Harringay, Haringey - So Good they Spelt it Twice!
Council Decides to Rename Black Boy Lane
Following my consideration on the origins of West Green's Black Boy name back in the summer, Haringey Council has decided to rename Black Boy Lane in West Green.
The Council have called the exercise a 'renaming consultation', but the online questionnaire offers only the ability to choose from a shortlist of two new names. So it appears that the decision to rename has already been taken with only the choice of name left to be decided.
They have issued the following press release.
The council has launched a renaming consultation with residents and businesses located on Black Boy Lane, as part of the wider Review on Monuments, Buildings, Place and Street Names in Haringey – which was launched on 12 June 2020, in response to the Black Lives Matter movement.
The council believes that the names of our monuments, buildings, places and streets must reflect the values and diversity that we are so proud of in the borough. One of the street names that has been identified as not being reflective of this is Black Boy Lane.
Meanings change over time, and the term “Black Boy” is now most commonly used as a derogatory name for African heritage men.
As part of the consultation, the council is asking residents to consider new alternative names that celebrate some of the borough’s most notable influencers, and truly reflect the borough’s rich heritage.
The two names that have been shortlisted for residents to consider are, ‘Jocelyn Barrow Lane’ and ‘La Rose Lane’. The consultation will launch today, Monday 28 September and will run for a period of 4 weeks to Monday 26 October 2020.
Letters will be arriving on Black Boy Lane residents' doorsteps this week, who can respond to the consultation using one of the following methods:
- Online: www.haringey.gov.uk/renaming-black-boy-lane.
- Email:
- bblconsultation@haringey.gov.uk
- Telephone: 020 8489 3797
- By post: Consultation Co-ordinator, The Communications Team, River Park House, 225 High Road, Wood Green, London, N22 8HQ
If Haringey residents have concerns or queries about place, street or building names in the borough, please get in touch. Send your views to Leader@haringey.gov.uk.
Bios:Dame Jocelyn Anita Barrow (15 April 1929 – 9 April 2020) was a Barbadian/Trinidadian British educator, community activist and politician, who was the Director for UK Development at Focus Consultancy Ltd. She was the first Black woman to be a governor of the British Broadcasting Corporation (BBC) and was founder and Deputy Chair of the Broadcasting Standards Council.
John La Rose was a publisher, poet and essayist. He founded the Caribbean Artists’ Movement and publishing company New Beacon Books which has a bookshop in Stroud Green. In 1975, he co-founded the Black Parents Movement from the core of the parents involved in the George Padmore Supplementary School incident in which a young Black schoolboy was beaten up by the police outside his school in Haringey.
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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 Devon Williams on
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Stavros is correct. Don't bother engaging with the council via their faux consultations. You can't see what other people say and there is no independent oversight. The council will just say the outcomes supported their agenda. We need to get the national press involved. Nothing happens in Haringey until the council is publically embarrassed into doing the right thing.
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Permalink Reply by Adrian Hackney on
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Devon , I think Haringey is not familiar with the concept of embarrassment. Unless there has been another email from the Padmore Institute have they not now now chosen the name that la Rose's successors have specifically asked them not to ?
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Yesterday, I forwarded their email to the Renaming Committee and copied in the Council leader (in case he'd forgotten) and David Lammy MP.
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Permalink Reply by Hugh on
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That’s useful since it was rather oddly completely overlooked in the most recent report. One might almost assume this was intentional.
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It's probably worth noting that from 1.52:20 of the Full Council Meeting Cllr Ejiofor indicates that the decision to rename rests with the Councillors and that he hopes it will happen.
According to the leader of the Council, "the name offends and upsets many people and has no place in the Haringey of 2020". Quite what data he relies on in forming this opinion are not disclosed.
Statutory consultation will happen "when the time is right". It appears from the minutes Michael linked to here the right time for this is over the Xmas break.
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It is HIS opinon. But HE is the leader, innit?
Reflects the society we live in. Pander to the flow even if they are wrong.
It's dangerous....
