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 Michael Anderson on
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I too am bewildered by the way the results have been interpreted.
If the results of the returns of BBL residents are expressed as a % of all households on BBL, so should those of the wider St Ann’s ward, otherwise the two figures are not comparable.
If anyone wants to do the maths the last Census showed there were 5,442 households in St Ann’s
BTW - when I used to carry out resident surveys in an old job I would have been over the moon with a response rate of 36%
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Permalink Reply by Alan Stanton on
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"If the results of the returns of BBL residents are expressed as a % of all households on BBL..."
Perhaps this evening we might learn whether Haringey staff had a reasonably accurate and up-to-date current list of all households. Especially since the rate of population churn in Tottenham Constituency was and probably is very high.
As a former Labour candidate, I did endless hours of "canvassing" - i.e. door-knocking. Though frankly I'd be dismayed by the task of trying to get accurate responses during a pandemic.
Door knocking had advantages far wider than getting promises of votes. It gave opportunities to have brief chats with people. On many occasions we'd hear about small problems which we might be able to help solve. Or simply to give some useful information.
People familiar with business school jargon will know about MBWA - (Management by wandering around). You always learn something fresh about an area you think you know.
We did at least take the trouble to have many leaflets printed, at least in part in other community languages. Weren't the Black Boy Lane leaflets all in English?
It's sad to see what Haringey has forgotten. Will the regime learn or change anything from this debacle?
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Permalink Reply by andy h on
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I might be mis-interpreting, but doesn't item 5.2 in the report mean there was never a choice over anything. The decision, including the new name, was made last July by the corporate committee!
If that was always the outcome, why oh why did they even bother consulting. It's just insulting.
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Andy h.
Have you had a chance to watch or listen to the meeting this evening?
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just finnished, tne main change vote, will go to next meeting as far as i understand.
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it seemed many were against the name of the street, but did not know what it stood for, they just thought it was racist because it has Black Boy in it.
Seems some of them just believed what was on the one sided/biased consultation. Some only know what the council tell them.
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We'll have to wait and see whether or not Ejiofor responds to the fresh opportunity to do a proper fair consultation now that the Covid restrictions are being loosened.
He's now got a chance to speak and act like a leader.
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Permalink Reply by Anna on
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All along we’ve been told it will come down to the corporate committee decision. It’s done. The vote is in favour to redo part of the consultation properly, with a proviso of getting residents on board if enough personalised guarantees are in place. And I truly think a name change will happen if we’re consulted. I know I am super naive but at the end, even if it was really close, the recorded, ratified vote is for getting us residents fairly on board. Press, MPs and legal entities are pretty much invested on this now. How could Mr Ejifior come in and delete what is firmly on the record without furthering damages to his political creds and future?
I, for one, am happy with the decision of extending the consultation in order to reassure my neighbours and I that our various costs and problems will be met/solved with full cooperation of this council or its next iteration.
All this palaver, excuse my French, had given me the chance to talk (in no particular order) with residents, lawyers, journalists, people from the rest of Haringey, Europe, America, Africa, and while I still think that there is nothing wrong with black boys I have to bow down to progressive ways of thinking and perceptions. Even if I don’t think the origin story is valid I understand the future has to be, well, futuristic so if, and only if, I know that Jean at number six and Sarah at number 54 will not suffer from consequences of a change of name I will not oppose this. Furthermore this whole thing has made me discover a little bit more about John la Rose, and he was pretty stand up guy I. If hear that the Padmore Institute is now on board with the renaming, I personally will not stand in the way of Black Boy changing to La Rose Lane. However I still believe my street should be renamed with a neutral name to avoid any possible family feuds in the future.
it’s super late, I know, but this thing has consumed our lives for nearly a year now and tonight, hope is restored somehow. As I said from the beginning, if we’re going to do it, let’s do it properly, let’s do it fairly, let’s do it flawlessly.
This is not the end, but we seem to all agree to follow a proper, unpeacheable route, and, again maybe super naive, but my trust in the council processes has been restored. It is a difficult issue and, tonight, I saw a bunch of people genuinely wrestling between feelings, beliefs and facts, and whatever the extended consultation throws my way, I am now confident (for the first time since June) residents opinion will matter, and our individual needs will be met. Plus, thanks to the Census this year, there will be a as accurate, current, as close as possible, representation of who lives here and who should be consulted. That said we still need to know if we should differentiate property owners or renters but shit it’s 2.45 am, so, yeah, later.
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There is nothing 'progressive' about this. It's exactly the opposite from concept through to implementation. Creating division and suggesting there is something shameful about black boys is as retrograde as it gets. And spending nearly £200,000 of council funds to do it is beyond belief.
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