Land Army, Charity Pull & Rosary Crusade: Saturday 8th October 2005 was a day of considerable variety as well as some tricky travelling around London for me, beginning in Whitehall with the women of the Land Army, rushing to Lewisham for a charity event organised by the Mayor and then back to Westminster Cathedral for a religions procession.
Commemoration of the Women’s Land Army – Cenotaph, Whitehall
During the Second World War many women joined the Women’s Land Army. First set up in 1917 during World War One, it was reformed in June 1939 when World War Two seemed inevitable, before the war actually began at the start of September.
During WW2, over 200,000 Land Girls worked in the Women’s Land Army, playing a crucial role in feeding the nation at war – and it continued for some years after the war ended in 1945, finally ending in November 1950.
For many joining up was a healthy alternative to working in munitions or joining the other services, less regimented and offering a wide range of activities. Few had any previous experience in agriculture, but “they ploughed, grew produce, milked cows, caught rats, drove tractors – and much more.”
But the war had ended 50 years earlier and they were now in their 70s and 80s when I met them opposite the memorial to the Women Of The Second World War which had recently been unveiled near the Cenotaph.
Some I talked to had been at the unveiling of that memorial and were extremely scathing about it and had been and were disappointed that the Queen had not spoken at all at the event.
They were a sprightly and feisty group despite their age. A few had come in 1940s dress but most wore some of their uniform often with a number of medals. They marched to the Cenotaph where wreaths were laid and a bugler sounded ‘The Last Post’. After which I rushed away to Charing Cross to catch a train as the event had run late.
Every year like most Mayors the Mayor of Lewisham has a charity appeal and for some years a Charity Vehicle Pull from Downham to Lewisham was organised as a way of raising money for this.
I’d got a later train than I’d hoped, so sat on the train trying to work out where the vehicle pull would be by the time the train arrived in the area. I left the train at Ladywell and rushed from the station to Lewisham High Street and fortunately found my guess had been correct.
“I took a few pictures – there isn’t a huge lot you can do with an event like this – and then got on the top floor of a bus which was travelling along the open lane inside the event, hoping to overtake them. It would have worked, but for an illegally parked vehicle that was blocking the lane.”
Rosary Crusade of Reparation – Westminster Cathedral
At Lewisham Station I’d missed the Victoria train, and had to run under the subway to jump on a Charing Cross service just as the doors were closing, changing at Waterloo East to Southwark Station on the Jubilee line, then at Green Park to the Victoria line to Victoria.
I hurried the short distance from Victoria Station to Westminster Cathedral arriving just at the right time for the start of the Rosary Crusade of Reparation.
The Rosary Cruade had started in Vienna in 1947, with a series of processions with the statue of ‘Our Lady of Fatima’.
The Virgin Mary appeared to Portuguese children at Fatima in 1917 and had asked for prayers and penance to avoid further wars and achieve world peace. This call was renewed in the Rosary Crusade by Father Petrus Pavlicek following a vision during his visit to a Marian shrine in 1946.
The processions became an annual event, held on or around 12th Sept, the Feast of The Name of Mary (which celebrated the defeat of Turkish armies surrounding Vienna in 1683), and soon spread to other countries.
When Russian troops left Austria in 1955, many Austrian catholics ascribed this to their prayers in the rosary crusade.
Goodbye & Good Riddance 2023: Apart from a protest by Just Stop Oil against the way their protests are being policed and non-violent protesters being given lengthy prison sentences because of political pressure by our government which has continued to move away from our ideas of liberal democracy towards a police state, all but one of the other events I photographed were about the continuing genocide of the people of Gaza. More and more civilians – men, women and especially children – were being killed every day, more forced to move out of their homes with nowhere safe to go, and an increasing humanitarian crisis – with many workers for relief agencies also being killed by Israeli forces.
Police Clamp Down on Just Stop Oil. London, 2 Dec 2023. I Just Stop Oil met at New Scotland Yard for a peaceful non-violent march. As it was about to start one of the organisers was arrested and others were warned that if they stepped into the road they would also be arrested. After a short meeting the protesters marched through the crowded pavements of Westminster holding photographs of jailed JSO protesters behind a banner ‘NO PRISON FOR PEACEFUL PROTEST’ to a rally outside the Supreme Court. Some held large photographs of peaceful Just Stop Oil protesters who are in jail, some serving lengthy terms though some juries have refused to convict those standing up for the future of our planet. Peter MarshallPolice Arrest Young Teen at Brixton Gaza Protest. London. 2 Dec 2023. At the end of a Gaza Ceasefire march to a rally in Brixton, a crowd surrounded a police van containing a young teenager arrested for an allegedly anti-Semitic poster, shouting “Let Them Go!” and preventing the van from leaving. Police argued with protesters for around 45 minutes, eventually bringing in almost a hundred officers who pushed the crowd back to the pavement so the van could leave. Peter Marshall
The situation in Brixton was rather confused and I got different stories from different people. The police too were arguing with each other for much of the time before a Senior Commander arrived, stopped another officer who had been trying to calm the situation and brought in reinforcements. There were at least two arrests, one for carrying a placard which I think compared in some way the actions of Israel in Gaza with those of the Nazis and the second for damaging a police vehicle.
