Category: Anti-social behaviour

Posted on

Notes from WEN public meeting on 14th October 2025

These notes are not intended to capture everything that was said at the meeting. They are just trying to capture some of the main items discussed.

1. East Lodge

The original planning application was withdrawn. Over 3,000 objections. Questions asked about why the lodge has not been included in a conservation area. Cllr Manro explained the delay caused by the staff member involved having to leave and took time to recruit a replacement. A new application may yet come forward.

2.Lammas Park and Flood risk works

The Council has authorized flood risk alleviation works in three of its parks – Lammas, Dean Gardens and Belevue Park Park. The aim is to capture excess surface water and then release it slowly back in to the sewer systems in order to avoid flooding at times of heavy rain,

The Lammas Park works have caused much local concern over the area of park taken up, delays in works and worries about e-coli in the water. Cllr Driscoll, cabinet member for climate action, spoke to this and explained the actions being taken by the Council and Thames Water to investigate possible misconnections to the sewer systems and rectify any problems. The works have yet to pass their final tests, so no date yet for completion.

3.West Ealing Community Library

Catherine Fitzgibbon is leading the group negotiating with the Council to take on the lease for the library which is run by volunteers. Her priority at the moment is to recruit new directors to join the board of West Ealing Community CIC which will be the organization taking on the lease. It is a small not-for-profit organization and needs to strengthen its governance in readiness for running the library. Anyone interested in joining the board please email – info@mywestealing.org.uk

4.Law and Order

David Highton, chair of WEN, said he was clear that our local MP Deirdre Costigan, our local councillors and the police themselves are all well aware of the level of concern about anti-social behaviour, drug dealing and drug taking in West Ealing.

He stressed the importance of people reporting ASB so the police have a record of it as this helps decide how they will deploy their teams. (details of ways of reporting are on the WEN website – www.westealingneighbours.org.uk )

There will be a new team of eight police who are being recruited for Ealing Broadway town centre. He said it was important that West Ealing was included as part of the town centre so they would spend time here.

5.Town Teams/Your Town Your Voice

This is a new initiative. Each of the boroughs seven towns now has a town team set up to encourage local community involvement in deciding how to spend their allocation from the  initial £480k budget for the borough. They will later be able to have a say in how the 10-15% of moneys from the Community Infrastructure levy will be spent. The team covering West Ealing is in the process of setting up guidelines for organisations wanting to apply. The one for Hanwell is not looking for applications.

6.West Ealing Action Group

This is another newly set up group. The Mayor of London has allocated £50k to improve the West Ealing high street, re-purpose empty shops, explore night-time activities and more. Any group interested in joining can email Cllr Manro – manros@ealing.gov.uk

7.Victoria Hall

The largest public hall in Ealing is owned by a charity. The Council wants to dispose of it to a hotel developer. Friends of Victoria Hall (FoVH) have been battling to save it for the community. The final phase of the legal battle over its future comes to a head in November. FoVH are looking for funds to help pay their costs – https://savethevictoriahall.weebly.com/

8.Stop and Shop

Some confusion over the introduction of a new scheme by the Council. The main reason for the new scheme is to stop people parking for hours or days in these short stay spaces. The Council has no way of knowing how long people have been parking in these so little or no enforcement. Under the new scheme people will have to register first before parking for their free 30 minutes. However, they can then extend their stay by paying for more time.

There was concern over people who did not have the smart phone needed to use the parking app. Cllr Driscoll explained there are alternatives such as some high street shops offering ‘pay point’.

Later clarification: The transaction charge is 10p and not 20p  when using the ‘pay by phone’ app.  We are in the final year for the 10p charge. It might go up in the future.  

9.Development sites

Dean Gardens car park

Cllr Manro confirmed that the work on this site will almost certainly have to be demolished and a new contractor found to start again.

Green Man Lane

Phase 4 soon to be underway once a new contractor has been appointed.

Gurnell

The leisure centre and housing are separate projects. Work on the leisure center should start early 2026

Kwik Fit site

Demolition has started. No date yet for the building work.

Majestic Wine Warehouse site

A change of plans means it will now be student accommodation with towers of 17. 14 and 5 storeys. The Council has negotiated a cash payment because of this change and loss of potential social housing.

Manor Road site

Much concern about the management Manor Road by the contractor and many felt it was an accident waiting to happen. Cllr Manro will ask for this to be checked.

Orion Park

A contractor should be appointed soon

St James Ave

A change of plan to a more modest development as Luxgrove haven’t found a housing association willing to but the planned social housing element. So, no bridge over the street joining the two sides.

Waitrose

No plans to start building until 2026. Waitrose have set up regular meetings with local groups to try to keep them informed about plans and progress. WEN is one of the groups involved

Old Woolworth’s site

Another Luxgrove development site. No work started yet.

