Newlands Hall fight featured in Guardian

The Wandsworth Guardian today covers the fight to save Newlands Hall on the Putney Vale estate. Reporter Chloe Lambert has been out talking to residents of Frensham Drive and Stroud Crescent - in particular the senior citizens who are among the Hall's most regular and active users and who would be hardest hit by its demise - especially as it's such an isolated part of the constituency.

Sadly, one of the area's Conservative Councillors is quoted excusing its closure: call me old fashioned but I always thought the job of councillors was to side with their constituents when the council gets things wrong; but evidently this isn't a view shared by the Tories.

This same councillor also tried to dismiss the petition we collected of over 150 signatories on the basis that it contained names of users who lived outside the estate, so I'm really pleased that the Guardian report focusses on the pensioners for whom Newlands Hall is vital.

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We've stalled the closure of Newlands Hall

My petition to save the Newlands Hall on Putney Vale estate went before the Council's Housing Overview and Scrutiny Committee last week.

And despite attempts by some silly Conservative councillors to discredit it - simply because some of the signatories were users of the hall who don't actually live on the estate itself - we did squeeze some concessions from the Town Hall.

There will now be a consultation with the community about the future of Newlands Hall which, given the council's determination to close it down just a few weeks ago amounts to a major U-turn.

Newlands Hall update

Over 100 Putney Vale residents signed my petition to save Newlands Hall, the community centre in the heart of their estate which the council has run down and now intends to close.

My colleague, Councillor Leonie Cooper, who is Labour's lead councillor on housing in Wandsworth, presented this petition to the full council meeting a week last Wednesday, formally entering it into the record so that the Conservative Adminstration now has to explain itself.

The next step is for the petition to be discussed at one of the Council's "Overview and Scrutiny" Panels, which are Conservative dominated so don't expect much overview or scrutiny of this cruel decision. This meeting takes place on 15 November at Wandsworth Town Hall - it's open to the public, so do come along.

Save Newlands Hall

Yesterday my campaign team and I were out and about on the Putney Vale estate, which is nestled just behind the ASDA superstore on Roehampton Vale.

Aside from it being right next door to where I play football, we were there because the Council is threatening to close down - and, we suspect, sell-off - Newlands Hall, the focal point of this estate ever since it was built.

Newlands Hall serves as the base for all sorts of community facilities; residents' meetings, family birthdays, it's the local polling station for that area - you name it, it goes on there. For years the council has neglected it - and now, instead of rectifying that neglect, they prefer to condemn it.

That's just not good enough, so today we were out in force there, chatting to residents, discussing the local anger this has caused, and despite only being around for just over an hour we drummed up nearly 100 petitioners demanding the council Save Newlands Hall.

We've only just begun our petition, and if you'd like to add your name, you can now do so online: just click here and fill in your details.