Now We Rise Day for Climate Justice. London, UK. 9 Dec 2023. Climate Justice Coalition protest at BP’s London HQ calling for climate justice. The UN COP28 climate summit in the UAE is presided over by an oil CEO and attended by a record number of fossil fuel lobbyists who togther saw we did not get the committment to phase out fossil fuels we need to survive. Our government too is blocking the path to a green transition, backtracking on cutting carbon and granting many new oil and gas licences despite record world temperatures and increasingly dire scientific predictions. Peter MarshallNational March for Palestine – Full Ceasefire Now. London, UK. 9 Dec 2023. Neturei Karta Jews support the march. Hundreds of thousands march in London to call for a full ceasefire in Gaza where Israeli forces have killed over 17,000 people including more than 7,000 children. Bombing has made humanitarian aid and medical treatment impossible and widespread deaths from disease and starvation now seem inevitable. Marchers call for an end to the genocide and a political solution to bring peace and justice to Palestine under international law. Peter MarshallGaza Ceasefire Rally, Elephant, London, 16 Dec 2023. The Gaza Ceasefire Now! rally in Elephant Square was one of many across the country in a day of action for Palestine as rage grows over the increasing death toll, with over 18,600, mainly women and children, now having been killed by Israeli attacks. Hundreds came to a rally to demand a permanent Ceasefire now, and for an end to British complicity in Israeli apartheid before marching to join a vigil by medical staff at St Thomas’s Hospital. Peter MarshallGaza Ceasefire Rally, Whitechapel. London 16 Dec 2023. The Gaza Ceasefire Now! rally at the Tower Hamlets Town Hall was one of many across the country in a day of action for Palestine as rage grows over the increasing death toll, with over 18,600, mainly women and children, having been killed by Israeli attacks. Several hundred came to demand a permanent Ceasefire now, and for an end to British complicity in Israeli apartheid and were supported by many drivers who hooted as they drove past on the busy road. Peter MarshallGaza Ceasefire March, Lewisham. London 16 Dec 2023. The Gaza Ceasefire Now! march in Lewisham was one of many events across the country in a day of action for Palestine as rage grows over the increasing death toll, with over 18,600, mainly women and children, having been killed by Israeli attacks. A large crowd possibly around a thousand met at New Cross to march demanding a permanent ceasefire now, and for an end to British complicity in Israeli apartheid. Peter MarshallVigil for the children of Palestine, Ilford. London 16 Dec 2023. A vigil for the children of Palestine in Valentines Park was one of many events across the country in a day of action for Palestine as rage grows over the increasing death toll. Adults and children spoke, some reading poems and we heard about the lives of a few of the many murdered children. The protest condemned the genocide in Gaza, calling for a permanent ceasefire now, and for an end to British complicity in Israeli apartheid. Peter Marshall
It was almost the end of the year. Christmas too was overshadowed by the news of new killings and increasing suffering in Gaza. Christmas festivities were cancelled in Bethlehem, and the Nativity scene at the The Evangelical Lutheran Church there showed the newborn Jesus wrapped in a kaffiyeh an a heap of rubble to show solidarity with the people of Gaza.
Like many others I greeted the passing of 2023 at the end of New Year’s Eve with thanks that 2023 was over and the hope that 2024 would see a better year for us all. But perhaps that hope was realistically only a glimmer.
Goodbye & Good Riddance 2023: My work in November was largely on protests over the continued genocide in Gaza where Israeli attacks were killing thousands of civilians including large numbers of children as they attempted to exterminate Hamas.
The killing continues and currently in January 2024 Wikipedia states “Over 22,000 Palestinians have been killed, a majority of them civilians, and thousands more are considered missing under the rubble of destroyed buildings.” Nearly all of Gaza’s 2.3 million population have been displaced and there is a severe humanitarian crisis with a shortage of food, medicines and safe water, with most of Gaza’s hospitals no longer able to operate. It now seems certain that many Gazans will die from famine and disease. The Israeli attack has quite unequivocally become a deliberate genocide.
Protests around the world have called for a ceasefire, and this is supported by the majority of countries in the world at the UN, but the killing continues with support for the Israeli offensive from the USA and UK and a few other countries.
While both Israel and the Palestinian resistance have committed war crimes, Israel is doing so on a huge industrial scale. Refugee camps and Hospitals have been deliberately targeted and many hospital staff are among the thousands of Palestinians detained in Israel. More journalists have already been killed in Gaza than the total number killed in six years of the Second World War and Israel has prevented the world’s press from reporting from Gaza and the parts of Israel which came under attack by Hamas and the other Palestinian groups.
