23rd September 2021

millwall Exclusive Page 34

Issue 1549

Established: 1987

50p

September 23 2021

southwarknews.co.uk

How defender bounced back from major setbacks

Victory!

day centre saved

Kingsdale Foundation School

First Class and Top of the Class Celebrating A Level Results at Kingsdale Foundation School!

Celebrating our A Level Success with Pride!

Our students did amazingly well and produced some of our best results ever.

Almost two-thirds of our graduates going on to higher education have been offered places at prestigious Russell Group Universities including Cambridge as well as Imperial, University & King’s College London, Manchester, Bristol and Nottingham.

Hannah & Ivy seem pleased after they recive their A-Level results

Our gifted and talented creative and performing artists will be attending highly esteemed conservatoires and institutions such as The Prince’s Foundation (The Royal Drawing School) and Kingston University. They have much to celebrate.

OPEN DAYS Wednesday 29th September: 4-5.30pm & 6-7.30pm Wednesday 20th October: 1.30-3.30pm & 4.30-6.30pm Wednesday 10th November: 1.30-3.30pm & 4.30-6.30pm Wednesday 24th November: 1.30-3.30pm & 4.30-6.30pm

Victor Chicaza-Alulema celebrating his 3A*/A Grades and place at UCL with his parents!

For further information, visit www.kingsdalefoundationschool.org.uk

millwall Exclusive Page 34

Issue 1549

Established: 1987

50p

September 23 2021

southwarknews.co.uk

How defender bounced back from major setbacks Page 4

Victory!

day centre saved

Charities given hope Page 4

We remember one of our own

Violent crime in Southwark is down Page 8

Page 3

4 NEWS

www.southwarknews.co.uk/news

Contents NEWS Pages 2-17 Education feature Pages 18-21

Southwark News, Thursday September 23 2021

40% of Southwark Universal credit Claimants are in work

OPINION Pages 22-23 Arts Page 24 history Page 25 property Page 26 family announcements and classified Page 27 Public notices Pages 28-30 SPORT Pages 31- 36 During the crisis, contact us if you have a story on 07973175511 or email

editor@southwarknews .co.uk

We are a London Living Wage employer Do you have a story

for our news team?

Call 0207 231 5258 You can WhatsApp us on 07494 070 863.

Thérèse Coffey, secretary of state for work and pensions

By Katherine Johnston katherine@southwarknews.co.uk Forty per cent of people claiming Universal Credit in Southwark and Lambeth are in work, according to shocking new government figures.

Ahead of October’s cut to the £20 weekly uplift, introduced during the pandemic, and the National Insurance rise, Labour politicians say more working people will be pushed into poverty.

As of July this year, four fifths of the 83,000 people claiming Universal Credit in both boroughs were in employment.

That month a total of 42,330 people in Southwark were on Universal Credit, with 40,702 in Lambeth.

The Conservatives’ work and pensions secretary, Thérèse Coffey attracted huge criticism after she suggested that Universal Credit claimants could regain the £20 being cut from their weekly payments by working two extra hours a week; a highly disputed claim. She also described being ‘entirely happy’ with the £20 cut.

Research from the Joseph Rowntree Foundation shows that the decision could plunge half a million, including 200,000 children, into poverty across the country, with the poorest families losing five per cent of their income overnight.

At a Mayor’s Question Time meeting on Thursday, September 9, Southwark’s assembly member Marina Ahmad and

London Mayor Sadiq Khan called on the government to U-turn on the cut.

Ahmad said: “Thousands of low-income workers in our community are facing the double hammer blow of a cut to their Universal Credit payments and an increase in their National Insurance contributions.

“Contrary to the claim recently made by the Secretary of state for work and pensions, the £20 being taken away each week can’t just be earned back by working a few extra hours.

“The government must reduce the taper rate on Universal Credit to address this, whilst increasing the minimum wage to equal the real London Living Wage of £10.85 an hour.

“I am also very concerned about the significant impact that the cut to Universal Credit will have on those who are unable to work.

“I was pleased to secure a commitment from Sadiq Khan at the last Mayor’s Question Time to continue to lobby the government to keep the uplift in place”.

Separate figures show that between May and July this year London had the country’s highest rate of unemployment - at six per cent.

Although this is so far below predictions that the economic shock of the pandemic could lead to one in ten in the capital being out of work, it is a worrying sign given that the furlough scheme officially ends in September.

Southwark second worst for STIs in England in 2020

By Charles Harrison

news@southwarknews.co.uk Southwark’s 2020 STI rates were the second worst in the England despite an overall drop in diagnoses, according to newly published statistics.

Southwark’s sexual health has been revealed by data from Public Health England which showed an overall countrywide decrease of 30 per cent in new STI diagnoses between 2019 and 2020.

However, Southwark had one of the highest rates of STI diagnosis in the country, with 2,377 people per 100,000 infected - second only to Lambeth, with 3,060.

“No one wants to swap social distancing for an STI,” said Dr Katy Sinka, head of the Sexually Transmitted Infections section at PHE. “If you are having sex with new or casual partners, use a condom and get tested.”

While the number of STI diagnoses for

Southwark was lower than the 3,191 per 100,000 in 2019, the overall number of sexual health screenings fell by 25 per cent, and the number of consultations at sexual health services fell by 10 per cent.

STIs have long been considered a problem for the borough - in 2015, as reported by the News, Southwark had the third highest rate of STIs in London. The newly published data, then, suggests Southwark is doing even worse than before at preventing the spread of STIs when compared to other boroughs.

Professor Kevin Fenton, London regional director for Public Health England said: “It’s unsurprising that fewer STIs have been diagnosed in London in 2020, but cases of chlamydia, gonorrhoea and syphilis across the capital are still in the thousands and new STI rates remain the highest seen in England.”

“STIs can have a huge impact not just on sexual health, but our mental health and wellbeing, as well as that of current and future sexual partners.”

OPEN DAYS

OPEN EVENING

21 & 22 September 23 September 9:00 - 11:30 4:30 - 7:30

Visit www.stac.uk.com for more information or to take a virtual tour!

Issue 1548

Editor: Kevin Quinn Deputy Editor: Katherine Johnston Reporter: Kit Heren Sports Editor: John Kelly Arts Correspondent: Michael Holland Weekender Series Editor: Laura Burgoine Media Partnerships: Anthony Phillips Sales Manager: Tammy Jukes Advertising: Clarry Frewin, Lorraine Wood, Design: Dan Martin, Aurelio Medina Finance: Em Zeki - Tel: 0779 883 3758 Subscriptions/Announcements: Katie Boyd Managing & Commercial Director: Chris Mullany Managing & Editorial Director: Kevin Quinn Published weekly on a Thursday at: Unit A202, The Biscuit Factory, Drummond Road, Bermondsey, London SE16 4DG. News and Sport: 020 7231 5258 Advertising: 0792 203 4598 News: news@southwarknews.co.uk Advertising: ads@southwarknews.co.uk Finance: em@southwarknews.co.uk Printed by Iliffe Print. Tel: 01223 656500 www.iliffeprint.co.uk

Established: 1987

50p

September 16 2021

southwarknews.co.uk

The Essential Guide to Education 2021/22

MILLWALL EXCLUSIVE Page 38

BELIEF THE KEY FOR BENNO

Find your free guide inside the paper Page 6

BISHOP’S DRAMATIC COURT APPEARANCE Page 4

Page 14

LEISURE CENTRES TO GO BACK UNDER COUNCIL CONTROL

Officers deliver baby on the street

Two arrested for alleged naked attack Page 10

The Southwark News is proud to be the only independent, paid for newspaper in London Southwark News started life as the Bermondsey News in 1987, as an A-4 photocopied sheet of paper and rapidly grew to cover the entire borough and the surrounding area. As the borough grew, so did the newspaper.

It is owned and run by Chris Mullany and Kevin Quinn.

Former reporters for Southwark News, they bought the title in 2002, after the founder Dave Clark died suddenly from cancer four years earlier.

Both directors live in the borough. A dedicated team of staff work tirelessly to cover as much of what is going on as possible and strive to ensure that a community-led, independent newspaper can survive and excel in a market dominated by national and multinational media groups.

Follow our social media to be updated on local news

southwark-news

@southwark_news

Southwark News is a member of the Independent Press Standards Organisation (which regulates the UK’s magazine and newspaper industry).

We abide by the Editors’ Code of Practice and are committed to upholding the highest standards of journalism. If you think that we have not met those standards and want to make a complaint, please contact 0207 231 5258.

If we are unable to resolve your complaint, or if you would like more information about IPSO or the Editors’ Code, contact IPSO on 0300 123 2220 or visit www.ipso.co.uk

Southwark News, Thursday September 23 2021

www.southwarknews.co.uk/news

NEWS 5

Editor of ITV News and one of the original Southwark News TEAM: Geoff Hill passes away AT THE AGE OF just 52

The News pay tribute to one of their own, a true inspiration

By Kevin Quinn kevin@southwarknews.co.uk News broke last week of former Southwark News journalist Geoff Hill passing away aged just 52.

Geoff with Alastair Stewart and Trevor McDonald

Geoff had been treated at King's College Hospital

Palace to Paris finish line

A tribute to Geoff was the final bulletin on ITV News on last Thursday night, September 17, Geoff having risen through the ranks to take over as Editor of the channel’s news in 2013.

In a career spanning almost 30 years, Geoff was still heading up ITV News when he was suddenly diagnosed with leukaemia in 2017 and had been receiving treatment for the disease when he was admitted to hospital and died on Thursday morning surrounded by his family.

We are proud to say that Geoff cut his teeth in journalism at the Southwark News and was one of our founding team of reporters when it moved from a photocopied sheet of paper, then called the Bermondsey News, to the weekly paper we know now.

He was the first to get to grips with a brand new dark room to process photographs for the Southwark News.

The most basic of dark rooms, barely big enough to walk into, these were less digital days for our independent outfit and well before social media.

As a budding reporter in Bermondsey Geoff made life-long friends at the paper. He left Southwark going straight to London News Network, starting his long association with ITN. In 1998 when the founder and editor of Southwark News Dave Clark suddenly died of cancer, Geoff with other former journalists helped to keep the paper going for a number of months.

He would turn up at our Bermondsey office after finishing his shifts at ITV's regional news programme London Tonight to edit the paper and always remained a friend and a supporter.

He first joined ITV News in 2000, where he stayed for seven years before going onto roles as Editor of Setanta Sports News, Director of Coverage at CNN, and Editor of Channel 5 News.

He returned to ITV News as Editor in 2013, overseeing coverage of major events including reporting the general elections of 2015 and 2017, the Scottish referendum, the EU referendum in 2016 and the election of Donald Trump as US president.

Temporarily stepping down from

Geoff Hill

his role at ITV to focus on treatment, he returned as its Editor last year, but despite so much hope that he was recovering, he relapsed.

In July this year Geoff, alongside his two brother-in-laws Lee Roberts and Jordan Smith, won the support of his beloved Crystal Place football club and raised over £30,000 for charity Cure Leukaemia.

Lee and Jordan ran 460km in just 30 days through the streets of south London. They had come up with the idea of running the equivalent of Selhurst Park to Paris to support Geoff and the charity’s research into pioneering cell therapy.

In the appeal we featured in the News, when writing about his illness showed Geoff the same resilience and determination that made him such a successful journalist. In tributes from colleagues throughout his illustrious career his kind and giving nature and the huge support he has shown to so many is mentioned again and again.

As the editor of the Southwark News and joint owner with Chris Mullany, I know we owe an invaluable debt to Geoff, we will miss him so much. As a fifteen-year-old schoolboy going to the Southwark News office, then in Rotherhithe’s Hope Sufferance Wharf, in the hope of getting work experience, Geoff was the man I looked up to and wanted to be. He was an inspiration, supportive and a great laugh, a true gentleman and scholar to me.

A full tribute to Geoff will appear in our paper from those who worked with him in those early years.

The Southwark News sends our deepest condolences to his entire family, his children Emily, Olivia and Alfie and his wife Nat.

6 NEWS

www.southwarknews.co.uk/news

Southwark News, Thursday September 23 2021

Victory as council steps in to re-open adult day care centre Exclusive

By Katherine Johnston katherine@southwarknews.co.uk Riverside Day Centre has been saved after a dramatic intervention by parents, carers and Southwark Council.

In May this year we revealed the Bermondsey service was being shut down with no prior consultation from its managers, The Camden Society.

It emerged that Southwark Council - which owns the building - had been completely unaware of the Camden Society’s decision; a claim that the organisation appeared to deny.

At the time, The Camden Society said it had been in discussions with the local authority for ‘over two years’ about the service’s future, while the council alleged the society had taken a ‘unilateral decision’.

On Tuesday, Southwark Council leader Kieron Williams confirmed that the centre for adults with disabilities and learning difficulties - which closed during lockdown - would be taken over by local charities with support from families.

“Our priority has always been to ensure the provision of care and support for those who need it,” he told the News.

“So I am delighted to say we have been able to agree a way forward with families and local charities that will ensure a new day service is offered from Riverside Day Centre. I was deeply disappointed when we previously heard The Camden Society had taken the decision to close Riverside Day Centre, without consulting the council. In doing so they let many adults with disabilities and their families down.

So I am especially glad that we have been able to work with families to turn this situation around.

“We will transition safely to the new arrangements and will put the new day service on a sustainable and secure footing for the future.”

A spokesperson for The Camden Society, told this newspaper in response: “As stated earlier this year, The Camden Society (London) had started to develop community-based support for people with a learning disability, away from the Riverside building, in line with national best practice. We are continuing discussions with the council about the delivery of support going forward.”

Norma Lawrence, whose daughter Dawn has been attending Riverside for more than three decades, Families who depended on the lifeline service had been left in shock at news of the closure, not least because they had already fought a hard-won campaign five years earlier to save it after its lease ran out. Eventually, in 2017, had the council U-turned and carers thought their nightmare was over.

But then COVID-19 brought new challenges. The Camden Society had changed the type of care offered during lockdown to a community-based model, including taking those who normally spent a whole day in the centre taking part in group activities out on brief walks instead.

Families had been looking forward to the return of more structured respite care as the country reopened, only to find out in the Spring that despite the end of lockdown restrictions the service would not resume “due to COVID-19” and the need for building repairs.

Thirty-six-year-old Gemma Cooper chairs the Riverside parents and carers group and was one of the key campaigners who helped save the centre five years ago.

She said she was over the moon with the news that Riverside would reopen, reiterating that this time the council had been there ‘every step of the way’ with families.

Her 38-year-old brother Lee Eidson, who lives with their parents in Bermondsey, has been attending the centre for nineteen years. He has a range

Hopes of a reprieve for charities in Burgess

of learning difficulties. The centre has been a place where he can develop his skills but also provide some time off for their pensioner parents.

Gemma told us that the first she heard of the planned closure was when her mum phoned her up to tell her about a letter, sent in April, explaining that the service was transitioning to community care.

It came as a huge shock given that from March 2020 to September that year there had been no service at all due to lockdown and from then on the offering had been extremely limited with just an ‘hour here and hour there’.

“The Camden Society told me that the council had wanted it to go more back to being community based, but the council actually had no idea what was going on,” she said. “I have to say that Southwark Council have been amazing throughout which takes a lot for me to say after what happened last time.”

The new model simply wasn’t working, she added: “The Camden Society was using other community centres instead, sometimes as a base before going on to do a different activity, or for a few hours.

They aren’t all secure and they don’t always have changing facilities.

“They were using, at different times, The Green at Nunhead, RJ4ALL community centre, and out of borough places like The Albany in Lewisham and one in Vauxhall.

“But if they were hired out by other groups then the location would change,

Exclusive

By Katherine Johnston katherine@southwarknews.co.uk Seven charities based in Burgess Park’s Giraffe House, slated for demolition and redevelopment, have been given new hope they can stay on site until the end of the year.

Representatives from the organisations, which include Southwark 1st Scouts and Burgess Sports, met with Mentivity - which has taken over the lease from previous managers Creation Trust - on Friday, September 10 to discuss their future.

Scout leader Frances White told the News: “We are all working together to find solutions for keeping all the groups on site at Giraffe until the end of the year, working to support our local community.”

Earlier this month we revealed that Giraffe House’s charities had been left in the dark about their future as an eviction notice loomed.

and parents would have to travel to another place.

“It costs £7 in a taxi to get my brother to Riverside, but £14 to the Green, and that isn’t in his care plan so it’s an added cost to my parents.

“Carers need stability and to know the facilities are right.

“We have had adults who need changing who have been left without from 7.30am to 4.30pm because the centre has no hoist or adult changing table, including on very hot days.

“It was a health and safety issue and we got to the stage where parents weren’t sending them back because they felt uncomfortable.

“It was horrible for parents and for the people who use the centre who haven’t seen each other - friends in some cases they have known since nursery.”

Norma Lawrence, whose daughter Dawn has been attending Riverside for more than three decades, had raised the alarm with councillors and other parents after finding out about the proposed closure.

When we first spoke to her in May 2021 she told of the huge toll lockdown, and fears for her daughter’s future without the centre, had on her family’s mental and physical health.

Dawn, who is partially sighted and profoundly deaf, loved doing art activities and cooking at Riverside, and is a dab hand at tidying up the kitchen after The building was meant to close permanently on September 17 in preparation for redevelopment as part of Southwark Council’s plan for a new skate bowl in the park. Although the charities had been aware of the long-term plans for redevelopment, they had struggled to find alternative premises and had criticised the council for a lack of support in finding new homes long term.

After being questioned by this paper about the situation, councillor Catherine Rose, cabinet member for transport, parks and sport at Tooley Street, admitted that not every group would be able to stay in the building.

“We have some really exciting plans for the space in the future, which continues to support sport and recreation for young people,” she said.

“This follows the success of other leisure opportunities in the area, such as the BMX track. Meanwhile, and following a tender process, Mentivity will now be managing the building’s use.

“They have spoken to all of their new sub-tenants and confirmed to the council

making her favourite muffins.

Learning to navigate a new building, and being without friends she has known for most of her life, would have been extremely hard - let alone without constant location changes and complex travel arrangements.

“I want to say thank you to Southwark Council and all the service users and carers who have helped put this solution together,” Norma said.

“It has been a very difficult time with a lack of information coming from both sides.

“As carers we have enough to do normally but even more during COVID and that has caused us huge stress.

“I am so pleased and joyful that Riverside will stay open and be accessible to the users who depend on it.

“I’d also like to say a big thank you to Southwark Pensioners Action Group and Southwark News for the platform they have given me to alert people about what happened.

“Thank you so very much for reporting on this. It could have gone the other way - we had a similar situation in 2017 and this time the council really listened.”

She said this week’s news that the centre’s future was secure was a ‘huge deal’: “It will make a lot of difference to Dawn, seeing the group she would normally see, interacting with people again and seeing all the staff.

“It has been stressful for me which makes this stressful for her - now there is less stress.

“She’ll be looking forward to going back and having her two days a week at Riverside, it’s a place that just works for her.”

Council Leader Kieron Willaims

that SE17 Working and Half Pints can be accommodated on their current terms.

“The BMX Club and Burgess Sports can be accommodated on the basis of a fee for use of the space – this would be paid to Mentivity and will contribute towards the running costs of the building.

“As these organisations will be subtenants of Mentivity, it is for them to agree terms with Mentivity rather than the council.

“There are a small number of groups that cannot continue to be based in Giraffe House, once Mentivity begin to deliver their programmes.

“As a council we value the work of all the groups that have been based in Giraffe House so far.

“Council officers are in touch with these organisations to support them to manage the changes and offer practical help them find alternative spaces.”

Southwark News has contacted Mentivity for clarification on how it will work with the existing groups in Giraffe House, but as yet has received no response.

is expanding.

Is your area affected?

NORTH CIRCULAR ROAD

Vehicles are not charged for driving on the North Circular Road (A406)

ENFIELD

HARINGEY

WALTHAM FOREST

BARNET

CAMDEN

ON GE

C

RICHMOND UPON THAMES

CITY OF LONDON

NEWHAM TOWER HAMLETS

ZON E

D AN

HOUNSLOW

CITY OF WESTMINSTER

ON GT A IN SE NS EL ITH KE & CH SM ER AM MM LH HA & FU

EALING

LONDON UL EZ AL

G

E

R CE NT

HACKNEY

ISLINGTON

BRENT

REDBRIDGE

R HA S T I ON C

LAMBETH SOUTHWARK

GREENWICH

LEWISHAM

WANDSWORTH

BEXLEY

SOUTH CIRCULAR ROAD Contains Ordnance Survey data © Crown copyright 2021

Vehicles are not charged for driving on the South Circular Road (A205)

From 25th October it’s expanding from central London up to, but not including, the North Circular Road (A406) and South Circular Road (A205), to help clean up London’s air. The North and South Circular Roads themselves are not in the zone.

If you drive within the zone with an older polluting vehicle that’s petrol or diesel and doesn’t meet the standards, you may be affected. Are you ready?

This is part of the commitment by the Mayor of London and TfL to help Londoners breathe cleaner air.

Search ULEZ Expansion, and check your postcode.

8 NEWS

www.southwarknews.co.uk/news

Southwark News, Thursday September 23 2021

Safety questions on rooftop homes still up in the air Exclusive

By Katherine Johnston katherine@southwarknews.co.uk Southwark Council has sought to reassure residents that the safety of its new rooftop extensions are its ‘highest priority’, despite early reports highlighting the risk of ‘disproportionate collapse’ and the extent of ‘invasive and costly’ work required.

