Forest Gate North – Rachel Tripp's councillor blog

Seyi writes…

For those living around Forest Gate Station you should have all received a consultation pack about the proposed plans and ideas for the Crossrail development both to the station and the local area around it. If for some reason you’ve missed it or we’ve missed you not to worry you can add your comments on the Newham Council website. The deadline in Friday 20th November.

Plans have come a long way since Councillors informal consultation on the sweatiest day of the day and through informal discussion with key stakeholders in Forest Gate.

There will be a few more public consultation meetings if you have any questions or concerns you would like to discuss:

Friday 6th November, 7-8pm at Forest Gate Youth Zone (This one is really for youth and young adults)

Thursday 12th November, 6-8pm at The Forest Gate Community Neighbourhood Centre (also known as #TheGate). Members of the Council design team will be at this meeting.

Seyi writes…

Maryland is where I grew up. It’s where I went to Primary school, dance school, visited my first Polling Station with my mum, learnt how to ride a bike, its where I played out with friends and its where I played knock down ginger (apologies for that!!). So Maryland has and will always have a special place in my heart and I’m genuinely so grateful that I can represent Maryland as part of Forest Gate North on the Council.

BUT sometimes being so emotionally attached to the area you represent has its low points. For example, just after becoming elected in May I went on a police patrol to learn about the hotspot areas for crime and anti-social behaviour. Although it was pretty cool be cruise around the ward in a police car by the end of the patrol my heart was heavy. (for obvious reasons I can’t reveal all of what I learnt that afternoon) I couldn’t believe the roads I used to play on and houses where my school friends used to live had been taken over by drug users/dealers, prostitution activities and to be honest un-neighbourly people. I was also taken back by the amount of rubbish on the roads and the number of local businesses on Leytonstone High Street that have closed or look a bit run down.

After a while of sulking I made a commitment to myself that by the time my term on the Council was over (May 2018) I would have helped restore a commUNITY in Maryland just like there is in the East side of the ward #ForestGreat. I’m not going to sugar coat it, IT HAS BEEN HARD, at times during the last 18 months, I think it would have been easier to pull out my tooth and hairs on my eyebrows and eyelashes than trying to get residents and local businesses in Maryland to engage with me and the Council! *sighs*. But after a lot of doorknocking and introducing ourselves, mobile Councillor surgeries at Maryland Primary school and Nooks Cafe, Street stalls on the High Rd, joint street stalls with the local police, picking up lots and lots of casework we had a breakthrough! We had our first Maryland residents meeting in the Summer, then we had another one in September which resulted in a new Maryland community litter picking group. A resident kindly offered to design and deliver flyers to inform Marylanders of the next meeting. And numbers began to grow. No longer did residents want to just complain they wanted to do something so I suggested our next meeting should be about the Quietways route  and improving the High Street.

I was about 15 minutes late for our October meeting (my previous council meeting over ran) and I walked into a very busy Nooks Cafe. I assumed the 8 people near the Council officer were the only people in Nooks Cafe for our meeting… oh how wrong was I. The packed Nooks Cafe were full of people who wanted to hear more about the Quietway route and help improve the local area. This then sparked a great conversation about regeneration in Leytonstone and how we could work together. One lovely resident gave a short presentation on the history of Maryland point and his ideas for the cross rail consultation.

Last week Friends of Maryland had their first steering group committee meeting at Nooks​. Due to the growing number of residents attending the residents meeting (which is fantastic by the way) we thought it would be helpful to have a steering committee of people who want to play leading role. We first looked at the Detailed Site and Policies consultation document and put together some proposals. The deadline is Friday so you have a bit of time if you would like to add your thoughts here.

We then agreed on a few priorities for the Friends of Maryland residents group these are: Flytipping and Littering, Regeneration and Urban Realm and Community Cohesion.
The group have agreed to hold a walkabout to identify hotspot areas but also good spaces for things like planting and maybe a street party. They have already formed a community litter picking group and we as a Community Neighbourhood will do our best to support that.