Posted on

How to report a crime and sources of help for anti-social behaviour

Reporting a crime

Metropolitan Police

If it is an emergency call 999

Non-emergencies call 101 . These include:

a stolen item, property damage, suspected drug abuse/dealing, anti-social behavior

Report online at https://www.met.police.uk/ro/report/

The Metropolitan Police have just launched a new free service called Met Engage which gives you alerts about issues in your area, crinme updates, safety tips and more –https://www.metengage.co.uk/

Crimestoppers

You can report anonymously with Crimestoppers on 0800 555111 or online at https://crimestoppers-uk.org/  They will pass on the information.

Mental Health

Solace Centre

The borough’s daily out-of-hours mental health resource centre. Clients need to be referred through a number of agencies. See their website for more details – https://www.westlondon.nhs.uk/our-services/adult/mental-health-services/solace-centre

Ealing Safe Space

A service for anyone, including carers, who feel they are reaching crisis point. More details on their website – https://www.westlondon.nhs.uk/our-services/adult/mental-health-services/safe-spaces

Safety Concerns

StreetSafe is a service from the police that allows you to report anonymously concerns such as poorly lit streets, vandalism as well as occasions when you feel unsafe due to being followed or verbally abused. Their website is https://www.police.uk/pu/notices/streetsafe/street-safe/

Homelessness

StreetLink is a service  linking people sleeping rough to local services. You can report a rough sleeper on their website https://thestreetlink.org.uk/

Addiction

RISE is the borough’s service to help people who want to cut down or stop their use of drugs and alcohol. Details of their services are on their website – https://www.changegrowlive.org/service/ealing-rise/west-ealing

Fly-tipping The Love Clean Streets app allows you to report environmental issues such as fly-tipping and potholes to Ealing Council – https://www.ealing.gov.uk/info/201230/my_account/2263/love_clean_streets/

You can also take action yourself and join LAGER Can – a group of volunteer litterpickers across the borough.

Posted on

Petition to tackle anti-social behaviour in and around Grosvenor Road in West Ealing

Further evidence of the level of frustration with the anti-social behaviour and drug related problems in West Ealing is captured in this petition calling for action by the police and council. Full details of the petition which has already been signed by over 170 can be found here.

This is a West Ealing wide problem and one we’ve looked at recently both in our last public meeting and in an article on this site. We will be

Posted on

Do you feel safe in West Ealing?

At the end of our public meeting on 24th October 2024, a number of people raised concerns about not feeling safe in West Ealing. We decided to follow up on this to see how widespread these concerns were. We set up an online survey which ran for a month, finishing on 20th February. We also commissioned a journalist, Smriti Gopal, to investigate this topic in more depth.

The results of the online survey are available to view here. It is important to point out that the respondents chose to complete the survey i.e. it was self-selecting, so it should not be taken as an opinion poll. Even so, the results clearly indicate a high level of concern about anti-social behaviour and that people are feeling less safe in West Ealing than a year ago.

Lastly, in this brief introduction, it is worth pointing out that West Ealing is home to Ealing Magistrates’ Court, the Probation Office and RISE (the addiction treatment agency). This inevitably means more people with a history of anti-social behaviour coming to West Ealing.

The following is an extract from an article by Smriti Gopal:

In addition to the above mentioned online survey, we have been speaking to many residents anonymously about the incidents that they witnessed and to better understand their concerns and find ways of how the community can come together and improve safety for everyone. To help us get as full a picture as possible, we also spoke to some local agencies offering help and support. This included the local police, the team at Solace, a West Ealing based mental health resource centre providing a support network to the residents in the Ealing borough and some local pharmacies. We were not able to get a response from RISE.

The centre of West Ealing is covered by two wards – Walpole and Hanwell Broadway. We spoke to Patrick Chapman, Chair of the quarterly Walpole ward police meetings where local residents can raise their concerns with the ward police team. He explained the priorities and goals for the Walpole ward.   “Antisocial behaviour is right at the top of our priorities including drugs which is another high priority and street drinking –  all equally important. Drugs and antisocial behaviour are major issues in society these days. We ask the police to focus on particular locations within the ward which are major hot spots.”

He added, “Antisocial behaviour sadly is an endemic problem in society. Police are doing their best with their work. If the police are warned and told about these problems, police will patrol the area to try to solve the problem. Maybe we, as residents, can change the pattern how the police work to make a positive impact. Walpole ward is getting more police officers and Police Community Support Officers (PCSO). We are getting more staff on the police team than before. This means that they will be able to patrol more and help all of us in the area to keep a lid on antisocial behaviour.”

Inspector Lee Ballard heads up the Neighbourhood Policing team covering West Ealing. He attended the most recent Walpole panel meeting in February (next on is 20th May). He agreed with Mr Chapman’s comments and went on to say, “My team and I are committed to being highly visible and present on the streets of West Ealing to deter crime and tackle our local issues and concerns through community-based policing.”

We had a wide range of comments from residents about how anti-social behaviour affected them: 

 “There have been alleged murders in Dean Gardens and I don’t feel safe to go through West Ealing anymore, especially at night time. Because of this, I now do my shopping online.”

