We would like to keep this page as up-to-date and comprehensive as possible. Please email us with details of forthcoming events, meetings and news generally in the Stoke Newington area.

We have just received the following press release from Hackney Council. Farewell, then, Leisure Connection. For a little poem on this subject, check out the ‘NOT THE clissold leisure centre' website on www.clissoldleisure.com.

The London Borough of Hackney and Leisure Connection Ltd have today announced their mutual agreement to end their contract for Leisure Connection to manage four facilities in Hackney.

The Council and Leisure Connection will be writing to all existing members of the leisure centres and leisure cardholders to inform them of the changes, as well as holding briefing meetings to explain the handover to leisure centre staff.

The Council is committed to ensuring that this mutual decision does not interrupt services and that there is a smooth handover to the Council to continue local services.

Hackney Council is currently exploring options for the future management of its leisure portfolio and is committed to having robust management arrangements in place by the agreed date of handover from Leisure Connection, which is 15th September 2005.

The Council is committed to involving residents and service users in the process of deciding the long term future of Hackney's leisure management.

For further information contact Polly Rance on 02083563323 Polly.Rance@hackney.gov.uk

In Issue 25, we printed an article headlined 'Taking Licence' which explained the forthcoming changes in the licensing laws. Hackney Council has sent us a press release - under the heading 'no sherry for santa?' - in which they explain current developments.

Hackney Council has now granted its first Personal Licenses under the Licensing Act 2003. Under the Act, anyone selling alcohol is required to have a personal license, which will last for a period of 10 years.

The Council is also expecting to receive 850 premises applications during the six month period which began on 7 February and ends on 6 August 2005.

Across the country the response to the change in law has been slow. This could mean a large number or premises being unable to open by the end of the year. (note, this would also effect cinemas, restaurants, take aways open beyond 11pm regardless of if they sell alcohol)

Anyone who has not yet submitted their application to convert their existing license, including justice's licenses which have an expiry date beyond August 2005 is encouraged to do so as soon as possible.

If licensees only wish to maintain the existing terms of their license, this will in most cases be a straight conversion. If however the licensee wishes to vary their current arrangements, for example by staying open later, then the application will be open to objections, and where these are received a decision will need to be made by a panel of Councillors.

It is imperative that licensees submit their application by 6 August otherwise they risk not being able to trade once the new licenses become active around November this year.

By law the Council has to process each application within a limited time frame and has written to all licensees advising them when they should submit their applications.

This phasing plan has been kept under review as some licensees will not be able to meet an early deadline. Some licensees are reporting difficulty in preparing their applications which need to be accompanied by plans of the premises and so may not have been able to get their applications into the Council at the time they were requested to do so.

Due to the high numbers involved the Council is keen to avoid a rush of applications arriving at the same time as this carries a risk that it will not be able to determine the applications that it receives within the statutory time frame. If this happens, any applications where the licensee wishes to vary their existing terms will be considered refused, and licensees will have to appeal to the magistrates courts, which could take a number of months.

The Council has therefore amend the phasing plan to ensure everyone is given the opportunity to apply, and all Licensees will receive an update in the next couple of weeks providing further information about when they should submit their applications.

If any licensees have queries about the above, please see the Council's website www.hackney.gov.uk/licensing or contact the licensing team on 020 8356 4970.

Councillor Christine Boyd, Chair of the Regulatory Committee, said:

“It is really important that people who need to change their license do so soon. Across the country there are far fewer license applications than expected. At that rate, the festive season will be pretty dry. Hackney Council has been writing to licensees to encourage them to make their applications, but there are still a large number of premises who haven't done so yet.

“There are a lot of people who live or work in Hackney who are affected by the new laws. Anyone who runs a pub, club, or any other licensable activity needs to submit an application for a premises license. Anyone selling alcohol needs a personal license.”