As part of priority 1 the group are now working on a petition to get Leytonstone High Road on a waste timed collection. Having had several meetings and walkabouts with various Newham council officers from Waste Collection and Enforcement team we all think this is one of the major contributing factors to the significant number of rubbish bags on the High Street which is attracting fly-tipping and litter. So in order for Maryland to be on a waste time collection a growth bid needs to be submitted Executive Member for Infrastructure and Environment but given the cuts to our budget we’ll need to put in a very strong case. I do think in the long run a waste time collection will save the council money so hopefully that + a petition from local residents and businesses will help put forward a convincing argument.

If you live in Maryland and would like to get more involved in the residents group. The next meeting is Tuesday 17th November, 7:30pm at Nooks Cafe where Newham Council Enforcement Officer will be giving a presentation answering any questions.

Seyi writes…

If you’re interested in engaging with the plan-making side of strategic regeneration planning (I mean who isn’t) then you may want to add your comments to the Details Sites and Policies document .

As part of the consultation on this plan, the Council have previously carried out two stages of consultation (on an Issues and Options and a Pre-publication version of the document). During these stages there is more scope to influence what goes into the document. Once we reach Proposed Submission stage as we now are, the views we are seeking are in regards to the ‘soundness’ of the plan, which relates to four tests set out by the National Planning Policy Framework to determine if there is a firm (legal) basis for the policies produced.

As soon as this plan is adopted by the Council (following submission to the Secretary of State and Examination Hearings) the Strategic regeneration team will be undertaking a full review of the Local Plan. This will look at both this DPD and the adopted Core Strategy, which sets out the Borough’s strategic priorities. At this stage officers will be carrying out consultation again, undoubtedly seeking groups to work with on engagement exercises and providing platforms for the community to tell us what they think. Officers can also use any commentary provided now as part of that process, so feedback is welcomed! A group of residents in Maryland came together to put forward their proposals, if you are a part of a local group that would like to get involved in this please do get in touch with us and we’d be happy to support you.

In relation to Maryland this DPD:

-> Sets boundaries for the newly designated Maryland Local Centre, this has policy implications in terms of the sorts of uses that can be located inside / outside the Local Centre (designed to help Newham’s centres function as successfully as possible).

-> Sets out new spatial designations near Maryland for LMUAs (Local Mixed Use Areas), MBOAs (Micro Business Opportunity Areas) and CFOAs (Community Facility Opportunity Areas). These first two designations identify places where business uses (that conform to certain criteria) can be located – it seeks to ensure commercial uses and residential uses co-exist peacefully without either stifling space for new businesses or having adverse effects on residential amenity. The CFOAs identify suitable locations for community facility uses, this addresses problems we have had in the Borough with community uses springing up in unsuitable or inaccessible locations and relaxes the existing position that such uses can only be in town centres. There are also a couple of new housing sites identified nearby.

More generally, the DPD also sets out policy to:

(1) address the proliferation of problem uses (betting shops / takeaways)

(2) locate specialist housing (student, hostel, older people) in suitable and accessible places and ensure minimum quality standards

(3) improve the sustainability of new development in regards flooding and biodiversity

(4) ensure that a range of issues aren’t made worse by establishing ‘cumulative impact’ zones.

The deadline is midnight on Friday so you have a bit of time if you would like to add your thoughts here.

Rachel writes…

Another quick post to highlight an interesting local event, this time the open day being held by the Quwwat-ul-Islam Mosque on Upton Lane.

You might remember that the mosque held an open morning as part of the Forest Gate arts trail in the summer. I went along and was treated to a tour of the premises, which are surprisingly big, and also arrestingly tranquil and peaceful, even though it’s right on the hustle and bustle of the main road. I was very struck by how friendly and welcoming Khalil Laher, the Imam there was, showing me around the various parts of the mosque and answering all my questions, and I was equally struck by the beauty of the tiled interior.

On Saturday November the 7th, the mosque is holding another open day, from 11am – 6pm. I would urge interested residents to go along and get a glimpse of this building. I admit I was almost a bit nervous before I went in during the summer; I suppose I was worried that I might be intruding in some way. But actually the warm welcome I received showed that the people at the mosque were delighted to show their building and explain some of their worship and faith. I loved not only the chance to see it, but also the feeling that I was sharing just a little in something that’s so important to many of my Forest Gate friends and neighbours.