“Antisocial behaviour makes me feel fearful when walking on the streets in west Ealing. I now might walk less and drive more or drive elsewhere to do my shopping and errands.”

“Walking through Dean Gardens used to be a shortcut for me. I don’t walk down this route anymore, especially at night because of the following alleged incidents – there are a group of men just sitting on the bench in the night and one doesn’t know what their intentions are. Sometimes they are alcoholics drinking and one of them had a kitchen vegetable knife with them. The guy started chasing a passer-by around the park with the knife. There have been rapes in this park and because of all these crimes, we’ll be looking to move out of West Ealing.”

“I’m not actually keen on walking down Melbourne Avenue after everything is shut. While the supermarket is open it’s not that bad. Also, the hotel around the corner has been open which sheds a bit of light. Generally, this a very poorly lit stretch and certainly once the supermarket starts shutting, in the evening, I don’t really like walking down here because there can be people allegedly hanging around and loitering that area and this hanging around has got worse, this past year. It doesn’t feel that safe.”

Inspector Lee Ballard addressed the concern of safety, “If anyone felt unsafe they can download the Street Safe app and use it to report issues anonymously, where you felt unsafe in public places and explain why; the app would identify the hotspots.”

Melbourne Avenue, Mattock Lane and Radbourne Walk are some of the major hot spots which the police are currently focusing on for the priority of drugs and antisocial behaviour. PS Katie Weston from the Metropolitan Police, also attended the last Walpole ward panel meeting. She said, “There has been a significant increase in street drinking and drug use since December. I’ve managed to obtain some extra resources from other areas and they have been patrolling the area around St. John’s and Melbourne Avenue more frequently. The police were trying to move people on and they have issued Community Protection Warning (CPWs) and Community Protection Notices (CPNs) to individuals but many of these individuals do not care and carry on regardless. The police have made a number of arrests recently, one of whom was on a recall to prison and several of them have been referred to Ealing RISE, the borough’s addiction treatment agency.”

West Ealing Neighbours was particularly concerned about how women and young girls felt about their personal safety as this concern was the starting point for our survey and this article.  Caitlin from the Press Office department of the Met Police provided us with a statement about this, she stated, “Ealing Safer Neighbourhoods is committed to delivering the strongest ever Neighbourhoods policing in the area to protect and serve all our local community. Tackling violence against women and young girls remains a significant priority for the Metropolitan Police Service as a whole.”

Returning to our online survey, we asked – “Do you feel less safe, than a year ago?” Results showed 221 residents said “yes” they feel less safe than a year ago and 64 residents said “no” they don’t feel less safe than a year ago.  The comments from residents described what they felt was an increase in crime and anti-social behaviour.  Many mentions were made of seeing individuals hanging around for drugs and drug dealing and leaving evidence behind on the street such as cans of Nitrous Oxide more commonly known as laughing gas – a recreational drug.

But this is not the only drug that is used. Along with the use of drugs, crack and heroin, individuals use methadone, a class A drug on prescription, as a maintenance therapy to combat the use of heroin. Drug addicts frequent two particular pharmacies in West Ealing specifically for methadone, Mattock Lane Pharmacy on St. John’s Parade and Grosvenor Pharmacy on the Broadway. Many residents are concerned, that because drug addicts and dealers go here, it attracts more of these groups of people here, leaving residents feeling very unsafe.

Being on drugs does not always mean an individual is an addict. It might also be that the individual is going through some difficult mental health moments in their life, which ends up making them struggling to cope with everyday life.

A member at Solace’s mental health resource centre, based in West Ealing,  explained that “Losing my children, triggered my mental health condition. I fell under the mental health service 29 years ago after some horrific things and ended up in hospital quite a lot. I did some dangerous things to myself which at the time I did not acknowledge but it was just the trauma I was in at the time with my mental health. A social worker brought me to Solace 20 years ago. Mirna and the team have been a massive support to me and helped me through my mental health problems. We have well-being groups here. It’s about talking to one another and understanding each other about what has helped them. It helps when someone has gone through similar experiences who share how to become a better person. It helped me make a positive difference to myself and to others. I’m back in touch with my children now.” 

After hearing about this, we followed up with Catherine Bingham, Senior Recovery Worker at Solace, to gain a deeper understanding. She said, “We assist patients from all over the Ealing borough. We help patients who have been going in and out of hospital for several years. When patients come to us here, in a safe environment, we encourage them to talk to us to understand their conditions so that patients can feel connected, especially with other people who also might have the same condition. For example, sometimes people are in a difficult situation but it’s the strength that people find when they get support from us. We learn about them and this helps us to quickly spot identifiers of someone’s mental health, so that we can address their condition before it escalates.

