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Book Review: From Sylhet to Spitalfields, by Shabna Begum

This exploration of the Bengali squatting movement in 1970s Spitalfields does justice to its importance and also reveals its subtleties and complexities
Seán Carey

Shabna Begum was born at Mile End Hospital in 1976, just a few weeks after her parents and their three-year-old daughter Rasna moved into a small, dilapidated house on Deal Street, a few hundred yards from Brick Lane. The family thought they were renting because they paid for and received a rent book from a “landlord”. In fact, the property belonged to Tower Hamlets Council and the landlord was a con artist. Begum aptly describes her family as “accidental squatters”.

This story sets the stage for a deft exploration of the Bengali squatting movement, which took root in the mid-1970s as a response to changes to Commonwealth immigration policy prompting women and children to migrate to the UK. The 1971 Immigration Act significantly altered entry conditions from work vouchers to family dependency, with profound consequences.

For many years, Spitalfields had been home to single Bengali men who eked out a living from low-paying jobs and lived in shared housing, frequently rotating beds in double or triple shifts. However, this hostel-style accommodation, which is still available in parts of Tower Hamlets, proved unsuitable for reunifying or new families, and finding suitable private or social housing was nearly impossible.

Inspired by the success of local countercultural groups, a small number of Bengalis – which grew into many more – took matters into their own hands. They began breaking into and establishing households in boarded-up slum properties in and around Spitalfields. Notably, Black Power activists of the  Race Today collective in Railton Road, Brixton, such as Farrukh Dhondy, Darcus Howe and Mala Sen, provided crucial ideological support and legal advice.

Begum’s concern that this episode of squatting in Bengali history in the UK has received little attention is well-founded. In particular, she discovered that the archives were lacking in acknowledging women’s contributions to the cause. Because of this scarcity of insider accounts, she, with excerpts of conversations with her parents carefully considered, conducted oral history interviews with former Bengali squatters (she prefers the term Bengali to Bangladeshi). After interviewing over 40 male and female participants in both Bengali and English, she realised that the Bengali squatters exhibited diversity within their ranks.

Begum, the Runnymede Trust’s current interim co-CEO, discovered that while some were proud of their activism, others felt ashamed as it seemed to contradict their cultural values of honour and respectability, both in their homeland and in the diaspora setting. But what all squatters had in common was a history of instances of street racism, perpetrated not only by members of the far-right National Front but also by white neighbours, who saw Bengalis as not belonging to the “real” East End, which was imagined as “essentially and rightfully white”. To make matters worse, these white neighbours viewed Bengalis, because of deliberately propagated colonial myths, as culturally inferior and primitive, and men, in particular, as passive and effeminate.

For an insightful chapter on Sylhet and how Sylheti Bengalis came to settle in the East End, Begum draws on available historical material from a variety of sources, including the writings of locally-based activists Caroline Adams and Charlie Forman, as well as academics such as social anthropologist Katy Gardner and historian Rozina Visram.

We learn that in the 1970s the Greater London Council owned approximately 31,000 homes in Tower Hamlets and the local authority, almost 18,000. Yet waiting list rules based on residency and other factors discriminated against Bengali migrant families. In addition, white housing officers who had considerable latitude in interpreting those rules, further blocked Bengali families from gaining access to suitable social housing. And given the pattern of horrific racial violence and harassment present on many of Tower Hamlets’ all-white housing estates, it’s no surprise to learn that families often preferred to live in or near Brick Lane in the borough’s west anyway.

This groundbreaking book introduces us to some extraordinary individuals, including Jalal Rajonuddin. In 1972, shortly after Bangladesh gained independence from West Pakistan, Jalal, then 12 years old, travelled with his family from Sylhet to Birmingham before settling in Tower Hamlets. A few years later, in the absence of action from the local police, Jalal, a co-founder of the Bangladesh Youth Movement (BYM), organised nightly vigilante groups to protect Bengali households from attack. He also had direct experience of racial violence, as did almost every male his age. Caroline Adams once discovered him unconscious after being attacked by a group of white boys at a funfair in Shadwell.

Another person we encounter is Husnara, who had four daughters when she began squatting. Using a transnational lens, she compares the efforts of women in making squatted premises habitable while also serving as meeting and dining spaces for male activists to the role women played supporting jungle-based freedom fighters during the Bangladesh Liberation War. Husanara modestly describes this as “work you might not see”. But her life story illustrates the significance of women’s domestic roles and traditional gender expectations within east London’s Bengali community. Indeed, Begum claims this domestic work was crucial – without it, the squatting movement, centred on curry cafes on Brick Lane, would have struggled to gain traction.

