Latest news with #SouthwarkCouncil
BBC News
11 hours ago
- Politics
- BBC News
Southwark Council to close two schools over falling school rolls
Two primary schools in south London are set to close amid a declining birth rate and families leaving the Council has said it has made the "difficult" decision to shut down Charlotte Sharman Primary School in Elephant and Castle and St Mary Magdalene Church of England Primary School in Peckham at the end of August despite efforts by campaigners to keep them closed, this will mean eight schools will have shut down in the borough since 2022 the Local Democracy Reporting Service board of governors at each school have appealed to the council to come up with solutions to keep them open. The council leadership agreed to the closures at a meeting on Tuesday in line with recommendations made in a leader Kieron Williams said: "The two decisions that we have got to contemplate this morning as cabinet I know are very difficult ones for people who are very attached to their schools as I am to my children's schools, so we understand they are very sensitive decisions and difficult ones to work through."There were talks to merge Charlotte Sharman and another school called St Jude's Primary however this plan fell through and Charlotte Sharman continued to struggle online petition to save the school from closure which has received more than 1,000 signatures has accused Southwark Council of not fully exploring other options such as merging with another school, securing additional funding or increasing enrolment outreach. 'Very, very sad day' David Workman, chair of governors at Charlotte Sharman, told cabinet members: "Since last year we have been engaging willingly and effectively with the local authority to look at our financial situation and try and put mitigations in place."There are alternative options we have put forward and to not give us the time to act more decisively and creatively after those two lengthy processes which have taken our bandwidth as it were, is to possibly neglect what might be possible in terms of preserving the school community."Sonia Phippard, chair of governors at the St Mary Magdalene school, said it had served the community for 170 years and that the council's decision marked a "very, very sad day".
Yahoo
01-06-2025
- Business
- Yahoo
Ranking boroughs most desperate for the London Underground Bakerloo line extension
Residents and businesses across London have thrown their support behind the proposed Bakerloo line extension, with 76 per cent of locals in boroughs along the proposed new route backing the scheme. The data comes from a set of surveys commissioned by Central London Forward, working alongside alongside Southwark Council, Lewisham Council and Business for Bakerloo, to understand the level of support behind the Tube line upgrade. The scheme would see the service extending to serve Lewisham via Southwark, as well as the opportunity to extend the service further to Hayes and Beckenham Junction. The survey saw 1,014 residents across seven London boroughs being questioned on the scheme. Brent was listed as showing the greatest support for the extension, with 81 per cent of residents backing the scheme. This was closely followed by Lewisham and Southwark, with 79 and 78 per cent respectively. READ MORE: The old London Underground route we wish still existed that went all the way to the seaside READ MORE: Britain's 'most woke' £2m roundabout due to open next week Harrow, Westminster and Lambeth residents all demonstrated a similar level of support, with approximately 75 per cent of those surveyed approving of the upgrade. Bromley respondents were more unsure, as 69 per cent backed the scheme while 24 per cent said they might support it. Regarding local businesses, 95 per cent of businesses surveyed in Brent expressed support for the scheme, while 90 per cent of Bromley businesses backed the proposal. Overall, 88 per cent of the 446 businesses in the area of the extension support the scheme, while 90 per cent of the 459 businesses which were not within the area also approved of it. Labour Councillor Claire Holland, leader of Lambeth Council said: "London needs to invest in its transport infrastructure to drive job creation and increase housing delivery. The Bakerloo line Upgrade and Extension is expected to support the creation of 150,000 good jobs and the delivery of 107,000 new homes across its length. Nearly 80 per cent of residents in Lambeth support the proposals." She added: "As a council we are keenly focussed on growth opportunities that benefit Lambeth residents. The extension would be a major boost for growth in Waterloo, better connecting the area's world-class arts & cultural institutions, thriving hospitality sector and major employers to the rest of South East London." Mayor of London Sadiq Khan said in February this year that the route for the proposed extension had been safeguarded by Transport Secretary Heidi Alexander. The comments came during the launch of the London Growth Plan, detailing ambitions for local leaders to work alongside the government to deliver transport projects such as the Bakerloo extension. Sir Sadiq told MyLondon at the launch event on February 27 : "We've safeguarded the route [this week] with the transport secretary, putting the case to her about the importance of the Bakerloo line extension. We're also keen to get government green light for the DLR extension to Thamesmead." He added: "Here's the point, the government rightly wants more homes. The government rightly wants more jobs, wealth, prosperity. Well giving the green light to these pieces of transport infrastructure does just that. More homes, better public transport, more jobs, more growth, more prosperity." Have a story you want to share? Email Don't miss out on the biggest local stories. Sign up to our MySouthLondon newsletter HERE for all the latest daily news and more.