This month, Southampton Way Estate Tenants’ and Residents’ Association wrote an open letter to councillor Stephanie Cryan, who holds the new homes portfolio at Tooley Street, urging her to reconsider the council’s proposals to build two extra storeys across the Peckham estate. The group described the current plans as potentially ‘fatally flawed’.

The letter, organised by chair Nick Fowler, states: “Residents on Southampton Way Estate are justifiably very worried and concerned the council is proposing to go ahead and build on blocks which its own feasibility study recommended against.

“Doing so without presenting any indication that extensive structural surveys have been done to justify a decision which goes against its own expert opinion...

And in doing so have set themselves on course to construct a fatally flawed rooftop development which risks the lives of a great number of residents.”

In October 2019 we first reported on the council’s plans to build new homes on flat roofs on existing estates as one of many ‘creative’ ways to solve the borough’s housing crisis, similar to controversial ‘infill’ developments where new housing is shoehorned into green spaces, disused

buildings, or built on top of demolished garages. Around 28 estates had been identified as potential sites.

The council believes 32 new social rent homes could be added onto Southampton Way via a rooftop development, with the council saying this could be far cheaper than buying land or real estate on the open market.

The first report to look at the scheme in any detail was a general study into the feasibility and cost, completed by ARUP, after being commissioned by the council in August 2020. This report raised doubts that buildings could cope with added wind pressure when gaining extra storeys, and also highlighted the risk of disproportionate collapse in blocks that predate the 1970s. The surveyors noted, for example, that adding just a single extra storey on top of a four-storey building would increase wind loading forces by 50 per cent. It concluded that building just two extra storeys on a four flight block would be “‘relatively unlikely to be possible due to the very significant increase in wind loading.”

It also claimed: “Disproportionate collapse regulations were only introduced in 1970, therefore pre-1970s buildings will not have been designed for disproportionate collapse and most are unlikely to meet the requirements.”

Not only would proving the work was safe require "intrusive internal surveys" it would also be ‘very costly’ - though details on exactly how costly are limited.

The most horrific example of disproportionate collapse in a high rise was seen in Newham’s Ronan Point tower block in 1968, when a gas explosion caused one side of the entire building to disintegrate, killing four people and injuring seventeen.

Major changes to national building regulations were subsequently implemented to ensure that in the event of a similar structural issue or event - such as a fire - damage is contained within a particular floor or area, and the entire building does not collapse like a house of cards.

A further report, from December 2020, looks at more detail on ten estates earmarked for rooftop homes across

More details on Lakanal’s sister block

By Katherine Johnston katherine@southwarknews.co.uk More details on the extent of fire safety work needed in Camberwell’s Marie Curie House have been revealed in a surveyor’s report.

The papers, prepared for Southwark Council’s cabinet meeting earlier this month (September 14) explain that not only is the building’s cladding “noncompliant” with updated building regulations, there are also issues with compartmentation - with some windows needing to be replaced to ensure fire breaks and other safety measures; though this is not the case in all flats.

Non-compliant front doors, which aren’t adequately fire proofed, have also been found in the block. Communal balconies, which are used as escape routes in the event of a fire, have been found to contain timber balustrades - combustible material that will need to be replaced.

The same has been found within the internal and external stairwells; escape routes that contain timber elements. The internal staircase is also not wide enough to act as a safe escape route and needs to be reconfigured, currently falling 60mm short of requirements.

It has been assumed fire-stopping in risers and ducts is inadequate across the building but there have, so far, been a limited number of in-depth surveys to confirm exactly how prevalent these suspected issues are across the block.

The contractors’ report notes: “All risers and ducts should be renewed and fully fire-stopped. This recommendation is extended to the ceiling to common parts

Southwark, including Southampton Way, nine of which are assumed to have been built before the 1970s. This report references ARUP’s findings and recommends that only single storey extensions are added, along with strengthening works - except for in the case of Southampton Way which, against the council’s recommendations, is earmarked for two new floors.

There is also confusion over the exact age of the estate. The council’s report fails to confirm the construction date, but one longstanding resident who has lived there since 1970 has told the TRA he believes it was constructed eight years earlier.

The majority of the council’s post-war housing stock was taken over by the local authority years after being constructed, and in some cases with key information missing. Initially many blocks were built and maintained by the Greater London Council which was dissolved in 1986 with its powers handed over to the London boroughs. In some cases, buildings had been commissioned by the previous body, London County Council, which was disbanded in 1965.

Record-keeping failures meant that Southwark Council was unaware strengthening work listed as having taken place on Ledbury Estate’s towers in the aftermath of Ronan Point had, in fact, never taken place. Invasive structural surveys eventually revealed the truth and - due to the high cost of work needed - the blocks are being demolished rather than refurbished.

Given the case of the Ledbury, and the ongoing fire safety issues continuing to emerge in tower blocks across the borough, it is not surprising that residents are concerned that surveyors and the council do not have accurate information about the the buildings for which they are developing

complex proposals.

Safety is only one issue. Although the council has pledged not to carry out any extensions without cast-iron guarantees that they can be done safely, residents are rightly asking whether the process is worth it - worth the cost and worth the stress for residents whose homes will be under hugely disruptive building sites.

A letter from Cllr Cryan to Southampton Way TRA, shared with the News last Thursday, has explained her position.

She described the initial feasibility study as a ‘ very general, desktop based, study’ that makes ‘some blanket comments about some of our older blocks currently being unsuitable for extensions – but the report also goes on to suggest it is possible with some additional works.”

Cllr Cryan highlighted that any potential site would have ‘in-depth assessments’ and be judged on a ‘case by case basis’, adding: “Please be assured that no works would take place where there was any doubt to the safety of our residents or the structural integrity of the building. The council is also aware of the impact extensions will have on people living in the affected buildings and has drafted a series of principles and commitments to maximise the benefits and minimise the impact on residents, and we will continue to consult and engage with residents as our proposals move forward.”

She also confirmed that “further comprehensive investigative works and surveys will be carried out to determine the structural stability of the blocks and their exact load capacity,” before adding: “Our residents’ health and safety is our highest priority and we will not proceed with the development until the structural works have been concluded and we are satisfied with the findings.”

44 new council homes given planning permission in Peckham

A CGI of the new block

By Katherine Johnston katherine@southwarknews.co.uk which forms a duct in its own right.

“Any ducts formed of non-fire-resisting materials are required to be removed, with fire resisting materials to be installed to achieve the minimum standard of fire resistance.”

Marie Curie house’s fire risk assessment was updated in January 2020 to “substantial”. One issue is an “inadequate standard of housekeeping” with communal rubbish and clutter posing risk.

Other issues that are of particular concern include: Damage to fire batt at ground floor electrical intake; ceiling damage in multiple places; water damage potentially impacting ceiling panel fire resistance; and bin chute blockages. There are also a number of “defective” communal doors, in fire escape routes, that need urgent fixing and “signage provisions are noted to be generally inadequate”. The emergency lighting system also fails to

meet current regulations and will need to be replaced.

As we reported last week, the bill for the project is expected to reach at least £16 million as every resident will need to leave the block while the invasive work is carried out.

At the cabinet meeting, Southwark’s councillors heard that a majority of tenants had decided to leave the block permanently rather than being temporarily rehoused.

The council is now commissioning an independent review into the block and safety works required which will look at why similar safety improvements were made in neighbouring building Lakanal House in the wider Sceaux Gardens Estate several years ago but have only just been discovered as urgently needed in Marie Curie - which has the same design. The report is expected to be completed toward the end of this year.

Proposals to build 44 new council homes on Peckham’s Lindley Estate have been given planning permission.

The development will see a new L-shaped block, part of which is five storey, as well as a new landscaped courtyard at 157-177 Commercial Way. At least fifty per cent of the new homes will be offered to existing tenants who are considered to be in housing need already living in the surrounding area, for example within the existing estate. The remainder will be available for bidding to those on the borough-wide register.

Construction work is expected to begin in spring 2022 with a view to complete in early 2024.

The project is one of Southwark Council’s controversial ‘infill’ developments, as detailed by the News, and has been in development since 2018 when Southwark Council first

consulted with the estate’s Tenant and Resident Association.

An existing two-storey block will be demolished to make way for the new development, designed by Pitman Tozer Architects, which includes seventeen one beds, sixteen two-beds, nine threebeds and two four-beds, including a wheelchair accessible home.

During the consultation process, original plans for an eleven-story block were scaled down to five storeys after concerns raised by residents including loss of light and the impact of other large-scale housing developments nearby - including at Bells Gardens.

Councillor Stephanie Cryan, cabinet member for council homes and homelessness, said: “It’s fantastic news that this development now has planning permission and will go ahead.

“This block will provide new council homes in an area where there is a high level of need for affordable housing, meaning that local people will be able to stay close to friends, family and the services they already use”.

Southwark News, Thursday September 23 2021

www.southwarknews.co.uk/news

NEWS 9

se15 residents tell of shock after diggers move in

Nearly 200 videos uploaded against infilling Peckham Green

By Charles Harrison news@southwarknews.co.uk

A huge outpouring of frustration and shock from Peckham residents has met construction work on a much-loved green space.

The protestor-led Twitter account Peckham Green Save It has shared 183 interviews with local residents who were shocked to walk to the green near Sumner Road, only to find it boarded up ready for development.

The construction work, which started on 9th August, is one in a series of controversial infill projects by Southwark Council, as reported by the News last month.

While the site, located just north of Peckham High Street, is officially named the Flaxyard site, it has become known locally as Peckham Green.

One of the nearly 200 residents interviewed, Pastor Isaac, said in his video: “This is disastrous. I used to have my church right here. Is disheartening that our green space is going, and disappointing that the council is allowing this.

Watch the video

nline

southwarknews.co.uk

Construction workers on Peckham Green “It’s good to have new homes but not to the detriment of other people.”

Weekly protests against the development have been held on the site since May 2021.

Key to residents’ frustration is the sense that the development was not adequately communicated.

Many of those videoed by Peckham Green Save It stated that they had no idea that there was a development happening right on their front door.

Interviewee Elizabeth said: “It’s disgusting that we’ve not been told what’s going on. We’re always the last to know."

It’s good to have new homes but not to the detriment of other people

ELITE FISH BAR 020 7237 6409

While a newsletter from council homes cabinet member Stephanie Cryan does explain the development, it only refers to it as the Flaxyard site - a name many residents are not familiar with.

Residents also expressed frustration that the last consultation on the development was in 2016 - five years before construction would actually take place.

But the council highlight the need to provide affordable housing - and, as reported by the News in July, the site was always intended for development.

Officially, it has been labelled the Flaxyard brownfield site since 1995.

In a newsletter earlier this week, council homes cabinet member Stephanie Cryan said: “There is a very real need for genuinely affordable housing in Peckham, with more than 270 households currently on the council’s waiting list in the Peckham ward.

“We have a moral duty to build more council homes.”

However, many residents have stated that they have always considered the site to be a park, as it has always played that role in the community - and therefore, it should not be built on.

Mr Schaffer said: “The people are so angry. Maybe it was labelled as brownfield in 1995 but times have changed.

"We’re in a climate crisis. We’re in a pandemic. We value our green spaces more than ever.”

Southwark Council have not yet responded to a request for comment on the interviews.

Traditional fish & chips

OPEN Mon-Thurs 11am-9pm, Fri 11am-10pm, Sat 11am-9pm & Sunday CLOSED

Ambrose Street, Bermondsey SE16 3NY (opposite TSB bank)

SPECIAL OFFER*

FISH & CHIPS REGULAR COD & CHIPS

*Limited time only

NOW £6.50 CLOSED SUNDAYS

EAT IN OR TAKE AWAY

SPECIAL DEALS Cod & Chips Rock & Chips Haddock & Chips Plaice & Chips Skate middle & Chips Skate wing & Chips Scampi & Chips

£9.80 £10.80 £10.80 £10.80 £14.30 £13.30 £8.80

£6.50 £8.50 £8.50 £8.50 £13.00 £12.00 £7.50

Battered sausage & Chips Jumbo sausage & Chips Saveloy & Chips Fishcake & Chips 6 Nuggets & Chips Pie & Chips

£4.30 £4.30 £4.30 £4.30 £6.80 £5.80

£3.50 £3.50 £3.50 £3.50 £5.00 £4.50

Chips

Regular £2.30 Large £4.50

Now on Deliveroo and Uber Eats

36 seater restaurant, eat in or take away - same price

10 NEWS

www.southwarknews.co.uk/news

Southwark News, Thursday September 23 2021

Rye lane is re-opening to buses and taxis - but is everyone happy?

By Frankie Lister-Fell news@southwarknews.co.uk Buses and taxis will once again be able to use Rye Lane from next Monday, as part of an eighteenmonth trial.

Rye Lane was temporarily pedestrianised in July 2020 to encourage social distancing and minimise traffic accidents during the pandemic.

However, as the News reported this summer, Southwark Council admitted that some businesses have lost customers who would normally travel by bus.

Looking to compromise, the council and TfL will reintroduce buses and taxis under an experimental traffic order on Monday, October 4, which allows authorities to impose changes without consulting the public first.

Cyclists and timed deliveries – from 7am to 10am every day – can still use Rye Lane. There will be two rounds of public consultation in both six and eighteen months’ time.

However, when trucks began resurfacing the carriageway on Wednesday week, September 15, some residents were shocked that they hadn’t been consulted.

Will Sandy, who lives near Rye Lane, believes a better compromise could have been reached.

“With a little more local engagement and conversation with Southwark Council it could have become a landmark street, future-proofing it against the climate emergency,” he said.

“Recent flooding will only get worse

Violent crime is down in Southwark and across the whole of London

if we don’t introduce soft landscaping and planting.”

Lois, from Peckham’s Warwick Gardens, would “love Rye Lane to stay as a more pedestrianised area”.

“It definitely feels like more of a community now, rather than a thoroughfare,” she said.

However, resident Brian Williams has found the current walk from the nearest bus stop to Peckham Rye station challenging. Brian is blind and uses a guide dog.

“I can’t wait for the road to be open to public transport again. Guide dogs are trained very specifically to walk on the pavement when there is one available.

“So having the road closed is no benefit to me at all,” he said.

When Nunhead mum Sarah Maloney was heavily pregnant this year, she stopped visiting Rye Lane’s shops because she struggled to walk.

She said she avoids using the station at night as she feels unsafe walking to get a bus.

Cat Owen, who lives in Sydenham, has also “never felt safe” going down Rye Lane alone at night.

She thinks the reintroduction of public transport is essential: “I always get catcalled. The walk to the next bus stop is about six minutes and that makes a difference when you’re being harassed.”

As for businesses, whether the temporary pedestrianisation impacted their trade varies by industry.

Grace Aka, who works at clothing store Baby in Rye Lane Market, said her shop has seen far fewer customers.

“You can see how dry this place is. You

By Kit Heren

kit@southwarknews.co.uk The number of robberies in Southwark fell more than 40 per cent in August this year compared to 2019, as police launched a crackdown on violent crime throughout London.

There were 96 instances of robbery of personal property in Southwark in August 2021, according to the Met’s crime database, compared with 167 in the same month two years earlier - a drop of 43 per cent. The comparison is with pre-pandemic levels in 2019, rather than 2020 when crime levels were naturally affected by lockdown restrictions.

Knife possession was also down in Southwark over the same period from a much lower level: from eleven instances

can see how quiet I am,” she said.

Beck from Peckham Organics explained: “This particular shop right now is not affected by no buses, but we’ll see.

“I think the council made the right decision.

“But we need to make sure everyone’s voice is heard during the consultation.

“We need to keep talking to each other to work out what we want as a community.”

Southwark Council was contacted for comment but did not respond before publication.

Beck, managing consultant of Peckham Organics

of ‘possession of article with blade or point’ in August 2019 to five in August this year. Gun crime was roughly flat.

Robbery was down 37 per cent across London as a whole. Knife crime fell by 32 per cent and there was a 38 per cent reduction in gun crime across the capital.

Police said they launched the Londonwide initiative to tackle the combination of the end of lockdown restrictions and the start of the school summer holiday.

Tactics included patrolling open spaces and violence hotspots like parks, public transport and other busy areas.

Commander Alex Murray, lead for violence in London, said: “The reductions are compared to crime levels before the pandemic, showing real progress has been made over this time. These are tremendous efforts by officers who are dedicated to creating safer communities.

Battersea station

northern line stations launched and on time!

By Katherine Johnston

katherine@southwarknews.co.uk The new Northern Line extension officially opened on Monday - on time despite the challenges of COVID-19.

Nine Elms and Battersea Power Station tube stations, on the Charing Cross branch, are now fully operational after the huge construction project started in 2015.

Trains started running at 05:28 on September 20. Among the first passengers were London Mayor, Sadiq Khan and secretary of state for transport, Grant Shapps.

Battersea Power Station Community Choir sang at the new Battersea station this morning to mark its opening day.

A peak-time service of six trains per hour operates on the extension and this will increase to 12 trains per hour by mid-2022.

The five trains per hour off-peak will double to ten trains per hour next year.

TfL says the project has been delivered £160m under budget, bringing its estimated final total cost to £1.1bn.

Sadiq Khan said: "After years of hard work, I'm delighted that we're Londoners can be reassured this work will continue.

“The work we are all doing plus the legacy effects of Covid-19 are also likely contributors to the declines.

“Policing alone is not enough and given the complex nature of violence, the responsibility falls across society. The reductions are also thanks to partners, volunteers and community workers who all work to make London safer.

The results are encouraging and we will continue to work together to tackle violence.

“To everyone who has made a call to police or Crimestoppers with information on violent crime, you too have made a difference in your community.

“Although these reductions are positive, we cannot and will not be complacent in the fight to tackle violence in all its forms.

able to open the Northern Line Extension today and it was great to have the chance to travel on one of the first trains between Nine Elms and Battersea Power Station.

“This extension will hugely improve the links between these vibrant, growing south London neighbourhoods and the rest of the capital, and will also help to support thousands of new jobs and homes as we move forward with London's recovery from the pandemic.

“The new stations are beautiful and I encourage Londoners and visitors to start using the Northern Line Extension to get around and help them enjoy everything the capital has to offer."

Transport secretary Grant Shapps added: "London's world-famous tube network has two new stations from today, the first stops to be added so far this century, with names that will soon become familiar to Londoners as they return to public transport after the pandemic.

"Ahead of the opening of the Elizabeth line next year, these upgrades extend vital connectivity across the greatest city in the world and show the power of transport connections."

“We encourage the public to call the independent charity Crimestoppers, 100 per cent anonymously, with any information they may have about violence or knife crime in their area. Any information, no matter how small, could save a life.”

REDUCE THE OF COVID-19 SPREAD OF REDUCE THE SPREAD To keep ourselves, families, and the community safe:

COVID-19 Get vaccinated if you are eligible

Keep social distancing and avoid crowded areas if possible

To keep ourselves, families, and the community safe: Wear a face covering (unless exempt) in crowded places and on public transport

Keep social distancing

Wash your hands regularly or use sanitiser

Wear a face covering (unless exempt)

If you have symptoms, stay at home and book a test at: nhs.uk/coronavirus

Wash your hands or use sanitiser

Meet outside, or ventilate rooms for indoor visitors

If you have symptoms, stay at home and Check a intest at venues for test and trace book at: nhs.uk/coronavirus

Check the the latest latestCOVID-19 COVID-19restrictions: information: gov.uk/coronavirus Check gov.uk/coronavirus Visit southwark.gov.uk/coronavirus southwark.gov.uk/coronavirusororsign signupuptoto our Visit our digital digital newsletter at southwark.gov.uk/followus newsletter at southwark.gov.uk/followus  @lb_southwark

 facebook.com/southwarkcouncil

KEEP SOUTHWARK SAFE

@southwarkcouncil

12 NEWS

www.southwarknews.co.uk/news

Southwark News, Thursday September 23 2021 ADVERTORIAL

Southwark News, Thursday September 23 2021

www.southwarknews.co.uk/news

NEWS 13

Can you help police to catch Chino’s killers?

Man injured in Bermondsey attack

By Kit Heren

kit@southwarknews.co.uk Police are calling for help one week on from a 'shocking' murder in south London.

By Kit Heren kit@southwarknews.co.uk A man was robbed and injured in Bermondsey on the afternoon of Thursday, September 16, in an attack that took place in broad daylight on a residential street.

The attack took place at about 5pm in Rossetti Road on the Stevenson Crescent Estate. Police could not confirm details about the victim, but he appeared to be middle-aged and did not speak English as his first language.

The man was seen being helped by emergency services workers on the cycle and pedestrian path between Sheppard Drive and Stevenson Crescent after the incident.

No one has been arrested yet.

A spokesperson for the Met told the News: "Police were called at approximately 17:00hrs on Thursday, 16 September to reports of a man robbed in Rossetti Road, SE16.

"The man, no further details, suffered a leg injury during the incident.

"Enquiries into the circumstances are ongoing. No arrests; enquiries continue."

CCTV images are released after knife-point robbery

By Katherine Johnston

katherine@southwarknews.co.uk CCTV images taken around the time of a knife-point robbery onboard a Blackfriars train have been released by British Transport Police.

The victim was targeted shortly after 11pm on Wednesday, August 25.

Just after boarding the southbound service from St Pancras he was

approached by two young men who pinned him against the window, pulled out a knife and took his wallet before running off the train.

Officers investigating the attack have asked anyone who recognises the two men, pictured, or has any information to come forward.