In the final chapter, titled “Tower Hamlets is not a place you live forever”, Begum reflects on how British Bengali identity continues to change. She cites the sale of properties owned by Bengalis, purchased under the Right to Buy scheme, and the migration of thousands to neighbouring London boroughs such as Newham and Redbridge and to Essex, in the search for family-friendly houses with gardens. Interestingly, some of these vacated properties are now occupied by well-educated (mainly non-Sylheti) Bangladeshis who, before the Brexit drawbridge came up, migrated from Italy, Portugal and Spain (where they hold citizenship) in search of a better future for their children.

Begum also addresses the persistent levels of deprivation in Tower Hamlets and its links to structural and institutional racism. She makes two specific points in relation to housing. Firstly, the borough, which is home to the largest Bangladeshi community in the UK, continues to struggle with overcrowding and a long waiting list for affordable social housing. Secondly, overcrowded housing, along with employment in hard-hit sectors like hospitality and transportation (including taxi driving), has contributed to the disproportionate number of Covid-19 deaths among Bangladeshis.

Not surprisingly, Begum discusses the ongoing Save Brick Lane campaign, led by British-Bengali activists who oppose a proposed development on the Old Truman Brewery site. The site is owned by the Zeloof Partnership, a business founded by a Jewish family of Baghdadhi roots formerly involved in the local garment trade. The plans call for the conversion of a parking lot near the northern end of the row of curry restaurants and cafes into offices, a shopping mall and a restaurant space. Significantly, the digitally savvy activists, who are young and middle-class with ties to the neighbourhood but do not live there, are inspired by the Bengali squatter movement of the 1970s.

The activists correctly assert that Bengali Brick Lane has social, cultural and economic significance beyond its historic association as the UK’s one-time “curry capital”. Local politicians, they believe, are allowing gentrification by default, by neglecting the area. However, Begum also found that not all locals oppose the Truman Brewery plans – some curry restaurant owners support them, believing the development will increase footfall and boost turnover for their businesses at a time when turnover has declined, largely because many City workers are now working from home.

While acknowledging the inherent difficulties of documenting complex social histories, Begum’s work is invaluable. Her informative and thought-provoking book provides a solid foundation for future scholarship by compiling important but often overlooked narratives. It encourages further investigation into this significant but little-known movement. And, most importantly, Begum’s story brings to life people who bravely fought for security and belonging in east London.

From Sylhet to Spitalfields is published by Lawrence and Wishart Limited (£16 paperback). Buy it HERE.

Seán Carey is a senior research fellow in the School of Social Sciences and a member of the Centre on Dynamics of Ethnicity (CODE) at the University of Manchester. An earlier version of this review was published in the Oral History Journal. Follow Seán on X/Twitter. Image from the book’s cover.

Categories: Books, Culture
Tags: Brick Lane, council housing, housing, Tower Hamlets, Tower Hamlets Council

Last lunch at the India Club

Founded in 1951, this timeless treasure on the Strand is finally closing its kitchen there for the last time
Dave Hill

Anticipating high demand, we showed up early. But even at 12:20 the restaurant was heaving and we were told there would be an hour’s wait. These are the last days of the India Club on the Strand, and it is going to be missed.

The history of this institution is well known, but always worth retelling. It was founded in 1951 by the India League, a nationalist organisation set up in London in 1928 by Krishna Menon, a member of the wealthy Vengalil family whose life as a young man in London included securing a masters degree at the LSE, winning a council seat for Labour in the Metropolitan Borough of St Pancras and becoming founding editor of Pelican books. Menon went on to become, by some assessments, the second most powerful man in India after Jawaharlal Nehru, the country’s first prime minister.

The India Club’s first home was reportedly in nearby Craven Street. It then moved to 143 Strand, at the lately-pedestrianised, Aldwych end of the street, taking up residence, as it were, within the Hotel Strand Continental. Initially, its clientele were visiting, activist and in-migrating Indians. Later, it opened for general custom.

Ironically for a dining and social venue born of a movement for radical change, the India Club’s unique selling point became its timelessness. From the worn floor lettering at the entrance, to the photos of dignitaries and the yellowed pages from India Weekly on the walls, it became a chapter of history preserved. The way in, a narrow slot between a newsagent and a café, is easy to miss – a slim portal into a vast past.

Screenshot 2023 09 10 at 13.21.47

I got acquainted with the place only last year thanks to an On London writer suggesting we meet there to eat. By autumn, I had booked the lounge bar for the website’s final event of 2022, a Christmas party and end of year review. It was a huge success despite the competing attraction of a World Cup semi-final and the unforeseen dual potential attendance-killers of icy weather and a rail strike, though at one point mid-afternoon I had feared the worst.