Wednesday drop in sessions  

Fostering

Hackney Council is encouraging anyone who feels that they could give a long- or short-term home to a Hackney child in need. The Council is looking for carers of all backgrounds, but currently has specific needs in the following areas:

. White carers for children of all ages

. Black carers for babies, older children,  

  sibling groups and children with disabilities

. Vietnamese carers

Bob Morgan, Hackney's Acting Director of Social Services said:

'Foster care can mean looking after a child for any length of time from a few days to several months or years. Both long and short term foster care can be challenging and also very rewarding.

Many different kinds of people of all different ages and backgrounds can become foster carers, whether they are single or living as a couple.   There are many people in Hackney who have so much to offer a foster child. I hope that they will come along to the open day and find out more.'

Hackney residents who wish to find out more about fostering should call Abigail Boafo Addai on 020 8356 6338 for information or visit www.hackneykids.org.uk/fostering.

BIDS Update (26 April 2005)

In March, at a public meeting, Stokey businesses decided to try to set up a local Business Development Area (BIDS). This meeting was a response by local business to their concerns about the area. These concerns include drug dealing and abuse, dirty and unsafe streets, low police visibility, lack of CCTV, no public toilets and the absence of parking permits for local businesses. Stokey businesses are also up in arms at what they see as Council indifference to the area over many years and lack of consultation on Hackney Council's Local Development Planning Framework.

Subsequently, the BIDS initiative has gained momentum. In April, a BIDS Working Group was set up and at their last meeting, they elected officers. Atique from Yum Yum is the Chair, Ian from Philips and Philips and Michael from Sunstone are the Vice Chairs, Richard from Beaucatcher is the Secretary, and Roseanne from Rosa's is the Treasurer. On the face of it, the Working Group's officers represent a wide cross-section of local businesses.

At the same meeting, two people were elected to find out about car parking and controlled parking zones (CPZ) in Stokey, and to report back to the Working Group. These representatives subsequently attended what turned out to be a fruitful meeting on CPZ at The Prince.

Other initiatives in the pipeline include a public meeting on Wednesday, 18 May 2005 that will be addressed by Dr Julie Grail, Director of Partnership Solution which has a successful track record in dealing with London BIDS.  

The next Working Group Committee Meeting will be held on Tuesday, 3 May 2005.  N16 Magazine will keep our readers informed of developments both through the mag and through this website.

News in brief from Issue 26

Matthew Kennard sent his interview with Noam Chomsky in our last issue to the great man and received then following reply:

‘Thanks for sending. Thought it came out very well, but too much respect. There are people who merit it – people who really face danger and repression constantly, without giving it a second thought. Not me. For people with freedom and privilege it’s easy.

Noam’

Chomsky also posted Matthew’s piece on his official site, and you can access it on www.chomsky.info/interviews/2005----.htm, along with a link to N16 Magazine. We’re delighted to be out there on the global ether in such distinguished company.

Hackney Council is looking for people who feel that they could give a long or short term foster home to a Hackney child in need. The Council is looking for carers of all backgrounds, but currently has specific needs in the following areas:

- White carers for children of all ages
- Black carers for babies, older children, sibling groups and children with disabilities 
-  Vietnamese carers

Bob Morgan, Hackney’s Acting Director of Social Services said: ‘Foster care can mean looking after a child for any length of time from a few days to several months or years. Both long and short term foster care can be challenging and also very rewarding. Many different kinds of people of all different ages and backgrounds can become foster carers, whether they are single or living as a couple. There are many people in Hackney who have so much to offer a foster child.’ Hackney residents who wish to find out more about fostering should call Abigail Boafo Addai on 020 8356 6338 for information or visit www.hackneykids.org.uk/fostering .

Stories have been appearing in the Press recently about the possibility of the Orthodox Jewish community in Stamford Hill moving elsewhere. N16 asked Rabbi Herschey Gluck, from the Walford Road Synagogue, if there was any truth in this. He replied: ‘Owing to the scarcity of affordable housing in the Borough and the many young families coming on stream, we have been looking into options further afield, including Milton Keynes and Thames Gateway. These options are at the drawing board stage. We are certainly not considering relocating the community, just facilitating and catering for the needs of a growing community.’ So it appears that one of London’s most interesting and distinctive communities will be remaining with us in Stoke Newington for some while yet.