Text British Transport Police on 61016 or call 0800 40 50 40. To remain anonymous call Crimestoppers on 0800 555 111.

Chino Johnson, 27. was shot to death in Ferrey Mews in Brixton on Sunday, September 12 at about 9pm. Two women, aged 29 and 26, were also wounded and treated in hospital.

Detective Chief Inspector Richard Leonard, from the Met’s Specialist Crime Command who leads the investigation, said: “Those responsible need to be identified and held to account for their actions and I would appeal to anyone who has information that could assist, no matter how small or insignificant they think this is, to contact my team in confidence.

“If you do not wish to speak to police, you can also provide information anonymously to the independent charity Crimestoppers.”

Mr Johnson was socialising with friends outside the property in Ferrey Mews when two suspects rode up on a light-coloured moped and opened fire on the group. The pair then fled on the moped eastwards in the direction of Bennett Road and Dora Way. Mr Johnson was treated by London Ambulance Service crews but died soon afterwards, while the 29-yearold woman was taken to hospital with injuries that are not life-threatening.

Chino Johnson The second woman later took herself to hospital with minor injuries.

Police are particularly interested in the light coloured moped, which is either white or silver and has a large black square box mounted on the rear and an L plate hanging down. Officers said it is either a Yamaha NX or a model that looks similar.

Call the incident room on 020 8721 4622 or tweet @MetCC, giving the reference 7163/12SEP. Information can also be provided to Crimestoppers, anonymously, on 0800 555 111 or through their website at www. crimestoppers-uk.org There have been no arrests and police enquiries continue.

Anyone with footage that could assist can upload it here: https://mipp.police. uk/operation/01MPS21S92-PO1

Can you make Southwark

cleaner greener or safer?

We are inviting people who live or work in Southwark to propose ideas to make their local area a safer, healthier place to live.

What is the funding for?

When do I apply?

Contact

Telephone 020 7525 4077 or email cgs@southwark.gov.uk

The Cleaner Greener Safer and Devolved Highways programmes fund improvements across Southwark, e.g. new playgrounds, food growing planters, lighting, cycle parking, and zebra crossings.

How do I apply?

The application period for the 2022/23 round is open from 1 September to 30 September 2021 (midnight).

Visit www.southwark.gov.uk/ cleanergreenersafer for more information and to submit an online application. If you are unable to apply online, call 020 7525 4077.

14 NEWS

www.southwarknews.co.uk/news

Southwark News, Thursday September 23 2021

southwark angels Helping in crisis

New job centre opens its doors with 60 ‘work coaches’ A new job centre opened in Southwark this week as part of the government’s push to get more people into work as the country emerges from the Covid-19 pandemic.

music scholarship is up for grabs

A prestigious music school in Borough has launched a new scholarship that will cover all the fees for the winner’s course.

London College of Creative Media (LCCM), based on Union Street, is holding an audition day this Saturday September 25 at its Music Box venue for anyone who would like to apply for the scholarship. The school runs courses in production, performance and music business at undergraduate and postgraduate level.

People applying for the audition will get the chance to show off their talent, ideas or passion projects to the panel of judges. Three finalists will then go to the grand final in the second week of term, overseen by a panel of music industry professionals and experts.

“We’re really excited to welcome talented individuals to the Music Box to impress us with their skills and musicianship,” said Pat Cotton, programme leader for undergraduate music. “Making a scholarship available on merit is such a fantastic opportunity and will really help the college support the development of more young musicians.”

The scholarship day will be an ‘opendoor’ style afternoon, with tours of the building, a welcome talk from principal Anthony Hamer-Hodges, student performances and careers advice.

Search for 'LCCM Scholarship Day' to find out more and register for an audition.

“We’re really thankful to senior leadership and the LCCM board for backing our vision and drive to get more talented young people to the Music Box and ultimately, to make them into true LCCMers,” said Evie Asio-Okwalinga, youth music officer at LCCM. “It marks a real line in the sand and proves our mission to create an achievable pathway to sustained career success, and it will be a real hit with our Youth Music network.”

Anthony Hamer-Hodges, LCCM principal

Minister for Employment Mims Davies came to the opening of the Blackfriars Road centre last Wednesday week, September 15.

The centre has 60 newly hired ‘work coaches’, who the Department for Work and Pensions (DWP) said will give local people looking for work in Southwark one-on-one support to find their next job.

Davies said: “It was brilliant to visit our new DWP Jobcentre in Blackfriars and meet some of the fantastic Work Coaches who'll be matching local people to jobs and making sure they have the skills and confidence to thrive in work.

“We know this has been a challenging time for many people and that’s why we’re boosting our DWP Jobcentre support in every community of the UK, including here

in Southwark.

“Every customer benefits from having a dedicated Work Coach.

They know the local jobs market and work with local businesses to match jobseekers to the latest opportunities.”

Luke Kelly is one of those work coaches at the Blackfriars Road centre.

Luke said: “I love being a Work Coach as I work with such a variety of customers and employers. I enjoy building a rapport with them and most importantly assisting the customers in gaining employment.”

Daniel Fennell is the District Operations Manager for Lambeth and Southwark overseeing the new site, with twelve years of DWP experience.

He added: “I am so proud to be opening this new Jobcentre focusing on our 18-24-year-old customers supporting them into employment by equipping them with the skills and confidence to gain long term sustainable employment.”

Music Box, where the auditions will take place

Southwark News, Thursday September 23 2021

www.southwarknews.co.uk/news

walk and unwind in rotherhithe

A Rotherhithe charity has launched a new weekly walking group to encourage locals to exercise and socialise

Surrey Docks, where the walks take place

UK’s busiest lifeboat station’s appeal to replace ‘old and cramped’ facility The busiest lifeboat station in the UK, which is based at Waterloo Bridge, is fundraising for a new station to replace the "old and cramped" facility staff use now.

Tower Lifeboat Station, which opened in 2002, has launched boats more than 8,000 times, rescuing almost 2,000 people and saving 334 lives. The crew – 55 volunteers and ten full time crew members – stay on the station in twelve-hour shifts every day of the year and are ready to launch within 90 seconds.

But the station is "old and cramped" and rises and falls seven metres with the tide - making it unsuitable for the team to do their job, said the Royal National Lifeboat Institution, the

charity that runs Tower.

The station does not have the facilities that the crew need to give the best possible care to the people it rescues - so when the crew need to gvive someone CPR, there is no privacy from the general public. The new station will include modern facilities such as private, purposebuilt spaces for taking care of people who have been rescued, a drying room for kit and a new area for public engagement.

Holly McGlinchey, a volunteer at Tower, was inspired to join the crew after taking part in a rescue when she worked for Thames Clipper, and called for people to support the station's "vital work".

"I joined the crew at Tower after

help is at hand for those wh0 have lost someone to suicide The Maudsley Hospital in Denmark Hill has launched a new service for people in Southwark and south-east London whose loved ones have committed suicide.

The service works with people who live in Southwark, Lambeth, Lewisham, Greenwich, Bexley and Bromley or whose loved ones lived or died in these boroughs. Staff support people in the aftermath of suicides, offering practical support like funeral arrangements, as well as emotional support.

The service, which is run by South East London Mind as well as the NHS trust that runs the Maudsley,

is available for people of all ages including children and young people who feel they may benefit from support.

Dr Michael Holland, medical director at South London and Maudsley NHS Foundation Trust said: “Our suicide bereavement service will support people in the community who are affected by suicide and, we hope will reduce the risk of further deaths by suicide in this vulnerable group through preventative, outreach work."

To use the service or find out more visit www.slam.nhs.uk/ our-services/suicide-bereavementservice/

The walks begin at the Restorative Justice For All (RJ4All) community centre at 10am every Wednesday morning and run for two hours around the Surrey Docks area.

Everyone who takes part in “Walk and Unwind” will be given a free coffee, and RJ4ALL plans to hand out free t-shirts for attendees soon. The aim of the project is to get people in the area exercising and socialising with one another in a bid to combat loneliness and improve the wellbeing of the neighbourhood.

NEWS 15

RJ4ALL said it expects most people who take part to be stay at home parents or retirees, as the walks take place on a weekday in the middle of the day in the middle of the week.

But there are no restrictions on who can take part and people of all ages and stamina levels are welcome. Children must be accompanied by an adult.

The new walking group follows in the footsteps of the Proper Blokes Club, a Bermondsey and Rotherhithe-based walking group that aims to tackle the stigma of men discussing their mental health issues.

To take part in the walks go to 30 Plough Way SE16 2LJ at 10am on Wednesday.

seeing the incredible work that they do first-hand," said Holly, 26.

"Watching them rescue someone was so emotional. After seeing it, I knew I wanted to join the team.

"Now that I’m on crew, I love being part of the team and am so proud of the vital work that we do. But we need to carry on doing our lifesaving work in a station that is fit for the future.

Our current station is old, cramped and lacks the proper facilities that we need. Please donate to our appeal so that we can have the station we deserve."

Tower want to raise £33,000 from the public fundraiser, although the entire new station is set to cost £8.2m, according to an August estimate.

Search Tower RNLI Appeal to donate.

La Perra Blanco

are you up for a malted shake in bermondsey?

A new music night is coming to Bermondsey's Maltby Street, starting from next week.

The weekly event, which begins next Thursday, September 23, will be a mix of blues, jazz, country, rhythm & blues, rockabilly and skiffle, among other genres.

Malted Shake will be held at Malt Bar on Maltby Street from 6pm-10pm. Aisha Khan and Leo Castro, owners of nearby Castro’s barbershop, are also helping to organise the event.

Aisha Khan said: “We have really

missed live music events throughout the lockdown and we love Bermondsey as it’s such a vibrant area full of great food, bars, art and design. We felt like music was the final missing part of the cultural landscape and when Malt built a stage in their new bar, we knew we had to get involved."

The first night will be led by La Perra Blanco, a young female Spanish guitarist and singer.

Tickets are £13.52 including a service charge. Search online for 'Malted Shake Presents' to find tickets.

16 NEWS

www.southwarknews.co.uk/news

Southwark News, Thursday September 23 2021

Plans submitted for canada water’s ‘future offices’

By Kit Heren kit@southwarknews.co.uk Plans have been submitted for a 110-metre office and shopping development by Canada Water dock in Rotherhithe - which could see Southwark residents miss out on a park approved years ago but never built.

Canada Water Dockside would be the “front gate” to a raft of new developments in the area, most

prominently British Land’s sprawling Canada Water masterplan, according to the plans.

The proposed new development, which would be built by German developers Art-Invest Real Estate, would see 24-storey and ten-storey buildings put up directly to the east of the dock, with a thirteen-storey building behind them.

But this could mean that the people of Rotherhithe lose out on a park that was agreed with Tooley Street planners several years ago. A different company

submitted a planning application for the same site in 2013, which included a park roughly where Art-Invest now want to put the ten-storey building, according to plans on Southwark Council’s website.

The plans were later approved by the council but the park was never built.

Art-Invest pointed out in response that the previous scheme was residential and nearly double the height of its buildings, with a smaller “footprint”.

The company said that this meant the previous application had more space for

New ‘university’ opens in Rotherhithe Students don’t need maths or physics A-level to get in

By Kit Heren kit@southwarknews.co.uk A new engineering ‘university’ has opened in Rotherhithe, with the aim of broadening the kind of people who go into the profession.

The first group of 27 TEDI-London students began their studies at the site on Quebec Way this Monday, September 20. The university aims to be more hands on with its teaching than is

normal for engineering courses, and staff say students will tackle real-life problems from the start. Students don’t need maths or physics A-Level to get in, which is unusual for engineering.

“Our students will be able to work on projects connected to, and for the benefit of, their local community, something which was a highly attractive proposition for us when choosing the location for our campus,” said Judy Raper, who runs the new university.

The university said that scholarships are available for Southwark-based students, but a spokesperson confirmed this week that there are none from the borough in the first intake.

TEDI held a launch event last week at the new campus, with speakers including MP and former engineer Chi Onwurah. Students at the event told

the News that what drew them to the university was the opportunity to get practical experience straightaway, as well as the sustainability of the new building.

The building is built from lightweight steel frame boxes clad with insulation, which means they don’t need deep piles.

The boxes were pre-fabricated and only took six weeks to put together once delivered to the site.

Funding comes from King’s College London, Arizona State University and the University of New South Wales in Sydney. British Land, which is carrying out its Canada Water Masterplan in the area, helped with design and building.

There is an outreach programme for TEDI this autumn. If you are interested in studying at TEDI search online for 'TEDILondon Thinking Ahead'

“public realm provision”, whereas ArtInvest’s public amenities would largely be inside the buildings and could “spill out” onto the surrounding landscaped areas.

The developers added that the previous application on the site was made before the Canada Water Masterplan was created, which includes a park on Surrey Quays Road. Art-Invest also pointed out that its scheme is more about “enjoying and activating the waterfront, creating quiet dwell spaces away from the water and fostering green links, with activities linked to the new town centre and the uses within the buildings.”

Meanwhile some locals have asked in response to the application why the area needs new office blocks when the last eighteen months have seen a mass shift to working from home.

It is unclear if this will change even after the pandemic; the government is contemplating letting employees ask to work remotely from the first day of a new job, when up to now workers have had to wait six months.

Art-Invest, who bought the site in 2020, are betting on a wide scale return to offices in London as the Covid-19 pandemic recedes. They say that the best offices will be flexible destinations where people can work with others and also have opportunities to relax and take part in leisure activities in the immediate area in their spare time.

The shops to be included as part of the development would be independent

“where possible”. “These might include for example a local baker, green-grocer, deli shop or hair-dresser for use by locals and workers alike,” the planning application continues. Also included would be a community centre for use by local community groups, and a health centre that could host a GP practice.

Art-Invest would also run a community wellbeing fund for the area with their neighbours, the sports shop Decathlon.

The fund, which would be given “tens of thousands of pounds every year for the next five years”, would sponsor sports and wellbeing initiatives in the area, although details are sparse at the moment.

The developers have consulted with locals for months. Rotherhithe residents canvassed by the News earlier this year were positive about the proposals.

Ali Abbas, who leads Art-Invest’s UK business, said: “We are very excited to be one-step-closer to being able to deliver on our vision that has been so well received by communities throughout the consultation for Canada Water Dockside. I would like to thank all of those residents and businesses who have participated in the process to date.

They have given us the confidence to realise this scheme and ultimately have helped shape the exciting application that has been submitted.”

To view and comment on the planning application visit Southwark’s planning website and enter reference 21/AP/2655.

Thames walkers will have to divert inland a little longer

By Kit Heren kit@southwarknews.co.uk A Bermondsey footbridge by the Thames is closed for repairs for nearly two months this autumn, meaning pedestrians have to go on a long diversion inland.

St Saviour’s Footbridge in Shad Thames closed on September 13 and is expected to remain shut until November 5. Work on the bridge first started in 2018, led by Southwark Council and builders Conway Aecom. The latest stage of the project began this month.

The plan is for the bridge, which crosses the dock of the same name, to open up to let large boats into the inlet, as was originally intended.

A note published by the Port of London authority in August said: “Due to further delays to the project, contractors working on behalf of Southwark Council will continue with maintenance works on St Saviours Footbridge.”

The council said on its website: “Since opening in 1995, the bridge has been subject to various mechanical, structural and operational problems and has been fixed in the closed position in recent years…

“In order to undertake the works, the bridge requires closure to pedestrians for dismantling and other required works. It will be necessary for pedestrians to follow a marked diversion via Shad Thames and Mill Street.”

Southwark News, Thursday September 23 2021

www.southwarknews.co.uk/news

NEWS 17

By Katherine Johnston katherine@southwarknews.co.uk South Londoners are invited to open up about grief and their mental health while enjoying an ice cream in Elephant and Castle this autumn.

Artist Annie Nicholson, known as Fantangoe Kid, is running her mobile van Fandangoe Whip in Elephant Park from September 30 to October 2.

The installation, a project run in collaboration with London College of Communication, has visited towns and cities across the UK, and brings Annie back to her roots, as she studied graphic design at the college.

The project was inspired by Nicholson’s own experience of grief - having lost family members in 2011 and the impact of COVID-19.

She explained: “We have all experienced a loss of some sort this past year, whether a physical loss of loved ones or a loss of lifestyle and routine, or both.

“How have we survived lockdown?

How are we processing the grief of all we have lost? And how can we do this

Photo by Tara Darby

Opening up over a fandangoe whip together?

“Grief is a part of life and one that comes to us all. The sooner we find ways in which we can start to share this, the less overwhelming I believe the world will be.”

Gill Henderson, Cultural and Communities Partnerships Manager at London College of Communication said: “The Fandangoe Whip presents an original yet accessible means of broaching what may be difficult topics for many people in the area.

“Annie’s eye-catching designs may already be familiar to people who work and live in Elephant and Castle.

Last year her designs inspired by local community workshops decorated a pillar at the entrance to the College, which visitors can still enjoy today.

“It’s fantastic that Annie will be continuing to engage with the Elephant and Castle communities through workshops and an installation which will combine being great fun with a safe space to talk about mental health and wellbeing.”

The Fandangoe Whip will be at Elephant Park, SE17 1UB, from 30 September – 2 October, open from 11am-4pm each day.

Box office 020 8463 0100 • blackheathhalls.com •

& s u n e V s i n o d A 2021 PRESENTS

AUTUMN 2021

SUZI RUFFELL

ED BYRNE

KATHRYN TICKELL & THE DARKENING

GARY DELANEY

DANCE LIKE EVERYONE'S WATCHING SAT 16 OCT 8pm

IF I'M HONEST WED 20 OCT 8pm

Blow y John b c i s u M

SUN 17 OCT 8pm

TUESDAY 28 SEPTEMBER | 6.30PM & 8.30PM THURSDAY 30 SEPTEMBER | 6.30PM & 8.30PM SATURDAY 2 OCTOBER | 2.30PM & 5PM SUNDAY 3 OCTOBER | 2.30PM & 5PM

V+A

GARY IN PUNDERLAND FRI 29 OCT 5.30pm & 8pm

18 NEWS

www.southwarknews.co.uk/news

Southwark News, Thursday September 23 2021

police renew appeal to solve ‘Torso in the Thames’ murder

By Katherine Johnston

katherine@southwarknews.co.uk Twenty years after the torso of a young boy was found in the Thames, police are renewing their appeal for information that could help identify the victim and solve the cold case.

In two decades little progress has been made in the distressing case, which made headlines around the world, and is now the longest unsolved child murder case in the history of the Met. The body, which had been severed of its head and limbs and was wearing a pair of orange shorts, was found in the river near

Tower Bridge by a member of the public on Friday, September 21, at 4pm.

Named ‘Adam’ by officers, the boy has never been identified. Forensics revealed he would have been just five or six years old at the time of his death, and hailed from Nigeria. It is believed he had been trafficked into the UK, possibly through Germany.

The cause of death was later declared as a result of violent trauma to the neck.

A leading theory is that he may have been murdered in a ritualistic killing.

In the twenty years since the shocking discovery, police have regularly reviewed the case including making use of new

forensic technologies.

The inquiry has also included comprehensive checks on all UK missing people and extensive inquiries in London, other parts of the UK and abroad, including South Africa, Holland, Germany and Nigeria.

Despite these efforts and numerous high-profile appeals over the years, including an appeal by Nelson Mandela to all the African communities across the world to help police, the case remains unsolved.

Detective Chief Inspector Kate Kieran, a homicide detective from the Met’s specialist crime command, said: “It

urgent. But Ronnie had not heard anything

by Friday and so called the council.

The council officer he spoke to told him that OCO, Southwark’s heating contractors for the area, would only be able to fix the problem on September 22 a full week after the issue was first found.

But within a day of the News contacting the council and OCO, the boiler was fixed and Ronnie had hot water again.

Ronnie and his wife had been planning to go on a caravan holiday to Dymchurch in Kent - their first trip away in three years.

She was able to go but Ronnie had to stay to let the contractors in. “I’ve missed out on my holiday - it’s messed us up,” he said.

“She’s gone because she can have a shower in the caravan,” Ronnie added on Monday, before the boiler was fixed. “It’s not just the shower that’s the problem.

Today is not that warm, I’ve got a dressing

gown on. We’ve both got arthritis, you can feel the cold in your bones.”

Ronnie, who has been a council tenant for about 40 years, said he was upset at the way both council officers and OCO staff handled the problem at first. “They said it was going to be fixed urgently, but then when I phoned up two days later no one seemed to know what was going on.

“Then when I eventually spoke to OCO, the woman told me that she had had the same problem and I should boil water in pots and pans.

“I told her we’ve both got arthritis - we shouldn’t be carrying pots of boiling water upstairs. I didn’t like the way I was dealt with. It was heartless.”

OCO were contacted for comment but did not reply in time for publication. The council confirmed the boiler had been fixed on Monday but did not comment further.

be setting up residencies in Sayer Street for the day, offering delicious street food to festival goers.

Anthony Badu, Co-Founder and Arts Director of flat 70, said: “By hosting Elephant & Carnival, we want to provide the area’s ethnically diverse community with a safe and joy filled event that reflects on the neighbourhood’s past, whilst celebrating the opportunities for the future.

“If Elephant and Castle is a family, then our exhibition is the family album, with photography, poetry and audio contributions from the living archive of residents and businesses who call the area home.

“The area continues to be home to a variety of cultures and communities that enrich our neighbourhood.

“Ensuring that these communities are represented, supported and sustained is incredibly important in maintaining inclusivity as Elephant and Castle changes.”