Lewisham March – National Day of Action For Palestine, London. 4 Nov 23. Several thousands march from a rally at Lewisham Council Offices in Catford to a rally in the centre of Lewisham in one of many local protests around the UK in solidarity with Palestine calling for an immediate ceasefire and against the government support for Israel’s assault on Gaza. Later many went on to the central rally for a Gaza ceasefire in Trafalgar Square. Peter MarshallHuge Trafalgar Square Rally for Gaza Ceasefire. London, 4 Nov 23. Many thousands packed Trafalgar Square and the surrounding streets for the largest rally there in living memory in solidarity with Palestine and against our government’s disgraceful support for Israel’s assault. The rally came after local protests around London and across the country observing a silence for those in Palestine and Israel already killed and calling for an immediate ceasefire with negations to free the hostages and towards a peace settlement in the area. Peter MarshallArmistice Day March Calls for Ceasefire In Palestine. London. 11 Nov 2023. Hundreds of thousands march peacefully from Hyde Park to the US Embassy at Nine Elms on Armistice Day calling for an immediate ceasefire in the Middle East, where thousands of innocent civilians including many children have died both in the Hamas-led attack on Israel and in hugely punitive air attacks which have devastated large areas of Gaza. Peter MarshallCeasefire Now in Gaza March Against Starmer. Camden, London. 18 Nov 23. Around two thousand fill the pavements at Chalk Farm station and march in solidarity to Camden Town and on to a rally outside the office of MPs Keir Starmer and Tulip Siddiq. Marchers expressed shock at killings of innocent civilians including children, doctors and patients, called for an immediate ceasefire in Gaza and were angry that Starmer had whipped Labour into voting against this. Peter MarshallPeople vs Oil PROTEST March, Just Stop Oil. London. 18 Nov 23. An officer puts handcuffs on one of a group who held up traffic to allow the march to pass safely. A crowd of supporters of Just Stop Oil of all ages marched from beside the London Eye through Southwark in protest against the failures of the government who are imprisoning peaceful protesters, licensing 100 new oil projects and ripping up any prospect of reaching net zero and endangering the future of human life on our planet. Peter MarshallGaza Ceasefire Now March in Lewisham. London. 18 Nov 23. Several thousands march from Lewisham Islamic Centre to a rally outside Glass Mills Leisure Centre in one of many local protests around the UK in solidarity with Palestine calling for an immediate ceasefire and condemning MPs including local MP Vicky Foxcroft who voted this week against a ceasefire. There was angry disbelief when police arrested a young woman for a placard she was carrying. Peter MarshallMake Amazon Pay Black Friday Protest. London. 24 Nov 2023. A protest at Amazon’s HQ in London joined groups across the world in the Make Amazon Pay coalition striking, protesting, picketing, boycotting, and fighting for the rights of Amazon workers around the world against abuse and exploitation. Amazon dodge taxes, deny union recognition, refuses to pay fair wages and fails to ensure safe working conditions and their activities are wrecking the climate, threatening the future of human life on earth. Peter MarshallCeasefire for Gaza Now – National Protest. London. 25 Nov 2023. Two police officers walk in the protest. Hundreds of thousands marched again through London to call for ceasefire in the war on Gaza where millions of civilians still face attacks by Israeli forces. The current pause and hostage exchanges are welcome but do little to address the urgent humanitarian crisis and the killing is set to resume. The marchers call for a permanent ceasefire and for a political solution to bring peace and justice to Palestine under international law. Peter MarshallHizb ut-Tahrir Britain Call for Muslim Armies. London, 25 Nov 2023. A large crowd of followers of Hizb ut-Tahrir Britain, men and women in separate groups, listened to speakers in front of the Egyptian Embassy calling for Muslims to rescue of Palestine from 75 years of occupation, brutal oppression, sieges, kidnapping and murder. They call on Muslims in armies in the region to join together to restore a just caliphate where people from all faiths can live together across the Middle East. Peter Marshall
It was getting dark as I took pictures of the Egyptian Embassy and I was tired and feeling chilled by the speeches. I think I first photographed Hizb ut-Tahrir Britain around 20 years ago and have never felt welcome as I took pictures. But I also remember that I didn’t take them seriously when years ago they talked about ‘Muslim Armies’ – and then we saw the rise of ISIS and I realised how wrong I had been.
The final part of my looking back on 2023 will be online tomorrow.
Lewisham, Secular Europe & Malta Day – Saturday 14th September 2013 was a very mixed day for me, beginning with a victory celebration by hospital campaigners in Lewisham, then moving to Westminster for a protest celebrating secularism in Whitehall before finally photographing a highly religious Malta Day celebration at Westminster Cathedral.
Lewisham Hospital Victory Parade
Lewisham Hospital is a highly successful and well run hospital serving a large area of South London, and when the government planned to close large areas of its services there was a huge public outcry, with large marches to keep it open, as closure would have severely damaged the health service in the area.
The planned closure was not in response to any failure by Lewisham; it’s sole purpose was to allow the NHS to continue to make massive PFI repayments due from the building of other London hospitals through contracts that were badly negotiated when interest rates were high and have already delivered huge profits to the lenders.
As well as a hugely successful public campaign, both Lewisham Council and the Save Lewisham Hospital campaign went separately to the High Court for Judicial Review of the decision by Health Secretary Jeremy Hunt, and both were successful.
The immediate response of the Health Secretary was to announce he would appeal the two decisions, and the campaign had launched a petition calling on him to accept the defeat gracefully and not waste any further time or taxpayers money over the appeal. Given the clear judgement of the court any appeal seemed unlikely to succeed.
The government also intend to change the law to make it much more difficult for people to contest their decisions in the courts after being defeated on this and other cases where they have failed to give proper consideration to policies. But having a government which seems to think ‘sod the law, we’re going to do as we like‘ doesn’t seem at all healthy for democracy.
The Victory Parade was rather smaller than the earlier protests which had brought thousands out onto the streets of Lewisham, with perhaps a little fewer than five hundred people, though more turned up to take part in the celebration event at the end of the parade in Ladywell Fields. But perhaps marching now seemed less important, and the poor weather will have put some off.
At the front of the parade was a Lewisham Council dustcart with large posters on it and following it were marchers with a small street band. Among those marching were two nurses wearing their uniforms from the Olympic opening ceremony, some ‘Olympic’ drummers and others in medical uniforms.
Around a hundred people had marched from Temple to a rally opposite Downing Street for the 6th annual Secular Europe Campaign protest celebrating secularism and demanding an end to religious discrimination and indoctrination.
As well as the protest in London there was also a similar protest taking place in Krakow, Poland, a country where politics are still very much dominated by the Catholic Church.
Things are rather different in the UK, but we still have the anomaly of 26 Church of England bishops sitting in the House of Lords, reflected in some of the campaigners wearing paper versions of a Bishop’s mitre with the number 26 on the front.