As if the road works weren’t bad enough, local pedestrians’ health and safety is further endangered by all the street light ‘activation’. The cordoned-off holes in the pavements (on which no one ever seems to be working) force people onto the roads, where they are at the mercy of our local mobile boom boxes and speed freak wannabe Schumachers. Stoke Newington is fast resembling a building site, and a dangerous one, at that. Also, why did Hackney Council not wait until EDF (the installers) were ready before shoving up the new lamp posts? And the ones which are working seem to be less bright than the ones they replaced. Is this sensible?

Newcomers are increasingly the lifeblood of Stoke Newington, but it’s encouraging to discover that some people have deeper ties to the area. Frances Rickford, who lives in Alkham Road and is editor of Learning Support Magazine a immediate support staff in primary schools ( www.learningsupport.co.uk ), contacted us about her family’s history in Stoke Newington.

Her children are at least the fifth generation of her family to live here. Her great grandparents ran an ice-cream parlour in the 1890s where the chemist shop now stands at the junction of Green Lanes and Church Street, and her grandmother and her sisters used to churn the ice cream on the pavement to sell to people coming out of Clissold Park. Another set of great-grandparents lived in Albion Road at the turn of the century, making artificial flowers. 

Her grandparents were married at St Mary’s in 1914, and her great uncle died in the First World War– his name is on the war memorial in the Library and Frances has a postcard he sent from the Front to his family, who then lived in Queen Elizabeth Walk. Frances’s mother Betty was born here in 1920 and christened at St Mary’s. She and her parents moved to Palmers Green when Betty was a child, and Frances knew nothing about the link with Stokey until after she moved here with her partner from Islington in 1986. Both her daughters have grown up here, attending Jubilee and Grazebrook Primary Schools and Stoke Newington School. Do any of our readers have a longer-lasting attachment to Stoke Newington? If so, we’d be happy to hear from you.

Calling budding Beckhams. Apparently football playing in London is in decline, partly due to divorce, weekend parenting and general job stress, with the number of local teams in London down by one fifth over the last three years. Stoke Newington resident Mark Cunningham decided to do something about this sorry state of affairs. 

After a notice pinned in the Bar Lorca attracted over seventy people who wanted regular football, Mark set about organizing a 7 a side tournament, which is now mushrooming into the biggest such tournament the capital will have seen. London 7s aims to bring over 100 teams to a two-day tournament in Hackney Marshes on the weekend of 16 and 17 July. 

The event is aimed at both men and women, with all funds raised going to the British Heart Foundation. As we go to press, we have just missed the formal cut-off date for applying for a place in the tournament, although Mark has kindly extended the date for N16 readers and teams to 25 June. It doesn’t matter if you are 16 or 60. If you can get a team together, you’re in. For full details visit www.london7s.com.

The end of term marks the end of an era for one of Hackney’s top rated schools when, on July 20, voluntary aided Avigdor Primary closes its Lordship Road doors for the last time, after 75 years. A saddened head teacher, Rabbi Yitchak Freeman, blames the school’s falling roll on demographic changes in the Stamford Hill community over the last couple of decades. ‘There’s a new reality which favours more independent schooling’, he says, ‘so the sector we were created to serve is dwindling to the point of vanishing. It’s a great shame’.

The school has been held in great affection for generations, for its welcoming environment (despite admittedly dilapidated buildings), breadth and inclusiveness. The prospect of some 60 pupils having no school places come September has been averted by Avigdor’s efforts in securing alternative schools for most in north-west London. Closing events include a weekend sleepover for the children, joined by veterans of the ‘kinder transport’, as well as projects documenting the memories and history of the school. Some of the resulting material may well be lodged with Hackney Museum and Archives, preserving the memory of a cherished institution which has served its community so well and for so long. 

Shalom!