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 JJ B on
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No Nick, I wasn't, but to others spreading misinformation about the motives of BLM and branding them 'extreme' in order to discredit their objectives.
BLM is not about putting right the wrongs of the past but precisely about allowing, IN THE PRESENT DAY, 'black' people and others, to have real full equality and not just citizenship in name only.
A small example : the US is a particularly bad case because the police constantly get away with just killing black people. But here too in the UK Stop and Search undermines trust in the police. We need to be able to rely on the police to protect us, all of us.
But instead the police are seen as one of the threats because Stop and Search is like legal harassment when you get stopped again and again and again for doing the same everyday things that 'white' people do not get stopped for. But there is also all the other subtle and not so subtle discrimination that has dire consequences not juts on the victims of it but on the whole society.
It is actually amazing that it has taken so long for a BLM movement to emerge as a fighting force. And I say again that when compared to how anti-semitism is treated you see a huge double standard. But no one can talk about that.
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Thank you for clarifying and obviously this thread here is not where I will comment further about this subject. However changing the name of a street will not address the issues mentioned. When I ask for a few extra minutes of care, when the pay to care agencies on AQP list is cut, when other services are closed by the council due to shortage of funds and they waste money on a name change which cost our tax money I feel very strongly against. On top of that the hidden costs to residents highlighted by Hugh makes me really angry and upset. Let’s find a way to stamp out all racism and discrimination not change names which in my opinion is now dividing and bringing forth more racism than before.
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Pol Pot was responsible for the violent deaths of a quarter of the population of Cambodia, estimates range from 1 to 3 million people killed between 1975-79. On the other hand BLM is (as JJB says above) " a legitimate movement that seeks to right a lot of the great injustices meeted out to certain ("black") people."
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Its called 'dog whistle' politics John D. BLM is decentralised so BLM has varying manifestos according to whether you live in the US, England, Wales etc and having read several there is nothing to threaten 'family values'; on a general level it supports 'non-violent civil disobedience in protest against police brutality and racially motivated violence against black people"(Wiki). Chucking Pol Pot into the mix was just an attempt to smear.
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Permalink Reply by John D on
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Dog whistle politics is "a subtly aimed political message which is intended for, and can only be understood by, a particular demographic group." I think everybody understood what he meant - nothing subtle about it.
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No one is disputing that a great wrong was committed but how far do you go to right the wrong of the past? If you go back into the past you will find many wrongs. To me it’s learning about the past and avoiding it happening again and just wiping out names or statues is not putting something right.
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I have been looking at all the comments made here and taking this into account is it not the case that there are several groups of residents from different ethnicities living in or around black boy lane? Is it also not true that Haringey has a duty to public sector equality and duty to avoid any discrimination in deciding any changes inclusive of road name changes? Is it therefore not discrimination against other ethnicities living in and around this street that only 2 name choices are being given both of black origin? What about other ethnic groups. Should therefore the council not have allowed a choice of several names from all cultures and ethnicities and allow the residents to choose? Should not all Haringey residents be included not just those on black boy lane as it affects all as money spent will be from Haringey residents council taxes. I shall be writing to the council to obtain under data laws how many people living in haringey actually did object and demand the name to be changed as it would appear to me that this is more of the Council Leader rather than actual residents making this unnecessary change. I believe this is more dividing people rather than uniting!
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Permalink Reply by patrick byrne on
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Let's face it - every name has "baggage" - whether it is deemed to be positive or negative.
And one person's hero is probably a villian to many others.
So no more memorials - leave all existing street names alone - all the existing names arose from something - an event or a thought process - embedded in the history of the area or the country.
This is a shared heritage and provides all citizens with a prism through which to view and understand the past.
Let's avoid the Orwellian idea of constantly rewriting history so that it corresponds with our current view of political correctness - an almost impossible task!
To future proof the names of any new streets or roads being created by developers - they should only be named using numbers (Such as Street1, Avenue2, Road3 etc) or named after harmless trees or plants (provided such items are not associated with any national or political movement eg Rose, Thistle, Daffodil, Shamrock etc)
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