Rachel writes…

Newham Cyclists (whom avid readers of this blog might remember as the group who got Seyi onto a bicycle….!) are holding a public meeting on Monday at the Wanstead Tap. I have given a link to their flyer at the bottom of this post, but here is all the relevant information:

‘PUBLIC MEETING
Monday 2nd November 2015 7pm at The Wanstead Tap
(Arch 352, Winchelsea Road, E7 0AQ)

Please come along and join us for this public meeting where Jack Skillen, London Director of Living Streets will be talking to us about the benefits of creating a “walking nation”.

Living Streets is the UK charity for everyday walking. We want to create a walking nation where people of all generations enjoy the benefits that this simple act brings, on streets fit for walking www.livingstreets.org.uk‘

I will be attending the meeting for various reasons. The first being that Newham Cyclists are a very pleasant, committed bunch of people some of whom I’ve been in contact with variously and individually but not met officially face to face yet and I’d like to see them and find out more. The second being that the Wanstead Tap is an extraordinarily great place, and worth a visit generally (if you’re reading this, and you’ve not been, I highly recommend a visit. Go to buy craft beer, and stay for the tea and the cakes, and lately also a weekend range of toasties).

But I am mainly going because I increasingly believe that the only sustainable way forward is for us to all, where we’re able to, walk and cycle much, much more. I think in everything we do, as a council but also as individuals and community groups, we need to provide opportunities for people to walk and cycle, and to create physical spaces that make this as safe and easy as possible.

I think this for a whole host of reasons, including climate change and pollution, but also for reasons of physical health, mental health, community building, and general pleasantness of our surroundings! And I am looking forward to finding out more about how we can help to make this happen, and to turn what is at the moment my ‘general feeling’ about the desirability of this into something a bit more concrete that I can learn more about.

I am interested generally in how this happens, but also am increasingly aware that it might be difficult. The consultation over some early ideas about the Quietway through Forest Gate North, and some of the opposition currently going on to ‘Mini Holland’ in Walthamstow have helped me to realise that there are a whole range of people who don’t feel the same way as I do. If that includes you then please do talk to me about it – I’m keen to understand your concerns and where you are coming from.

I also know from experience that a desire to cycle isn’t quite the same as putting it into practice. I have now owned my own bike for a year, and in that time have used it, I think, on two occasions. Largely due to my own laziness, I confess, but there you have it. Rome wasn’t cycled across in a day, as they say.

If you’re interested at all in walking and cycling, and in finding out more about Newham cyclists or Living Streets, do come along on Monday to the Newham Cyclists meeting. And if you see me there, please do say hello.

Living Streets flyer 1
(on a related note, if anyone knows how to easily insert a pdf into a WordPress post as an image, I would be very glad to hear from you! In the meantime, my apologies.)

Rachel writes…

Like many other residents, we have been watching events unfold in refugee camps with a mixture of horror, compassion, sadness and disbelief. Many people in Forest Gate have already donated items for the camps in Calais (a big shout out to Jane and Anna who collected items after the very successful Jumble Trail) and a Forest Gate based group has already met together to discuss co-ordinating some action.

Now, every Community Neighbourhood area in Newham is holding a meeting to discuss how to raise funds for the United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees (UNHCR).

Our meeting is this coming Wednesday the 21st October, from 6.30pm until 8pm, at the Gate library. If you have an idea for an event you’d like to hold, or if you have a vague idea for an initiative that might help to raise funds, if you’re part of a group that wants to do something but doesn’t know where to start, then please do come along, we would love to have you there. The format of the meeting will depend on who comes along, and what they want to do, but depending on numbers we will aim to group people together to make plans, and will look at how we can support the things you want to organise.

There is a meeting taking place in each of the Community Neighbourhoods, and you can see this page of the Newham website for more information. If organising isn’t your thing but you’d like to donate, then you can make a donation online here.

If you’re interested in being involved, then do come along to the Gate this coming Wednesday, and I look forward to seeing you there.

Rachel, Ellie and Seyi write…

In July, Forest Gate North Labour party held a meeting open to all local Labour party members, friends and supporters, to an event at Coffee7 called ‘Changing London’. Based on the book, and blog, put together by local residents David Robinson and Will Horowitz, this was a discussion event that enabled local people to share their thoughts and ideas about what we want from the next London Mayor.

