Working together to make West Ealing a better place for residents, businesses and visitors.
For those of you that missed us at Hanwell Carnival we will be at PPiTP for the first time selling our lovely locally picked and made produce – including our best selling elderflower cordial (£2.50) We will also have our chutneys this time – we had lots of requests at Hanwell for these!
You can also find out more on the Abundance project and volunteer too!
See you there.
Diane
Hi, we’re there – and so are hundreds of other people. It’s a great event- try to drop round and see us. (I recommend elderflower and lemon marmalade on creme fraiche on bread – lovely stuff).
Gill
We are all working hard to make sure we have enough stock for Hanwell Carnival on 18th June at Elthorne Park. We will be there from 11am setting up our stall until around 5pm. Come early to make sure you get a bottle of our delicious elderflower cordial (£2.50). Why not stick with the elderflower theme and also buy some lemon and elderflower marmalade? (£3.00) We will also have a selection of other jams/jellies and chutneys to tempt you.
Sergeant Pinder Chana of the Walpole Safer Neighborhood Team and Patrick Chapman, of Walpole Residents’ Association discuss local policing priorities in the wake of concerns about drug-dealing anti-social behaviour in West Ealing
Many people are unsure how our Safer Neighbourhoods Teams (SNTs) fit in with the other police teams – and who to contact for assistance or support.
The SNT are working closely with the Council and local community to tackle problems in Walpole. Ealing Police take drug dealing as a serious issue and we would encourage members of the public who witness any drug related activity to call on 0300 123 1212 and ask to be put through to the SNT – or to call 999 if there is a need for an emergency response. Alternatively if you wish to remain anonymous, call Crime stoppers on 0800 555 111.
Want to get to know your neighbours and your community? West Ealing Neighbours in partnership with West Ealing’s newest gastro pub, The Star and Anchor is holding West Ealing’s first Tweetup on Wednesday, June 29th from 8pm.
It’s a chance to have a drink and a chat with your neighbours in West Ealing, meet some new people, and maybe even make a connection or two! We’re inviting local tweeters, bloggers, foodies, councillors and personalities. There will be locals to talk to about the arts in Ealing, including local film, reading and music. Or, if you’re interested in the bricks and mortar of our community, you can talk to people about local planning issues and regeneration. Maybe there’s a fantastic local restaurant you want to tell everyone about?
So come on down to the Star and Anchor (there will probably be nibbles!)- it would be great to see you there and have a drink with you!
West Ealing Neighbours Tweetup and Meetup
Date: Wednesday, 29 June 2011
Time: From 8pm til late
Where: The Star and Anchor, 94 Uxbridge Road, West Ealing, London, W13 8RA
The pub is situated next to Ealing Job Centre and can be reached by all Uxbridge Road buses (except 607) at the Dane Road stops (83,207,427,E2,E7,E8,E11)
Who’ll be there: Most of the WEN Committee and some other locals with an interest in the community
Vice Chair of West Ealing Neighbours, Eric Leach, looks at the housing situation in Ealing and finds few reasons to be cheerful about the future.
Recent research by the School of Medicine at University College London suggests that apart from smoking, the principal sources of avoidable illness and premature death are overcrowding, homelessness, a poor standard of housing and insecurity in housing. (Hansard HC Deb, 5 May 2011). These findings should leave no-one in any doubt as to the gravity of anyone not having a home.
The numbers of Rough Sleepers in London is on the rise. There were 3,673 in London in 2009/10 – an annual increase of 6%. (Crisis CHAIN database). This is the first uplift in the figures since 2002. Rough Sleepers life expectancy is 42 years. (Crisis).
Historically homes for the poor were described as Council Housing. Prime Minister Thatcher began the phasing out of Council House building in 1979. By also allowing Council House tenants to buy their homes that further depleted the stock of homes for the poor. Successive Governments have continued this policy of not building Council Housing. As of now there are three working definitions of housing stock for households whose needs are not met by the market.