Mathew Onuba, a trader who formerly operated from the shopping centre, said the event was a reminder that although the shopping centre has gone, the community is still thriving.

"This is a place I love; many people love that place,” he said.

“There is lots of togetherness.

Elephant and Castle gave us hope and belief that we can do something. That is what it means to me. It is a lasting thing, I will never forget."

The event is also a much-needed

opportunity to celebrate arts and cultural organisations from the borough, many of whom were unable to work or put on events during lockdown.

A Run Dem Radio spokesperson explained: "We are thrilled to be able to spread good vibes by sound tracking Elephant & Carnival, especially in a year when the carnivals that inspired it and so many live music events have been cancelled.

“The local community needs

Elderly couple left without hot water

By Kit Heren

kit@southwarknews.co.uk An elderly and unwell Bermondsey couple have complained of ‘heartless’ treatment after being left without hot water for nearly a week - ruining their first holiday in three years.

Ronnie Bates and his wife, who are both in their seventies, had a routine check on their boiler last Wednesday week, September 15. The workman discovered a problem that meant the boiler had to be turned off immediately. The immersion heater was also broken, leaving Ronnie suddenly without hot water.

Ronnie and his wife both have arthritis and severe problems with their hearts and the workman said he would report the broken boiler and immersion heater as

It is carnival mania at the Elephant this weekend

By Katherine Johnston katherine@southwarknews.co.uk Two community carnivals are coming to Elephant and Castle this weekend - one in Castle Square and another in Sayer Street.

Both aim to showcase the area’s vibrant culture and support independent traders.

The inaugural ‘Elephant & Carnival’ festival, taking place in Sayer Street, brings together community groups, charities including Latin Elephant, and restaurants on September 25, with dance, music, food and a photography exhibition, with a festival soundtrack provided by Elephant Park-based community radio station Run Dem Radio.

Dance collectives Oraceon dance crew, At Your Beat, and the Federation of Latino American Artists and Groups will perform throughout the day, and there will also be kids and family friendly entertainment.

A new photographic exhibition will also be on display at Flat 70, marking a year since the closure of the shopping centre.

The photo-series takes a look at the people who call Elephant and Castle home, traders past and present, and the history of the iconic shopping centre - celebrating more than 50 years of cultural diversity in Southwark.

Meanwhile, Ecuadorian and Jamaican restaurants Miko’s and Tasty Jerk will

is incredibly sad and frustrating that Adam’s murder remains unsolved. “The homicide command have been working tirelessly over the years to find out who is responsible.

“We recognise people may not have wanted to speak up at the time and may have felt loyal to the person or people involved in this.

“However, over the past 20 years, allegiances and relationships may have changed and some people may now feel more comfortable talking to us.

“We implore them to be bold and come forward if they know something so that we can finally deliver justice once and

for all. No matter how old or small that information may seem, it really could make all the difference.

“This young boy has not and will not be forgotten. He deserved better and we will not give up on him.”

A series of arrests in connection with the case have proved fruitless. They include a woman arrested on suspicion of murder who was bailed and released with no further action, and two men both of whom were arrested on suspicion of trafficking and later released with no further action.

Anyone with information should call 1010 or, to remain anonymous, 0800 555 111.

opportunities to get together and dance, to meet friends separated by distance and make new friends as the area changes.”

Elephant & Carnival takes place on Saturday 25th September, from 12pm to 20:00pm in Sayer Street. Entry is free to all.

Meanwhile, Castle Square will celebrate a year since opening as an alternative, temporary home for traders during the regeneration.

On Saturday the square will host

its own Fusión De Los Pueblos, a ‘Latin Folk Fiesta’ from 12-6pm, with seventeen dance groups from across Latin America and the Caribbean performing throughout the day and food from numerous traders including Coma y Beba; Daddy O’s, El Guambra; The Original Caribbean Spice; Kaieteur Kitchen Original; Tupi and Pizza Pappagones serving up food.

The event is free to attend, and held at Castle Square, Elephant Rd, London SE17 1AY.

Southwark News, Thursday September 23 2021

www.southwarknews.co.uk/news

NEWS 19

Camberwell author’s look at black british theatre

By Kit Heren

kit@southwarknews.co.uk

Stephen Bourne

A Southwark author has written a groundbreaking new book about the history of black British theatre.

Stephen Bourne’s Deep Are the Roots: Trailblazers Who Changed Black British Theatre, covers a 150-year period from 1825, when a black actor played Othello, the greatest black character in a Shakespeare play, on the British stage for the first time.

Ira Aldridge, an American actor, had a difficult time when he first came to this country as a teenager, although he moved to London to avoid oppression at home in the US. He married a white English woman called Margaret Gill, which angered pro-slavery activists in London, according to Mr Bourne.

The slave trade had been abolished in the British Empire 1807, although slavery in British colonies was not finally outlawed until 1833. According to Mr Bourne’s book, this made it difficult for Aldridge to establish himself on the London stage and he was forced to move out of the capital to build up his reputation.

He played Othello for the first time in his career in 1825 in Brighton, and toured provincial British theatres with great success for several years before returning to London in 1833. He played Othello at the Theatre Royal in Covent Garden. According to Mr Bourne, “it was the first time a Black actor had appeared in a Shakespeare tragedy in a first-rate London theatre”.

He received hostile reviews: one

Ira Aldridge newspaper quoted in Mr Bourne’s book said: “Aldridge shall be jammed to atoms by the relentless power of our critical “BATTERING RAM” if his name is not immediately withdrawn from the Bills!!!”

Aldridge persevered and performed as Othello again at the Surrey Theatre on Blackfriars Road. He also toured extensively in Europe. Ira eventually died in Poland aged 60 in 1867.

Mr Bourne has also uncovered the

story of a black American actor from the nineteenth century who lived near Camberwell Grove. Paul Molyneaux came to London and performed as Othello in a theatre in Kilburn in the north-west of the capital in 1883. The production got bad reviews, at least in part down to its mostlyamateur cast, which frustrated Molyneaux.

Molyneaux appears to have moved to Glasgow, where he married a white British woman, but eventually left the country. He

Pandemic puppy purchasing rush may have dangerous consequences

By Charles Harrison

news@southwarknews.co.uk

Audit highlights council admin error and problems recovering debt in pandemic

By George Mathias

A doggy health organisation this week revealed worrying statistics about a rise in virtual puppy buying in London that may worsen breeding conditions for dogs.

Dog ownership soared across London during lockdown, and Southwark saw the biggest increase, with a 140 per cent rise in puppy purchasing.

But data released by dog health organisation Kennel Club suggests that 45 per cent of London dog owners admit to having a puppy delivered, or “click and collecting” without ever seeing its breeding environment or parents - and three out of five would order the same way again.

This goes against years of campaigning by various dog charities to reduce this kind of purchasing, as it enables scammers and rogue breeders to take advantage of a less regulated market and sell dogs who have been raised in horrid breeding conditions.

“It’s understandable that many of us may have developed some fairly harmless bad habits during lockdown,” said Chief Executive of The Kennel Club Mark Beazley, “But when it comes to puppy buying, these bad habits must be reversed.”

“If a breeder is offering to deliver the pup to your house or asking to take money from you before you’ve even seen the pup, alarm bells should be ringing.

Scammers, rogue breeders and cruel puppy traders can, and will, cash in on this dangerous virtual puppy buying world, with devastating consequences for dogs.”

died in 1891, probably because of a brain tumour.

Mr Bourne describes Paul as ‘the forgotten Othello’ because historians have often claimed that Aldridge was the last black man to play the character in Britain for about 60 years, before Paul Robeson in the 1930s.

But he has not been forgotten by his British descendants, who have done their own research into their pioneering

news@southwarknews.co.uk An administrative error meant Southwark Council overpaid BUPA by nearly half a million while nearly £300,000 has been mistakenly given out as COVID-19 grant payments, a new report reveals.

“Only seeing your puppy online could mean that you’re missing vital clues that your puppy may have come from an unscrupulous breeder,” said RSPCA Chief Inspector for London South Mark Miles.

Among some of the more worrying statistics were that 18 per cent of Londoners spent less than two hours researching their new puppy and where it was from, with 23 per cent admitting that they didn’t find a reputable source, and relied only on internet chatter and social media.

Fifty-one per cent of new owners didn’t bother taking their dog to training classes, with a nearly a quarter reporting that they haven’t socialised their dog with other dogs or with people.

Furthermore, Government figures in 2021 saw a rise of 75 per cent in commercial dog imports from the year prior, creating concern about how many dogs are coming from illegal or unscrupulous backgrounds.

A spokesperson for the RSPCA also highlighted the difficult financial aspect when adopting a dog without properly researching ahead of time.

“Many people massively underestimate the cost of medical procedures and so it can be a major shock when their pet becomes unwell. For example, a ruptured cruciate, ligament in the knee, could cost £3-5k to repair and surgery to remove a corn cob stuck in the intestine can be £24k, or more if there are complications.

“Most owners would not be able to find several thousands of pounds should their pet become unwell but this can be the reality if you don’t have insurance.”

Kennel Club’s research found that 23 per cent of new owners put off completing post-purchase admin such as buying insurance.

For more tips on how to “puppywise,” they advise visiting their website at thekennelclub.org.uk/be-puppywise.

relative. Molyneaux’s grandson lives in Wales and his great-granddaughter in Devon. His ten-year-old great-greatgrandson has recently performed in his first Shakespeare play.

The family told Mr Bourne: “It has given us great pleasure to know that Paul’s achievements are not forgotten and that his life and experiences will inspire other young actors to keep battling against disadvantage and discrimination. As a family we are all very proud to have had such brave and inspiring ancestors.”

The book is also deeply personal. In the opening chapter Mr Bourne shares the story of how he was first introduced to the world of black British theatre and other art forms by a friend, Sonia, with Caribbean roots who worked in the Peckham unemployment office in the 1980s, against the backdrop of the riots in south London. They remained friends and stayed in touch for decades before Sonia died aged just 45.

Other chapters include discussions of the twentieth century actor and singer Paul Robeson, the experiences of black students at the famous RADA acting school from the 1930s to the 1960s and the influential playwrights Mustapha Matura, Michael Abbensetts and Alfred Fagon, among many other stories.

Deep Are the Roots: Trailblazers Who Changed Black British Theatre is released on October 7, to coincide with the 30th anniversary of Mr Bourne’s first book about black British history.

He is giving several talks to promote the book, including at Camberwell Library on October 25 at 7pm.

The document, titled the Internal Audit and Anti-Fraud Progress report, was published following an audit on the council’s financial practice by accounting firm BDO. In this financial year, over £285,000 was mistakenly handed out as COVID-19 grant recipient funding whilst private healthcare company BUPA was overpaid by £452,950.47 £344,736.47 of which has now been paid back. The council is currently investigating the outstanding balance.

Much of these issues are attributed to the council’s internal finance system Mosaic and staff training, with the council admitting: “A training module has not been developed for new starters in the operational teams.

“New starters are provided with on the job training by the individual teams themselves and the systems and support team has little or no involvement in the process.

“This has led to inappropriate working practices and absence of knowledge and expertise, in the operational and finance teams.”

The audit details that two current staff

and six former employees are currently under investigation and, from April to August alone, the council opened 156 fraud investigations.

The council said it was not able to comment on any of these cases for legal reasons.

According to government estimates, fraud costs councils across the country around £2.2 billion each year.

The council says its fraud response plan, which sets out in detail the local authority’s approach to identifying and dealing with potential fraud, is to be reviewed this month by the strategic director of finance.

However, on other aspects of the report, the council scored more highly, particularly in relation to its property portfolio.

On this the council was found to have “appropriate controls and processes in place” and its operational effectiveness was ranked “substantial”.

In addition, on the anti-facilitation of tax evasion, the council was praised for its due diligence and for having “reasonable procedures in place relating to payments made to non-VAT registered traders.”

The report also reveals the council is owed almost £10m with nearly a third of this debt more than a year overdue, likely due to the impact of COVID-19.

The report explains: “Although debt levels have increased over this time period, this is unsurprising given the restrictions on the methods of recovery action available”.

20 NEWS

www.southwarknews.co.uk/news

Southwark News, Thursday September 23 2021

starting secondary school next year?

Each year the challenge of deciding on which secondary school to apply to for your child remains one of the biggest education decisions for parents and carers...

You can’t expect to name a secondary school and assume that your child will automatically be offered a place. It is simply a case of listing the schools you prefer and awaiting the outcome of the allocation process.

It is vital that you get the order of preferences right on your child’s primary to secondary transfer application. You may be tempted to name just one school on the online application as it is the only school you want for your child. However, there are no guarantees that your child will be offered this school. To increase the chances of your child being offered a preferred school, we strongly advise you to list up to six preferences on their application.

There are various types of secondary schools to choose from including

academies, voluntary aided, foundation, free and independent schools. And it is here where the oversubscription criteria vary. It is important you fully understand the oversubscription criteria and match them to your own circumstances. Some schools are heavily oversubscribed, with hundreds applying for places.

Southwark Council has not published open day/evening dates in their brochure this year and you are strongly advised to check each school’s website for details on how and when they will be holding their open day/evening as this may be subject to change at short notice.

Make sure you find out how many applications the school usually receives this information will also be printed in the Starting Secondary school in Southwark 2022/23 brochure and the Starting secondary school in Lambeth 2022/23 booklet, as well as other boroughs.

The more people who apply for a school for their children, the bigger the risk that your child might not be offered a place at that school. Armed with this knowledge, you should be better placed to put your preferences down.

Do use all six preferences - however, you need to be wary about only choosing schools which are heavily oversubscribed. You should name your first preference school on the application, but also list preferences where your child has a realistic chance of being offered a place.

Applying for secondary schools can be emotionally difficult. It is such a vital

decision for your child’s future. If your child is in Year 6 and currently attending one of Southwark’s or Lambeth’s primary schools, you will receive further information from your child’s school.

If you are a Southwark resident you must apply online at: w w w. s o u t h w a r k . g o v. u k / schooladmissions or if you are a Lambeth resident you must apply online at www. lambeth.gov.uk/eadmissions The online application process gets rid of the paperwork and is available to use 24 hours a day, seven days a week.

The site allows users to save, continue or make changes to their application, right up until the closing date and your details are safe and secure. You will receive an email with a summary of your submitted application and you can also view the outcome online. The closing date to submit the online application is 31 October 2021 by 11.59pm.

You also need to ensure that you submit a school Supplementary Information Form (SIF) to the schools you apply for that need these, to the school by their deadline. These ask for further information, such as religious observance or regarding school specialisms. Where a school requires your child to sit an admissions banding test, it is vital that they sit the test. If you are applying to a secondary school that uses banding within its criteria, your child will be required to take a test. Please contact the school directly for further details on

banding test arrangements.

If you are thinking of applying to schools that test for ability/aptitude, you must ensure that you register your child for the ability/aptitude admission test before each school’s published deadline and you must also submit your child’s online admissions application by 31 October 2021. Failure to provide a SIF to the school by their deadline and your child sitting a banding test or an ability/ aptitude test, where these are needed, may significantly reduce the chances of your child being offered a place at a school on your application.

Children who have an Education, Health and Care Plan follow a different admissions process and parents and carers must contact the Special Educational Needs and Disabilities Team within their local authority for further advice.

Once you have made your preferences and submitted your online application by the closing date, your application will be processed. If you have successfully submitted your online application before the closing date, you will be able to view the results of your application on the eAdmissions website (www.eadmissions. org.uk) during the evening of 1 March 2022. You will also be sent an email in the evening of 1 March 2022 which will contain information on what to do next.

If it was not possible to offer a place at any of your preferred schools, then the School Admissions Team will allocate

your child an alternative secondary school. This is likely to be the nearest school to your child’s home which has a vacancy. You also have the right to appeal against the decision not to offer your child a place at a preferred school. The email containing the outcome of your child’s application will include information about how to appeal.

If it has not been possible to offer a place at any schools named as a higher preference on your child’s application, your child’s name will automatically be added to the waiting lists of these schools. You may also ask for your child’s name to be added to the waiting list of any out of borough schools listed on your application. Please contact the local authority the school is located in for further information.

If your child has been offered a secondary school place, you have until 15 March 2022 to respond to this offer. For those that live in Southwark, if the School Admissions Team do not hear from you by this date, your offer will automatically be accepted and your child’s details forwarded to the allocated school. If you live in Lambeth, the School Admissions Team require all offers to be responded to, ie accepting these by 15 March 2022.

Only if you reject the offer and also provide details of any alternative arrangement you have made for your child’s education, will your child’s place be withdrawn and offered to the next child on the school’s waiting list.

SU CELE Compassionate... Reflective... Inclusive... Supportive... Transformative... CCE BRA SS TIN IN G An 11 - 18 Church of England Girls’ School 20 21!

Open Sessions 2021

Thursday 23rd September 6pm-8pm (Head’s talks at 6.45pm and 7.30pm) Friday 24th September 10am-12pm (Head’s talk at 10.45am) Wednesday 29th September 10am-12pm (Head’s talk at 10.45am) Thursday 30th October 10am-12pm (Head’s talk at 10.45am) Tuesday 5th October 10am-12pm (Head’s talk at 10.45am)

Book your visit NOW at www.ssso.southwark.sch.uk New Kent Road, London SE1 4AN T: 0207 407 1843 W: www.ssso.southwark.sch.uk E: office@ssso.southwark.sch.uk

Proud to be Haberdashers Haberdashers’ Borough Academy opened in September 2019.

Located on Southwark Bridge Road in the former Fire Station, this school brings together the traditional and the innovative.

We’re proud to be Haberdashers

Part of the Haberdashers’ Academies Trust South, we are proud of our longstanding reputation for educational excellence. Borough Academy brings together this experience with brand new facilities to provide an unrivalled secondary school experience in Southwark.

Admissions for Year 7 in 2022 Please check our website for the latest admissions information and to learn more about our school.

www.habsborough.org.uk To apply for a place at Haberdashers’ Borough Academy please complete the common application form through your local authority.

Application closing date: 31st October 2021

JOIN US AT A BOROUGH ACADEMY OPEN EVENT Open Days, 09.15–10.15 29th September 6th, 13th and 20th October Open Evening 6th October 16.30–18.30 FIND OUT MORE & BOOK www.habsborough.org.uk 020 3764 1321 boroughacademy@haaf.org.uk

‘World Class School’

Ranked third best non-selective, co-educational state secondary school in London.

The Sunday Times ‘Parent Power’ 2020

Since The Charter School North Dulwich was founded 20 years ago, it has been our commitment to be an exceptional and inclusive community school that transforms the life chances of all our young people.

Year 7 Open Day will take place on Wednesday 29 September 3.00pm - 7.00pm Sixth Form Open Day will take place on Thursday 04 November 4.30pm - 7.00pm Tickets must be booked in advance, please see website for more details.

Follow us on Twitter, @TCSDulwich, to be kept up to date about this and other admissions information regarding Year 7 and Year 12 entry for September 2022, or check the website for updates. www.charternorthdulwich.org.uk The Charter School North Dulwich Red Post Hill. London. SE24 9JH Phone: 020 7346 6600 Email: info@charternorthdulwich.org.uk

Advertorial

What St Saviour’s & St Olave’s is all about

An 11 - 18 Church of England Girls’ School

This year our students once again achieved excellent outcomes at GCSE and A’ level. But our school is more than our exam results and we believe in the importance of educating the whole person.

From Year 7 through to Sixth Form our students live and learn our school values which are encompassed in these five words - Transformative, Supportive, Inclusive, Compassionate and Reflective.

Our aim is to be transformative – to develop well rounded, capable, emotionally and spiritually engaged young women who take advantage of the opportunities offered within the school and beyond.

We are a supportive school community – we have strong systems built on mutual support and collaboration. We have common goals which we work towards, with a focus on the wellbeing of

all.

3 x Midday Meal Supervisors We are an inclusive school everyone is unique, required as–soon as possible London Living Wage: £10.85 per hour, 7.5 hours week special and12.30pm loved by God, regardless ofperfaith, - 2.00pm Monday-Friday, Term Time, 38 weeks per year looking for status. three Midday Meal Supervisors to join our current team at this ethnicity, We oraresocial 11-19 comprehensive school for girls. Duties will include supervision of students both indoorsour and around the school grounds. will need to be an enthusiastic, motivated We teach students toYoube compassionate and committed individual with good communication skills to join our team. You will be working in a friendly and vibrant environment.

You will, as part of your role ensure the – encouraging them to help and support each security, welfare, safety and good conduct of our students during the midday break.

You will need have a confident positive approach to dealing with students of other, as well as toserve the and wider community. secondary school age. Shortlisted candidates invited for an interview will be given the to experience a lunchtime session first-hand.

We are opportunity reflective in that we emphasise the Application forms and further information are available to download via the TES website, or by emailing the schoolworship at apply@ssso.southwark.sch.uk importance of collective and we value The closing date for all applications is Friday 15th October 2021 at 12 noon Interviewsto will be held on Monday October 2021 opportunities reflect on18th what is important to us.

New Kent Road, London SE1 4AN T: 0207 407 1843 E: office@ssso.southwark.sch.uk Our students are focused and disciplined. They are talented and ambitious, they work hard and achieve well.

Our school is committed to the safeguarding of students, so all our appointments are subject to medical clearance, two references and a satisfactory enhanced DBS check. We are committed to Equal Opportunities.