We obviously need reform of the House of Lords, but the bishops seem to me a minor issue and are among the more sensible and progressive members of the house. There are still 92 hereditary peers, as well as many more wholly undeserved political appointees, particularly those given a seat as thanks for their political and other services to retiring Prime Ministers. The recent list by Boris Johnson included some that clearly bring our politics into disrepute, and if the list by Liz Truss is approved following her disastrous fifty days in office, our politics will clearly have become a farce.
The campaigners also called for an end to religious indoctrination in schools, though I was pleased to hear one speaker make clear that not all church or religious schools were guilty of this, with many providing a good education that encouraged their pupils to think for themselves.
Others complained about the lack of secular speakers on Radio 4’s ‘Thought for the Day’, and though I think the selection has widened a little in recent years there is certainly still room for a wider choice of viewpoints. And they still have some who make me cringe every time they appear.
Some of the other things that concern the secular movement are religious discrimination against women and gays, abuse of children by the clergy, the teaching of creationism in schools, the anti-abortion lobby and misinformation about contraception and AIDs, religious male circumcision and female genital mutilation, false accusations about witchcraft, Sharia law, forced marriages and the right to die with dignity. And of course many of these concerns are shared with many religious people.
Finally I walked to Westminster Cathedral where a Mass was taking place for Malta Day, attended by the Lord Mayor of Westminster, Councillor Sarah Richardson, taking pictures as people came out from the church for the procession which was to follow.
Malta Day, actually 8th September, is a public holiday in Malta, the Feast of Our Lady Of Victories or Victory Day. Celebrations in villages there mark the Nativity of the Blessed Virgin Mary, commemorated in statues of ‘il-Bambina’, one of which was carried in the procession.
The day also celebrates the Victory of the Knights of St John of Malta against the Turks in 1565, a victory over the French in 1800 and the surrender of Italy, then occupying Malta, in 1943.
Fire-crackers were set off in the plaza and a band played before the procession finally set off down Victoria Street.
As well as the statue of ‘il-Bambina’, there were also seeral large and colourful banners, men in the robes of the Knights of Malta, and girls in huge black hooded cloaks (Faldetta or Ghonella), which seemed a little sinister to me. For various personal reasons although I’ve never been there I’ve long regarded Malta as an epitome of religious intolerance.
NHS Birthday Celebrations: Today the National Health Service marks its 75th Anniversary, founded thanks to the efforts of the Labour Party and in particular Aneurin Bevan, following on from the 1942 report by Liberal economist William Beveridge which had proposed wide-reaching social reforms to tackle the “five giants” of “Want… Disease, Ignorance, Squalor and Idleness” (Idleness meaning of course unemployment.) The pictures in this post come from the 65th anniversary ten years ago today, Friday 5th July 2013.
Beveridge was opposed to means-tested benefits which he stated were unfair on the poor, and although the wartime coalition government set up committees to look at how his reforms could be put into practice they were from the onset opposed by many Conservatives and some on the Labour right.
But Labour stood in the 1945 elections promising to put the proposals into effect, and after their victory passed the National Insurance Act 1946, the National Assistance Act 1948, and the National Health Service Act 1946 and other Acts to do so, founding the UK’s modern welfare state.
Bevan was the wizard who integrated the multifarious per-existing medical services into the single functioning state body of the National Health Service, though he had to make many compromises to do so, working against considerable opposition both political from the Tories and from the medical bodies which were dominated by old men, many with fixed ideas.
The 75 years since then have seen many changes in the NHS, not all for the good, with both Conservative and Labour governments determined both to penny-pinch and bring in private enterprise to profit in various ways from our health service. The last 13 years have been particularly tough for the NHS, with disastrous reforms brought in and cuts which have made it impossible for NHS workers to provide the services and care they desperately want to do.
Covid of course didn’t help – and the failure to provide proper protective equipment, with too many contracts going to cronies who didn’t deliver – and fraudsters – was a real disaster, killing far too many health and other key workers. Despite a magnificent effort by health workers too many died, and the only reward for the huge efforts made by the NHS was claps.
Currently we have a government which refuses to talk sensibly with workers across the health centre, instead simply saying that the below inflation rises it is offering – essentially wage cuts – are fair. It obviously hopes that by provoking strikes and getting its friends in our billionaire owned right-wing press to condemn the strikers for the cancellations, increase in waiting lists and possible deaths it will get the public on its side against the NHS.
Instead we need policies which will engage with the problems the NHS faces after years of underfunding, overwork and shortages. The recently announced workforce plan at least is a plan to do something, though it seems unlikely to prove workable. The shortage of doctors, nurses and other medical staff has been clear almost since the start of the NHS, and certainly critical for many years.
We need to both increase the number of training places and tackle some of the other causes. Private hospitals rely on publicly funded doctors and nurses – and should at least have to pay the training costs for those they employ – although personally I’d prefer to see them being brought into public ownership. As well as poaching staff they also cherry-pick offering care for simpler cases but largely passing back more critical care to the NHS.
There needs to be an end to the expensive and somewhat unreliable use of agency staff, at least by the NHS setting up its own temporary staffing organisation and also by ending payments for work at above normal rates. The NHS also needs to become a much friendlier employer in terms of flexibility of shifts etc.
