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Please go to this link and read the history of whats going on in Poplar East London.
2 Planning applications for demolition of the poplar employment exchange at 307 Burdett Road have already been refused by Tower Hamlets Council, now the sites owners are taking our council to the High Court.
If I remember my history correctly, and please feel free to put me right, is that this employment exchange is one of the first in the country, and actually put forward by George Lansbury himself. Maybe I’m wrong, but finding information about Poplar’s History can be quite difficult in a borough that once tried to decimate its own historical archives at Bancroft Road.
I’ve become quite despondent of late, in looking around the borough at what I perceive to be huge unrestrained developments with virtually no real oversight by our councils planning officers, this particular one is a site that definitely qualifies to be saved.
Please people wake up to whats going on in this borough, get outside talk to your neighbours, get organised and try and call for a stop to the rot in this borough. We are already one of the most densely populated boroughs in the UK, which brings with it all the social problems usually attached with over-population, unemployment, depression, suicide, alcoholism, drug-abuse and a whole host of other social problems.
Sorry I’ve gone off track, anyway back to the Poplar Employment Exchange.
Tom Ridge (as well as others in the East End Waterways Group) the man who fought so valiantly to save the Bancroft Road Library is now also fighting the destruction of what residents and English Heritages own advisors believe to be an important landmark.
“There is no doubt that the Poplar Employment Exchange has strong local value
and is an important East London landmark. If this were a Conservation Area, the
dignified neo-Georgian elevations and historic interest of Poplar Employment
Exchange would make a positive contribution to its character.” Hannah Parham,
English Heritages Adviser’s Report 1/6/2009.
The above quote was submitted as part of the case before council to provide conservation area status upon the Poplar Employment Exchange as part of the Limehouse Cut Conservation Area
Trillium are now taking Tower Hamlets Council to the High Court on the 11th and 12th of November 2010 to basically quash the democratic desicion of our council to grant the Limehouse Cut Area conservation status. Just so that they can build another monstrous tower, so that more rich people can move into the area taking jobs in Canary wharf that are unobtainable by the local residents already living here.
Here is the latest Newsflash from the East End Waterways Group;
NEWSFLASH
EAST END WATERWAY GROUP
AND PATRON
JIM FITZPATRICK MP POPLAR AND LIMEHOUSEPRESENTING OUR PETITION
TO TELEREAL TRILLIUM140 LONDON WALL*
London EC2Z 5DNAt 11 am Monday
25 October 2010We, the undersigned local residents and others ask Trillium (Prime) Property Group Ltd to allow the retention and adaptation of the former poplar employment exchange at 307 Burdett Road as a training and social enterprise centre for unemployed local people, called THE LANSBURY CENTRE.
* on Bastion Highwalk
East Side of Museum of London
Nearest Tube St PaulsPLEASE BE ON TIME AS WE HAVE ARRANGED FOR THE EVENT TO BE PHOTOGRAPHED BY THE EAST LONDON ADVERTISER (as. Newsletter 6)
PLEASE RETURN COMPLETED PETITIONS BY POST BY 22 OCTOBER 2010 TO EAST END WATERWAY GROUP, c/o J-GO TRAINING LTD, RAILWAY ARCH 421, BURDETT ROAD LONDON E3 4AA
Heres a copy of the petition to download, download it, get as many signatures as possible and return it by this friday.
A Labour baroness who claimed second home allowances for a housing association property in London is to be suspended from Parliament.
Baroness Uddin is one of three peers who will be suspended after an inquiry found that they had broken expenses rules and wrongly claimed thousands of pounds. She has been ordered to pay back £125,000.
Read the whole story over at InsideHousing: http://www.insidehousing.co.uk/news/housing-management/baroness-suspended-for-social-home-claims/6512127.article
As a borough that is blighted by addictive drug use, and also as a person who has seen personally what the effects of drug addiction can do to a family I still find this report by the BBC absolutely disturbing..
http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-england-london-11545519
I have kept my thoughts away from the mayoral elections on this blog recently because I know Ted Jeory’s blog is doing a fantastic job of already reporting whats going on behind the scenes. Too be honest I cant really be bothered because theres not one i would really vote for. This apathy is probably felt by thousands of others around the borough, and councillors bank on this fact. Combine this with the fact that most of us couldn’t vote for hundreds of years, and many people have died to give us the right to vote, then not voting lets everyone down.
Anyway keep an eye on Teds Blog over at www.trialbyjeory.wordpress.com hes doing an already excellent job of showing the dark underbelly of whats going in the political fields of this borough.
Also check out Andrew Gilligans blog over at the Telegraph: http://blogs.telegraph.co.uk/news/author/andrewgilligan/
Do you know who to vote for on Thursday 21st October?
Who do you wan as the first elected Mayor of Tower Hamlets?
What are your major concerns? – Housing, Council Tax, Health cuts, Educations cuts, Benefits etc etc
Come and find out what the Candidates stand for?
Ask questions….
Hold them accountable……….
Come to:
St Matthias Community Centre
Tuesday 12th October
Prompt-7.30pm-9pm
St Matthias Community Centre resides within the old St Matthias Church at the corner of Woodstock Terrace and Poplar High Street E14. There is street parking available but remeber this could become busy. There is also bus stops along Poplar High Street and East India Dock Road which stands at the other end of Woodstock Terrace. There is also the DLR which you can get off of at All Saints or Poplar.
Above is a google map of the area showing walking routes to and from East India Dock Road for buses, and also the two nearest Docklands Light Railway Stations. Click on the link above to be taken to a larger map.
Its actually behind this building in Poplar High Street: http://maps.google.co.uk/maps/ms?ie=UTF8&hl=en&t=h&msa=0&msid=102795114516331108903.00049269ebf38c0f3b732&ll=51.508903,-0.015474&spn=0.003138,0.009645&z=17&layer=c&cbll=51.508903,-0.015474&panoid=6OpvYEycECeEJINCtZILYg&cbp=12,321.36,,0,1.1
Tommorow evening (Wednesday 6th October 2010) at St Mary’s & St Michaels Church in Commercial Road on the corner of Lukin Street at 7pm (see Google Maps Street View), Poplar Harca Estate Cleaners (see last post)sources inform me that they have been summoned to a meeting with the the Chief Executive Steve Stride (Stephen Edwin Arthur Stride) of Poplar Harca. Apparently they are to be given an update on their request for recognition of their work by bringing their wages up to the minimum London Living Wage level.
I’ve called the church, who inform me that TELCO (The East London Community Organisation) were holding a mayoral hustings there tommorow evening at 7:30pm to allow residents of Tower Hamlets to question the prospective mayoral candidates. Asking about Poplar Harca’s meeting, the church seemed unaware of this, but told me to contact TELCO.
I contacted TELCO who told me that I was correct. Harca were holding a meeting to discuss the Cleaners wages, as part of the London Living Wage Campaign which TELCO support and that Babu Bhattacherjee – Harca’s Director of Communities and Neighbourhoods was going to address the issue and not Steve Stride. When I asked if Steve was going I was told by TELCO that he was on holiday.
So tommorow evening at St Mary’s & St Michaels Church at 7pm Wednesday 6th October 2010 Director of Communities and Neighbourhoods for Poplar Harca Babu Bhattacherjee will be addressing the Estate Cleaners directly on the issue of the London Living Wage. Sources at Poplar Harca tell me that it will be unlikely if the backdating of the payment will be going ahead, as Poplar Harca are already reaching their peak debt facility of £275 million and are already looking at ways to curb spending .
Tower Hamlets Watch 