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.
If you'd like to respond to this post, please consider the sensitivities around the issues before you commit finger to keyboard. Any responses that are not in line with our house rules will be deleted.
Tags for Forum Posts: blackboy lane name change, review on monuments, building place and street names
Replies to This Discussion
-
Permalink Reply by Michael Anderson on
-
Some people have got a lot of time on their hands I see
-
-
Oh come one. This is a matter of such unimportance the survey was probably put together by a junior member of staff. A simple phone call to whoever heads up parks and open spaces (who the Friends groups meet on a regular basis) asking for “neutral” to be changed to “Other location, please specify below” surely would have sufficed.
A judicial review risks the losing side many thousands in costs. A pétanque court a couple of thousand. I wouldn’t be surprised if Haringey just drops the idea.
-
Permalink Reply by Stav Aristides on
-
Its a petanque piste. Not a court.
-
Permalink Reply by Hugh on
-
It's an interesting issue, Adrian, but as far as I'm aware there isn't a statutory requirement for the Council to consult on changing a street name.A council committee voted for the proposal to change the street's name. As far as I'm aware this was allowed. Therefore, running a consultation on a choice of names would only be predetermination if the choice between the two names had been predetermined.
However, the 'consultation' on BBL seems questionable in other respects. FIrstly, it seems that many of the street residents didn't receive any invitation to respond. Secondly the email to Tottenham Labour party members, urging them to contribute seems highly questionable.
I've had a quick look and I can't find any clear set of guidelines that the council hold themselves to, other than an unambitious and toothless 'consultation charter' meant for public consumption.
Attachment: consultation_charter.pdf
-
Permalink Reply by Alan Stanton on
-
Do I have a lot of time on my hands? Well, who amongst us can be certain in a time of plague? And as the Motown song wisely advises: "My smile is just a frown turned upside down".
Thanks Adrian for giving us the excerpt from the Friends of Priory Park. A "desired predetermined outcome" seems a fair description of Blackboy Lane renaming as well.
Although the excerpt refers to "Haringey's Consultation Guidelines", I couldn't find a document with this title on the Council website. Do you know if this is the correct link?
https://www.haringey.gov.uk/sites/haringeygovuk/files/statement_of_...
If so, it seems like a consultation wonderland compared to the current shameful shambles. Do Haringey staff play more such tricks on the Borough's citizens? Even a teensy whiff of manipulated "consultation" wafting from Priory Park may offer some lessons.
-
-
It’s an area to throw balls around. The number of conspiracy theorists who have found a home on HoL recently would put Parler to shame.
-
-
Love Michael Anderson’s blogs, shame he does not seem to understand what subject this site it for, and does not understand the History of BBL, or what life living on BBL is like and most importantly what the consequence for residents of BBL the change will have on them, let alone the costs and waste of time to the council. He must have toooo much time doing nothing, so sad.
-
Permalink Reply by Andrew Stillman on
-
which road do you live on, james?
-
-
As I have stated before I lived in Black Boy Lane in the 1950’s & 60’s, and never had ANY trouble OR COMMENT with the name, there were many Caribbean and other none whites living there, and heard nothing bad said about the name at the time. At the old very rough South Grove senior school (now closed) where lots of very black boys were, we who lived on BBL also had no comments about it’s name, it was just the name of the road we lived on.
I also lived in North London and Tottenham on and off to 1990’s before leaving London for good, for the fresh air, as London air caused minor coughing all the time .
-
-
Have you read some of the posts on here? Totalitarian State, like 1984, like a third world dictatorship are just some of the contributions. It’s not. It’s very badly managed consultation on the renaming of a road that a lot of people seem not to want to happen. End of.
I don’t give a monkey’s what BBL is called now or in the future even though I lived on it for four years. That’s for the people who live on it now to decide. What I do give a monkeys about is the level of bullying of anyone who dares to put forward a view that doesn’t coincide with that held by a cabal that seems to have taken the discussion over,
© 2024 Created by Hugh.
Powered by