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I'm a Stavroulla rather than a Stavros but you're right otherwise ;)
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Permalink Reply by Alan Stanton on
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I've heard a rumour that Cllr Joe Ejiofor may have had an online "meeting" - inviting residents from Black Boy Lane.
█ Is this rumour accurate?
If so.
█ How was it arranged?
█ Were Council staff in attendance?
█ What was the outcome?
█ Were minutes taken and made available?
█ Did anyone audio record the meeting?
█ Was it made clear how such a meeting - if it happened - fitted into the formal Council consultation sequence of events?
█ Was there any mention of the letter from the George Padmore Institute?___________________________________________
If I am wrong and no such meeting took place, then I apologise.
-.-.-.-.-.-.-.-.-.-.-.-.-.-.-.-.-.-.-.-.-.-.I subscribe to a website called Academia which occasionally has downloadable articles on topics which interest me. I recently saw mention of this article.
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This is the email and I had a prior engagement:
Mon 09/11/2020 12:54
Dear resident of Black Boy Lane,
I enclose herewith the joining details for the meeting about the proposed renaming of Black Boy Lane that has been scheduled for Thursday 12 November at 18.30 – 19.30.
The meeting will be held virtually on the Microsoft Teams application, the link for which you will find below. I am aware that there will be residents that do not have access to this application - I therefore enclose a conference telephone number to enable those residents to join the meeting. Please dial: 020 3321 5218 and enter the conference ID number: 751 651 571# when prompted. You will be held in a virtual waiting room until the meeting commences. I will be asking all participants to give their names at the start of the meeting.
I am only sending this email to those residents who have emailed me in connection with the proposed name change. If you have a neighbour, who lives in Black Boy Lane, who would like to participate in this meeting, please do forward this email to them.
I look forward to speaking to you on Thursday evening.
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Is the "I" in this email Cllr Joe Ejiofor personally?
(Or perhaps from someone writing on his behalf?)
When participants were asked to introduce themselves did this include a council officer (i.e. member of staff?) who was there - hopefully to take minutes?
Have participants received minutes of the online meeting?
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Permalink Reply by Michael Anderson on
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It’s a proposal that will go out to resident consultation
https://www.minutes.haringey.gov.uk/documents/s119895/20-11-24-Corp...
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The argument used to justify the name change is so contorted it misses the point.
When is the last time anyone heard the term "black boy" being used to refer to a black man?
As I wrote before if we are allowed to use black to refer to ourselves and that is PC, then there is no way the name should be changed because it is not derogatory but celebrating blackness.
Just because some people feel unease with this then they need to be educated as to the history.
However, what I do not understand is that, if there is offence at this name, then why are official groups and organisations still allowing the use of the word 'black' to describe anyone, to continue. Since it is in fact a derogatory term per se which was used by the enslavers to refer to the people they considered as their chatel and to so dehumanise them.
In the very document M. Anderson has put the link to .....
"“The Commission will focus on increasing representation among Black, Asian and Minority Ethnic communities, women, the LGBTQ+ community and disability groups."
"Black lives matter."
In council questionnaires to determine ethnic group - 'black caribbean'.
But then Asian which is also problematic because both Indian and Chinese people are 'asian'.But then we use 'South Asian' (although India is to the west!)
Do people find 'Yelllow lives matter' to be acceptable? Or 'Yellow chinese"'or 'Brown Indian' to refer to ethnic categories?
The term 'Red Indian' is no longer used. It has been replaced by 'native...' or 'first nation'.
In any case John La Rose, for a 'black' person, was quite light-skinned with "nice" straightish hair.
In Trinidad he would have been called "french creole" or "payol" by some people. When in fact he was an "Afro-Saxon". Like so many of us!
And then look at this picture on the G. Padmore website there John is standing beside S. 'White'
OMG!
"Tis but thy name that is my enemy;
Thou art thyself, though not a Montague.
What's Montague? It is nor hand, nor foot,
Nor arm, nor face, nor any other part
Belonging to a man. O, be some other name!
What's in a name? That which we call La Rose
By any other name would smell as sweet;"
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