Scottish Sun
07-05-2025
- Business
- Scottish Sun
Free cash you can get on Universal Credit at any time worth up to £29,000 – and you don't have to pay it back
Click to share on X/Twitter (Opens in new window) Click to share on Facebook (Opens in new window) STRUGGLING households on Universal Credit could be missing out on a treasure trove of cash. Even better, none of the cash or benefits need to be paid back whatsoever. Sign up for Scottish Sun newsletter Sign up 1 Families on Universal Credit could receive up to £29,000 a year From free childcare and school meals to help with energy bills and even funeral costs, there's a raft of support available that could be worth up to £29,000 a year. As families continue to feel the pinch of the cost-of-living , it's really important to know what help is available and claim any additional benefits that you're entitled to. Here's how to make sure you're not leaving money on the table. Household Support Fund – Up to £600 Firstly, if you're struggling to keep up with day-to-day costs, you might be able to get help from your local council through the Household Support Fund. The fund is designed to help families pay for essentials like energy, water bills, food, and white goods. Some councils offer up to £600, but amounts and eligibility vary, so check with your local authority. You can find out more about how to apply here. School Uniform Grants – Up to £200 Kitting out the kids for school can be pricey, but many councils offer uniform grants to help. In Wales, families can get up to £200 per child, while in England, amounts vary by council. For example, Southwark Council offers a £45 voucher for 11-year-olds moving to secondary school. Energy Bill Grants – Up to £1,500 For those facing a hefty bill, some providers, like British Gas, offer grants up to £1,500 to help customers in need. Eligibility varies, so contact your supplier to see what's available. What energy bill help is available? There's a number of different ways to get help paying your energy bills if you're struggling to get by. If you fall into debt, you can always approach your supplier to see if they can put you on a repayment plan before putting you on a prepayment meter. This involves paying off what you owe in instalments over a set period. If your supplier offers you a repayment plan you don't think you can afford, speak to them again to see if you can negotiate a better deal. Several energy firms have schemes available to customers struggling to cover their bills. But eligibility criteria vary depending on the supplier and the amount you can get depends on your financial circumstances. For example, British Gas or Scottish Gas customers struggling to pay their energy bills can get grants worth up to £2,000. British Gas also offers help via its British Gas Energy Trust and Individuals Family Fund. You don't need to be a British Gas customer to apply for the second fund. EDF, Octopus Energy and Scottish Power all offer grants to struggling customers too. Thousands of vulnerable households are missing out on extra help and protections by not signing up to the Priority Services Register (PSR). The service helps support vulnerable households, such as those who are elderly or ill. Some of the perks include being given advance warning of blackouts, free gas safety checks and extra support if you're struggling. Get in touch with your energy firm to see if you can apply. Help to Save – £1,200 Over Four Years The Help to Save scheme rewards you for putting money aside. Save up to £50 a month, and the government will add a 50% bonus which is up to £1,200 over four years. As of April 2025, all working individuals on Universal Credit earning £1 or more are eligible. Five key changes to PIP & Universal Credit as Labour's benefits crackdown unveiled Healthy Start – Up to £442 a Year For families expecting a baby or that already have children under four, the Healthy Start scheme provides prepaid cards to buy essentials like milk, fruit, and vegetables. You could get up to £442 a year, depending on your circumstances. Free School Meals – Worth Up to £967 a Year Children in households on Universal Credit with an income below £7,400 a year may be eligible for free school meals. With the average meal costing £2.65, that's a potential saving of £967 per child annually. Council Tax Support – Up to £2,280 Many