If you would like to visit us during any of our Open Sessions listed in our advertisement, then you must please book online at www.ssso.southwark.sch.uk

24 OPINION

www.southwarknews.co.uk/letters

Southwark News, Thursday September 23 2021

Comment Conservatives are taking us back to Victorian Britain

N

ext week, the government will cut Universal Credit by £20 a week, more than £1000 a year.

This shameful cut is cruel and unnecessary. £20 a week makes all the difference to families on the lowest incomes, many of whom are already working all the hours they can but simply cannot make ends meet.

Our local food banks provide emergency food and other household essentials to hundreds of families in Southwark and Lambeth every week.

They have been warning for months that if this cut goes ahead, the need for emergency food support will increase dramatically, putting even more pressure on their staff and volunteers.

The Conservatives are taking us back to Victorian Britain, where people forced into appalling hardship by the government’s failures are reliant on the good will of our communities in ever-increasing numbers. Our food banks work with love and care to provide support, but their role should not be to plug gaping holes in our welfare state.

This cut comes at a time when the

from

Westminster

helen hayes

MP for Dulwich & West Norwood cost of food is increasing, and the government is struggling to get a grip on soaring energy prices. The average household could see their annual gas and electricity costs go up to more than £1000 pushing hundreds of thousands into fuel poverty unable to heat their homes as the winter months approach. There can be no doubt that people will have to choose between putting food on the table or heating their homes, and some will go hungry or be forced into debt to pay for the bare essentials.

The cut to Universal Credit also makes no sense economically. When high streets up and down the country are struggling and shops are closing, it is completely counterproductive to take millions of pounds of expenditure away from high streets in every single constituency in the country.

Alongside my Labour Party colleagues, I have been calling on the government to cancel this devastating cut. Shamefully, when Labour forced a vote in the House of Commons last week Tory MPs couldn’t even be bothered to show up.

There are many ways in which the

Government’s social care plan fails on every test

Kieron Williams

Southwark Council leader

I

n Southwark and across the country people are living longer.

In the 1850s most people in Britain barely made it past their fortieth birthday. Fast-forward to today and life expectancy has doubled to over eighty. It’s an incredible achievement that we should celebrate much more.

However, we must not rest on our laurels. Our success in adding years to life has created a new challenge for us to solve. How can we best provide the care that so many of us will now need as we live on into our seventies, eighties, nineties and beyond?

This month the government announced their long overdue response to this question. It’s over two years since the prime minster stood on the steps of Downing Street and announced he would “fix the crisis in social care once and for all, with a clear plan we have prepared” so you would have been forgiven for expecting some real improvements.

Sadly, that was not to be.

Underneath the headlines there were no answers to the real issues most families face. No plan to drive

up the quality of care. No plan to help millions of people who need care but are not currently eligible to get help from the state.

The prime minister’s plan also fails to provide the funding social care so urgently needs. For the next three years almost all of the money announced will go to the NHS and experts have cast doubt on whether much of it will every go towards providing better quality social care.

Worse still the Prime Minister’s plan is deeply unfair. With low paid working people hardest hit, while the wealthiest pay less. Take large private landlords for example. They will pay no more tax on the often sky-high rents paid to them by their tenants, while their tenants will see their personal tax bill rise. When you add together the impact of the Prime Minister’s tax rise with the Government’s plan to cut Universal Credit, the very lowest paid workers will lose almost £1,300 a year. At a time when so many low paid workers are struggling to put food on the table that cannot be right.

In Southwark we have taken a very different approach, focussing

government could lift people out of poverty. They could raise the minimum wage to the real living wage, make housing and childcare more affordable and ban zero-hours contracts, but they have failed those on the lowest pay for more than a decade and now they are punishing the same low-paid workers.

These are the same people who have been at the frontline of the coronavirus pandemic working in social care, retail, childcare, as delivery drivers, hospital cleaners and porters and many other vital roles.

This is no way to treat those who have seen us through the greatest crisis since the second world war.

It does not take a degree in engineering to know that if the screws are too tight, the pressure will buckle and break even the strongest of materials. This cut to Universal Credit risks breaking people whose strength and resilience have already been placed under intense pressure as a result of the COVID-19 pandemic and more than a decade of Tory austerity.

I will continue to fight against this cut and for everyone who is struggling to get the support they need. on making the real and practical changes that will improve care for those who need it.

In 2018, we adopted the Ethical Care Charter for those receiving care at homes. This ensured that no home care visit would last less than 30 minutes and that staff have better training and a real Living Wage. The impact has been profound. With residents’ satisfaction with the service rising from just over 50% to over 90%. Now we are expanding that work with a new Residential Care Charter, to improve care for people in nursing and care homes too. As well as building a brand new state of the art nursing home near Burgess Park.

Even at the height of the pandemic, we had to make our own way. With the government repeatedly changing its position on PPE and failing to make adequate plans to supply care homes, Southwark Council had to step in to provide our own PPE to local care homes. Then we went above and beyond, providing a hub to get PPE to care homes across the city too.

In each case we have acted because we know how important high quality care is to local people. Every family should have access to affordable and dignified support as they get older.

With people living so much longer we urgently need a national plan to provide that care for all who need it. A plan that increases funding, quality and access and a plan that is fair, with the wealthy paying their fair share. Sadly, the prime minister’s plan fails on every test.

READERS’ VIEWS Letter to the editor As the cabinet member for a safer, cleaner borough I am particularly proud that Southwark has the best recycling rate out of all the thirteen inner London boroughs, despite over a decade of punishing Tory cuts where we have lost 60p in every £1 of government funding.

Liberal Democrat councillors lambasting our rates as ‘rubbish’ are doing a disservice to the waste and recycling teams who have had a challenging eighteen months with staff shortages due to COVID-19. Not to mention – and I’m sure you will have seen this on the news – the national shortage of HGV drivers on account of Brexit. I wish to thank all the frontline staff at the council for their dedication and hard work, and for getting the job done week in and week out.

Like all councils we have seen an increased demand for the service since the beginning of the pandemic, with residents working from home, producing more waste and disposing of more packaging from deliveries. In addition Southwark is seeing a growth in the number of houses in the borough (which is no bad thing as it is thanks to our substantial council house building programme).

However, the tonnage of waste and recycling we collect over the past year has risen by six per cent, with no extra vehicles to cover this. I’m pleased to say that despite this we have managed to keep to 99 per cent of collections collected on the right date, and when this isn’t possible we have collected the following day. Furthermore, the recycling we collect is actually recycled – unlike the Liberal Democrat-run Sutton and Kingston councils referenced by Cllr McCallum, who recently made headlines for burning the recycling they collect.

It’s the council’s job to keep the streets clean, but we can’t do it without help from the community. I would ask residents to please do the right thing; don’t dump waste on the streets, use the correct bins when out and about, and recycle everything that you can in your homes. If you do see fly-tipping please report it - we really do appreciate all your help.

Cllr Darren Merrill, cabinet member for a safer, cleaner borough

South London midwife spared jail despite huge stash of child porn The judiciary is unfit for purpose.

Maxwell Martin, via Facebook

The justice system is an insult.

Nirvana Patel, via Facebook

So, you can’t wee near a plaque because obviously you get launched into the nick but you can have thousands of absolute filth and yeah that’s ok. Ridiculous, shameful, embarrassing and insulting. No wonder this country is gone.

Dean Thwaites, via Facebook

Protestors gather to stop new Elephant and Castle hotel towering over children’s park We’ve had enough hotels built around this area there isn’t a need for more ! It’s making our community transient and we don’t want that!

Dodson and Amigo independent tenants group, via Twitter

Decision pushed back a month on infill development I am very keen to host the site visit to allow the planning committee to stand in my garden so they can experience and understand first hand the impact.

Save Slippers Place, via Twitter

Southwark News, Thursday September 23 2021

www.southwarknews.co.uk/letters

OPINION 25

Riverside centre being saved is wonderful news

N

ews that Riverside Day Centre has been saved is a huge victory for parents and carers who have faced unimaginable hardship during lockdown.

Being a carer is the toughest of jobs at any time, let alone when so many support services have been cancelled or cut to the bone.

As the rest of the country was opening up and doing back to work and play, some of our most vulnerable residents with profound, complex needs were left high and dry.

It’s a cliche but if something isn’t broken - why fix it?

Earlier this year The Camden Society, which provided the service at Riverside in the Southwark Council building, said COVID-19, the need for building repairs to take place, and discussions with families about what type of support worked for them all influenced its decision to transition into a community care model.

It was news to not only the families who maintained they had no idea the changes were taking place - and hadn’t been asked - but also Southwark Council.

Community-based care has its place. But in some cases there are complex needs that cannot be met by a walk in the park, or a standard community centre.

Claims that adults who need changing facilities were left soiled for an entire day after being placed in unsuitable sites for respite care are utterly shocking.

This was an entirely foreseeable situation. Travel difficulties, rising costs to carers and a lack of structure have all had a negative impact on those who depend on the centre for friendship, fun and learning.

These problems, sadly, were also wholly foreseeable and - therefore - avoidable.

The adults who benefit from Riverside, around 90 people, deserve so much more than the lack of respect and dignity they have been shown throughout this entire debacle.

We are incredibly glad that we could play our part in highlighting this gross injustice, and look forward to reporting on the newly reopened centre and its impact on the families who will be, no doubt, overjoyed by this decision.

Find out more about our work and future plans

Annual Public Meeting Wednesday 29th September 2021 Virtually via Microsoft Teams Meeting 6pm – 7pm Presentations include:

• Review of the last year, including our response to the Covid-19 pandemic, merger with Royal Brompton and Harefield, and future plans Dr Ian Abbs, Chief Executive Sir Hugh Taylor, Chairman • Council of Governors’ report Heather Byron, Lead Governor

There will also be an opportunity to submit questions to the Trust Board.

To register your interest in joining the online event please email: AnnualPublicMeeting@gstt.nhs.uk

CRYPTIC PUZZLE Clues Across

1 Think again and bring salvation (6) 7 Spoken from memory - about the co-respondent? (7) 8 The urge to admit I’m beat (7) 9 Lay back to see it was faithful (5) 10 Pause to bury the duellist, disturbed and listless (9) 12 Droop as the heat comes back (3) 13 Except a backward Middle Eastern (4) 15 We hear of waterproofing the roof (7) 17 Frame the band (4) 19 The fish returns on the sheltered side (3) 21 Writing down the recipe for the best gin sling? (9) 22 Sounds the correct way to sign (5) 23 Exposing the falseness of the fastening (7) 24 Stays for the ruins (7) 25 There’s cold comfort in such blockhouses (6)

Clues Down

1 Denunciations of fences? (8) 2 Warehouses of French containers (6) 3 How the angler with the tail of one that got away will exaggerate (7) 4 Balance the proportionate size (5) 5 One who supports a game contestant? (6) 6 I’d look back at the image (4) 7 Politicians who are concerned with ancient tax collectors (11) 11 Teachers can provide something for everyone (4) 13 Grew old having managed without a husband (4) 14 Loose women secure challenges (8) 16 Initially very good inner way of getting up courage (7) 18 Sacred marks - no thanks, a mark of infamy (6) 20 The same - see around for a vital urge (6) 21 Time to take right back and send the money (5) 22 Was dressed for battle by the sound of it (4)

QUICK PUZZLE Clues Across

1 Views (6) 7 Pacify (7) 8 Out of doors (4,3) 9 Fool (5) 10 Operating by itself (9) 12 Singular (3) 13 Writing fluids (4) 15 Choked (7) 17 American university (4) 19 Negative word (3) 21 Gesture of greeting (9) 22 Noosed rope (5) 23 Become less brisk (7) 24 Most elevated (7) 25 Metals (6)

Clues Down

1 One who hides aboard ship (8) 2 Jewish quarter (6) 3 Shackle (7) 4 Fundamental (5) 5 Fixed allowance (6) 6 Chair (4) 7 Leading character (11) 11 On one occasion only (4) 13 Image (4) 14 Snakes (8) 16 Delight (7) 18 Finally (6) 20 Equipment (6) 21 Cavities (5) 22 After due or usual time (4)

Solutions to last week’s crossword Cryptic

ACROSS: 4 Switch 8 Related 9 Cruise 10 Isolation 11 Here 13 Stabs 14 Bemused l6 Average 18 Oboes 19 Lead 21 Encounter 22 Outfit 23 Detract 24 Thymes DOWN: 1 Sensitive 2 Early bird 3 Depth 5 Warn 6 Tribes 7 Heeled 9 Cores 11 Husbandry 12 Reverence 15 Agent 16 Almost 17 Earthy 20 Dover 21 Eire

Quick

ACROSS: 4 Shrimp 8 Temples 9 Locate 10 Ferry boat 11 Mess 13 Stops 14 Riposte 16 Overeat 18 Cargo 19 Felt 21 Essential 22 Endive 23 Started 24 Siding DOWN: 1 Deceptive 2 Spare part 3 Herbs 5 Hoot 6 Images 7 Please 9 Latin 11 Monastery 12 Stagnated 15 Raise 16 Offers 17 Eluded 20 Rests 21 Even

26 ARTS

www.southwarknews.co.uk/arts

Southwark News, Thursday September 23 2021

what’s on

in Southwark

The ten-man troupe literally rose from the ashes to open Paula Vogel’s Indecent, a play that covers all the major shames and taboos of the 20th century, writes Michael Holland.

Three of the ten breakaway to form a klezmer band that provides a soundtrack to take us from 1907, when Sholem Asch reads his new play to a small group of writers, to the mid-40s.

The play, God of Vengeance, includes lesbianism and divides his audience.

Asch is advised to ‘burn it’. He, on the other hand, sees it as an important and honest piece of work that shows true love between two women, so finds actors to perform it around Warsaw, then Europe, where it becomes a huge success.

The next stop is New York City after WWI broke out, where, again, opinions were divided over the first ever kiss between women on a theatre stage.

Like any country, America has its prudes and racists. There had recently been moves to stop immigration and plans to stop ‘lewdness’ on the stage.

Nevertheless, the play outgrows the smaller venues until in 1923 it opens in Broadway after the kissing scene is cut.

This, conversely, merely deletes the feelings of love building between the two that lead to the loving embrace, leaving only what critics now see as a sordid affair of someone taking advantage of an ingenue. The police raid the theatre during a performance and the cast are arrested for obscenity.

Laws are soon passed in New York State that prohibits plays ‘dealing with to subject of sex, degeneracy or perversion’. With so much opposition

the troupe of players returns to Poland just in time to get caught up in the rise of Naziism. We last see them performing God of Vengeance, wearing yellow stars, in the Łódź Ghetto before they are disappeared.

A backdrop of dates are projected to guide us through the turbulent life of this play and its players. As the troupe return to the ashes from whence they came, we are once again reminded that the 20th century troubles of nationalism, racism, anti-Semitism, and homophobia

are very much still with us today.

Finbar Lynch as the stage manager Lemml gently takes our collective hand to walk us through; softly-spoken when we want to shout, calm when we are angry. Always there to show that there is light in the darkest of tunnels.

Poignant and painful in equal measure, Indecent is not an easy watch. Its staging sometimes confuses. It was only the oftrepeated scenes that let us know that they were performing God of Vengeance in a succession of European theatres,

and not just being melodramatic for Indecent. But it is an important play and we are lucky that director Rebecca Taichman, who got a Tony Award for directing this in 2017, has come here to direct Indecent for its UK premiere.

Menier Chocolate Factory, 53 Southwark Street, SE1 1RU until 27th November.

Times: Tues - Sat 8pm; Weekend matinees 3.30pm.

Admission: £40 - £49.50.

Booking: www.menierchocolatefactory.com

The radical beauty of Helen Frankenthaler

As you walk into the final room of the Helen Frankenthaler exhibition at The Dulwich Picture Gallery, you are met by three versions of Madame Butterfly, Helen Frankenthaler’s 2000 masterpiece, writes Madeleine Kelly.

The piece appears, as Frankenthaler intended for her art, ‘born at once’ – a lyrical and intuitive explosion of colour. But if it is an explosion, this exhibition suggests it is a controlled one. Marking the 10th anniversary of her death, the exhibition tracks Frankenthaler’s woodcutting process, introducing us to an artist whose work was as careful as it was intuitive, who described Art as ‘feeling, not factual’.

Frankenthaler was one of the most eminent of the second generation of American Abstract Expressionists.

Inspired by Jackson Pollock to paint with her canvasses on the floor, she created a myriad of new techniques both working with canvas and, later on, working with woodcuts. But her work,

though it inspired many better-known male imitators, was often sidelined in her lifetime.

This exhibition is part of a renewed interest in Frankenthaler’s work, taking as its subject the woodcuts Frankenthaler made in the latter part of her career. Its title, Radical Beauty, seeks to challenge the rather patronising criticism of her

work as merely beautiful by centring the artist’s refined technique and process. In choosing to focus on the more technical woodcuts rather than the paintings, the exhibition takes great pains to dismiss the idea that Frankenthaler’s work was ‘easy’. In one room a few of the 65 proofs for Essence Mulberry (1977) can be seen with the artist’s succinct and often

humorous notations, ‘NO schmalz pliz!’

The woodcuts themselves are mesmerising. Inspired by traditional Japanese woodcutting - Frankenthaler collaborated with Japanese printers and master carvers – and Expressionism, the lines in each work are their own language giving you a sense of being totally enmeshed within each work.

Colour frequently gives sense to line and form, bestowing fresh meaning with each glance. The work is repeatedly novel as it resists consistent interpretation.

The exhibition is worth seeing for the work alone rather than the point it is making. Whilst credit for this work is long overdue, it is hard to stand in front of such dizzying work and care for a system of meaning as hierarchical as the canon. It is a world of its own: radical, yes, beautiful, yes, but above all feeling, not factual.

Dulwich Picture Gallery, Gallery Road, Dulwich, SE21 7AD from 15th September - 18th April. www.dulwichpicturegallery.org.uk

Photo by Johan Persson

An Indecent Rise From The Ashes

Greenwich Theatre goes into Battle

In Soft Wings announce that the world premiere of Hugh Salmon’s moving, effecting, and humorous debut play Into Battle, the true story of a bitter feud at Oxford University, will open at Greenwich Theatre on the 13th October.

Carefully researched, Salmon tells the tale that exemplified the elitist culture of the British establishment and the privilege of the ruling class encapsulating the social conflict in Britain before WWI. Winston Churchill said, ‘The greatest danger to the British people is not among the enormous fleets and armies of Europe. No. It is here in our midst, close at home, close at hand, in the unnatural gap between rich and poor’.

1910. Balliol College. Dangerous rifts are appearing between the ‘have’ and the ‘have-nots’. Of the fifty-three freshers who went up some four years earlier, eighteen had been to Eton.

In an increasingly personalised and bitter feud, will social influence and wealth prevail over those dedicated to improving the lives of the poor and hungry on the back streets of Oxford?

And when facing a far greater adversary will vicious personal differences be put aside in the face of a common enemy?

Into Battle unearths a true story that has remained buried for over 100 years.

A story that shows how the political and social divisions tearing Britain apart were reflected at Balliol College, Oxford through the bitter feud between Hon. Billy Grenfell, the future war poets Hon. Julian Grenfell and Patrick Shaw Stewart and those dedicated to the Balliol Boys Club founded by Keith Rae and England rugby international Ronald Poulton.

Hugh says “What compelled me to write ‘Into Battle’ was the human journey these remarkable people take from one point in their lives to another. And that the issues that divided them were not only reflected at a national level, against the background of one of the most divisive general elections in history in 1910, but that these issues still resonate over 100 years later: specifically, the inequality and unfairness that is still prevalent in today’s society and the divide this creates in communities large and small. How much has changed?” ”The more I researched the Balliol Feud, and the people involved, the more I realised that I was uncovering and piecing together a story that has been buried in history but that I could bring back to life for today’s audiences. These individual real-life characters are so wildly full, interesting, and engaging I wanted to share their journeys and let their voices be heard by a new generation. Whatever our differences, we can come together” Greenwich Theatre, Crooms Hill, SE10 8ES from 13th - 31st October.

Tues-Sat at 7.30pm, Sat matinee at 2.30pm, Sun at 1pm and 5.30pm.

Book tickets at: 020 8858 7755 / www.greenwichtheatre.org.uk

Southwark News, Thursday September 23 2021

www.southwarknews.co.uk/history

HISTORY 27

History

Arthur Jones: Peckham War-Resister

Local author John Taylor has published a book on his research on the resistance to the First World War in south London. Here he tells us about Southwark’s part in that movement...

sang regularly outside London prisons.

Two national weeklies, the Herald and Labour Leader, campaigning vigorously for immediate peace talks, were another source of information. As the flow of COs dried up and most (unlike Jones) accepted transfer to work camps rather than endure jail as a matter of principle, it becomes clear that they were no longer in the vanguard of the anti-war movement. From mid-1917 they were just part of a wider coalition - headed now by the ILP with its many branches and by the Women’s Peace Crusade. The latter, expanding to 123 local crusades, was a major force in the north, the midlands and Scotland.

Part two of my self-published research, delayed by COVID, is at last in print. The Great War is now out of mind again. It was, by general consent, the primal catastrophe of the twentieth century. Not only were millions of men flung to their death, including 722,000 from this country. It led directly to the Russian revolution and the horrors that followed, and less directly to Hitler. So late or not, it’s worth recording and honouring the men and women who refused to take part and tried to stop it; men like Arthur Jones.

11 November 1918. As the guns boomed out to mark the armistice after four years of war, as the church bells rang and the crowds cheered, one man in Pentonville prison wrote that he wanted to creep away and weep.