Marooned on my Hackney doorstep, weighed down with roll-up banners and an improvised stage and unable to summon a cab – I’d never have got all that stuff on a bus – the possibility arose that Sadiq Khan would be at my party but I would not. I was saved by one of my sons, who hailed an alternative ride for me. The Mayor, preceded by his security detail, made a witty and generous speech, as did others from the capital’s political world. Robert Gordon Clark and Professor Tony Travers presented one of their legendary London quizzes. The food was delicious, the atmosphere superb – a London night I will never forget.

On Friday, the day of our last lunch at the India Club, my two dining companions and I waited in exactly that same first-floor space for a table to become available upstairs, pleasantly immersed in squashy sofas of a type more familiar from costume dramas than real life. In the end, we only had to be patient for 30 minutes before ascending to be fed.

The restaurant was packed and loud. Unseasonal sunshine poured through its windows, which look out on to the Monopoly board avenue. Our fellow customers, I assume, were mostly the regular crowd – academics and staff from neighbouring Somerset House and King’s College and nearby Royal Courts of Justice, making the most of the last few weeks before the kitchen closes for good. There were loads of them. We squeezed in at the end of a long table, survived the blow of learning there were no dosas left, ordered the set menu and were grateful. Not a scrap of food was left.

Screenshot 2023 09 10 at 13.03.28

The India Club’s future has been under threat for a few years. The site’s freeholders, Marston Properties, wanted to enlarge and modernise the hotel, expelling the club. A 2017 planning application for the six-storey building was rejected by Westminster Council‘s planning committee the following year in recognition of the India Club’s historic importance. “The India Club has a special place in the history of our Indian community and it is right that we protect it from demolition,” said committee chair, Tony Devenish, at the time.

But last year the lease ran out. And last month the club’s manager Phiroza Marker announced the end will come on the 17th of this month. She and her father, Yadgar Marker, took on the running of the club from the India League 26 years ago. She has described the decision as “heartbreaking”.

She was, however, there on Friday, present in the restaurant and the kitchen. I thanked her for the club’s hospitality, especially last December, and she confirmed that the India Club is looking for a new home. A bit of old London is passing, but the magic of the city never dies.

X/Twitter: On London and Dave Hill. If you value On London and its writers, become a supporter or a paid subscriber to Dave Hill’s Substack for just £5 a month or £50 a year.

Categories: Culture
Tags: Sadiq Khan, The India Club, The Strand, Tony Devenish, Westminster Council

Alexander Jan: For London’s sake, Michael Gove must be defeated over M&S Marble Arch

The secretary of state's decision to reject the retailer's plans for redeveloping its flagship store was wrong in every way
Alexander Jan

Before he went on his holidays, Michael Gove, Secretary of State for Levelling Up, Housing and Communities, was a busy man. In addition to dealing with the challenges of regional inequality and the housing crisis, he weighed in on some local planning decisions.

Gove’s powers to “call in” are wide-ranging with few limitations – another example of Henry VIII-style decision-making in England. By convention, powers to review or overturn planning determinations at national government level are exercised only when a matter is of national importance or conflicts with national policy. But lately, developments in Tunbridge Wells, East Cheshire and Leamington Spa (the latter since withdrawn) have all caught the secretary of state’s eye.

He frets that these schemes – often housing-led – are “too generic” or “too ugly”. He has said on record that he will use all the powers he has “to make sure that developments which are not aesthetically of high quality don’t go ahead”. This threat has now been carried out in London and its impact is anything but beautiful. It has had a chilling effect on those coming forward with investment plans for the capital just when they are most needed.

Gove announced in July that he had thrown out Marks & Spencer’s plan to redevelop its flagship store at the Marble Arch end of Oxford Street. It had been two years since the retailer submitted proposals for replacing its asbestos-ridden, clapped-out existing buildings there, surrounded by “the reek of failure”, with a new, low carbon mixed-use development. Providing retail space fit for the 21st Century, it would have secured the future of a major “anchor” retailer and provided badly-needed high-grade, sustainable office space geared to getting workers back into central London.

All of this would help Oxford Street to recover and more generally boost the productivity of a central London economy damaged by Brexit, a cost of living crisis and a seemingly unending, bitter war of words between central government and City Hall. As it is, Oxford Street risks looking less like its rivals Fifth Avenue or the Boulevard Haussmann than a graveyard of retail history.

The plans have faced fierce opposition from, among others, Save Britain’s Heritage, an expert lobby group made up of the great and the good from the world of architecture and heritage. Gove is, of course, the minister who, on the eve of the Brexit referendum, famously told us that “people in this country have had enough of experts from organisations with acronyms saying that they know what is best and getting it consistently wrong”. But no matter. SAVE, as it is known, proclaimed the M&S unlisted building a “handsome landmark” and decried the loss of “a perfectly good building”.