Also, patients get support through peer support to help raise awareness about their conditions. Sometimes there are moments where patients need further clinical support and medicine so we refer them to clinicians. If a patient doesn’t have anyone to help them, it’s for them to go to their GP who will have a social prescriber or a mental health person at their surgery. So they’ll need to use a computer to get a referral. The mental health professional will contact us to deal with the referral form. Our slogan is, together accepting difference. We’ve had the good fortune of getting refreshed funding from both the Ealing council and the west London Mental Health Trust. We had Deirdre Costigan, Labour MP, for Ealing and Southall come to Solace on 6th December 2024 so we have the funding to go forward.”   

Finally, we asked Cllr. Jasbir Anand, Ealing Council’s Cabinet member for tackling crime and antisocial behaviour for her views on the current situation.

She said: “We’ve been actively engaging with the Hanwell and West Ealing community and recently held a meeting in Hanwell, with residents and MP Deirdre Costigan, to discuss tackling crime and anti-social behaviour.

“Ealing Council has been liaising closely with the Hanwell Broadway and Walpole Safer Neighbourhoods teams-(local policing teams). We have been sharing information provided to us by residents to guide their patrols, discussing individuals/addresses that are coming to our attention and they can explore enforcement action.

“As well as coordinating with them, Ealing Council’s safer communities team has arranged for Parkguard, our private security contractors, to begin attending specific areas within West Ealing including St John’s Church, Leeland Road, Melbourne Avenue and Uxbridge Road, in addition to their regular patrols of Ealing Council’s estates and parks. The team will carry out daily, high visibility, patrols to gather intelligence around these areas and will address issues of antisocial behaviour. When this is not being addressed Parkguard will request police assistance. In addition, Ealing Council has arranged for regular CCTV patrols of those areas and will alert the police to any incidents and share stills/footage.”

Where to get help

Reporting a crime

Metropolitan Police

If it is an emergency call 999

Non-emergencies call 101

Report online at https://www.met.police.uk/ro/report/ocr/how-to-report-a-crime

Crimestoppers

You can report anonymously with Crimestoppers on 0800 555111 or online at https://crimestoppers-uk.org/  They will pass on the information.

Mental Health

Solace Centre

The borough’s daily out-of-hours mental health resource centre. Clients need to be referred through a number of agencies. See their website for more details – https://www.westlondon.nhs.uk/our-services/adult/mental-health-services/solace-centre

Ealing Safe Space

A service for anyone, including carers, who feel they are reaching crisis point. More details on their website – https://www.westlondon.nhs.uk/our-services/adult/mental-health-services/safe-spaces

Safety Concerns

StreetSafe is a service from the police that allows you to report anonymously concerns such as poorly lit streets, vandalism as well as occasions when you feel unsafe due to being followed or verbally abused. Their website is https://www.police.uk/pu/notices/streetsafe/street-safe/

Homelessness

StreetLink is a service  linking people sleeping rough to local services. You can report a rough sleeper on their website https://thestreetlink.org.uk/

Addiction

RISE is the borough’s service to help people who want to cut down or stop their use of drugs and alcohol. Details of their services are on their website – https://www.changegrowlive.org/service/ealing-rise/west-ealing

Fly-tipping

The Love Clean Streets app allows you to report environmental issues such as fly-tipping and potholes to Ealing Council – https://www.ealing.gov.uk/info/201230/my_account/2263/love_clean_streets/

Smriti Gopal

Posted on

Notes from West Ealing Neighbours’ public meeting on Thursday 27th March 2025

Around 150 residents packed into the Ballroom at The Drayton Court Hotel at 7:30pm. WEN Vice Chair Eric Leach chaired the meeting. Four Ealing Council Councillors attended – Councillors Quansah, Driscoll, Knewstub and Manro. The latter two sit on Ealing Council’s Cabinet.

West Ealing Community Library (WECL)

Catherine Fitzgibbon, who is leading the Library project, explained that the West Ealing Community CIC (of which David Highton is a Director) is negotiating with Ealing Council to replace Open Ealing (and prior to that Ealing & Hounslow Voluntary Services) as library leaseholders. WECL is run entirely by volunteers and is currently open Tuesday to Friday 10am to 5pm. WECL Friends was recently established and more volunteers are needed. Contact info@wecl.org.uk. All residents were invited to an Open Day at the library on Saturday 5 April 2025 – which will feature music, poetry, story telling, puppet shows and face painting.

Feeling Safe in West Ealing

Kofi Nyamah, Ealing Council’s Community Engagement Manager discussed the Council’s Your Voice, Your Town (YVYT) and Town Teams initiatives. Up to £9 million of Community Infrastructure Levy could be spent based on Town team’s recommendations 2025 – 2039. The main subject of residents’ concerned revealed by YVYT research in 2014 was ‘feeling safe’.

Awful crime figures for Central West Ealing were announced at the meeting for January 2025:

All Reported Crime: 324 incidents

Anti-Social Behaviour (ASB): 135 incidents

Violent and Sex Crimes: 53 incidents

These monthly figures were worse than any month in 2024.