As a result of those discussions, we have written the following letter, which we hope reflects the ideas people brought and shared, and gives a flavour of the kind of Mayor we want, and the kind of London we want to create.

AN OPEN LETTER TO THE CANDIDATES FOR LONDON MAYOR 2016

Dear Mayoral Candidates,

Our leaders regularly describe London as ‘the greatest city in the world’. But for many Londoners living in poverty and deprivation that claim can sound hollow. So in July 2015 Forest Gate North Ward Labour Party, inspired by the book/website Changing London: a rough guide for the next London mayor, hosted an open meeting for local residents to share their ideas on how the next Mayor could tackle growing inequality in London. Below, we outline our ideas in seven key areas.

While the Mayor of London’s formal powers may be limited, he/she has great influence and can play a key role to play in making London a better place to live for all of us. We ask the next Mayor to use both their powers and influence to champion a fairer, more equal, less divided, greener and safer city. We need a pro-active and collaborative Mayor who can develop a strategic cross-London vision, co-ordinating the work of all 32 boroughs and the City of London to promote economic and social development, address poverty, health inequality, and radically improve the environment and air quality.

We want the new Mayor to …
1  Gain greater control over revenues and raise more funding for London:
•    develop a plan for devolution of tax and revenue raising powers, and vigorously argue the case with central Government
•    set up an investment vehicle whereby Londoners can buy bonds to help finance infrastructure
2  Produce a housing strategy to alleviate rather than exacerbate the housing crisis:
•    work with local authorities to learn from and scale up schemes to increase the supply of genuinely affordable homes
•    commission a feasibility study into and argue for replacing council tax with a progressive property tax or land value tax to reduce housing market volatility, prevent property speculation driving up prices and make it too expensive for properties to stay vacant for long periods
•    oppose government changes that reduce the ability of councils and Housing Associations to provide social housing, eg the Housing Revenue Account borrowing cap
•    promote Community Land Trusts and housing co-operatives to provide affordable homes for local people especially in high value areas
•    crack down on manipulation of viability reports allowing developers to avoid including affordable homes in new developments
•    ban selling off plan directly to foreign buyers
•    strengthen and encourage the use of powers to take over empty properties
•    tackle exploitation in the private rental sector
•    lower VAT for housing renovation
3  Encourage good business practice:
•    purchase a share in the largest businesses in London giving him/her the right to speak at AGMs pushing the case for living wage, apprenticeships, curbs on high pay, fair and honest tax contributions etc
•    use procurement policies to encourage payment of the living wage
•    lobby central Government to allow the Mayor to set a London Living Wage
4  Make sure that Londoners have the right skills for employment, and reduce youth unemployment:
•    work with businesses and charities to set up apprenticeships and paid internships
•    set up a scheme similar to Labour’s ‘baby bonds’ so every young person has access to a pot of savings at 18 to be used e.g. for further education or training or set up a business
5  Improve the environment
•    develop strategies to support community solar energy schemes
•    phase out use of diesel fuel for transport in favour of electric buses
•    prioritise walking and cycling over other means of transport

6  Tackle crime, poverty and exploitation:
•    support the police in prosecuting white collar crime, which undermines responsible business practice, just as much as they do ‘poor’ crime
•    expand credit unions so people have an alternative to loan sharks
•    restore the homelessness safety net and improve support for non-priority older single homeless people
•    ban the use of Public Space Protection Orders which potentially criminalize (persistent) rough sleepers

7  Bring back healthy high streets:
•    Reform planning laws to enable councils to block gambling shops, chicken shops and pawnbrokers from taking over our high streets

Sincerely,

Forest Gate North Ward Labour Party, Councillors and residents
email: forestgatenorth@gmail.com
twitter: @forestgatenorth

——————-

If reading this sounds like your kind of London too, please do consider getting involved in your local Labour party. We are always keen to welcome new members. You can join online here. We would love to have you.

Ellie writes...

A couple of years ago Eric Pickles patronisingly suggested 50 money saving tips to local authorities. This year alone Newham must find savings of £50 million. By 2019, these cuts will average £91 million a per year. To put this in perspective, in 2014/15 we spent £87.8m million on looking after vulnerable adults and £52 million on looking after vulnerable children and young people.