The Fight to a Finish: War-Resisters in South London and Beyond is available at Southwark Local History Library and the Imperial War Museum, or will be shortly.

Photo by Bodleian Library Oxford University

He saw in a vision the tragedy of it all: the despairing minds and desolate hearts, the fair joyous friends who had gone.

Yet in his secret heart he was glad: glad that he had been able to hold firm in his refusal to serve in the army despite four sentences of hard labour under the harshest prison regime.

“My protest against war was my bit”, he wrote, “my contribution to the nation’s life & thought. Joy came to me that destiny had given me this work.”

The writer is Arthur Creech Jones, then 27, a civil service clerk. He lived at 46 Keston Road, Peckham and was a leading figure in both Camberwell Trades and Labour Council and in Dulwich Independent Labour Party, or ILP. This had its base in Hansler Hall, off Lordship Lane. A picture from before his arrest shows an earnest young man in a solid tweed jacket. He told his first court-martial: “I view War as a test of might, resulting from dynastic ambitions, commercial rivalries, financial intrigues and imperialistic jealousies. It is a stupid, costly and obsolete method of attempting to settle the differences of diplomatists, in which the common people always pay with their blood, vitality and wealth.”

This was one pole of opposition to the war in the present borough. The other, in Bermondsey, centred around the Quaker socialists Alfred and Ada Salter, who were both active at national level. All three were involved in the NoConscription Fellowship, or NCF, which sprang into action when compulsory military service came in in early 1916.

The prison correspondence between Arthur Jones and his lively cousin Vi Tidman, a schoolteacher, runs like a thread though my account of the borough’s war-resisters. The two married after the war. (Are there still Tidmans in Peckham? I would love to find a picture of Violet.) The letters are among Arthur’s papers in the Bodleian library in Oxford; he went on to become a Labour MP, serving as colonial secretary in Attlee’s post-war government. The Salters of course are well known – not only by local reputation but through biographies by Fenner Brockway and Graham Taylor.

Altogether, in the present borough, some 241 men refused the call-up on grounds of conscience: 57 from Bermondsey and Rotherhithe, 32 from old Southwark and 152 from the old borough of Camberwell, which included

Dulwich, Peckham and Nunhead. Most are not well known at all.

I have sought to recover what I can, drawing for the custodial record on Cyril Pearce’s national register of conscientious objectors – accessible via the Imperial War Museum website – and supplementing this with details from the three local papers. This task becomes more difficult after 1916.

Fewer conscientious objectors, or COs, come before the tribunals, and at this stage in the war none of the papers give any publicity to anti-war activity.

We know from Vi Tidman’s letters that there were regular anti-war rallies on Peckham Rye. In 1917 Dulwich’s

No-Conscription branch published a handsome booklet which must have been used in local campaigning.

In 1918 the philosopher Bertrand Russell – tirelessly active in the NCF - twice spoke at meetings held at Bermondsey’s Labour Institute in Fort Road. But there’s not a word in the local press.

However other archival sources make up for this news blackout. They give a good account for example of Dulwich’s NCF branch which, meeting in Hansler Hall, heard the men’s letters read out, gave friendship and support to the families, made prison visits and reported back to head office. NCF choirs

Southwark News, Thursday September 23 2021

www.southwarknews.co.uk

CLASSIFIED 29

recruitment

An 11 - 18 Church of England Girls’ School

Janeway Street, London SE16 4PS • Telephone 0207 237 3227 www.riverside.southwark.sch.uk

Cleaner Required to work within a team to undertake general cleaning duties within the school.

3 x Midday Meal Supervisors required as soon as possible

All positions involve responsibility for the Health, Safety and Welfare of pupils.

Riverside School is committed to safeguarding and promoting the welfare of children and young people and insist all staff and volunteers share this commitment. All posts are subject to pre-employment checks, and successful candidates will need to undertake an enhanced DBS check.

References will be sought and must be received prior to interview.

For an application pack please visit the school or request by email at office@riverside.southwark.sch.uk Closing Date - 30th September 2021

We are looking for three Midday Meal Supervisors to join our current team at this 11-19 comprehensive school for girls. Duties will include supervision of students both indoors and around the school grounds. You will need to be an enthusiastic, motivated and committed individual with good communication skills to join our team. You will be working in a friendly and vibrant environment. You will, as part of your role ensure the security, welfare, safety and good conduct of our students during the midday break.

You will need to have a confident and positive approach to dealing with students of secondary school age. Shortlisted candidates invited for an interview will be given the opportunity to experience a lunchtime session first-hand.

Application forms and further information are available to download via the TES website, or by emailing the school at apply@ssso.southwark.sch.uk The closing date for all applications is Friday 15th October 2021 at 12 noon Interviews will be held on Monday 18th October 2021 Our school is committed to the safeguarding of students, so all our appointments are subject to medical clearance, two references and a satisfactory enhanced DBS check. We are committed to Equal Opportunities.

New Kent Road, London SE1 4AN T: 0207 407 1843 E: office@ssso.southwark.sch.uk

Classified and community notices

WANTED

CARS + VANS ANY CONDITION ANY AREA PROMPT & POLITE SERVICE TELEPHONE

020 8659 8988 ANY DAY, ANY TIME, 7 DAYS MOBILE

07850 323 508 CLASSIC & UNSUAL CARS ALSO WANTED

CASH / CASH / CASH / CASH / CASH

CASH / CASH / CASH / CASH / CASH

Hay Grade 1 – Point 2 - £11.84 per hour 10 hours per week

London Living Wage: £10.85 per hour, 7.5 hours per week 12.30pm - 2.00pm Monday-Friday, Term Time, 38 weeks per year

Wanted Records ROCK, POP, PUNK, INDIE, REGGAE, SOUL...

LPs AND SINGLES - WHOLE COLLECTIONS WELCOME

Call: 07956 832314 / 020 8677 6907 Or Email: vinylwanted@aol.com ALSO INTERESTED IN NON CHART CD COLLECTIONS

Our key activities helping local people make life better: Bede Learning Disabilities Service, Bede Youth Adventure Project, Bede Starfish Domestic Violence Project.

www.bedehouse.org , tel: 0207 237 3881

Call 020 7232 1639 to advertise in Classified

30 PUBLIC NOTICES

www.southwarknews.co.uk

Southwark News, Thursday September 23 2021

LONDON BOROUGH OF SOUTHWARK

LONDON BOROUGH OF SOUTHWARK

ROAD TRAFFIC REGULATION ACT 1984 SECTION 14(1) (ALEXIS STREET, ARNSIDE STREET, CHOUMERT ROAD, MANOR PLACE, SEDGMOOR PLACE, OMEARA STREET)

ROAD TRAFFIC REGULATION ACT 1984 SECTION 14(1) (ILDERTON ROAD

(TEMPORARY PROHIBITION OF TRAFFIC) 1.

The Council of the London Borough of Southwark hereby gives notice that to enable various works to be carried out by, EB7/Higgins Group, SGN, Conway, Thames, Neilcott Construction and EC1A Group, it made an order, the effect of which will be to prohibit vehicular traffic from entering part of the above named roads.

2.

Whilst the works are in progress, or whilst the authorised traffic signs are displayed, no person shall cause any vehicle to enter, proceed, stop, wait, load or unload in: (a) Alexis Street, at it’s junction with Macks Road for 52m in an easterly direction (cherry gardens school) (b) Arnside Street, at it’s junction with Walworth Road (c) Choumert Road, between Copleston Road and Bellenden Road (d) Manor Place, eastbound carriageway, at the junction of Walworth Road and the side of No’s 198 – No’s 200 (e) Sedgmoor Place, between Southampton Way and Melbury Drive (f) Omeara Street, at it’s junction with Union Street in a northern direction for a distance of 48m

3.

The alternative route for affected traffic (2a) Macks Road, Southwark Park Road, St James Road. (2b) Walworth Road, Merrow Street, Queens Road (2c) Danby Street. (2d) Manor Place, Penton Place, Penrose Street, Walworth Road. (2e) Southampton Way, Havil Street, Dalwood Street. (2f) as indicated by the signs displayed.

TEMPORARY WAITING AND LOADING RESTRICTIONS AND TEMPORARY PROHIBITION OF TRAFFIC 1.

The Council of the London Borough of Southwark hereby gives notice that, because of works

by HG Construction Ltd, it made, an order the effect of which would be to prohibit vehicular traffic from waiting and loading at any time in part of Ilderton Road.

2.

Whilst the restriction is in place, and whilst the authorised traffic signs/road markings are displayed, no person shall cause any vehicle to wait, including waiting for the purpose of loading and unloading at any time in: (a) Ilderton Road, (southern side), install double yellow lines from the end of the existing double red lines on IIlderton Road near it’s junction with Wagner Street for a distance of 124m northwards. (b) Ban vehicles from entering Wagner Street, located between Ilderton Road for a distance of 29m in an easterly direction. (by bridge)

3.

The alternative route for affected vehicles and pedestrians for 2(b) will be via White Post Street, Old Kent Road, Ilderton Road.

4.

Exemptions will be provided in the Order to permit reasonable access to premises, insofar as it is practical without interference with the execution of the said works.

5.

The restrictions will not apply to any vehicle being used in connection with the said works, or for fire brigade, ambulance or police purposes or anything done with the permission or at the direction of a police constable in uniform.

4.

The permit holders parking spaces located within the closure, will be suspended for (2a)

5.

Exemptions will be provided in the Order to permit reasonable access to premises, so far as it is practical without interference with the execution of the said works.

6.

The restriction will come into force on the 2nd October 2021 – 1st April 2023.

7.

6.

The restrictions will not apply to any vehicle being used in connection with the said works, or for fire brigade, ambulance or police purposes or anything done with the permission or at the direction of a police constable in uniform.

Further information may be obtained by contacting Road Network & Parking Management on 0207 525 2014.

Dated this 23rd September 2021

7.

The works will be in operation for (2a) 1st October – 30th March 2023 (2b) 4th – 8th October (2c) 4th – 5th October. (2d) 4th – 6th October. (2e) 4th – 8th October (2f) 1st October – 26th November.

8.

Further information may be obtained by contacting Road Network Management at ttmo@southwark.gov.uk

Dated this 23rd September 2021 Ian Law Traffic Manager London Borough of Southwark Network Management Traded Services Environment and Leisure 160 Tooley Street PO Box 64529 London SE1 5LX Ref: (2a) 5848/ (2b) 5627/W117647054-00097 (2c) 5805 /26465482 (2d) 5825/ 000030871182-002 (2e) 5680.1/LBSCR11969-3 (2f) LBSCR11797 LONDON BOROUGH OF SOUTHWARK ROAD TRAFFIC REGULATION ACT 1984 SECTION 14(1) (HEYGATE STREET) TEMPORARY SUSPENSION OF BUS LANE 1.

The Council of the London Borough of Southwark and in consultation with Transport for London hereby gives notice that, they made, an order under section 14 (1) of the Road Traffic Regulation Act 1984 to facilitate development works being proposed in part of Heygate Street.

2.

The effect of the order would be to: (a) Close the eastbound lane of traffic and cycle lane in Heygate Street, located between Sayer Street and O’Callaghan Way (b) Suspend the westbound bus lane in Heygate Street, located between Sayer Street and O’Callaghan Way. (c) Suspend the existing westbound lane of traffic to allow an eastbound traffic flow system.

3.

The restrictions will not apply to any person or vehicle being used in connection with the said works, or for fire brigade, ambulance or police purposes or anything done with the permission or at the direction of a police constable in uniform.

4.

Exemptions will be provided in the Order to permit reasonable access to premises, so far as it is practical without interference with the execution of the said works.

5.

No alternative route is applicable.

6.

The restriction will be in place between the 1st October 2021 – 30th March 2023 and will apply during such times and to such extent as indicated by the traffic signs.

7.

Further information may be obtained by contacting Road Network & Parking Management at ttmo@southwark.gov.uk

Ian Law Traffic Manager London Borough of Southwark Network Management Traded Services Environment and Leisure 160 Tooley Street, PO Box 64529 London SE1 5LX Ref: 5851/LBSCT12034

Notice of Application for a Premises Licence made under Section 17 of the Licensing Act 2003 Please take notice that I / we Mchomo Charcoal Grill Have made application to Southwark Council for a new Premises Licence in respect of Mchomo Charcoal Grill, 66 Peckham Rye, London, SE15 4JR The relevant licensable activities and proposed times to be carried on, or on from the premises are Days

Start time

Finish time

The retail sale of alcohol:

Monday to Sunday

12:00

22:30

Opening hours:

Monday to Sunday

12:00

23:00

A register of all applications made within the Southwark area is maintained by: The Licensing Service, Hub 1, 3rd Floor, 160 Tooley Street, London, SE1 2QH A record of this application may be inspected by visiting the office during normal office hours by appointment on 020 7525 2000; details are also available on our website at http://app.southwark.gov.uk/licensing/licenseregister.asp It is open to any interested party to make representations about the likely effect of the application on the promotion of the licensing objectives. Representations must be made in writing to the Licensing Service at the office address given above (or by email via licensing@southwark.gov.uk) and be received by the Service within a period of 28 days starting the day after the date shown below.

Note: It is an offence to knowingly or recklessly make a false statement in connection with an application. A person guilty of such offence is liable on summary conviction to a fine not exceeding level 5 on the standard scale.

Date of application: 15th September 2021

Dated this 23rd September 2021 Ian Law Traffic Manager London Borough of Southwark Network Management Traded Services Environment and Leisure 160 Tooley Street PO Box 64529 London SE1 5LX Ref: 5788/

To place a notice, please email em@southwarknews.co.uk or call 07798 833758. Deadline is 2pm on Tuesdays

Southwark News, Thursday September 23 2021

www.southwarknews.co.uk

Notice of Application to Vary a Premises Licence made under Section 34 of the Licensing Act 2003

LONDON BOROUGH OF SOUTHWARK ROAD TRAFFIC REGULATION ACT 1984 SECTION 14(1) (PORTLAND STREET, SWAN MEAD, WEBBER STREET)

Please take notice that I / we C&C Coffee LTD have made application to Southwark Council to vary the Premises Licence in respect of CROL AND CO 66A NEWCOMEN STREET SE1 1YT

(TEMPORARY PROHIBITION OF TRAFFIC)

The proposed variation is as follows: Extending the supply of alcohol from currently 22.30pm to 02.00 am as proposed.

Extending playing of recorded music from currently 22.30pm to 02.00 am as proposed Days

Start time

Finish time

The retail sale of alcohol:

Monday to Sunday

07:00

02:00

The provision of regulated entertainment:

Live Music Monday to Sunday 14:00 Playing of recorded Music Monday to Sunday 07:00

23:00 02:00

Opening hours:

Monday to Sunday

02:00

07:00

PUBLIC NOTICES 31

A register of all applications made within the Southwark area is maintained by: The Licensing Service, Hub 1, 3rd Floor, 160 Tooley Street, London, SE1 2QH A record of this application may be inspected by visiting the office during normal office hours by appointment on 020 7525 2000; details are also available on our website at http://app.southwark.gov.uk/licensing/licenseregister.asp It is open to any interested party to make representations about the likely effect of the application on the promotion of the licensing objectives. Representations must be made in writing to the Licensing Service at the office address given above and be received by the Service within a period of 28 days starting the day after the date shown below. http://www.southwark.gov.uk/business/licences/how-to-lodge-a-representation Note: it is an offence to knowingly or recklessly to make a false statement in connection with an application. A person guilty of such offence is liable on summary conviction to a fine not exceeding level 5 on the standard scale.

Date of application: 20th September 2021

1.

The Council of the London Borough of Southwark hereby gives notice that to enable various works to be carried out by, Hill Partnership, Thames Water and Centercomms, it intends, to make an order, the effect of which will be to prohibit vehicular traffic from entering part of the above named roads.

2.

Whilst the works are in progress, or whilst the authorised traffic signs are displayed, no person shall cause any vehicle to enter, proceed, stop, wait, load or unload in: (a) Portland Street, between Sondes Street and Albany Road (b) Swan Mead, at it’s junction with Webb Street for 47m southbound (c) Swan Mead, between No’s 12 – No’s 30 (d) Webber Street, between Lancaster Street and Blackfriars Road

3.

The alternative route for affected traffic (2a) Albany Road, Thurlow Street, Flint Street, Stead Street, Wadding Street. (2b) & (2c) Webb Street, Swan Mead. (2d) as indicated by the signs displayed.

4.

The existing one way working in Webb Street and Swan Mead, will be made two way for access and egress purposes for (2b) & (2c)

5.

Exemptions will be provided in the Order to permit reasonable access to premises, so far as it is practical without interference with the execution of the said works.

6.

The restrictions will not apply to any vehicle being used in connection with the said works, or for fire brigade, ambulance or police purposes or anything done with the permission or at the direction of a police constable in uniform.

7.

The works will be in operation for (2a) 11th October 2021 – 11th February 2022 (2b) & (2c) 11th October (2d) 11th – 13th October.

8.

Further information may be obtained by contacting Road Network Management at ttmo@southwark.gov.uk

Dated this 23rd September 2021

THE LONDON BOROUGH OF SOUTHWARK TOWN AND COUNTRY PLANNING ACT 1990 (as amended) THE LONDON BOROUGH OF SOUTHWARK has made an Order under Section 247 of the above Act to stop up the following area of public highway shown hatched black on the drawing attached to the draft Order and labelled Lovegrove Street Stopping Up Area 01:1. An irregular shaped area of highway at Lovegrove Street which measures 24.209 metres in length (at its longest point) and 9.313 metres in width (at its widest point).

The stopping up has been made to enable the development described in the Schedule to this Notice to be carried out in accordance with the planning permission granted under Part III of the Act by the Council on 4 March 2021 under local planning authority reference No. 20/AP/0188.

COPIES OF THE ORDER AND THE RELEVANT PLAN MAY BE INSPECTED FREE OF CHARGE by way of appointment at 160 Tooley Street, London SE1 2TZ by calling 020 7525 2135 and referring to the Lovegrove Street Stopping Up Order. A copy may also be viewed on the Council’s website at https://www.southwark.gov.uk/transport-androads/traffic-orders-licensing-strategies-and-regulation/highway-stopping-up-closureorders?chapter=4 Any person aggrieved by the Order and desiring to question the validity thereof, or of any provision contained therein, on the ground that it is not within the powers of the above Act or that any regulation made thereunder has not been complied with in relation to the Order may, within 6 weeks of 23rd September, apply to the High Court for the suspension or quashing of the Order or of any provision contained herein.

Doreen Forrester-Brown Director of Legal Services THE SCHEDULE ‘Construction of two joined two storey buildings arranged in an L-shape following the street layout on the junction of Old Kent Road with St. James's Road. The use class will include B1, D1, D2 with ancillary use classes A1, A3, A4, A5.’

Ian Law Traffic Manager London Borough of Southwark Network Management Traded Services Environment and Leisure 160 Tooley Street PO Box 64529 London SE1 5LX Ref: (2a) 77000788 (2b) & (2c) 000030978620-002 (2c) WC8PGN0N001

NEWS TRAVELS FAST Over half our online readers now access our journalism on their mobiles Call us on 020 7232 1639 to find out how to promote your local business online

32 SPORT

www.southwarknews.co.uk/sport

Southwark News, Thursday September 23 2021

LONDON BOROUGH OF SOUTHWARK TOWN & COUNTRY PLANNING ACT 1990 (as amended) PLANNING (LISTED BUILDINGS AND CONSERVATION AREAS) ACT 1990 (as amended) The planning applications listed below can be viewed on the planning register at https://planning.southwark.gov.uk/online-applications/ You can use facilities at your local library or 'My Southwark Service Points' to access the website.

How to comment on this application: You should submit your comments via the above link. Comments received will be made available for public viewing on the website. All personal information will be removed except your postal address. Online comments submitted without an email address will not be acknowledged and those marked 'confidential' will not be considered. Written comments can be submitted to; Southwark Council, Chief executive's department, Planning division, Development Management, PO Box 64529, London SE1 5LX. Reason for publicity. The applications are advertised for the reasons identified by the following codes: AFFECT - development affecting character or appearance of a nearby conservation area; OR development affecting setting of a nearby listed building(s); DEP - departure from the development plan; EIA - environmental impact assessment (these applications are accompanied by an environmental statement a copy of which may be obtained from the Council - there will be a charge for the copy); MAJ - major planning application; STDCA - development within a conservation area; STDLB - works to or within the site of a listed building; 24 CRIMSCOTT STREET LONDON SOUTHWARK SE1 5TE (Ref: 21/AP/0681) Demolition of existing building and redevelopment to provide an eight storey building comprising flexible Commercial, Business and Service floorspace (Class E) along with public realm improvements, landscaping, private and communal amenity space, secure cycle parking, refuse and recycling facilities and other associated works. REVISED DESCRIPTION (Within: Pages Walk CA) Reason(s) for publicity: MAJ STDCA STDCA MAJ (Contact: Troy Davies 0207 525 1513) 24 CRIMSCOTT STREET LONDON SOUTHWARK SE1 5TE (Ref: 21/AP/0681) Demolition of existing building and redevelopment to provide an eight storey building comprising flexible Commercial, Business and Service floorspace (Class E) along with public realm improvements, landscaping, private and communal amenity space, secure cycle parking, refuse and recycling facilities and other associated works. REVISED DESCRIPTION (Within: Pages Walk CA) Reason(s) for publicity: MAJ STDCA STDCA MAJ (Contact: Troy Davies 0207 525 1513) 23 SUTHERLAND SQUARE LONDON SOUTHWARK SE17 3EQ (Ref: 21/AP/2574) Construction of a single storey rear infill extension and alterations to existing property. (Within: Sutherland Square CA) Reason(s) for publicity: STDLB (Contact: Catherine Jeater 020 7525 5375) 91 CAMBERWELL GROVE LONDON SOUTHWARK SE5 8JH (Ref: 21/AP/3015) The listed building application seeks consent for the following works: . Lower ground floor: 1. New door; 2. Glass screen; 4. New coving; 5. Dryer under stairs; 6. Remove floor tiles; . Ground floor: 1. Insert letterbox; 2. Remove panelling; 3.