Resident Dave Randles derived these figures from the Crime Maps at www.police.uk

David Highton, WEN Chair, announced the results of a WEN ‘feeling safe’ survey of WEN members. It was small sample size (230 – 273 replies) but the results are very sobering:

Q1 Is ASB in West Ealing a concern for you?

A1 Yes: 94.14%    No: 5.86%

Q2 Do you feel safe in your neighbourhood?

A2 Yes: 23.94%      No: 76.06%

Q3 Do you feel less safe than a year ago?

A3 Yes: 78.13%   No: 21.88%

Q4 Have you been directly affected by ASB in the past 12 months?

A4 Yes: 72.41%   No: 27.59%

Q5 Did you report it to the Police?

Yes: 29.13%  No: 70.87%

The Police Sargeant in charge of West Ealing centre spoke about what actions the Police had taken recently. He also pointed out his slim resources and re-iterated the need for residents to report every incident to the Police. The audience showed its appreciation for the Police efforts.

Lammas Park & East Lodge

Exposurebox videos of digging up the park and e.coli in the park were shown.

The number of objections to the East Lodge Planning Application has exceeded 3,100. In the chair’s experience of 20 years examining Planning Applications, this number is the highest number ever recorded.

The Building Preservation Notice for East Lodge has now been granted. This gives 6 month’s protection from demolition. Council efforts to have East Lodge Listed by Historic England are still being pursued by the Council. A Listing would, theoretically, protect the Lodge in perpetuity.

WEN has recently discovered that a London-wide consortium of all London Boroughs, TfL, Thames Water, Thames Flood Officers and the Environment Agency is behind the digging up of Dean Gardens, Lammas Park and more recently Belvue Park in Northolt. They are implementing a ‘Sustainable Drainage Action Plan (LoSUDS)’.

Waitrose Development

A decision by the Planning Inspector is awaited. The Council thinks this will happen imminently but Justine Sullivan of Stop the Towers said it might take some time.

Gurnell Leisure Centre Development

The GLA Stage 2 response to the Council approved Planning Application criticised building on a floodplain and on MOL, the  footprint and height and only 35% affordable on public land but….decided to leave the decision to Ealing Council. The £100m housing development will be carried out by an external contractor – probably Wilmot Dixon.

Sherwood Close Development

Residents’ champion Antonia Moutsopoulou detailed safety, security, ASB, maintenance and Clarion Housing problems. Councillor Quansah volunteered to meet Antonia on site and help her deal with residents’ problems.

Dean Gardens Development

Since Henry – the builders – went bust in June 2023 the two unfinished tower blocks have not attracted a new builder to deal with the problem and complete the development. It’s thought if/when a new builder is engaged the blocks may have to be demolished and the Planning Application process begun all over again.

Old Woolworths Building Site , 96 – 102 Broadway West Ealing

New proposals for an apartment hotel with 268 suites has been proposed. See BroadwayEaling.site for details and how to comment. The frontage of the proposed  9 storey building elegantly mimics the frontage of the 1922 Woolworths building.

St Mary’s Cathedral

A wonderful repurposing of the St James Church, which has not been in use for years. The opening of the Assyrian Church of the East Cathedral on 15 February 2025 was attended by 500 people from all over the world. WEN is building up good relations with the Cathedral management.

Green Spaces and WEN Abundance

 Green Spaces is a local community initiative for co-ordinating volunteers to recover and re-present small green spaces (westealinggreenspaces.org). Abundance is on ongoing WEN project which involves harvesting fruit in public places and, with permission, in private gardens. The fruit is turned into jams, chutneys and cordial. Both projects are volunteer based and more volunteers are needed.

The public meeting ended at 9:00pm.

Posted on

Serious incident in West Ealing shuts Sainsbury’s and nearby roads

An area in West Ealing south from Sainsbury’s in Melbourne Ave has been cordoned off by the police following a serious incident last night. It’s not clear exactly where the incident was and what happened but it must be serious for such a large area to be cordoned off. Roads closed include Melbourne Ave, Regina Road, St James Ave, Adelaide rd, St Kilda Road and Oaklands Road.

Tuesday 10.15am

Update 1pm

According to the MyLondon news website a man was stabbed and killed in the Oaklands Road area of Hanwell last night

Posted on

Your Town Your Voice event 13th February

Your Voice Your Town is a Council run initiative to involve local residents in some key decisions for their area. It fills a bit of the gap left when the ward forums were stopped a few years ago.

For Ealing, Feeling Safe was chosen as the top priority, as voted by local people who either live, work and/or study in Ealing Town. There were 468 votes cast, and the most votes went to – Feeling Safe (27.4%) with Community Facilities (27.1%) closely behind. Thank you to everyone who took the time to cast their vote.  

There is a two-hour workshop on Thursday 13th February from 7-9pm at The Atrium, Perceval House, 14-16 Uxbridge Road, Ealing W5 2HL.The workshop is designed to create a vision for an Ealing area where people have an increased feeling of safety, where you get to define what that looks like, and share how you can be part of creating that change. Whether you have practical suggestions, creative ideas, or a passion for community improvement, your input is invaluable. Ealing’s elected ward councillors, council officers, and other stakeholders will be present to offer their support as the conversation unfolds.   Please register your place at this workshop via this Eventbrite page, before 5pm, Monday 10 February.  