So however much we ‘embrace video conferencing’ or ‘hot-desk’ our socks off, as Pickle’s helpfully suggests, we are unlikely to make the savings his Government has demanded. So we are going out to consultation to help us make much more difficult decisions about the services which matter.

Unfairly, but predictably, Newham is being hit hard by this Government’s cuts. Next year we will receive £284 less for every home in the borough, while wealthy Richmond residents only see a cut of £57 per home.

We have always been committed to fighting this government, to protecting the front line, and to finding imaginative and creative ways to make savings. Over the last five years we have already made £106 million in savings. In my cabinet role I am responsible for OneSource, which is our shared back office service. This is basically sharing things such as I.T., legal, property and H.R. services with Havering Council. Putting our political differences aside (Havering is a Tory borough) we have been able to set up a genuinely shared service which has saved Newham £5m in its first year. By 2018/2019 it is estimated it will achieve the cumulative savings of £41 million.

Despite this, and a number of other efficiency savings we still need to go further. So please get involved in helping us think about how we do that:

• If you haven’t already, please drop by a street stall – outside Maryland Station on the 24^th at 10am or on 3^rd October at Woodgrange Market at 2.30pm
• Pop into the library to pick up a questionnaire, or you can fill it out online here 
• Join us on the 30^th budget challenge community consultation meeting at the Gate Library at 6.30pm.

The results from this consultation will help the us take your views into account when we are setting the budget for next year.

Sadly, getting rid of the choccy bickies in meetings probably isn’t going to help tackle this problem, so please make sure your voice is heard.

If you have more detailed questions about this consultation, you can check out the Q&A doc here. 

Rachel writes…

There is a busy weekend of community activities coming up, so I thought I’d blog as a quick reminder for anyone who has missed the publicity.

The first is a Forest Gate event to celebrate 50 years of Newham.
Saturday 5 September 12 noon – 4.00pm Magpie Close, Forest Lane Park, Forest Gate, E7 9DF
A party in the park with a 60s theme, this promises plenty of fun with entertainment including:

• 1960’s music and dance classes, cake decorating, embroidery workshop with  the Sewing Bees group
• Come along dressed in your 1960’s clothes, with prizes for best fancy dress.
• Bring a packed lunch and your favourite teddy to join our teddy bears picnic.
• Have a go at skipping,  hula hooping and other traditional 1960’s games.
• Bring along a white t-shirt to transform at our tie dye stall.
• Horticulture workshops provided by the Forest Gate Community Gardening Group, including soil testing and food preserving.
• Enter the great Forest Gate cake off…… show us your baking skills.
• Donate a picture for our Forest Gate memories scrapbook.

You can download the flyer in PDF format here: 03735_CN_ForestGate_St_Party_A5_V2

The second is the much anticipated Forest Gate jumble trail, on Sunday the 6th, from 11am – 4pm.

All the details of the jumble trail are on the website here, or you can find them on twitter, or facebook to stay up to date.

I first heard about a jumble trail on twitter, and I confess I was slightly transfixed by the brilliance of the idea: a fabulous combination of community spirit, decluttering, secondhand shopping, and general fun. In essence it’s like a big jumble sale, but taking place in participants’ front gardens. Like an enormous carboot sale, full of your neighbours, with a side helping of home made cake. You can see where all the stalls are on the weblink above, and can follow the ‘trail’ by going to as many or as few roads as you want to.

This one has been organised by the amazing Elaine Odlin, and is now up to around 90 stalls. I will have a stall myself, and am very much looking forward to setting up, decking the front of the house with bunting, clearing out our house a bit, and enjoying the atmosphere.

So it’s all go in Forest Gate. A party on Saturday, and a Jumble Trail on Sunday. I hope to see you there!

Come and say hello to us this Saturday. Forest Gate North Labour Party are holding another street stall in Woodgrange Market (corner of Sebert Rd and Woodgrange Rd) from 11am to 1pm. Come and chat to us about anything from local issues to Newham Council’s budget cuts consultation, even the Labour leadership selection! We look forward to seeing you.