And of course we need to remove the caps on training for doctors, nurses and other staff, and to provide proper bursaries to cover both fees and maintenance for these vital workers. The proposed ‘apprenticeship’ scheme for doctors seems unworkable as such, but all medical course are already in some part apprenticeships, including some on the job training. Finding the additional mentors needed for more work-based schemes seems an example of cloud-cuckoo land thinking, and the setting up of a two-class system of doctors seems highly undesirable.
Importantly too we need to drastically reduce the bureaucratic workload of all doctors and health staff at all levels. Theoretically the increased use of IT could play a role in this – although the NHS has been disastrously shafted by its IT providers in the past, promising much but delivering mainly greater complexity. So far bringing in IT has increased the amount and time spent in form-filling at the expense of treating patients, partly because the various levels of administration up to the government has seized the opportunity for the greater demands it makes possible.
I was born before the NHS and looking at it in recent years I’ve sometimes wondered if my own death will be due to its stuttering demise. I hope not. But the NHS is certainly not safe in the hands of the Tories, and little that we have so far seen about Labour’s plans give me confidence it will be safe in theirs.
The two events I photographed on the NHS’s 65th Birthday were all concerned with its problems and doubts about its future, The GMB trade union came to Parliament with 3 vintage ambulances saying the NHS Is At Risk, campaigners at Lewisham Hospital celebrated hoping and fighting to keep their busy, successful and much needed hospital open and stop it being sacrificed to meet the disastrous PFI debts of a neighbouring hospital. I’d taken my bike to ride to Lewisham, and made a leisurely ride through Deptford on my way back to Westminster.
At the Ministry of Health, then still on Whitehall, Dr Clive Peedell was about to begin his 65 mile ultra-marathon run to David Cameron’s Witney constituency where he was to ceremonially bury the NHS coffin and launch the National Health Action Party plan by doctors and health professionals to revive the NHS. Their 10-point plan included “policies to restore the duty of the Secretary of State to provide comprehensive NHS care, and return the NHS as the preferred provider of services.”
More about the events on the 65th Birthday of the NHS – from which all the pictures in the post come – are on My London Diary.
Lung Theatre ‘E15’ Battersea March: Thursday 16th March 2017 was a rather unusual day for me in that rather than photographing a protest I was being part of a theatrical performance, though not in a theatre but on the busy evening rush hour streets of Battersea.
But like many of the others there, I was playing myself as a photographer of protests, and taking pictures as I would if this had been a real protest.
This performance was to announce that Lung Theatre, a small theatrical group, were bringing their Edinburgh festival award-winning performance ‘E15’ to Battersea Arts Centre, and they were doing so with the help of many of the housing protesters, particularly from the Stratford-based Focus E15 campaign, on which their ‘verbatim theatre’ performance was based.
An interesting article, Documentary & Verbatim Theatre by Tom Cantrell of the University of York gives a clear definition, “Verbatim theatre is a form of documentary theatre which is based on the spoken words of real people. Strictly, verbatim theatre-makers use real people’s words exclusively, and take this testimony from recorded interviews.”
The “protest” began in the rather dim light of the street outside Clapham Junction’s busiest entrance, and it was hard for me to distinguish the actors from the housing protesters by their speech and actions, though rather easier in that they were the only faces I didn’t recognise, having met and photographed the activists so often at previous events. But the group certainly put on a convincing performance as they handed out leaflets and fliers, both about the Focus E15 campaign and their forthcoming performances at the Battersea Arts Centre.
Focus E15 began when a group of young mothers housed in the Focus E15 hostel in Stratford were told that Newham council were going to evict them and they would be dispersed not just in the borough but to rented accommodation across the country in far away places where they had no friends, no family and away from any jobs, schools, familiar services and support.
Newham had adopted a policy which amounted to social cleansing, removing people from its area who, as the then Mayor put it, could not afford to live there. Rather than accept this they came together to fight the council, and inspired others across the country to fight for ‘Social Housing NOT Social Cleansing’.
And Focus E15 won their fight but didn’t stop there, continuing the fight for others in the area faced with homelessness and eviction, demanding the council bring empty council housing back into use in a campaign for ‘Housing For All’. They are still out on Stratford Broadway with a street stall every Saturday, still forcing the council to face up to its responsibilities despite considerable harassment (and more recently a change of Mayor.)
As well as some of the leading activists from Focus E15 at the eevent were also other campaigners including some from Sweets Way in north London and Lewisham People Before Profit and others fighting the demolition of council housing by London’s mainly Labour controlled councils, increasingly in league with estate agents and property developers scrambling for excessive profits from sky-high London market prices. And they had brought some of their banners with them for the event.
From Clapham Junction the “protesters” marched up Lavender Hill to the Battersea Arts Centre, where they occupied the foyer for a few final minutes of protest in what had been a pretty convincing event. And while actors had to go on stage and give their performance, the activists could sit down in the theatre and watch.
I didn’t join them, as I knew I had to come back to view it a week later and then be a part of a panel discussion Art & Accidental Activism, a week later. It was an impressive performance and gave a real impression of some of the more dramatic aspects of the real protests I had covered and made clear the political aspects of the housing crisis and why activism was necessary. But sometimes it did seem strange to hear words I remembered well coming out of a different person.
I couldn’t really enjoy it as much as I would have liked as I was very nervous, considerably daunted at having to appear afterwards ‘on stage’ to answer questions with fellow panelists Jeremy Hardy, journalist Dawn Foster and theatre legend Max Stafford Clark. But in the event it went well (my sternest critic says) and I rather enjoyed it and the session in the bar that followed.