It will be an open space that welcomes individuals of all backgrounds, levels of experience, ability and knowledge. Ealing has a fund of £120,000 and the support of local skills, resources and expertise to be invested in community-led projects.  

If you cannot attend but would like to be kept informed about Your Voice, Your Town visit the council’s website.

Posted on

Are you worried about anti-social behaviour in West Ealing?

Some of our members have talked to us about their concerns. Now, we want to ask a wider audience for their views. This survey we have set up is quick and simple to complete. The aim of the survey is just to get some sense of whether residents of West Ealing are concerned about anti-social behaviour, whether they feel is is getting better or worse and so on. We would be very grateful if you can spare a few minutes to complete our survey. The survey will stay open until Thursday 20th February. We will publish the results as soon as we can after that date along with our ideas about how WEN will use the results.

The survey link is now closed. We will publish the results here in due course.

Posted on

Notes from West Ealing Neighbours meeting on Thursday 24th October 2024

1.Chair’s report

David Highton, chair, gave a brief report on the past year. He started by saying that when WEN started in 2006 there was very little time spent on considering major developments. In the first years, WEN got involved in activities such as preserving the heritage lampposts, improving pedestrian safety at the Lido Junction and helping establish the arts centre OPEN Ealing. Now, most of our time is spent on major developments – many of which are on tonight’s agenda.

There are two other recent activities he wanted to highlight. Firstly, the efforts made to tackle anti-social behaviour within the O’Grady Court sheltered flats (above the library) which has spilt over on to Melbourne Avenue. A number of agencies were involved and the result is that Peabody Housing which manages the flats has employed security guards to prevent non-residents getting in to the building. Secondly, the library was facing possible closure as it was proving too much for OPEN Ealing to run alongside their arts centres. Neither the Council nor OPEN wants to close the library but a way forward needs to be found. In response to this, WEN helped bring together some dozen interested groups and residents. They met on Monday (21st October) and out of this came a group willing to look at the vision and appropriate governance for the library. This is an encouraging first step towards finding a solution to keeping the library open and enabling it to be at the heart of our local community.

WEN has also been active in supporting efforts to save Victoria Hall, secure the future of Warren Farm and play a part in  Save Ealing’s Centre’s work. Finally, WEN has an active book club and an Abundance project selling its own apple juice through a local deli.

Accounts

Thanks to our treasurer, Andrew Cazalet, for producing the accounts. As at the end of December 2023 WEN has £1324 in the bank. With the cost of this meeting and the one held in February there will be very little left in the bank. Contributions towards the cost of this meeting would be very gratefully received.

Election of committee members

David Highton said the three existing post holders of Chair (David Highton), Vice Chair (Eric Leach) and treasurer (Andrew Cazalet) were silling to stand again. Ian Potts proposed the three and Gillian Brown seconded this.

New committee members

Finally, David Highton thanked all the current members of the committee for their hard work over the past year. He stressed the importance to WEN’s future of new people joining the committee to bring new ideas, enthusiasm and energy.

2. Public Meeting

This part of the meeting was chaired by Eric Leach.

Leeland Terrace

This a part completed development in Maitland Yard/Dean Gardens car park off Leeland Terrace. The builder Henry went bust some time ago. Cllr Manro said the Council is still looking for a builder to take over. In response to a question, he said there are no plans to demolish and start again. No time scale  yet for the works to re-start.

 Green Man Lane Estate

Phase 4 will be 396 homes and is still being reviews by the GLA. After the first contractor went bust the new contractor building the town houses on Felix Road is nearing completion with the first residents having moved in.

Gurnell

Plans include 295 homes in five towers. The new planning application should be submitted by the Council early next year. Cllr Polly Knewstub spoke about the plans and was confident that a top quality project, including a new swimming pool, would be delivered. She also talked about the different ways funds could be raised to cover the costs.

Kwik Fit

This development is for shared living ( a bit like student accommodation) for people of all ages. It will be 134 co-living studio flats in towers up to 9 storeys. Eric Leach raised questions about how this would work in practice and mentioned a similar development where this idea had not worked and had been dropped.

Cllr Manro said the developers for this site are ones which do get on with the work so likely to start soon.

Faulty Towers

This refers to the three tower blocks being built within close proximity of each other – Waitrose, Manor Road and the Majestic Wine site. The councillors didn’t comment on the likely traffic chaos caused by the three simultaneous developments in Manor Road (tower next to station), Hastings Road (Tide Towers) and Alexandria Road for Waitrose.

Tide Tower

This is the old Majestic Wine Warehouse site. Plans are for 448 student bedsits in four towers up to 13 storeys high. The demolition phase has been completed and building work has begun.