These views have not been universally shared within the world of building design and aesthetics. Nikolaus Pevsner’s Buildings of England, which is the gold standard text to which architectural experts including SAVE usually cling, struggles to say much in favour of the haphazard job-lot of what is actually three buildings, other than that it is at least in part “dull fronted”.

What was going through Gove’s mind? Ostensibly, he was concerned about aesthetics and carbon. Beauty is, of course, at least in part in the eye of the beholder and therefore subjective. But overturning three decisions made in favour of M&S – by local authority Westminster Council, the Mayor of London and the planning inspector appointed by Gove’s department – should surely require a solid justification.

Yet, remarkably, his decision was heavily weighted towards, not so much the merits or otherwise of the development itself, but his opinion of what its impact would be on Selfridges, that leviathan of a building standing on the other side of Oxford Street’s junction with Orchard Street which was surely totally out of character with its surroundings when it was opened in 1909. Indeed, it was criticised at the time as an “American invasion of London”.

Selfridges itself has backed the M&S scheme. Yet Gove wrote that the “apparent harm” to the Selfridges building and some others nearby should carry “very great weight”, rather than accepting that it would have only the “moderate impact” ascribed to it by the inspector. And despite agreeing that the application was in overall compliance with London policies on greenhouse gases, energy, reducing waste and the circular economy – policies which are among the most stringent for any world city – and acknowledging the economic benefits the scheme would bring, he concluded that the proposal “fails to support the transition to a low carbon future”.

As a result, it is hard to imagine what sort of economically viable building could ever meet Gove’s test for delivering net zero. His move also risks enabling the existing environmentally- unfriendly store to limp on as it is or, worse still, to become yet another vacant or under-utilised plot for years to come. Despite some positive developments, a stroll down other parts of Oxford Street confirms that this is a real possibility.

But fear not: such is Gove’s Alice in Wonderland world, he went out of his way to suggest that the M&S decision should not create a precedent; this was a unique set of circumstances; read-across to other projects should not be presumed. Like so much in Whitehall, this is another “one-off” from which no wider lessons can or apparently should be learned.

That is all too convenient. It allows Gove to pick and choose between planning decisions he likes and doesn’t like. He has already, with a straight face, decanted civil servants into brand new (and not that pretty) carbon-intensive buildings in Wolverhampton and Darlington, where there are heritage buildings available to be put to good use. Those who support his M&S decision should be wary of what they wish for: a future secretary of state might have very different views on building aesthetics from the current one.

Gove has undermined the rules-based decision-making system for development. Perhaps antipathy towards Sadiq Khan and London more generally was a factor. If so, that would be a betrayal of not only trust in the planning system, but also of the investment case for the Elizabeth line, with its two major stations on Oxford Street, at Bond Street and Tottenham Court Road.

It also risks undermining the long-term position of central London – the most carbon efficient place in the United Kingdom to live and do business. And it might make it harder for Westminster and the New West End Company’s public space plan for Oxford Street to succeed.

Losing Marks & Spencer from the western end of Oxford Street would be a disaster. The jobs and economic prosperity the blocked redevelopment would bring are desperately needed. Legal action by the retailer against Gove’s decision is now underway, following Berkeley Homes doing the same over his rejection of their Tunbridge Wells scheme (which Gove has since said he will look at again).

For the sake of Oxford Street, the environment, the economy, and the credibility of a rules-based planning system, let’s hope M&S wins. Londoners and the West End deserve better.

Alexander Jan is chief economic advisor to the London Property Alliance and former Chief Economist of Arup. X/Twitter: Alex_Jan_London and On London. If you value On London and its writers, become a supporter or a paid subscriber to Dave Hill’s Substack for just £5 a month or £50 a year.

Categories: Comment
Tags: Michael Gove, Oxford Street, planning, West End, Westminster Council

Jack Brown: Universalism, practicalities and politics – meanings of the Mayor’s free school meals scheme

What are the long-term implications of Sadiq Khan's policy for families, schools and the election?
Jack Brown

This week has seen the introduction of free meals for all children at state primary schools in London. Given the noise over the Ultra-Low Emission Zone expansion, you are forgiven if you’ve missed it. But this is a significant development.

It puts into effect Sadiq Khan’s pledge to provide a one-year “emergency programme” of funding to help with the ongoing cost of living crisis. Over a quarter of a million London children will now receive a healthy school meal without being charged for it. The Mayor’s office claims this will save families over £440 per child over the course of the academic year. Jamie Oliver likes it too.

Feeding school children is the sort of thing London-wide municipal government used to do. And it was popular.