Bird in Bush Road, Peckham, Southwark, 1989 89-3c-21
I spent some time exploring the area around Malt Street and Ossory Road, now on the other side of Asda, where some demolition was taking place but took few photographs, none on-line, and then walked back along along the Old Kent Road to Peckham Park Road, going down this to Green Hundred Road. I found myself in a large area of council housing, much of which was fairly standard LCC five storey blocks dating from the late 1930s, solidly built, their height limited back then by the lack of lifts.
The foreground flats in this picture are from the late 60s and are on Bird in Bush Road, part of the GLC designed Ledbury Estate, and as well as these 4-storey maisonette blocks there were also four identical 14 floor H shape tower blocks, including this one, Bromyard House, which has its entrance on Commercial Way.
Bird in Bush Road, Peckham, Southwark, 1989 89-3c-22
This picture was taken from close to the east end of Bird in Bush Road, and the building cut off at extreme left of the image is the former Arthur Street Board School (now Camelot Primary School.)
The design dates of these flats, also on the Ledbury estate, is from the early 1960s and was replicated across London by the GLC, using the prefabricated Danish Larsen-Nielsen system. After one at Ronan Point suffered a disastrous collapse following a gas explosion flats built using this system should have been strengthened, but somehow Southwark Council failed to do so on this estate. I’m not sure whether this had now been put right. but none have yet collapsed.
This semi-detached residence dating from 1836 which was Grade II listed together with the neighbouring Doddington Place around nine years after I took this picture.
The name possibly comes from Doddington Hall in Cheshire, built by Samuel Wyatt for Sir Thomas Broughton in 1777-90 and its parkland landscaped by Capability Brown. There is also Doddington Place at Doddington near Sittingbourne in Kent, but this was only built around 1870.
Tustin Estate, Old Kent Rd, Peckham, Southwark, 1989 89-3c-11
The Tustin Estate is on the north side the Old Kent Road immediately west of Ilderton Road. It has three 20 storey towers, Windermere Point, Grasmere Point (in the centre here) and Ambleside Point, each with over 70 flats which were approved by the GLC in 1964. There are also six low-rise blocks on the estate.
According to Southwark Council, “In March 2021, residents voted in favour of demolishing and rebuilding the low-rise buildings in a residents’ ballot. This will include replacement council homes, additional council homes and key worker housing, shared equity homes and homes for private sale. There will also be a replacement school building, new commercial spaces and a new park. All existing residents will be able to move to a new council home in the first phase of the scheme.” I’m unsure how far this scheme has so far progressed and it remains to be seen whether the council will keep its promises, which it almost completely failed to do on some earlier schemes.
I returned to Clifton Crescent which I had photographed earlier and too a rather better and closer picture of this magnificent curved terrace. As I explained earlier, it was Southwark Council’s decision in 1972 to demolish this crescent that led to a local action group which became the Peckham Society in 1975. Fortunately they managed to stop the demolition when only No 1 had been lost. They convinced the council that retaining and restoring the properties was a cheaper option, and the lost house was rebuilt and the entire crescent, Grade II listed thanks to their efforts in 1974, was restored by 1977. The Crescent was built in 1847-51 and represents an interesting transition between earlier Regency styles and the simpler Victorian terraces.
Car spares, Loder St, Peckham, Southwark, 1989 89-3c-15
From there I made my way east, going under the railway on Culmore Road or Clifton Way and then south to Loder St. This whole area has been redeveloped since I made these pictures in 1989 and is now covered with low-rise housing. I made two pictures of this car breaker’s yard (you can see the other on Flickr).The tower blocks are those of the Tustin Estate.
Hatcham Liberal Club, Queen’s Rd, New Cross, Lewisham, 1989 89-3d-61
I walked down to Queen’s Road, I think along York Grove, stopping briefly to photograph a street corner. On Queen’s Road before catching a bus I photographed the Hatcham Liberal Club, built in 1880 in Queen Anne Dutch style and Grade II listed ten years after I took this picture. It was one of the largest of a number of late Victorian working men’s clubs and became a popular venue with a large hall at the back available for hire for parties and gigs and also for until it closed in 2006. In 2009 most of the interior was converted into flats.
Shops, John Ruskin St, Camberwell, Southwark, 1989 89-3d-62
I changed buses in Camberwell, where I made a slight detour to make another visit to photograph the row of shops on John Ruskin Street as the final picture of the day and this walk.
Save Lewisham Hospital March & Rally – Saturday 26 January 2013
On Saturday 26th January 2013 an estimated 25,000 people marched through Lewisham to save their hospital from closure and to protect the NHS, showing south London united against the closure on pure financial grounds of its highly successful and much needed A&E and maternity departments.
Now the whole NHS is facing a crisis, and a similar united response across the country is needed to save it. It becomes clearer and clearer that this crisis has been deliberately engineered in order to destroy our health service and hand it over to private providers, particularly the US health giants.
Two years ago, US health insurance giant Centene Corporation took over 49 NHS GP surgeries and practices. Now as Jeremy Corbyn posted a couple of days ago on Facebook, “US health insurance giant, Centene, is the single largest provider of NHS primary care in England. Privatisation is the cause of — not the solution to — the NHS crisis. Stop wasting money on private contracts and start investing in a fully-public NHS instead.“
Unfortunately both Tory and Labour parties have taken part in the move towards privatisation of the NHS, though Tories have been more open in their support of such changes as suggesting the introduction of charges to see a doctor. But both parties have introduced changes which have brought private companies into providing NHS services, have taken large donations from private health companies, and have leading members who profit from them.
It was under Labour that the NHS took on poorly thought out Private Finance Initiative contracts that have landed many local health trusts with huge debt repayments, many of which extend to the middle of the century, and it was these which led to the crisis in Lewisham.