Remove all panelling, strip all lights, add skirting boards; . First floor: 1. Remove all panelling, strip out all lights, add skirting boards; 2. Fit new mantles; . Second floor: 1. Replace wardrobe doors; 2. Fix door shut; and . Third floor: 1. Fitted bath with stone surround and shower. (Within: Camberwell Grove Conservation Area CA) Reason(s) for publicity: STDLB (Contact: Tracy Chapman 020 7525 1948)

and the addition of two roof lights to the front roof slope. . (Within: Nunhead Cemetry CA) Reason(s) for publicity: STDCA (Contact: Anthony Roberts 020 7525 5458) ROTHERHITHE CIVIC CENTRE ALBION STREET LONDON SOUTHWARK SE16 7BS (Ref: 21/AP/3230) Minor material amendments of approved plans to application 17/AP/1255 granted 22/03/2018 (Construction of part 4-storey, part 5-storey development consisting of commercial space (A1/A3/A5/B1/D1) at ground floor and 26 affordable residential units above (14 x Social Rented Flats and 12 x Intermediate flats with the following mix:7 x1 bed, 11 x 2 bed, 8 x 3 bed).

Re-landscaping of the public square to the east of the site.) The amendments are as follows: Changes to the energy strategy and to achieve current technical standards approvals. Elevational changes to the building height including alteration of location of ASHP plant on the roof and the provision of substations required for the ASHP plant. - Internal re-arrangement of service spaces at ground floor level due to addition of substation Reason(s) for publicity: MAJ (Contact: Alexander Cameron 020 7525 5416) CREDON HOUSE VERNEY ROAD LONDON SOUTHWARK (Ref: 21/AP/3247) Demolition of existing building and construction of a nine storey building comprising up to 82sqm of Class E floorspace at ground floor and up to 22 homes (Class C3). Provision of ancillary plant, amenity spaces, cycles and refuse stores.

Reason(s) for publicity: MAJ (Contact: Troy Davies 0207 525 1513) 18 FRANK DIXON WAY LONDON SOUTHWARK SE21 7ET (Ref: 21/AP/3241) Construction of a single storey garden studio with AC unit to the rear of the garden. (Within: Dulwich Wood CA) Reason(s) for publicity: STDCA (Contact: Louise Dinsdale )

169 BOROUGH HIGH STREET LONDON SOUTHWARK SE1 1HR (Ref: 21/AP/3226) Two non illuminated fascia signs. (Within: Borough High Street CA) Reason(s) for publicity: STDCA (Contact: Glenn Ruane 020 7525 5447)

ST JUDES CHURCH ST GEORGES ROAD LONDON SOUTHWARK (Ref: 21/AP/3070) Replacement of existing side gate with a Bandit gate with railheads to match existing railing Replacement of wooding frame gate with Bandit gate frame and gate to the side passage of the building New railing to the top of the existing wall of the southeast facing elevation (Colnbrook Street) to match existing railing (Within: West Square CA) Reason(s) for publicity: STDLB (Contact: Athena Hylton-Thompson 020 7525 2161)

60 IVYDALE ROAD LONDON SOUTHWARK SE15 3BS (Ref: 21/AP/3234) Construction of a L-shaped rear dormer extension including raising of roof ridge line, juliet balcony

2-10 OSSORY ROAD LONDON SOUTHWARK (Ref: 21/AP/3246) Demolition of the existing building and construction of a part one, part ten and part

eleven storey building comprising up to 421sqm of Class E floorspace at ground floor and up to 117 homes (Class C3). Provision of ancillary plant, amenity spaces, cycles and refuse stores.

Reason(s) for publicity: MAJ (Contact: Troy Davies 0207 525 1513) PECKHAM RYE RAILWAY STATION STATION WAY LONDON SOUTHWARK SE15 4RX (Ref: 21/AP/3272) Roof and gutter repairs reconfiguring of rainwater goods/ gutters. Reinstatement of the lost cast iron cresting to the main roof. Replacement of life expired slate to the four wing roofs with patent clay tiles to the building's original Victorian design and installation of thermal insulation to ceilings below. Installation of architectural lighting to the front facade. Replacement of existing pigeon deterrent. Stone work repairs. Steam clean of the brick and stonework. Repainting of external doors and windows. The refurbishment of the internal south east wing stairway. (Within: Rye Lane Peckham CA) Reason(s) for publicity: STDLB (Contact: Tracy Chapman 020 7525 1948) 137 CAMBERWELL NEW ROAD LONDON SOUTHWARK SE5 0SU (Ref: 21/AP/3255) Construction of a two-storey rear extension in connection to the conversion of a single dwelling house into 2x self-contained flats. Ground floor to be converted into a 2x bedroom flat and the first floor to be converted into a 3x bedroom flat.

Construction of a roof terrace above the flat roof of existing extension. (Within: Camberwell New Road CA) Reason(s) for publicity: STDCA (Contact: Michèle Sterry 020 7525 5453) FLAT D 53 LYNDHURST WAY LONDON SOUTHWARK SE15 5AG (Ref: 21/AP/3299) Creation of new roof terrace at first floor level to a one bedroom apartment, with metal railings/balustrade, and replacement of a window with a door. (Within: Holly Grove CA) Reason(s) for publicity: STDCA (Contact: Agneta Kabele ) 83 ALLEYN PARK LONDON SOUTHWARK SE21 8AA (Ref: 21/AP/3275) Minor material amendment of Condition 1 of approved plans and Condition 5 approved Materials to applicaiton 19/AP/5573 granted 30/03/2021 (Demolition of the existing dwelling and its replacement with a building containing 9 flats (3 x 3 bed, 5 x 2 and 1 x 1 bed) accommodated within two buildings of traditional design.) (Within: Dulwich Village CA) Reason(s) for publicity: STDCA (Contact: Michèle Sterry 020 7525 5453) 190 RYE LANE LONDON SOUTHWARK (Ref: 21/AP/3302) 1x Main fascia sign situated above entrance; internally illuminated 1x Projecting sign situated next to fascia area; internally illuminated

READ IT HERE FIRST Check out our website for the latest breaking news, and the chance to see more photos and videos of the stories you have read in your Southwark News...

www.southwarknews.co.uk

Illuminated door surround. (Within: Rye Lane Peckham CA) Reason(s) for publicity: STDCA (Contact: Ewan Lawless 020 7525 1264) FLAT 11 ST SAVIOURS HOUSE 21 BERMONDSEY WALL WEST LONDON SOUTHWARK SE16 4TJ (Ref: 21/AP/3105) Addition of x4 rooflights to the east elevation roof slope and x4 rooflights to the west elevation roof slope. (Within: St Saviours Dock CA) Reason(s) for publicity: STDCA (Contact: Winnie Wing Tse ) 29 TRAFALGAR AVENUE LONDON SOUTHWARK SE15 6NP (Ref: 21/AP/3188) Construction for single storey rear extension, internal alterations and alterations to front garden (Within: Trafalgar Avenue CA) Reason(s) for publicity: STDCA (Contact: Winnie Wing Tse ) Dated: 21 Sep 2021 - comments to be received within 21 days of this date.

STEPHEN PLATTS - Director of Planning and Growth

Southwark News, Thursday September 23 2021

sport@southwarknews.co.uk SURREY WERE dominated on the first day of their LV= Insurance County Championship second division match against Surrey at the Kia Oval as David Lloyd’s career-best 121 spearheaded Glamorgan’s impressive 379 for 4 for the Welsh county.

Two wickets in quick succession after tea, including that of opener Lloyd, gave Surrey renewed heart during a gruelling day in warm sunshine but Kiran Carlson and Chris Cooke, unbeaten with 45 and 44 respectively, steered Glamorgan into a position of real strength on an easy-paced pitch with an unbroken alliance of 90 in 20 overs.

Joe Cooke also made his highest firstclass score in a second wicket stand of 125 in 37 overs with Lloyd, the 24-year old left-hander’s gritty 68 a maiden half-century in his 14th appearance.

That partnership was only broken 15 minutes before tea, after Lloyd and former New Zealand Test opener Hamish Rutherford had added 86 for the first wicket, and Eddie Byrom then arrived to contribute a punchy 57-ball 45, with eight fours, as he and Lloyd put on a further 76.

But both Byrom and Lloyd fell in the space of five balls, in the 76th and 77th overs, as they attempted to increase the pace in the final session, but Carlson and Cooke – who both hit six fours – snuffed out Surrey hopes of a late rally with the second new ball.

Surrey, captained for the first time by 23-year-old England batsman Ollie Pope, did not start well with the ball but Rutherford and Lloyd also put pressure on the home seamers with their positive intent, the openers both taking fours off Jordan Clark in the fourth over and Glamorgan’s 50 coming up in only the 11th over.

Lloyd, however, having hit Dan Moriarty for a straight six, was badly dropped on 33 by Amar Virdi at long leg, after top-edging a hook at Rikkie Clarke – the veteran all-rounder playing in his final match before retirement.

Moriarty’s slow left arm had been introduced as early as the 12th over and off spinner Virdi was also in action by the 21st over. Virdi, indeed, provided Surrey with a much-needed breakthrough in his second over when an arm ball beat left-hander Rutherford’s forward push to have him

Surrey dominated on first day

SPORT 33 Surrey’s Dan Moriarty

Lloyd hits career-best for Welsh side

leg-before for 36.

There were also two overs of off breaks from Will Jacks as Pope used six bowlers before lunch but Surrey had no further joy until Cooke lifted a loose checked drive at Moriarty straight to mid off. He had hit 11 fours and resisted for 144 balls after an afternoon of accumulation.

Left-hander Byrom, signed recently from Somerset on a two-year contract, took successive fours off Moriarty and leg-glanced Jacks for another boundary

as he began brightly and then, after tea, becoming the main aggressor as Lloyd, 29, completed his fifth first-class hundred.

At 287 for two, Glamorgan were seemingly in total control but Byrom then charged down the pitch to Moriarity to be stumped by Ben Foakes – playing his first senior game since late May after recovering from a bad hamstring injury.

Lloyd also had a rush of blood, trying to hoick Virdi over mid wicket from

down the pitch and instead lobbing a catch to cover off a leading edge after facing 180 balls across almost five hours and hitting a six and 13 fours.

Surrey finished the day with their two wicket-takers Moriarty and Virdi in tandem again but Carlson and Cooke stood firm.

Surrey left arm spinner Moriarty said: “Unfortunately we were on the wrong side of the toss today but I thought the Glamorgan guys batted really well and made it difficult for us. It was always

Jones who truly kicked it open with 5-33.

It meant the Charlotte Edwards Cup winners never threatened to chase down a target of 186, Kalea Moore top-scoring with 35.

Thunder’s total of 185 all out in 47 overs owed much to Ellie Threlkeld’s unbeaten 70 made off 92 balls with six fours, leg-spinner Dani Gregory bowling beautifully for 2-23 from her 10 overs.

Hartley was almost unplayable from ball one, finding not only prodigious amounts of turn but exaggerated bounce, creating confusion in the minds of all Stars’ batters.

The hosts had already lost Chloe Brewer and stand-in skipper Alice DavidsonRichards with just 23 on the board when Hartley began her mesmerizing spell. It soon proved too much for Alice Capsey, who skied a catch to cover

At the other end, Jones had Grace Gibbs caught, before pinning Kirstie White lbw, but it was Hartley who claimed the crucial wicket of Moore, the ball turning away from the all-rounder who could only poke it into the hands of point.

Phoebe Franklin and Kira Chathli hit some late defiant blows, but Jones continued to pick them off and they came up well short.

Earlier, Threlkeld stood tall while all else fell around after Thunder won the toss and opted to bat.

Coming in at No. 3 after the run out of Seren Smale, the 22-year-old produced the only innings of substance all day, successive fours in one over from Moore two of five in a 50 which came up in 71 balls.

While she prospered others came and went, Gregory’s delightful mix of flight

and spin accounting for Natalie Brown and Laura Marshall as the visitors slumped from 84-2 to 90-5.

Threlkeld pushed on to 70 not out, but only Liberty Heap who made 19 and Alice Dyson 13 could stay with her for long as Thunder were bowled out with three of their 50 overs left unused.

“We ran into two left-arm spinners in top form,” Gregory said. “They got a bit of turn out there, got on top of us and we had a little bit of a collapse. It wasn’t our best batting performance and we’ve had better days.

“Alex Hartley is a very talented bowler, so all credit to her. It was the plan to let Alex bowl her overs and try and attack someone else, but then they had a very talented spinner (Jones) from the other end who was also turning it square, so it was very difficult to deal with.

going to be a hard day with the ball on a good pitch but we were not as consistent as we would have liked even though we bowled well in patches.

“There is still a lot of hard work to do but we are very hopeful that it will spin more as the match goes on so it might be a different game in the last two innings. We just need to bowl them out tomorrow and then bat well ourselves and see where we are.”

Go to southwarknews.co.uk for the final report.

Stars feel Thunder roar in Rachel Heyhoe Flint Trophy Rachel Heyhoe Flint Trophy

Thunder 185 (all out) beat South East Stars 130

By Jon Batham sport@southwarknews.co.uk SOUTH EAST Stars were defeated at Beckenham last weekend as leftarm spinners Hannah Jones and Alex Hartley produced bewitching spells for Thunder who ended their Rachael Heyhoe Flint campaign with a 55-run win.

Former England World Cup winner Hartley bamboozled the hosts with turn and bounce in a mesmerizing display taking 2-17 to start Stars’ demise, but if she edged the door ajar it was spin twin

“We have been a little bit under par the last two performances. We pride ourselves on the performances we put out and they have been below the standard we want to show our spectators.

“It’s been a long season and we have tired players in the camp, but that is no excuse.

“I’ve had a few games where my bowling has been a bit hit and miss, so I focussed on just being relaxed at the crease and getting through my action and fortunately bowled pretty tightly and picked up a couple of wickets. One was a full toss but it happens that bad balls take wickets.

“On the whole I have been pretty happy with the way I’ve bowled this year.”

“On the whole I have been pretty happy with the way I’ve bowled this year.”

Photo by Mark Sandom

By Mark Baldwin

www.southwarknews.co.uk/sport

34 MILLWALL

www.newsatden.co.uk

Southwark News, Thursday September 23 2021

Hamlet suffer FA Cup shock

dulwich hamlet fc

By John Kelly

johnk@southwarknews.co.uk

Joe Jackson scored the only goal of the game to send Bedfont into the next round.

It was ominous early on for the Hamlet who despite starting their National League South campaign positively struggled to break down their opponents from the Isthmian League South Central Division, two tiers below.

Darren McQueen started brightly and threatened in the nineteenth minute but it was the visitors who went ahead after half an hour through Jackson.

A minute later Andrew Harris-Sealy fired an effort on goal and Danny Mills couldn’t find the net from the rebound.

Mills did have the ball in the net eleven minutes into the second half but it didn’t count and even with plenty of time left most of the 1,605 inside Champion Hill were beginning to suspect it wasn’t going to be their day.

Hamlet boss Gavin Rose sent on Chike Kandi for Harris-Sealy in the 69th minute as the hosts tried to find a different route through a crowded and ruggedly determined away defence.

There was another throw of the dice with ten minutes remaining when Jack Holland replaced Deon Moore but Bedfont edged closer to a historic result.

Mills had a glorious opportunity to level in the 81st minute but somehow sent his effort the wrong side of the post.

Jaydn Mundle-Smith was Rose’s final change when he came on for winger James Dayton, but the away side refused to crack and claimed a deserved win.

The visitors were elated but took time to pay tribute to their hosts on Twitter. They posted: “I must say

Dulwich knocked out by side two tiers below Photo by Liam Asman

DULWICH HAMLET were shocked

by Bedfont Sports in the second round qualifying of the FA Cup last weekend.

James Dayton shows his frustration

Danny Mills can’t believe he missed the target

without any doubt the welcome we received at Dulwich Hamlet was the best since we joined the non-league pyramid.

“Great people, great support and just a wonderful atmosphere. Thank you from everyone at Bedfont Sports.”

Fisher strengthen squad with three additions

By John Kelly johnk@southwarknews.co.uk FISHER HAD no game last Saturday but instead were busy in the transfer market.

Photo by Dave Anderson

The Fish recruited Ayoub Cherradi from Cheshunt, David Mensah who has been through Boreham Wood’s academy, and Ezekiel Adesanya from Witham Town.

The trio were joining up with the squad ahead of their mid-week game at Erith Town.

Last Friday, Ajay Ashanike’s side drew 1-1 at Holmesdale in their SCEFL Premier Division clash.

Temi Oladejo gave the visitors the lead in the 50th minute and ten minutes later the home side were

reduced to ten men after right-back Jamie Rawsthorne received a straight red for a two-footed lunge on Courtney Swaby that prompted a melee.

But Holmesdale levelled five minutes later through Owen Punselie and they held on for a point.

Meanwhile, Fisher have been drawn at home against Welling Town in the SCEFL Challenge Cup and could set up a tie with close rivals Stansfeld from the league below.

The Fish are twelfth in the league

Little consolation for the Hamlet as Bedfont moved to within two wins of the first round proper. They have been drawn against Southampton side Sholing of the Wessex League Premier Division in the third qualifying round.

Dulwich’s focus is back on league

action this Saturday when they travel to Chelmsford City. Kick-off is 3pm.

Hamlet: Charlie Grainger; Jazzi Barnum-Bobb, Andre Blackman, James Dayton (Jaydn Mundle-Smith, 90), Quade Taylor, Tyrone Sterling,

Deon Moore (Jack Holland, 80), Giovanni McGregor, Danny Mills, Darren McQueen, Andrew HarrisSealy (Chike Kandi, 69).

Subs not used: Henry Molyneux, Miguel Scarlett, Jamie Splatt, Alpha Diallo.

Cottrell heroics earn Stansfeld point

By Sports Reporter sport@southwarknews.co.uk STANSFELD ARE still unbeaten this season but missed the chance to close the gap further to Croydon at the top of the SCEFL First Division table as they were held to a 1-1 draw at Larkfield & New Hythe last weekend.

The Stans were without captain Casey Killilea who had to withdraw on the morning of the game, and after a reshuffle it took a while for the visitors to settle.

Larkfield took the lead in the fourth minute through Chris Webber as Stansfeld had their backs against the wall in the early part of the game. They were struggling to find any rhythm with their changed shape and were relieved to go in at the break only a goal down.

But Stansfeld came out in the second half and started much more positively to draw

level in the 55th minute when Jack Carthy scored from the penalty spot after Ollie Milton had been fouled.

Stansfeld had the attacking momentum but ten minutes in the sin bin for Dan Parkinson knocked the wind out of their sails.

Larkfield almost took full advantage with the extra man and were in the ascendency when Charlie Cottrell pulled off a brilliant save to block an effort from six yards.

And Cottrell was not done with his heroics as with fifteen minutes left he saved a penalty.

There was some bemusement among the visitors when Parkinson’s time in the sin bin somehow extended to sixteen minutes.

But after he finally returned Stansfeld got a little more control in the game. Parkinson had a chance to put the away side in front but his free-kick from 22 yards out was well-saved.

Although Larkfield applied most of the late pressure aiming to clinch the three points, Cottrell didn’t have another save to make as Stans secured a good away draw.

Man of the match: Charlie Cottrell Stansfeld 2nds moved into the next round of the KICS with a fine 5-1 win against Bexley.

Stansfeld thirds were held to a 2-2 draw at home to Metrogas Res. Stansfeld 4ths had a convincing 5-0 cup victory at home to South Dulwich Reserves.

This Saturday’s fixtures: FA Vase Second Qualifying Round Worthing United vs. Stansfeld (3pm) Stansfeld Reserves vs. Peckham Town (League; 2.45pm) Stansfeld 3rds vs. Erith & Belvedere Reserves (League; 2.45pm) Chelsfield vs. Stansfeld 4ths (League; 2.30pm)

Southwark News, Thursday September 23 2021

www.newsatden.co.uk

MILLWALL 35

Brad day at the office

Sav nets first league goal this season – but striker wrongly denied by officials

Tom Bradshaw heads home a perfectly legitimate goal

championship report Millwall - 1 Saville 21’ coventry - 1 Gyökeres 9’ Date: Saturday September 18, 2021 Referee: Keith Stroud Man of the match: Bartosz Bialkowski

By Jake Sanders at The Den sport@southwarknews.co.uk AVERAGING ONE point a game would lead Millwall into a relegation battle, but based on their recent performances they are capable of a lot more.

Gary Rowett’s team have been criticised for showing a lack of ambition and though this ended up being their fifth draw in eight Championship games, Millwall did everything in their power to avoid yet another afternoon when the points were shared.

But if they want to start climbing the table and moving closer to those top-six places, then not falling behind in games

The forward and team-mate Matt Smith can’t believe the decision

George Saville found the back of the net for the first time this season

would be a good place to start.