Waitrose

The planning application is for 428 homes in six towers – the tallest approaching the height of Big Ben.

The planning application for this development was not determined by the Council within the required timeframe. As a result, John Lewis Partnership has taken it to the Planning Inspectorate to rule for a decision. The Council has decided not to contest this. However, Save The Towers is contesting it and is seeking funds to help it cover its costs.

In response to some strong views on the Council’s decision not to contest this , Cllr Manro explained that the Council required a minimum of 30% affordable homes on this site. The plans had only 20%. The council believe it was negotiating in good faith with John Lewis only ‘to have the rug pulled from beneath it’ by John Lewis. He went on to say that the cost of contesting this application could run in to some £100,000s and this was considered to be too much and not a good use of the Council’s limited resources. He also added that another John Lewis development had proposed just 10% affordable housing and this had been accepted by the local borough, so this would not have helped Ealing Council’s case.

Cllr Manro then made a wider point about how difficult it is for the Council to meet its own targets for affordable housing. They are only managing to reach half their annual target of 2,000 affordable homes a year.  The period of austerity and inflation had pushed a number of builders in to bankruptcy and this had slowed down building these homes. In addition, the costs to housing associations of both the fire remediation work post-Grenfell and  repairing existing stock because of mould and damp mean that housing associations have much less money for new builds.

Stop The Towers

Justine Sulliivan, co-chair of Stop The Towers, outlined why they were willing to represent Ealing residents in opposing John Lewis’s plans for the Waitrose site. She was strongly of the view that if this case was lost then the whole borough would feel the impact of these massive style developments and would be powerless to stop them. The Government Inquiry starts on 19th November. Save The Towers needs financial help to pay its lawyers. Visit their website https://stopthetowers.info to find out how you can help.

Commuter Congestion

Eric Leach commented that the rush hour trains of the Elizabeth Line are already crowded by the time they reach West Ealing. The pressure will only increase with the 7,000 or so new homes being built in Southall on the old gas works site along with the towers by West Ealing station.  He put in a plea for the Council to lobby for more trains on this western branch of the Elizabeth Line.

Old Woolworths site

Still a pile of rubble with no sign of action. Cllr Manro believed this site is still for sale and so no timescale when this site will be developed.

Manor Road Towers

144 flats in two towers – 12 and 18 storeys high. Work is back underway after the initial building contractor went bust.

St James Place

144 flats with towers up to 16 storeys. This is the same developer as for the Kwik Fit site so work should start fairly soon.

Electricity and Water Supply

There were some strong views on the potential problems and likelihood of a shortage of these two utilities. A question from the audience highlighted the impact of data centres on electricity supply (one data centre requires on average enough electricity to supply 50,000 homes). What was the Council doing to secure adequate supplies of both water and electricity? Cllr Manro’s argument was that building would continue and the supplies would have to be provided. The Council could not stop trying to build the homes required for the borough because of this.

Lammas Park

A lot of concern as to just what is happening with the drainage works, the lack of information on the scale of the works and the worries about children’s safety near the newly created ponds. Cllr Gareth Shaw explained that the project was being undertaken with the Environment Agency and was about capturing and slowly releasing excess water from the surrounding area. Work has stopped as a new planning application is required to complete the works. Once complete the works will be connected to the Thames Water system. In terms of safety, Cllr Shaw explained that the planting around the edges of the ponds would act as a deterrent to children to stop them getting too close to the water. There were concerns expressed about loss of green space and a lack of consultation.  

David Highton for the WEN committee

29th October 2024

Posted on

Notes from WEN’s public meeting 26th April 2018

Notes from West Ealing Neighbours’ Annual General Meeting on Thursday 26th April 2018 at St John’s Church, Mattock Lane, West Ealing

Review of past activities

David Highton, chair, opened the meeting with a brief review of some of West Ealing Neighbours’ activities over the past couple of years:

  • Following the cancellation of the 2015 SoundBite Festival In Dean Gardens due to an overnight incident in the park, WEN took the initiative to try to start to tackle anti-social behaviour. It brought together local stakeholders such as housing associations, faith groups, residents’ groups, councillors, council officials and police in a series of regular meetings. With financial support a plan to redesign Dean Gardens was commissioned. This plan has been incorporated in to the new Liveable Neighbourhood project for West Ealing funded by TfL.
  • This group supported the introduction of the Public Space Protection Order which came into force in April 2017 and which has helped reduce anti-social behaviour in West Ealing.
  • WEN has been on the working group for the co-working business hub due to open later this year in St James Ave.
  • The Abundance project continues and contributes £500-£1000 a year to WEN’s funds. The projects produce includes apple juice, chutneys and more and the main outlet is Cheddar Deli in Northfiled Ave. Thanks to Elizabeth Highton for all her hard work on this.
  • In December we started looking after the planters/seats in Melbourne Ave and have cleaned them, replanted some and now maintain them on a regular basis. We have offered to look after the flower beds planned for the pigeon-infested patch of grass on the corner of Leeland Terrace and Melbourne Ave.
  • We continue to help put on the annual Soundite Festival and Christmas Fair.
  • Diane Gill and others manage our successful Facebook group which has about 4,500 members.
  • The bookswap shelf is still active in West Ealing station
  • Jane Humphreys runs the monthly book club meetings in the Star and Anchor on the last Wednesday of each month.
  • The 2017 accounts show a bank balance of nearly £7,000. Some of these reserves could be spent for the benefit of the local community and this is an item later on the agenda.

