarmament Diplomacy, and photographer Janine Wiedel, who put her camera to work at the peace camp during 1983 and 1984.

A strong thread of the exchanges, which involved audience members too, was frustration about how little is known about the Greenham campaigners among people below the age of 35. In my experience, something similar is true of another huge phenomenon of the 1980s, the HIV/AIDS epidemic. For young people I know, though very alive to contemporary sex and gender debates, the TV drama It’s A Sin was a revelation.

Is there something of the same forgetting about protest movements against the racism of the 1970s – responses to actual neo-Nazis attacking and intimidating ethnic minority communities in London and elsewhere and, just three decades after the defeat of Adolf Hitler, even winning significant vote shares in elections in the parts of the capital. At least a recent photographic exhibition at Tate Britain captured something of the fear and fightback of that era

The semi-amnesia about an eventful and pivotal period of post-war British history was identified by Robert during the discussion. The big exception is the miners’ strike, perhaps in part because of coal mining’s emotional symbolic presence in British historical narratives – something that resonates with nostalgists like Jeremy Corbyn and opportunists like Nigel Farage alike – perhaps in part because of Billy Elliot.

Can’t Kill The Spirit and the discussion that followed also prompted reflection on the protest politics of today, which, in different ways and for different causes, have become so prominent in London life of late, ranging from Black Lives Matter and Extinction Rebellion during the depths of the pandemic to the continuing demos about Israel and Gaza since October 2023.

How much deliberate disruption of the city is acceptable in a democracy? When does one group’s freedom to protest become another’s unacceptable source of anxiety? Some of those convinced they have a monopoly on the moral high ground can be troublingly lacking in empathy (“What Hamas did was terrible, but…”).

When does protest become an end in itself, a kind of lifestyle choice? And how good are protest politics at effecting changes they want to see? Raising awareness of an issue is one thing. Getting a critical mass of public opinion on your side and, most importantly, getting results, may take quieter, subtler methods and, of course, the stuff some protest advocates despise – compromise.

If you haven’t already seen Can’t Kill The Spirit, I recommend it – and not just because I’m a friend of Robert Gordon Clark and Lisa Day (co-founders of the Play CG Theatre Company).

It is written and performed with great insight and skill, dramatising the tensions between competing commitments; between tending to precious personal relationships and trying to save the world. It stimulates fruitful reflections on the dynamics of power and progress in free societies, not least in the capital where those dynamics are often at their most vivid and contested.

Finally, on top of that, buying a ticket will help support London ‘s smaller theatres – a cause that can never be anything but good.

Buy tickets for Can’t Kill The Spirit here. Photo from Can’t Kill The Spirit Instagram.

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Categories: Culture
Tags: Black Lives Matter, Extinction Rebellion, Waterloo East theatre