The PFI contracts were negotiated by civil servants and were and are a bonanza for private companies. Under them we pay totally ridiculous charges for simple jobs – such as Hull and East Yorkshire Hospitals Trust paying £8,450 to install a dishwasher because they are locked into maintenance contracts. Changing a light bulb can cost a couple of hundred pounds.
Lewisham Hospital wasn’t directly affected by PFI, but it was in 2009 put into the South London Hospitals Trust, which had two hospitals at Orpington and Woolwich whose PFI contracts saddled the trust with debts of over £60 million a year until 2032.
Lewisham Hospital was successful both medically and financially, but Health Secretary Andrew Lansley appointed a special administrator to the trust with a remit to drastically cut the trusts costs. And Matthew Kershaw decided to do so by closing the highly successful and much needed A&E and maternity departments at Lewisham.
It was a decision that made no sense. There wasn’t the spare capacity at other hospitals to cope with those no longer able to get treatment at Lewisham – the system was actually working in the other direction, with these other hospitals having to send patients to Lewisham.
Financially it made no sense – the patients would still require treatment and this would cost more elsewhere. The small annual savings the closure would give would be more than offset by increases in costs elsewhere – though some of these might be in other trusts.
The proposal generated an incredible amount of local opposition, with the campaign to save the hospital supported by all local MPs and policitician both in the area and across south London. Community groups and organisations all came together to save the hospital – Millwall football club even changed their weekend fixture to Friday night so the team and supporters could join the march.
As I wrote back in 2013, “The fight to save Lewisham Hospital isn’t just a local issue, but very much a national one, with the provision of medical services that form the bedrock of the NHS under attack. If the government can close down services at Lewisham, no other successful hospital in the UK is safe in their hands.”
Nurses and ambulance workers are now striking not just for a better deal for themselves, but for the future of the NHS, which the Tories have deliberately run down with drastic underfunding and a deliberate failure to train and recruit staff. Perhaps their most obvious action was the removal of the bursary for nurse training, but as well there has been the continuing decrease in real salaries with below inflation wage rises over the years. Together with the failure to keep European staff in this country after Brexit and the impact of Covid the results have been disastrous – except for those private companies providing agency nurses and doctors, often at horrific cost to the NHS.
If the NHS is to be saved it will need the kind of public mobilisation that saved Lewisham Hospital, with the people as a whole getting behind the nurses and doctors and others who are fighting to save it. We need to fight the policies and greed of the Tories and of Labour and of the billionaire press to preserve the NHS as a national service free at the point of use and organised for the national good rather than for profit.
Saturday 21st September 2019 was an even more varied day than usual for me in London. I began by travelling to Bow Creek for a duck race, moved to Trafalgar Square for a climate protest, then visted the weekly Zimbabwe vigil before going to Catford for a march against air pollution.
Bromley-by-Bow to Star Lane & Cody Dock Duck Race
It was a fine day and still warm for the time of year as I walked from Bromley-by-Bow District Line the short distance to Tweletrees Crescent and Bow Creek.
I’d decided to come to see the Duck Race along Bow Creek being organised by the people at Cody Dock, but had arrived early to give myself time to revisit the gas works memorial site nearby.
Bow Creek is the tidal section of London’s second river, the River Lea, and the duck race was a part of the ‘Lighting Up the Lea’ festival for ‘Totally Thames 2019’. It was meant to start at 11.00 but this was delayed as the people in canoes who were to shepherd the ducks were a few minutes late in arriving.
It was close to low tide, and there was little water in the creek when the ducks were dropped from the bridge, and a westerly breeze soon blew the ducks onto the mud on the east side of the creek.
Cody Dock’s Simon Myers had beached his kayak on the gravel bank a hundred yards or so downstream and strode through the shallow stream and mud to rescue the ducks and through them back into the middle of the stream. But the breeze soon returned them to the mud and he had to get them again.
I decided I had to move on to complete my walk and get back to central London for my next event and walked on towards Cody Dock, past several small groups of people waiting to see their ducks. At Cody Dock there were a small line of catchers waiting hopefully in the stream, but they were in for a rather long wait.
I’d hoped to be able to continue my walk by the riverside to Canning Town, but this further section of the Bow Creek path has yet to be opened, and after taking a few pictures at Cody Dock I made my way to Star Lane DLR station.
Members of Extinction Rebellion Youth International came to Trafalgar Square and held a brief protest for the UN Climate conference.
This was a rather more low-key event than I had expected and the group was ignored by heritage wardens as they sat in a circle in the centre of the square with posters while one member at the centre read the letter they are sending to the UN calling for real urgent action to avert the impending climate catastrophe.
The weekly Zimbabwe Vigil every Saturday at the side of the embassy at 429 Strand began on 12th October 2002. I’ve joined it and photographed occasionally over the years, but mainly for special occasions. It’s hard to say something new about an event which happens every week.
Mugabe had been forced to resign in 2017 died earlier in the month and had died two weeks before my visit, but the vigils continue and little has changed in Zimbabwe. His successor Emmerson Mnangagwa was Mugabe’s right-hand man for 40 years, and is accused of the genocide of over 20,000 Ndebeles in the 1980s. Although he promised reform he has delivered state terrorism and protesters have been killed, beaten, tortured and raped by the security forces.
The South Circular Road brings large volumes of traffic through Catford, often pumping out fumes at standstill during peak hours. Particles from brakes, tyres and the road add significantly to the pollution – and won’t be reduced as we switch towards electric cars.