Jerry White’s wonderful book London in the 20th Century tells of how a Conservative London County Council administration elected in 1907 cancelled school meal funding for poor children as part of an economy drive. A year later, after the voluntary sector failed to step in and replace this lost offering as had been hoped, the LCC was forced to reinstate the scheme. Mayor Khan’s political opponents don’t want to make the same mistake. His Tory rival Susan Hall has said she would keep the scheme going for “as long as required” if elected next year.

At the same time, there is a sense in which the Mayor is plugging the gaps in existing incomplete and uneven programmes. Central government has been paying for free school meals for all Key Stage 1 children – Reception class, Year 1 and Year 2 – since September 2014, as well as providing for all school children whose parents are entitled to certain means-tested benefits, including (since 2018) households on Universal Credit whose income falls below £7,400 a year.

But research by the Institute for Fiscal Studies (IFS) has shown just how many families on Universal Credit still do not quality for free school meals, and how hard this hits them. And several boroughs already provide free school meals for all their primary school children. Others, such as Camden, have announced they will make the scale of provision enabled by the Mayor permanent after his funding ends. Tower Hamlets has announced plans to extend its existing universal offer for primary schools to its secondary schools as well. And in Westminster, the Mayor’s additional funds will be used to enlarge its existing primary school scheme to encompass early years settings and secondary children aged 11-14.

Encouraged by the Mayor, is the capital moving towards making access to free school meals a universal entitlement? There is an interesting wider debate about the issue. The IFS research found that, at a national level, it would cost roughly the same amount to extend free school meals to primary and secondary school children for all households on Universal Credit as it would to all primary school children regardless of income. Khan, though, has elected to help only London households with primary school-age children, including the most affluent.

Some argue that universalism is essential for building a sense of collective buy-in to state provision across society. But this is somewhat complicated by the highly political nature of Khan’s offer – while only some citizens have been receiving help from Conservative national government, many others will now, quite pointedly, receive it from the Labour Mayor.

Ensuring all children qualify for free school meals would also help end the stigma some face – the indignity of being visibly separated from their peers by their family’s wealth. That said, you could forgive parents who already qualify for assistance not celebrating too wildly over seeing £135 million spent on ensuring that their better-off peers get the same.

Implementation of the Mayor’s scheme is not entirely straightforward either. School meal costs vary quite significantly across London, and some boroughs have said that Khan’s funding, whilst welcome and comparatively generous, will not cover the additional costs it has imposed on them.

For example, the Mayor’s funding does not pay for investing in new facilities, equipment or staff – it only contributes to the cost of the meals themselves. So some of London’s schools and local authorities are having to find any extra money they have needed. And when the one-year programme runs out, it is not certain that they will be able to find the cash to keep additional facilities in use. There has also been a concern that pupil premium funding will be lost.

None of these issues seem insurmountable, yet they illustrate the complex reality of making good on a relatively simple and apparently straightforward pledge. And how will the free school meals programme be received by Londoners at large?

It is interesting to compare its possible electoral impact with that of the ULEZ expansion. Both could be described as public health policies, even though City Hall has framed the meals scheme primarily as a cost-of-living measure. But only a small percentage of Londoners will actually pay the ULEZ daily charge, and even that number is expected to fall. The Mayor therefore surely hopes that the noise about the ULEZ will decrease and the benefits of free school meals will be felt by many more.

That said, much of the outrage over the ULEZ has been from people who are not directly affected by the policy. It seems unlikely that loud expressions of delight over the Mayor’s free school meals programme will be quite as universal.

Jack Brown is a lecturer in London Studies at King’s College and author of The London Problem. X/Twitter: Jack Brown and On London. If you value On London and its writers, become a supporter or a paid subscriber to editor and publisher Dave Hill’s Substack.

Categories: Comment
Tags: education, health, poverty, Sadiq Khan

Minister for London says government should restore VAT-free shopping

Paul Scully broke rank with Conservative policy at a Business Improvement Districts summit, by calling for the return of the tax concession for overseas shoppers
Charles Wright

The government should back down now on its refusal to reinstate VAT-free shopping for international tourists. That was the call from a perhaps unlikely opponent of the Chancellor, minister for London and Sutton & Cheam MP Paul Scully, speaking at yesterday’s BusinessLDN Business Improvement Districts summit.

In a combative speech, Scully (pictured) said the Treasury’s stance – that the tax concession would be a cost to the exchequer –  was misguided. He backed the business lobby group’s argument, set out in a letter to Number 11, that the retail retail, particularly in London, has been paying the price, with overseas tourists shunning the UK in favour of EU countries where shopping is now 20 per cent cheaper.

The minister, who was unexpectedly overlooked when his party selected its candidate for the London mayoralty in July, went on to give his backing to the Crossrail 2 scheme, the north-south counterpart to the Elizabeth line, which was put on hold in 2020 as a condition of the government’s financial support for Transport for London during the pandemic.

