Harringay, Haringey - So Good they Spelt it Twice!
Council dimisses views of Blackboy Lane residents
Next week the corporate committee of Haringey Council will make a decision on the Blackboy Lane issue.
According to the report prepared for the committee, the majority of Blackboy Lane residents would prefer no change, However, the report states that this option has been dismissed.
It also says that the option to consider another name is dismissed - not because it's the right thing to do but simply because that wasn't what they said last time!
Below are the results of the second consultation along with the report's somewhat tortuous justification for dismissing the wishes of Blackboy Lane residents.
Of course, those of you who have been following this issue will have little faith in these consultation results. You will have leaned that the Council may have sought to swing the result the way it wanted by approaching select groups through the local Labour Party apparatus and asking them to reply to the consultation to support the name change.
So, there you go, no surprises here: that's how politics is done in Haringey these days.
For the record the author of this post has no objection to street renaming where the existing name clearly causes offence and where widespread support for the change can be proved.
Full text of the Blackboy Lane item in the Council report available here.
Tags for Forum Posts: blackboy lane name change, review on monuments, building place and street names
Replies to This Discussion
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Permalink Reply by Ian Jackson-Reeves on
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I am pleased, but I hope that this will ensure that the full story, including costs are clearly put forward in the consultation process and those that are elderly, not able technically, or who have language challenges are fully supported and encouraged in the process.
If the final decision is not until June or later, there is a chance that some of the political manoeuvring will have settled down and a true commitment going forward will happen.
However, I am a little disillusioned. Results to date from the residents, and the St Ann's Ward as a whole, have not given clear or overwhelming support to the proposal. I am hoping that extending the consultation is not an attempt to keeping asking the same question until the answer is the one wanted.
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Permalink Reply by Neil Le Milliere on
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Not sure if this has been posted but in case nit, this is the letter I received today.
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Permalink Reply by Anna on
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3 days in, and I am starting to recover from the very tense affair that was the corporate committee meeting. I was told that one of the committee members is Joseph Ejiofor’s wife. I don’t remember this being noted in the ‘conflict of interest’ bit, it just feels like it should have been disclosed somewhere? Anyhoo, this is the lady that can’t drive down my street because it hurts her feelings too much. But she lives in Muswell Hill, so I am not super sure how often she needs to come down Black Boy Lane. I am sure City Mapper could offer some alternative, less painful route? Plus she was the one adamant all our changes of paperwork are digital, free and hardly any hassle. (Dismissing the many households without tech access or knowledge right of the bat).
So on this, I was wondering in anyone on HOL could quickly help us. This time, my neighbours and I will properly have a chance to meet, and talk in real life, not those long email chains or hurried, cold muffled by a mask conversations in the street, and we can have a better 360 of what our different needs will be. So if anyone has inside knowledge of things like property, probate, immigration (quite a few asylum seekers here, and double nationality that would need to update their papers in two countries), that would be great. I did contact a few random lawyer firms but I couldn’t go very far because they either wanted to be hired, or would shy away from giving me a quote I could use because it would vary too much by households.
We just want a really general idea, so we have more details to give the council and get those added to the budget as soon as possible. The only number I have so far is £190 per codicil and copy (ie, if you have a will and all the copies of said will).
I’ll keep trying to get some quotes, but if one of you has some professional knowledge of those areas, it would be great.
Another ‘inside’ thing I have learned - the lady who sent that last minute letter to all labour members, begging them to vote on that snap survey and change the name of our streets because it ‘hurts children’ is also related to Joseph Ejiofor. If I wasn’t blessed with such a sunny personality, I may have to start muttering conspiracy theories!
I am even more grateful that, while in such a stronghold, the Corporate Committee members kept the fate and decision of our street residents in mind, and agreed to revise the process to get us on board. Only then, we can be at peace and welcome a new street name.
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And another thing (make her stop!) - I was thinking that when our missing street signs (replacements ordered on the 4th of Jan this year, but not arrived yet because of Covid), we could have a plaque explaining the likelihood of Black Boy Lane being Charles II nickname. It would go a long way to educate the occasional users of our street and maybe quell some of this assumption jumping that ‘Black Boy’ is bad.
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That would be the sensible solution, but the councillors and leader then wouldn’t be able to make their big virtuous point.
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Permalink Reply by Alan Stanton on
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Instead of actually "leading" the council towards greater tolerance, inclusion, and mutual respect, Ejiofor and his allies have further divided people. And caused, or at least accentuated, mutual suspicions and negative feelings.
But let's imagine that Joe Ejiofor proposed this project aiming at a positive outcome and with the very best of intentions. But then, largely because of his top-down, winner-takes-all, autocratic understanding of leadership, the means selected to achieve the aim were simply doing it to the residents; instead of trying to do it with them.
Joe now seems to have limited options They include leaving his thinking cap gathering cobwebs in the trunk in his attics. While insisting on his Leader power: he-who-must-be-obeyed. Legally that may work to get the signs changed. But grudgingly for some residents, and leaving a bad taste. Alternatively Joe Ejiofor can decide to wise-up and seek a way out of the corner he's painted himself into, finding a route to the sort of compromise which some residents are saying they might consider. A win-win.
Where does that leave remembering and honouring John La Rose? Maybe his name and a description might be approved for a blue plaque? Or something similar? There must be a dozen or more ways.
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Permalink Reply by Sarah on
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I have dual nationality. When I moved house (so changed address including postcode) I don't remember having to do anything besides telling my bank. Somehow people still find you...the first piece of mail I got was a letter from my school to tell me how wonderful they are and have I thought about legacies?
I think it cost me £190 to get an entire will drafted (no legacy to my old school, oops!), so that sounds like a lot to update an address.
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Permalink Reply by Michael Anderson on
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We had codicils to our wills when we got married and it cost £20. When we were doing it we asked if we needed to do a codicil as we’d moved since drawing up the original wills and the solicitor said it wasn’t necessary unless that specific address was something mentioned (I hereby leave 29 The Street to.. rather than I leave all property to...). In the end he wrote a note which we both signed and he lodged it with wills at zero cost.
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Could it be that Mrs Ejiofor is the only person who has ever actually interpreted Black Boy Lane negatively?
Is this expensive, divisive and ultimately unnecessary palava all down to a couple of Muswell Hill types being offended on our behalf?
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Meanwhile we read about this in the Sunday paper:
Row erupts over bid to revive London's historic Caribbean cultural hub
https://www.theguardian.com/uk-news/2021/mar/28/row-erupts-over-bid...
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I think you will find, as nearly always, James H. that there is more than one possible interpretation of the facts - and selection of facts - relating to this particular story.
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Trying to offer a helpful response to Devon Williams.
A little mutual respect for the views of everyone involved might take us towards win-win solutions.
Yes, it would have been better if Cllr Ejiofor had had more respect for the residents of Black Boy Lane and taken a different approach to winning their support. At the same time, shouldn't all of us make more efforts to listen to and consider the varied ways in which our neighbours and fellow Londoners view our city, and its neighbourhoods. And how, yes, names matter; the histories matter.
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