Although a major traffic route, the South Circular has always been more an idea than a planned route, going along many fairly narrow roads lined with houses which were never designed for the traffic. Fortunately major schemes which would have laid waste large areas of highly populated parts of South London have never come to fruition – the obvious environmental devastation of roads like the Westway having put paid to urban motorway schemes.
The answer has to be policies at both national and local level which reduce vehicle use and promote greener alternative transport including walking and cycling as well as public transport use. But although Lewisham Council are not responsible for the South Circular Road, remedial actions such as planting screens of trees and hedges can reduce local pollution levels, particularly the levels of harmful particulates.
I met local residents at the Corbett Library on Torridon Road in Catford, built with funding from Andrew Carnegie in 1907. It is now a Community Library run by volunteers and is on the Corbett Estate, 3,000 houses around Hither Green developed by Glasgow-born Archibald Corbett from 1896 to 1911.
They were busy finishing placards and posters for the march, which soon set off, marching up on the pavement to the South Circular at Brownhill Road, on their way to a rally at the council offices in Lewisham. Traffic on the South Circular made it a little difficult for me to take photographs as it was seldom possible to stand on the road. I left them before the rally to travel home.
Ella Adoo-Kissi-Debrah, a nine-year-old girl who lived near the South Circular Road in Lewisham died from asthma in 2013. Following a 2020 inquest ruling she was the first first person in the UK to have air pollution listed as the cause of her death on her death certificate.
The previous post on this walk is Evelina, Sassoon, Queens Road, Montpelier and Mazawattee. The pictures here come from the final film on my walk on 18th December 1988. I only finished the film and developed in it January 1989 so they appear in my Flickr album for 1989.
Mural, Sanford Walk, New Cross, Lewisham, 1988 89-1a-61
‘Riders of the Apocalypse’ was painted by Brian Barnes on the end property of Sanford Housing Co-operative in 1983. Student Co-operative Dwellings (SCD) was founded in 1968 by John Hands and colleagues and campaigned for five years lobbying parliament and looking for land until the government and Lewisham Council agreed to allow them the build Sanford Co-operative Dwellings. This was the first purpose-designed co-op scheme for the young and mobile, and was completed in October 1974.
Cold Blow Lane, New Cross, Lewisham, 1988 89-1a-63
Cold Blow Lane in the 19th century led to Cold Blow Farm, now long gone. In the 1850s the Croydon Railway built several tracks over it, and one of these went on the bridge whose two piers can be seen in this picture though the bridge has gone. Railway tracks still go over the lane, and I took this picture close to the exit of the long tunnel that goes under them. At the end of the lane is Mercury Way, and Cold Blow Lane turns at 90 degrees to go south.
Straight ahead, under another railway line, was ‘The Den’, then the home of Millwall Football Club, and I think the top of a stand is just visible in the picture. On the wall at left, among other graffiti is the message ‘Home of the Lions’
Surrey Canal Road, New Cross, South Bermondsey, Lewisham, 1988 89-1a-51
I think I made this and the next picture from a footpath just to the north of the Surrey Canal Road. The contact sheet gives a grid reference 356781 and this may show part of the area which is now Millwall’s ground in Senegal Fields.
Surrey Canal Road, New Cross, South Bermondsey, Lewisham, 1988 89-1a-52
You can still see this long range of buildings on Stockholm Road, just south of The Den. and parallel with Surrey Canal Road, occupied by a range of commercial companies. I imagine they date from when the Surrey Canal bed was filled in and the road bulit by Lewisham Council in the early 1980s.
Footpath, Senegal Rd, New Cross, South Bermondsey, Lewisham, 1988 89-1a-54
Since 1993, the Millwall football ground has been on Senegal Fields. The footpath now runs next to the new Millwall Stadium and then under the railway lines which have some very impressive Victorian brickwork.
These are most of the lines out of London Bridge Station which begin to diverge in this area. You can see all three bridges in this picture. This was a very run-down area and the abandoned parts of a moped at right seemed an appropriate way to express this.
Hill, Bridgehouse Meadows, New Cross, Lewisham, 1988 89-1a-56-Edit
I turned around here and walked back south across the Surrey Canal Road and to Bridgehouse Meadows.
This was the site of the former New Cross Stadium opened as an athletics stadium in the early 1900s but from the 1930s used for greyhound racing and speedway before its closure in 1969. For some years Millwall FC whose old ground was next to it used it for training. The stadium was demolished in 1975 and there were ambitious plans for it be part of the site of a new ground for the club – but these fell through and the new stadium was eventually built further north.
Factory, from Bridgehouse Meadows, New Cross, Lewisham, 1988 89-1a-42
This factory has been demolished and new housing built in its place. I think this site was also part of the over-ambitious plans for expansion by Millwall who wanted to take over a huge area.
Path, Bridgehouse Meadows, New Cross, Lewisham, 1988 89-1a-43
The path through the meadows crosses the Surrey Canal Road on a bridge you can see in the distance, no longer present. Both sides of the park area now have new housing.
Ilderton Rd, South Bermondsey, Southwark, 1989 89-1a-44
This is part of a site for travellers on Ilderton Rd and this house is still there, though there were no Christmas window decorations when I last walked past – but that was on a housing protest march in March 2017, where we stopped briefly at the Bermondsey Travellers Site. Behind is the railway line from South Bermondsey Station next door to the site where my walk ended.
This was the last picture from my walk on December 18th and completed a series of walks around this part of South-East London. My walks in 1989 began around the Elephant.