But “levelling up” did not mean the government had “forgotten London”, he said. “Each part of London is contributing to making London the cornerstone of the UK economy. None of the rest of levelling up can happen without London.” He added that London’s post-Covid recovery is well underway, with the business improvement districts (BIDs) playing a major role.

The first BID in the capital was launched in Kingston 20 years ago. Now, the conference heard, there were 75 of them across the city, generating £60 million in revenue from their levies on business ratepayers, and increasingly involved not only in supporting their local areas but also in attracting new investment and taking on larger improvement work.

The recent Strand Aldwych pedestrianisation project, spearheaded by the Northbank BID, was a flagship example, said BIDs pioneer Ruth Duston, managing director of the Primera consultancy. Other schemes in the pipeline include Oxford Street public realm improvements, getting underway in a partnership between Westminster Council and the New West End Company BID, and ambitious plans from the London Heritage Quarter coalition of BIDs to pedestrianise the Parliament Square area.

Challenges nevertheless remained, delegates heard, including pressure from inflation, tourism numbers and footfall on high streets still not fully recovered from the pandemic, and the continuing impact of  “hybrid” working, along with funding shortfalls.

London is still spending “far less” than its competitor cities on tourism promotion, according to Laura Citron, chief executive of City Hall’s tourism and inward investment agency London & Partners. “We need long-term sustainable funding on a scale befitting a global city,” she said.

Promoting the “right kind” of tourism goes hand in hand with promoting business investment, Citron added, while a warning about over-reliance on the visitor economy came from Westminster Council cabinet member for economic development Geoff Barraclough.

“Tourism brings huge amounts of disruption, noise and rubbish, family homes turned into short-term lets and poor-quality jobs,” he said, arguing for more funding to manage the impact of tourism on residents, perhaps through levies on night-time businesses and hotels.

Transport for London chief customer and strategy officer Alex Williams also had a warning about money. “The big issue is long-term funding,” he said. “We don’t yet know how much money we [TfL] will have next March. There needs to be a reality check about how much money we can bring to the table.”

There was better news, though, for advocates of TfL’s long-standing plan to extend the Dockland Light Railway to Thamesmead, he said, following communities secretary Michael Gove’s recent announcement of a “Docklands 2.0” plan for new housing in East London, including improved transport connections. Positive discussions had been held with the minister about TfL’s business case for the extension, which could “unlock” 20,000 new homes, Williams said.

X/Twitter: Charles Wright and On London. . If you value On London and its writers, become a supporter or a paid subscriber to publisher and editor Dave Hill’s Substack. Thanks.

Categories: News
Tags: Business Improvement Districts, BusinessLDN, economy, Geoff Barraclough, Laura Citron, London and Partners, Paul Scully, Primera, Ruth Duston, Transport for London

Two London schools had funds to fix ‘crumbling concrete’ withdrawn in 2010

Secondaries in Ealing and Hammersmith & Fulham were due to have the unsafe RAAC product replaced, but David Cameron's government blocked it
Dave Hill

The Conservative-led coalition government withdrew funds for rebuilding two London schools containing potentially dangerous reinforced autoclaved aerated concrete (RAAC) within months of coming to power in 2010, according to an investigation by the BBC.

The Ellen Wilkinson School for Girls in Ealing and the London Oratory School in Hammersmith & Fulham (pictured) had both been approved under Labour to have work done to replace RAAC in their buildings, but its successor administration reversed this.

The two London schools are among a list of 13 in England so far identified by the BBC as having had funding to address RAAC in their buildings withdrawn by the Conservative-Liberal Democrat coalition led by Prime Minister David Cameron as his Chancellor, fellow Tory George Osborne, set about slashing public spending under a programme known as “austerity”.

The Department for Education (DfE) has released a list of 147 schools in England containing the so-called “crumbling concrete”, many of which have been unable to open for the new academic year or have had to take other action to ensure the safety of pupils and staff.

There are a total of 18 London schools on the DfE list, including the two which had funding withdrawn. They include schools in Barnet, Bexley, Lambeth, Tower Hamlets, Harrow, Newham, Enfield, Greenwich and Redbridge, along with two in Havering and three in Haringey.

Green Party mayoral candidate Zoe Garbett described the situation as “a disgrace” and blamed “successive governments” for failing to deal with the RAAC problem. “Parents and carers shouldn’t have to worry about their kids’ schools falling down,” she said. “We need proper investment in our schools’ infrastructure to bring buildings up to a standard fit for the 20th Century.”

Conservative candidate Susan Hall and Labour’s Sadiq Khan were also approached for comment.