The size of the ‘unhoused’ in England and Ealing can be summed up in a string of facts which include:
There are 1.8 million people on Council Housing Waiting Lists in England. There are 17,000 on Ealing Council’s Housing List (Ealing Council, February 2011). Affordable Housing needs in Ealing are estimated at 3,213 homes (Shelter England). The building of Social Rented homes in Ealing is inadequate – only 126 of them were built last year (Ealing Council Annual Monitoring Report 2010). The cost of renting is 51% higher in London than the rest of the country (GLA report).
Government Proposals and Ramifications
The Government is cutting 65% off the budget for Social Home building. The poor are now to be asked to fund the building of new social housing. Rents on new Social Rented Homes (typically built by Housing Associations and by property developers) are to be increased from 40% of market rates to 80% of market rates. The cash raised from the increased rents is to be used to fund the building of new social housing. This initiative pretty much removes the distinction between Social Rented Housing and Intermediate Affordable Housing. If the former is to be 80% of market rents, and the latter (say) 90% of market rents there’s barely any difference between the two categories. I wonder which category will be ‘disappeared’ by the Government.
Many Housing Associations are wary about being able to achieve this uplift in social rents. They may well conclude that taking on the building of new social rented homes is too much of a financial hill to climb and may concentrate in the future on building homes for sale and/or acting as Registered Social Landlords. Family Mosaic, a well respected large Housing Association, has stated that ‘setting rents of 80% of market rent would increase our clients’ requirements for Housing Benefit by 151%.’ (Hansard HC Deb, 5 May 2011). Housing Benefits reform proposals will cost people living in social housing an additional £728/year. (National Housing Federation).
London Proposals
Social Rented Home building starts in London:
Source: Government’s Homes & Communities Agency
These numbers are pretty scary and seem quite unintelligible.
Ealing Proposals
2011-2026: 14,000 homes to be built of which 50% will be Affordable Housing units (7,000) and of which 60% will be Social Rented (4,200). (Draft LDF Core Strategy, September 2010
Likely outcomes for Ealing
Some people and families in central London boroughs will not be able to afford to live there and will move to cheaper boroughs which will include Ealing. Similarly people in Ealing may also move out to cheaper boroughs to the west, north and south.
Rough sleeping in Ealing is likely to increase.
The number of new social rented homes built over the next few years will be very small:
It’s hard to see how and where the 4,200 new Social Rented Homes or the 7,000 new Affordable Homes will be achieved in Ealing by 2026.
Now is the time to pick them and make them into a fragrant cordial (ah, the aroma of the south-west corner of the Elthorne playing fields! Nothing like it.) West Ealing Abundance people picked themselves to a standstill yesterday – but there’s plenty out there for everyone for another week or so. Go to the West Ealing abundance cordial recipe for what to do with your harvest.
As a consultation on library services in the Borough draws to a close, and the threat of library branch closures looms, James Guest of Ealing Fields Residents Association breaks down the costs of Ealing Libraries, and find that the Council needs to take a closer look at libraries’ considerable overheads if they want to make any cuts.
Key points
Charlie Chaplin? Metropolis? Ivan the Terrible? They’re classic films and deservedly great -best of all you see them locally at Ealing town hall on a Friday night. Put City Lghts in your diary for Friday May 13th, Metropolis for May 20th and Ivan the Terrible for May 27th – 7pm Ealing Town Hall, £7.50. You need to be a member so for membership and information : classiccinemaclub@hotmail.co.uk 020 8579 4925
Diane, Gill and some volunteers from West Ealing Neighbours’ Abundance project plan to pick several hundred elderflower heads on Saturday morning, May 14th – weather permitting at a location in West Ealing. We might do a repeat ‘pick’ on Saturday morning, May 21. We’ve found a location where they’re quite prolific, in the ‘fields’ beyond Elthorne Park, although you’d need wellies to wade through nettles in some places, and a crooked stick to pull down the high branches.
We’ll be following the recipe on the WEN Abundance blog http://westealingabundancew13.wordpress.com/2010/06/11/292/ which we used last year to produce the cordial which went down very well at Hanwell Carnival and will will be selling again at this years Carnival on the 18th June, as well as Pitshanger Party in the Park on the 26th June.
Anyone who is interested in knowing more, or getting involved, please email wenabundance@gmail.com.
Cheers for now – Gill and Diane.