Viktor Gyokeres’ ninth-minute strike at The Den was the sixth time this season they had conceded first. Fortunately for the Lions, their never-say-die attitude means they always have a chance of coming back.

They have only gone on to lose one of those games, at home to Fulham.

Last Saturday, the Lions were facing a Coventry outfit that had a 100 per cent record after taking the lead this season and they briefly sat top of the second tier when Gyokeres beat the challenges of both Jake

Cooper and Murray Wallace before lashing into the bottom corner past Bartosz Bialkowski.

After his heroics at West Brom and Swansea, it was always going to take something special to beat the Millwall goalkeeper. And while it wasn’t exactly spectacular, the quality of the strike ensured the Polish international was left with little chance.

Millwall had started the game on the front foot but were then forced to do it the hard way once again.

Luckily for those inside The Den, they didn’t have to wait long for the equaliser, because twelve minutes later, three one-touch passes from Matt Smith, Tom Bradshaw, and Jed Wallace – his third assist in four games – teed up George Saville arriving in the box and he scored his first league goal of the season, albeit via a kind deflection off Todd Kane.

He celebrated with a beaming smile but those smiles soon turned to frustration when Millwall were denied a clear second goal by a rather bizarre offside decision on the stroke of half-time.

Saville, once again involved, found Scott Malone who picked out Bradshaw with a curling cross from the left towards the back post. Bradshaw planted a wonderful header into the bottom left corner for a well-deserved first goal of the season following a selfless first-half display.

Or so he thought.

Except, the linesman appeared to think Smith had been offside and interfering with play as he attempted to reach the cross. Replays showed both Smith and Bradshaw had been onside when Malone

struck the ball, so the goal should have stood.

Coventry manager Mark Robins later agreed his side had been fortunate. Sky Blues fans knew it, too, as they ironically gave the linesman a hero’s welcome when he reappeared for the second half.

Bradshaw’s own frustrations didn’t let up when Simon Moore sprang across to make a diving save and keep out his header late on.

It was a fifth game without defeat for the Lions, but they’re already seven points worse off than at this point last season and they desperately need a victory at Nottingham Forest this weekend to revive the impression they are top-six contenders.

Millwall: 3-4-3: Bialkowski; Ballard, M Wallace, Cooper; Leonard, Kieftenbeld (Mahoney, 81), Saville, Malone; J Wallace, Smith (Mitchell, 69), Bradshaw (Bennett, 81).

Coventry: 3-5-2: Moore; Hyam, McFadzean, Clarke-Salter (Rose, 62); Kane, Hamer, O’Hare (Allen, 82), Sheaf, Maatsen; Gyökeres, Godden (Walker, 82).

Boss pleased as youngsters sweep Tykes aside

By John Kelly Johnk@southwarknews.co.uk MILLWALL UNDER-23 boss Kevin Nugent was pleased to get back to winning ways as his side thumped Barnsley 4-0 at Calmont Road on Tuesday afternoon.

Sean O’Brien scores from the spot

Nugent has a young and inexperienced squad this season with a number of players out on loan but they comfortably claimed three points in their Professional Development League game against the Tykes.

Seb Drozd scored twice either side of Sean O’Brien’s penalty to put the hosts 3-0 up before Tyrese Briscoe adding a fourth after just an hour.

“I was really pleased with that,”

Nugent told Millwall’s media. “We’ve not had the greatest of starts to the season.

“We’ve been a bit disjointed with regards to players but we’re getting some bodies back now as well, so I’m really pleased with everything about today. Particularly the intensity and the intent to go and win the game.”

Millwall’s under-23s play the same system as Gary Rowett’s senior side.

Nugent added: “The back three and all the players reached a really good level of performance today.

“The goal is to now get that consistency.

We’ve spoken throughout the week of having a real intent and purpose in how to win games. I feel as though they took that on board and did it.”

Nugent praised attacker Drozd and Briscoe who scored three of the goals.

“It’s been difficult for both of them because they both picked up injuries.

I’m pleased they both managed to get goals, they deserved them.

“Tyrese put himself about and was our main focal point up front. It was really good to have that platform today.”

Next up for Millwall’s under-23s is a trip to Cardiff City on Monday afternoon.

The Bluebirds are managed by former Lions striker and captain Steve Morison.

Millwall: Gillmore, Walker, Grande, Penney, Okoli, Topalloj, Davis, Allen (Cotton 64’), Briscoe (Adom-Malaki 68’), O’Brien, Drozd (Esse 68’).

Subs not used: Hammond, Smith.

36 MILLWALL

www.newsatden.co.uk

EXCLUSIVE

By John Kelly johnk@southwarknews.co.uk DANIEL BALLARD has two missed calls on his phone as well as a voicemail.

“Hello, mate,” the text reads a few minutes later. “Sorry, just woken up! You still okay for a chat?”

The News had scheduled an interview with Millwall defender Ballard for 4pm last Tuesday and he’s shaking off the grogginess when he eventually answers the phone half an hour later.

“Sorry about that, I fell asleep around half two and I didn’t think I’d still be sleeping by four.”

The immediate impression is Ballard takes things in his stride.

Anyone who has seen him play would class him as a composed and calm figure.

He’s comfortable on the ball, whether playing long diagonal passes or stepping forward into space to look for a pass to the feet of an attacker.

And he speaks in a calm, laidback manner, though there is no mistaking his steely focus and determination.

He’s asked if that steady nature is one of his best attributes.

“I’d like to say so,” he agrees. “But that’s always something I’ve had to work on throughout my career, stuff on the ball.

“I’ve always found defending and being aggressive has come really naturally to me and I’ve always enjoyed that.

“What I’ve had to do is try and add the stuff on the ball throughout my career, especially coming up through Arsenal and the way they want to play, play out from the back.

“The way Arsenal play now I have to be comfortable on the ball if I was to ever go back there.

“I’d like to say that’s an area that has improved massively but I want to keep working on it and improving it.”

Despite being only 21, Ballard has experienced contrasting swings of fortune in a career that looked over before it started when he was let go by Arsenal at under-16 level.

He went to Southampton on trial but broke his ankle. But in a remarkable twist, and just as he was about to sign a scholarship deal with his hometown club Stevenage who appeared to be the only club interested in him, Gunners academy boss Andries Jonker called. The under-18s were short a centre-back and Jonker asked him what his situation was and f he could go to Germany to play in a friendly against German giants Bayern Munich.

Ballard couldn’t turn down a chance that is almost unheard of for a player that has been released.

After impressing in the game, just months after he thought his dream was over, Jonker offered him a scholarship on the flight home.

Ballard agrees the memory of that time is a daily motivation.

“Yeah, definitely,” he says. “I think about that moment, how tough I found it. Growing up it was my dream to play football.

“I never quite thought I would be in the position I am now and I’m only here because I’ve worked really hard.

“I was in a position where no team wanted me so to be playing every week in the Championship is a big turnaround.

“I certainly don’t forget how I’ve got here and what it was like three or four years ago when times were very different.

“Andries Jonker gave me the chance to come back. He always really believed in me when no one else did and if it wasn’t for him I definitely wouldn’t be where I am now.

“It was a tough period at that time. You

Southwark News, Thursday September 23 2021

Heartbreak to Lionheart Defender on two major setbacks in his career and how he bounced back

Daniel Ballard displays his battle scars go from being an Arsenal player to having absolutely nothing.

“You realise you’re on your own, almost. My family were really good, really understanding. They helped me out massively. You find out who’s really in your life and my family and friends were massive.”

Ballard made the first loan move of his career to experience senior football at Swindon. But again bad luck struck as he suffered a knee injury and was out for five months.

That took him into early 2020 before Covid-19 hit the UK and football was suspended in March.

It meant that he went more than a year without playing a game of competitive football.

But in another remarkable turning point in his young career, his first match in thirteen months, between a 3-0 defeat to Colchester with Swindon in August 2019 and September 2020, was his international

debut for Northern Ireland in a Nations League game in Romania, a 1-1 draw.

Then within the space of a week he had twice faced one of the most fearsome forwards in the world, Norway’s phenomenon Erling Braut Haaland, who has averaged a goal a game for his country and Borussia Dortmund since the start of the 2019-20 season. Haaland scored twice in the first game but was kept quiet in the second and failed to find the net.

Ballard again used the experience of his release by Arsenal for perspective while he had no competitive football.

“That was probably the second biggest challenge I’ve had,” Ballard says. “With Covid I didn’t play a game of football in a year. That’s a long time to be out of the game and there were a lot of challenging moments in that.

“Of course it was extremely difficult but I looked back on the time that I was released and used that as motivation to keep going.

“My first full 90 minutes was my

international debut. It was pretty surreal.”

A month later, League One Blackpool signed Ballard on a season-long loan.

Ballard played 30 times including the 2-1 play-off final win against Lincoln at Wembley.

Would he agree Blackpool took a punt on him after he had played so little club football?

“I’d say definitely they took a punt,” he replies. “I hadn’t played in a long time so I was pretty grateful they did that because I was really struggling for a loan move.

“I wanted to go out and play and be involved again. I had a great time there.”

Blackpool wanted him on loan again for this season’s Championship campaign, but Ballard was ready for a new challenge.

Ahead of the trip to Nottingham Forest this weekend, he has started all eight league games and would have played every minute but for a cut to his eye forcing him off in the 70th minute against Swansea.

He admits he is slightly surprised he has

become a fixture in Gary Rowett’s team so quickly.

“I was going there because I wanted to play, but they had lots of experienced, top defenders,” Ballard says of his decision to join Millwall. “As soon as I got there I saw the standard was high and I knew I would have to work hard to show the manager I’m a good player.

“If I’m not doing that there are a lot of other people who can step in. I was probably quite surprised, I definitely didn’t think I’d have played this number of games and sort of made this positon my own at the moment.

“I’m really pleased with the start but if I were to take my foot off the gas I’m sure someone would come in straightaway and replace me.

“It’s up to me to keep doing what I’m doing and working hard because we’ve got a really good squad.”

Ballard will continue to take things in his determined stride.

Southwark News, Thursday September 23 2021

Championship preview

www.newsatden.co.uk

VS

Nottingham Fores Millwall

MILLWALL 37

The City Ground, Saturday September 25, Kick-off: 3.00pm

Lions face new man at City Ground Forest appoint fourteenth boss in last decade matCh details Possible Millwall starting XI: 5-2-3

Bialkowski; McNamara, Ballard, Hutchinson, Cooper, Malone; Kieftenbeld, Saville; J Wallace, Smith, Ojo.

Match odds:

Forest 6/5 Draw 2/1 Millwall 7/5

Last meeting:

Championship (January 16, 2021): Forest 3-1 Millwall (Ameobi 34, 70, Yates 83; Thompson 89).

Gary Rowett in opposition to Steve Cooper, far right, when the latter was the manager of Swansea last season

By John Kelly johnk@southwarknews.co.uk IT’S AT times like this if you’re a Millwall fan that you really should appreciate how stable your club is when you glimpse the mess others are in.

Okay, it hasn’t been the most exhilarating start to the season with the Lions having drawn the jointhighest number of league games so far.

But if one of your few complaints is that your team are involved in too

many stalemates – or, to look at it another way, don’t get beaten that often – then you might count yourself fortunate.

On Tuesday, Nottingham Forest appointed Steve Cooper to take over from Chris Hughton, who was unsurprisingly sacked after the 2-0 defeat to Middlesbrough at the City Ground last week.

Interim manager, former Millwall midfielder Steven Reid, oversaw Forest’s first league win of the season last weekend, 2-0 at Huddersfield. That was a first win the Championship in fifteen games since April 5.

Latest Forest boss gets the backing of Chopper

By John Kelly johnk@southwarknews.co.uk FORMER MILLWALL manager Neil Harris has backed Steve Cooper to be a success at Nottingham Forest.

The Lions face ex-Swansea manager Cooper this Saturday in his first game in charge of the Tricky Trees.

Harris twice went head-to-head against Cooper’s Swansea in the south Wales derby as Cardiff boss, drawing 0-0 and losing 2-0, both at home.

“Coops is a really good guy, a really nice fella and really well-respected in

the changing room,” Harris told Sky Sports.

“He comes across very well in the press. I saw Steven Reid took the team on Saturday and played a 3-4-3 formation and I expect Coops to play something similar to that.

“It may be something slightly different to what Chris Hughton has done and perhaps he’ll give people an opportunity who have been on the fringes or not had an opportunity this season a chance.

“The last two seasons at Swansea he got them into the play-off positions and it’s a great achievement for him so I think it’s a good fit.”

In the last decade, including caretaker stints – three of those for academy boss Gary Brazil and two for Rob Kelly – former Swansea boss Cooper represents the 22nd time the door has revolved in that position.

Cooper is the fourteenth full-time appointment over those ten years and a bit since former England manager Steve McLaren was handed one of the most poisonous chalices in English football in the summer of 2011.

Billy Davies had two goes at it, club playing legend Stuart Pearce lasted six months, Martin O’Neill the same. In his

second spell Davies oversaw 59 games, the most of those fourteen bosses.

For context, Gary Rowett is only Millwall’s fifth full-time manager in over fourteen years, since Kenny Jackett was appointed in 2007, and will oversee his 98th match in charge of the Lions as Cooper takes his first this weekend.

Dane Murphy, Nottingham Forest chief executive, said Cooper was their number-one target.

“Steve was our first-choice as head coach and we are delighted to have secured his services. His

Defender makes Dover debut

By John Kelly johnk@southwarknews.co.uk MILLWALL DEFENDER Junior Tiensia made his debut for Dover Athletic in their 1-1 draw at Weymouth last Saturday.

Left-back Tiensia, 20, went straight into Andy Hessenthaler’s side, who are bottom of the National League table on minus-ten points after a twelve-point deduction for failing to fulfil fixtures last season as they had no gate income because of Covid-19 restrictions.

Koby Arthur put Dover ahead before former Millwall forward Josh McQuoid levelled for Weymouth.

Dover were in action at home to Solihull Moors in midweek.

Also in the fifth tier, Dan Moss played the full game for Yeovil but they lost to Chesterfield, who went top after goals from Manny Oyeleke and Kabongo

Tshimanga.

Yeovil dropped to ninth.

In League Two, centre-back Alex Mitchell still hasn’t been on the losing side for Kenny Jackett’s Leyton Orient, who won 3-1 at Bristol Rovers to go second.

Mitchell produced a brilliant piece of defending in the second half to chase down Harvey Saunders from the halfway line and prevent him from getting a shot on goal.

It was a different story for Mahlon Romeo in League One as he was on the losing side for a third consecutive game in Portsmouth’s 2-1 defeat at home to Cambridge United. Pompey had a chance to end that run when they hosted Plymouth this week.

Meanwhile, Hayden Muller lost his place in the side to former Millwall defender James Brown as St Johnstone won 1-0 at Aberdeen in the Scottish Premiership.

record of developing young talent is exceptional,” Murphy said after Cooper’s appointment was confirmed on Tuesday morning.

“Steve knows what is required to be successful in the Championship and has a proven track record with Swansea.

“We have reduced the age of our squad over the summer and Steve is the ideal coach to blend a team to start moving us up the table.

“On behalf of the owner and the board, we welcome Steve to the club and look forward to providing every support he needs to be a success at Nottingham Forest”.

Cooper has a slight advantage over Rowett in preparation time. Forest were not in mid-week EFL Cup action and former England under-17 manager Cooper took his first training session on Tuesday morning, at the same time as Rowett was putting his squad through their paces at The Den ahead of their third-round clash against Leicester City.

But at least Millwall could be boosted by the returns to league action of Danny McNamara, Benik Afobe and George Evans who all trained this week. Sheyi Ojo should also be in contention to play his second game after recovering from illness.

SKY BET CHAMPIONSHIP TABLE P W D L GD Pts

1 Bournemouth 8 5 3 0 8 18 2 Fulham 8 5 1 2 11 16 3 WBA 8 4 4 0 7 16 4 Coventry City 8 5 1 2 3 16 5 Stoke City 8 4 2 2 1 14 6 Blackburn Rovers 8 3 4 1 3 13 7 Huddersfield T 8 4 1 3 2 13 8 QPR 8 3 3 2 4 12 9 Bristol City 8 3 3 2 1 12 10 Cardiff City 8 3 2 3 2 11 11 Birmingham City 8 3 2 3 0 11 12 Derby County 8 2 4 2 -1 10 13 Luton Town 8 2 4 2 -2 10 14 Reading 8 3 1 4 -3 10 15 Sheffield United 8 2 3 3 0 9 16 Middlesbrough 8 2 3 3 -1 9 17 Preston NE 8 2 3 3 -2 9 18 Millwall 8 1 5 2 -2 8 19 Barnsley 8 1 5 2 -3 8 20 Blackpool 8 2 2 4 -5 8 21 Swansea City 8 1 4 3 -4 7 22 Peterborough U 8 2 1 5 -7 7 23 Hull City 8 1 2 5 -7 5 24 Nottingham F 8 1 1 6 -5 4

inside

Sport Southwark

Page 32

Hamlet shocked in FA Cup

Manager closes in on century

Gary Rowett during his first game in charge against Stoke in 2019

Gary Rowett on upcoming milestone as Forest start from scratch

EXCLUSIVE

By John Kelly johnk@southwarknews.co.uk MILLWALL BOSS Gary Rowett is approaching 100 games in charge – but his focus is on improving results rather than reflecting on that milestone.

Rowett will oversee his 98th Lions game at Nottingham Forest this Saturday, against a manager who is taking charge of his first after Steve Cooper was appointed to replace Chris Hughton this week.

Rowett’s first game was a 2-0 win over Stoke City in October 2019 and he has led the side to consecutive top-half finishes in the Championship.

But Millwall have started this season slowly and although they are unbeaten in four league games they have only won once this season and have eight points from eight games compared to fifteen at the same time last season.

Cooper is Forest’s fourteenth full-time appointment in the last decade. Rowett is the Lions’ fifth permanent boss in over fourteen years.

Rowett was asked if he would reflect on a century of games in charge.

“Anybody in management, particularly in the Championship, but at any level who manages to stay in the job for 100 games first and foremost has done okay,” Rowett said.

“I think that it’s down to the great work the staff are doing but also testament to

the club and the stability that’s around the club.

“There’s a big belief around Millwall that if you get that stability you’ve got a chance of being successful.

“But, look, the pressure at a club like Forest is perhaps slightly more than it is at Millwall in terms of what the expectation is.

“When you’ve won the European Cup, for example, there is always that in the back of people’s minds.

“But I am pleased to get to nearly 100 games here. I’d like to hope there are many more. But when you’ve started the season like we have the focus is to improve results immediately rather than worry about how long you’ve been somewhere or are going to be

Go to newsatden.co.uk for the report and all the reaction from Millwall’s clash with Leicester City on Wednesday night.

somewhere.”

Hughton was sacked after a 2-0 defeat to Middlesbrough left Forest winless at the foot of the table.

Rowett added: “I was sad to see Chris go because he’s a really good guy, a brilliantly experienced manager.

“Surprised? I’ve been in the Championship for a long time, I’ve been in management for a while, I don’t think you’re ever surprised in football when the results have not been as good as you would like, you always know there is an inevitability about anyone’s job regardless of which division or how much experience they’ve got.

“Chris is a top manager and I’m sure he will bounce back somewhere and do his usual which is be successful.”

V’s

Jed set to be tenth absentee

By John Kelly johnk@southwarknews.co.uk MILLWALL COULD be dealt a major blow this Saturday as they are set to be without Jed Wallace against Nottingham Forest.

Wallace, 27, missed the third-round EFL Cup game against Leicester City on Wednesday through illness.

If Wallace is ruled out then he would be the tenth Millwall player to be absent for a league game through illness or injury already this season.

The Lions hope to have Danny McNamara, Benik Afobe and George Evans available as they aim to extend their unbeaten Championship run to five games, and claim a first three points in four league matches.

Boss Gary Rowett had his fingers crossed that on-loan Liverpool winger Sheyi Ojo would be fit for the City Ground clash.

He said: “Hopefully we’ll have Sheyi back, potentially, if all goes well this week. That would be a big plus for us.”

It has been a wretched run of luck early in the season for the Lions, with players affected by quad, knee, groin and ankle injuries, as well as illnesses to Wallace and Ojo. Commenting on Ojo’s potential availability as Wallace was set to be ruled out, Rowett ruefully said: “What you get given by one hand is taken away by the other.”

Rowett’s side are aiming for a first away win in the league since their 2-1 victory at Stoke City on April 5.

Jed Wallace

The recycled paper content of UK newspapers in 2014 was 83.5%

Summer 2021 - Another Year to Celebrate a fine set of GCSE Results at Kingsdale Foundation School!

Laura Chakarov, Angelie Nadarajah and Janii Henry-Jones

Kingsdale is Outstanding in every area (Ofsted 2017) and presents exceptionally rich opportunities to challenge students of all abilities including providing options to study Latin, Economics and Psychology. There is also the choice to learn two languages from the start of Year 7 for gifted & talented linguists. Kingsdale attracts many able students and operates a diverse, expansive curriculum to meet the particular needs and aspirations of all of our students and their families. The school offers a wide variety of academic subjects including 4 or 5 optional courses selected by each child in addition to co-curricular activities every day.

‘The curriculum is broad and balanced, supporting pupils’ outstanding outcomes because of the chance pupils have to be successful in a range of subjects.’ Ofsted 2017 The recycled paper content of UK newspapers in 2014 was 83.5%