X/Twitter: On London and Dave Hill. Image from London Oratory School video. This article was updated at 16:25 on 6 September 2023 after the DfE published its list of RAAC-affected school. Zoe Garbett’s comment was added later. If you value On London and its writers, become a supporter or a paid subscriber to Dave Hill’s Substack for just £5 a month or £50 a year.

Categories: News
Tags: George Osborne, RAAC, schools

Will it be all change again at Stratford station?

Plans for a big upgrade of the interchange and its environs are a response to the ongoing rebirth of the east of London
Dave Hill

There was time, not long ago, before the bombshell of Brexit and the bluster of “levelling up”, when London was recognised by governments of all persuasions for what it is – a global city economic powerhouse on which the entire United Kingdom depends. Few national politicians mention that these days, unless they’re Michael Gove taking a swing at Sadiq Khan. But in spite of everything, including Covid, London continues to grow, especially the eastern side of it. That’s why Stratford station needs a revamp.

Consider some large numbers. In 2006, after the Olympics bid was won but before the Westfield shopping centre was built, about 40 million “passenger movements” took place through the station, meaning flows in and out of and within it, from platform to platform and line to line: Underground,  Overground-to-be, Docklands Light Railway, National Rail. In 2019, with the Games gloriously hosted, the Queen Elizabeth Olympic Park in legacy mode and the retail cathedral booming, that figure hit 128 million.

It dropped during the pandemic, but rose in relation to other big London stations, making it the busiest in the country for a spell. Now with Elizabeth line services too, it is still one of the busiest and in danger of bursting at the seams. If, like me, you frequently set off the Overground at Stratford you will be familiar with passenger tailbacks on the platform delaying your descent to the subway. Transport for London is predicting that passenger movements will have increased by 60 per cent by 2041 – or rather lack of passenger movements, because there simply won’t be room to move.

Plans for easing such discomfort have been the taking shape, the joint endeavour of Newham Council, Network Rail, TfL and the London Legacy Development Corporation (LLDC), custodian of the Queen Elizabeth Olympic Park and its environs. The latter, as planning authority for the area, held a public consultation last October and the four partners’ outline business case, for national government attention, followed last month.

It presents three different options – “minimum”, “medium” and “significant”. The “minimum” is the cheap one, something Whitehall always likes to have these days. It would see the Elizabeth line platform widened and some control rooms moved around, making a bit more space inside the station’s confines without any wider redesign. It would help a bit, but not for long.

The other two options are more ambitious, combining larger station improvements with adjacent development which would help to pay for them. “Medium” includes a new bridge joining the Carpenters housing estate at the edge of the Park – a long-contested settlement that is finally to undergo a big regeneration – with Stratford town centre, augmenting what some call the “rusty bridge”, a pre-Games engineering feat and “street in the sky” which carries pedestrians between the old Stratford shopping centre, fronted by the gorgeous Stratford Shoal, and the new Stratford City across the ranks of railway tracks.

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“Significant” is a perhaps self-effacing label for a still larger rejuvenation that also would see tracks and platform realigned and the Jubilee line decked over, creating space for a public realm solution to the site’s uncompromising fragmentation by road and rail infrastructure. The station’s southern ticket hall would be rebuilt and built on top of. There would be development upon, over and around the busy Stratford bus station and stand, opened in 1994. Designers 5th Studio argue that “infrastructure should be better integrated” into a coherent urban space that is agreeable to move around.

This scenario would produce up to 2,000 new homes, half of them affordable, along with commercial space. It would create potential for funding the station enhancements – a combination of selling land and retaining business rates would, the four partners hope, cover two-thirds of the ambitious station works costs, leaving a gap of perhaps £1 billion-plus for public funds to fill. That’s a lot of money, but a lot less than it could be for a project that aspires to addressing mayoral, borough and national goals all at once.

The London Plan sees Stratford, along with Old Oak Common, as a “reserve location” for Central Activities Zone office functions, supplementing the City, West End and Canary Wharf.

The partners are encouraged that two lobby groups, the Great Eastern Rail Campaign and the West Anglia Taskforce, are very interested in their work. Trains in and out of Stratford serve their areas, providing crucial links to London and interchange connections to Liverpool Street, Canary Wharf and, for that matter, 25 of the 32 boroughs. Stansted, City and Southend airports also come with its passenger orbit, as does freight heading for Felixstowe.

The Stratford hub’s international dimension is already apparent from the name of the Lendlease International Quarter London project (IQL), which stands between Westfield and the Park and, next to Stratford International station at the other end of Westfield, IQL North, where a Hadley Group scheme is evolving. The day may finally come when international trains actually stop at the international station. Conversations to that end are taking place.