councils offer reductions on council tax for those on Universal Credit. Depending on your circumstances, you could get up to 100% off, saving you as much as £2,280 a year. Water Bill Help – Up to £328.50 Water companies offer social tariffs for low-income households. For instance, Affinity Water caps bills at £119.50 annually for eligible customers, compared to the average £448 bill. This could save you an extra £328.50. Childcare Cash – Up to £21,227 a Year Parents on Universal Credit can now claim back up to 85% of childcare costs, with the monthly cap raised to £1,768.94 for two or more children as of April 2025. That's a whopping £21,227 a year and you can even get the cash upfront if you're starting a new job or increasing your hours. What help is available to parents for childcare costs? CHILDCARE can be a costly business. Here is how you can get help. 30 hours of free childcare - Parents of three and four-year-olds can apply for 30 hours of free childcare a week. To qualify you must work at least 16 hours a week at the national living or minimum wage and earn less than £100,000 a year. free childcare - Parents of three and four-year-olds can apply for 30 hours of free childcare a week. To qualify you must work at least 16 hours a week at the national living or minimum wage and earn less than £100,000 a year. Tax credits - For children under 20, some families can get help with childcare costs. For children under 20, some families can get help with childcare costs. Tax-free childcare - Available to working families and the self-employed, for every £8 you put in the government will add an extra £2. Funeral Expenses Payment – Up to £1,000 If you're arranging a funeral and receive Universal Credit, you might be eligible for a Funeral Expenses Payment of up to £1,000 to cover costs like burial fees and travel. Mums expecting their first child can claim a one-off £500 Sure Start Maternity Grant to help with the costs of a new baby. Apply from 11 weeks before your due date up to six months after the birth. Free NHS Prescriptions and More If you're on Universal Credit and meet certain income criteria, you may be entitled to free NHS prescriptions, dental treatment, and eye tests. This can save you hundreds over the year. Flexible Support Fund – Amounts Vary The Flexible Support Fund helps cover costs related to starting or staying in work, such as travel, childcare, or uniforms. Managed by Jobcentres, the amount you can get varies, so speak to your work coach for details. Free legal advice You could get help through Legal Aid if you're at risk of homelessness or eviction. Legal aid can also help meet the costs of family mediation and representation in a court or tribunal. For instance, says you might get legal aid if: you or your family are at risk of abuse or serious harm, for example domestic violence or forced marriage you're at risk of homelessness or losing your home you've been accused of a crime, face prison or detention you're being discriminated against you need family mediation you're adding legal arguments or bringing a case under the Human Rights Act You'll usually need to show that you cannot afford to pay for this help, and you might even have to pay some money towards the legal costs of your case or pay costs back later. The government has a helpful tool you can use to see if you might be eligible. Cheap Broadband – Save Up to £196.68 a Year Broadband providers like BT offer social tariffs for those on Universal Credit, with prices starting at £15 a month. Switching from the average £26.39 monthly bill could save you £196.68 annually. Virgin Media Essentials: £12.50/month for 15Mbps or £20/month for 54Mbps. No setup cost and a rolling 30-day contract. Sky Broadband Basics: £20/month for 36Mbps. 18-month contract, no setup fee. Vodafone Essentials: £12/month for 38Mbps or £20/month for 73Mbps. 12-month contract. Hyperoptic Fair Fibre: £15/month for 50Mbps or £20/month for 150Mbps. Rolling contract, available in select urban areas. NOW Broadband Basics: £20/month for 36Mbps. Includes line rental and has no setup cost. TalkTalk: Offers its Future Fibre social tariff in partnership with the DWP. It's available to benefit claimants and provides full-fibre speeds at a lower cost. Its always important to check what you may be eligible to receive to make sure you're getting all the help you can.