Election of the committee

David Highton, Eric Leach, Diane Gill, Andrew Cazalet, Jane Humphreys were all willing to stand again for the committee and Laura Cross was willing to stand as a new committee member. These nominations were proposed and seconded and accepted by the meeting.

David noted that there were a number of other people interested in getting involved and we will follow up with them after the meeting

Difficulty of dealing with the Council over claiming benefits

Tony Eley talked briefly about his own experiences of how difficult it was to claim housing benefit now everything is done online. He asked the audience to raise this with candidates for the local election and what they could do to help improve this very difficult situation for many older people, non-English speakers and residents not able to access or use the internet.

Public Space Protection Order

Abbi Shaw, Safer Communities Officer gave some statistics about the impact of the PSPO:

As part of the analysis undertaken on the West Ealing PSPO, crime and ASB data from April – October 2017 was reviewed in comparison with the same period from the previous year (prior to the introduction of the PSPO).

The analysis showed that, compared to a borough wide reduction in overall crime of 5% during April-October 2017, crime in the PSPO wards is down 29%.  Particularly striking for me are the significant reductions in criminal damage (45% compared to 9% borough wide) and drug offences (77% compared to 3% borough wide).

Reductions in ASB, violence and sex offences and public order are all significantly better than those across the borough too.

Wider analysis was also done around other emergency services data, which showed a 24% reduction in alcohol related calls to London Ambulance Service compared to the same period the previous year.

She then took questions covering problems about the PSPO displacing anti-social behaviour from West Ealing to Northfields, Hanwell and Ealing Broadway. As a result, the Council is working on a borough-wide PSPO with a consultation likely in December.

In reply to a question about the problem of reporting incidents on 101 she said changes were likely to be made to this service. But residents could contact her to report incidents and these would be logged and investigated.

West Ealing Business Inprovement District

Anna Elliott BID Manager explained about how the BID works in West Ealing. Busineses with over a£10,000 annual rateable value contribute 1.07% of the rateable value to the BID. There are some 400 levy payers.  All the money raised is used to provide services and other benefits to local businesses such as a waste collection service, pest control services and a wide range of publicity and promotional activities such as the recent and successful children’s craft activities at Easter.

The BID’s first 5 year period ends next year so she is leading the campaign for the ballot in Novemebr when businesses will vote yes or no to renewing the BID for a further 5 years.

She explained a new BID initiative which is a map of the West Ealing shopping centre showing key businesses, cultural events and more on one side and a list of shops by category on the other.

West Ealing Liveable Neighbourhood project

David Highton spoke briefly about this £8.6m TfL funded project. It has only just started and the most useful information is in the FAQs handout which everyone should have.  The plan includes a redesign of Dean Gardens (as mentioned earlier) and a range of measures to improve the area along and both sides of the Uxbridge Rd.  The improvements are aimed at making it more attractive for pedestrians and cyclists along with improving the air quality. WEN is on the stakeholder group which will meet regularly and help shape and guide the final plans.

Concerns were raised by a number of people about TfL not being car friendly and this could affect elderly and disabled people who need to use their cars to come to West Ealing. Also, concerns about wasteful ideas which may lead to unnecessary changes to pavements and Dean Gardens. Another question raised about ensuring pedestrians are properly considered in the plans.

One key role for West Ealing Neighbours is to give maximum publicity to this project and the plans so as many residents as possible know about them and are able to put forward their view and ideas.

West Ealing Centre Neighbourhood Forum (WECNF)

Eric Leach, Chair of WECNF, talked through the group’s plans for West Ealing which will go to vote alongside the local election on 3rd May. If over 50% of both residents and businesses who vote are in favour then the plans will become part of the formal planning decision process. The plan can be seen at the local library and on their website www.wecnf.org

Using our surplus funds

David Highton explained that WEN has almost £7,000 in the bank. We don’t need to hold this amount so are there any ideas as to how some of it could be spent to benefit the local community?  For example, WEN has spent about £3-400 on the improving the planters in Melbourne Ave. We could, for example, take on planting the flower beds that are due for inclusion in the Council’s redesign of the patch of grass by Sainsbury’s.

Two ideas were suggested: we could fund live music in St James Ave as part of making it a more inviting and attractive space and we could hold more public meetings as there are now only two ward forums a year.

The committee will consider these and any other suggestions and report back on its decisions.

Any Other Business

The meeting closed at 9pm and David thanked the committee for its work and support.