Stratford first had a railway station in 1839, connecting the town to Hertfordshire. New buildings and new lines followed as East End industries migrated up the Lea Valley in what today might be called a start-up corridor. From 1903, the station was linked to the Monopoly board interchanges of Liverpool Street and Fenchurch Street and to suburbs to the east. The Central line arrived in 1946.

There was a post-war lull, when government policy was to discourage London’s growth: Sir Patrick Abercrombie, in his Greater London Plan, described the station and its environs as “beyond salvage, cluttered up with heavy industry, gasworks and a network of railway sidings”. Stratford became regarded by some local people as a locus of disrepute, as railway station neighbourhoods can be.

But as the end of the 20th Century neared, London began to grow again. Neither it nor Stratford station have stopped since. The DLR started there in 1987. The Jubilee line was extended there in 1999. The growth of the station and its web of connections has been astounding, a yardstick for the transformation of that part of London as a whole.

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Upgrades were accelerated by the needs of the Olympics, described by the then TfL commissioner Peter Hendy, now Lord Hendy and chair of Network Rail, as “the first public transport games”. The combination of political willpower and negotiating skill that forced the pace of change on the bitterly dysfunctional developer consortium behind what eventually became Westfield is one of the most remarkable chapters of the Olympic Park story.

A drawback with these incremental upgrades has been to make change rather piecemeal within a constrained site. The new plans would seek to bring coherence. And they come at pivotal time for the area.

The planning powers of the LLDC, set up under the mayoralty of Boris Johnson, will, in December 2024, revert to the original four “Olympic boroughs” – Tower Hamlets, Waltham Forest, Hackney and Newham. The latter’s boundary takes in the largest amount of Park land, encompassing the London Stadium, home of West Ham United, and East Bank, the ambitious education and culture cluster, which will be the most substantial legacy of Johnson’s time as Mayor.

Part of its UCL East component, next to the London Aquatics Centre, is already open. The Marshgate section, on the other side of the Waterworks River beside the Orbit Tower, will officially open later this month. The new home of the London College of Fashion, part of the University of the Arts, London, will follow suit in November on East Bank’s Stratford Waterfront section. V&A East, Sadlers Wells and the BBC will follow. Separately, on the Stratford side, the MSG Globe music venue may rise.

Newham Council is less enthusiastic about that. But in May it celebrated work getting underway on a new entrance to the station from the Carpenters – all part of responding to the needs and aspirations of a fast-growing, young and largely low-income population. A whole new piece of London is continuing to form in part of the city devastated by post-war deindustrialisation. Stratford station is absolutely central to it. As options for changing it progress, getting left behind cannot be among them.

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Categories: Analysis
Tags: Olympic Park, Queen Elizabeth Olympic Park, Stratford station, transport

Birmingham’s financial crisis underlines London local government pressures

Different boroughs are in different situations, but there's no question that the capital as a whole has endured deep cuts since 2010
Dave Hill

News that Birmingham City Council has issued a Section 114 notice, the local government equivalent of declaring effective bankruptcy, has prompted a predictable flurry of political point-scoring at national level. It has also served as a reminder that struggles to make ends meet have become familiar to many local councils in recent years, including in London.

Croydon Council, of course, has had to do the same thing as Birmingham no less than three times in the last two years, most recently last November. As with other councils around England that have found they cannot make ends meet, such as Thurrock, Northamptonshire, and Slough, Croydon’s story is particular to it. But several more have warned that they are close to the brink. And London Councils, the body representing all 33 of the capital’s local authorities, has long been raising a collective cry for more funding from national government.

It says that boroughs’ overall resources are 18 per cent lower in real terms than they were in 2010, when the Conservative-led coalition government came to power and introduced its programme of public spending cuts, known as “austerity” and when Greater London’s population was almost 800,000 people smaller.

An independent assessment of the pressure on London boroughs has been made by the Institute for Fiscal Studies (IFS), which in its recent study of how much public spending local areas across the country receive said that London as a whole gets 17 per cent less money that its share as measured against estimated need (page 57).

Within that overall figure, the IFS found significant variations between boroughs. It also pointed out that some – it named Westminster, Wandsworth, Hammersmith & Fulham and Kensington & Chelsea – set Council Tax levels “far below the national average” and that if they chose instead to adhere to that average, each “would have more than £300 more total funding per capita [for each resident]” (page 24).

Even so, many of London’s local council appear entitled to feel hard done by and some are facing significant budget gaps – Barnet, for example, says it must find £23 million from somewhere, citing an “ongoing” post-Covid rise in costs. The government is under pressure to reconsider how it treats local government in general. The question many, not least in London, are now asking is whether their fortunes will change if there’s a change of government next year.

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Categories: Analysis
Tags: Council Tax, Croydon Council, Institute for Fiscal Studies, local government, London Councils