Daily Mail
02-05-2025
- Automotive
- Daily Mail
TOM UTLEY: Mrs U's £55 parking fine meant that, for once, SHE looked silly. I paid up - it was cheap at the price for the joy of seeing her blush!
The other day my darling wife, and fellow technophobe, finally joined the brave new world of the smartphone parking app. It was to prove a costly experience. Until then, something had gone wrong whenever we tried to download the PayByPhone app on her Samsung Galaxy, although – unusually for me – I'd had no such trouble downloading it on my iPhone. She therefore used to ring me whenever she had the car and needed to pay for parking. She would then tell me the location number of the space she had found, and I would feed it into my own app to pay the fee. But then, last week, she announced triumphantly that, at last, she had succeeded in downloading the app. So off she drove, exulting in her newfound independence, to walk the dog in Dulwich Park, where Southwark Council now charges an extortionate £2.70 per hour for using the once-free car park. An hour later, she was home, seething with rage and clutching in her fist... a parking ticket! 'The flaming app told me I had five minutes left!' she said. (To be brutally honest, 'flaming' was not her precise choice of word, but this is a family newspaper, and she was sorely provoked, poor thing.) Well, I checked our joint bank account online and, sure enough, a payment of £2.70 had gone out to Southwark Council half an hour before the ticket was issued. So what on earth had she done wrong to incur a £55 fine, rising to more than twice as much if we didn't cough up pronto? 'Um, are you quite sure you put our registration number in the app?' I asked. 'Of course I did! I'm not stupid!' she fumed, and she thrust her PayByPhone app under my nose to prove it. At first glance, it looked all right. But, oh, dear, wait a minute. Instead of the last three letters of our registration number, she'd absent-mindedly programmed in the last three characters of our postcode. Perhaps other long-married couples will understand when I say that my irritation over the parking ticket was mixed with a delicious sense that, for once, she was the one who looked silly, and not me. 'Never mind, darling,' I said, as I relished my moment of schadenfreude. 'It could happen to anyone. God, don't I hate modern technology too!' Indeed, I can't help feeling that life was an awful lot simpler in the days before the smartphone, when there was no danger of making a mistake like hers. You knew where you stood with good old cash, when paying for parking meant feeding sixpences or shillings into a meter. (For the benefit of the young, a sixpence was 2.5p, and a shilling was 5p). True, you had to have the right change – and many of us kept a stash of coins in the glove compartment for that purpose. But even if we didn't happen to have what we needed, a passer-by would usually be happy to give us change for a half-crown (12.5p) or a ten-shilling note (50p). I should also admit that coin-in-the-slot meters were often out of action through theft or wanton vandalism, even in those days before so many of our city centres became no-go areas riddled with crime. But, if so, we could generally get away with parking without charge, simply by sticking a note on the windscreen saying: 'Meter out of order.' Though never noted for their forgiving nature, traffic wardens would usually understand. Of course, paying electronically for parking – or for anything else – can be much more convenient than using cash, assuming that the technology is working properly and we are careful with how we use it. But, this week, we were treated to terrifying warnings of just how vulnerable our increasing reliance on electronic technology makes every one of us – and not just the odd absent-minded old lady. I'm thinking of the catastrophic power cuts in Spain and Portugal, where life as we have come to know it came to an abrupt halt when the electricity supply failed. Entire transport systems ground to a standstill, hospitals were plunged into darkness, ATMs stopped issuing money, distribution networks for food and goods ceased to function, TV channels went off air and millions couldn't contact anyone to ask what the hell was going on. Meanwhile, only those with the luck or the foresight to have cash in their wallets were able to buy what they needed for their families. Yes, I know the blackout has been blamed on Spain's excessive dependence on solar and wind power, which are apparently more vulnerable than old-fashioned methods of generating electricity (and there would surely be a lesson in that for Ed Miliband, if only he were not too deranged to listen). But just imagine how quickly a hostile foreign power could consign us all to the dark ages of hunger and disease, simply by interfering with the computer programs that govern our electricity supplies for a week or two. Don't tell me that modern anti-virus systems are too sophisticated to allow such a thing to happen. Just look at the huge harm inflicted this week by hackers – possibly teenagers, it's said – on shops such as M&S and Harrods, causing mayhem by attacking their IT systems. Indeed, every week we read of more businesses falling victim to cybercrime, while the number of ordinary citizens who suffer a similar fate grows greater all the time. Now we are told that even everyday household appliances such as high-tech fridges, TVs, smart speakers and video doorbells may be capable of spying on us and harvesting our personal details for nefarious purposes. That's not to mention online retailers, banking apps or payment-card readers. No wonder so many of my generation and older are deeply wary of shopping with plastic cards or making payments online, feeling much more comfortable with notes and coins. Yet so many outlets now refuse cash that life is becoming increasingly difficult for those who prefer it. Indeed, it has come to the point where MPs say shops and services may one day have to be forced to accept cash, in order to protect vulnerable people who rely on it. Meanwhile, members of the cross-party Treasury Committee advise that we might all be wise to keep a store of cash, to see us through future cyberattacks and blackouts. We of a certain age are well used to being mocked by our young for our technological incompetence and our grave suspicion of the internet. But at the rate we're going, there may soon come a time when they are forced to accept that we've been the smart ones all along. As for that parking fine, yes, I know we should have challenged it. But I'm ashamed to admit that I just couldn't face the palaver of hanging on the line for an eternity ('Your call is important to us'), before trying to explain my wife's mix-up over the registration number to some bloody-minded official, whose computer would almost certainly say 'No' to my pleas. So I meekly coughed up that £55 fine, on top of the £2.70 my wife had already paid. Ah, well, it was cheap at the price for the pleasure of seeing her blush.
ITV News
01-05-2025
- Business
- ITV News
Councillors promise to urgently address safety fears at London's top tourist food market
Tap above to watch video report by Simon Harris Councillors say they will take action to address fears over safety at London's top tourist food market - Borough Market. Crowds of shoppers often pour out of one hall into another and run the gauntlet of cars and vans as they cross Bedale Street.A report by crowd control experts estimated shoppers pause for vehicles - or drivers hit the brakes to avoid pedestrians - 800 times a report calls them interactions. "We commissioned the report because we know that Borough Market can be very busy at peak times," said Shane Holland Chair of Borough Market Board of Trustees. "The safety of everyone who comes to the market and all of our traders is paramount. "We commissioned an independent survey to look at how we can mitigate some of those issues," Mr Holland one end of the market Stoney Street was closed to traffic after the London Bridge terror attacks in 2017 and the concrete bollards were meant to be at the other end of the market in Bedale Street there are no bollards so visitors and vehicles jostle for MP Neil Coyle thinks that needs to change. "There are too many near misses - there are far too many people trying to use a road and pavements that is not managed very well," Bermondsey & Old Southwark MP Mr Coyle said. Borough Market is no local street market but a significant landmark on the London tourist trail. The market's popularity as a destination for both foodies and tourists grew rapidly after the Covid lockdowns. The area now attracts 30 million visitors a also become hugely popular on social media - in particular Instagram and McCourt has been a butcher at the market for a decade and thinks Southwark Council's traffic management policies have made matters worse. He said: "They are closing roads all around the surrounding area, they are narrowing roads and taking away loading bays so they are forcing more traffic to come here." There are problems for cabbies too. Ikea opens Oxford Street store amid rejuvenation of West End shopping area Steve McNamara from the Licensed Taxi Drivers' Association said: "The more roads you close, the more traffic you put on other roads. "London is already Europe's most congested city - are we going to make that worse?" Southwark Council told us it was urgently working with the police TfL and the market to look at safety. Councillor James McAsh from Southwark Council's said: "The safety of our residents, visitors and traders is a top priority for us. "We're urgently working with the Metropolitan Police, Transport for London, Borough Market Trust and traders to look at safety at Borough Market. "We will ensure all parties are kept informed of this work as it progresses."
