Help stop the vile network Rail from selling off one of the most vibrant parts of London-The Arches

Whether you are a small business owner, customer or a supporter of thriving local communities, sign our open letter to the Secretary of State for Transport and help us guard the arches.

Dear Mr Grayling,

There are thousands of small businesses based in railway arches all over the country. We are committed and energetic businesspeople – motorcycle mechanics, café owners, furniture restorers, garage owners, textile manufacturers, bakers and much else besides – who work hard to make a living and provide a service. We are the beating heart of the places where we’re based, powering local economies and giving life and energy to local communities.

But our future is in grave danger. By August this year, our landlord Network Rail wants to sell off all of the 5,500 railway arches in its possession to the highest bidder. Network Rail have valued the arches at around £1bn, and already the sharks are circling. Some of the biggest names in property and financial speculation are lining up bids, from Goldman Sachs to Terra Firma. Somehow we do not believe these companies have our interests at heart.

We are already under huge pressure from Network Rail. Many of us have faced in-year rent rises of as much as 500%, as our landowner seeks to increase the long-term ‘value’ of the arches. Some of us have already been forced to close as a result. Others have had to move out of places they’ve been doing business in for decades, with terrible consequences for their own businesses and for the places and communities they have had to leave behind.

This has to stop.

It’s easy to forget this, but Network Rail is publicly owned. And the land it owns is public too. That means they have a responsibility to serve the public good. They say the Government is forcing them to balance the books, so they have to sell off their assets – including the arches. But how many small businesses will go under as a result? How many entrepreneurs will lose the will to carry on when they’re facing unpayable rent demands? And how many of the communities who rely on these businesspeople will suffer as a result? Is that really serving the public good?

We are at the sharp end of this sell-off. We are the human cost of this approach. We are:

• A garage owner whose 92-year-old dad ran the business for 60 years but couldn’t carry on when faced with a 500% rent rise
• A nationally renowned bakery concerned that the neighbourhood which sustains the business will collapse because nearby firms are being driven out one by one
• A motorcycle repair shop facing a 300% in-year rent increase after Network Rail took away their security of tenure

And many, many more.

We have a simple request. Stop this sale of the railway arches. Stop the unnecessary destruction of local businesses and local economies all over the country. Instead, meet us and talk to us about how we can reach a settlement for the future.

We are business people – we are reasonable and we know how to reach a deal. So before you let this damaging sale go through, talk to us about how the arches should be owned and managed.

We are the Guardians of the Arches. We won’t quit until the future of the railway arches – and the businesses and communities which rely on them – is secure.

THURSDAY POEM TURDIS KHAN

TURDIS KHAN

Reading Wallace Shawn's 'Night Thoughts' on the loo.
About the lucky and the unlucky.
Please READ IT!
But I am skeptical about his admonitions to the filthy rich.

I rise & notice my huge,
Intransigent-yes my Prussian-Turd,
Wedging itself implacably
In the elbow of the bowl.

Like the brave three hundred
Straining at the pass.
Brownly staring down all comers-

I have created Turdis Khan-
Who will found the Empire
Of Turdistan.

From abject despair suddenly
A godlike saviour has been birthed!

Thus do heroes arrive from Nowhere-
I have shat out an Achilles!
For the Greeks and the Chinese.

I do not flush.

Hidden Treasures of St Giles Church Horsten Keynes and memories of the Norman Holocaust.

The Norman Church of St Giles located in the pretty village of Horsten Keynes in Sussex.  Built by the Normans as they blitzkrieged their way from the battlesite of Hastings across Southern England as the latest holocaust to hit this Island, exterminating the Anglo Saxon culture as they came and instituting a tyranny under William the Bastard whose effects still can be felt today.  For further excellent juice on this topic try this:

Written in a initially strange Olde English hybrid, it becomes familiar just a few pages in leading to a wonderful immersion in the sense of fully inhabiting the books narrative.  Hereward The Wake was one of my early heroes as I had a book about him in my early library when I was about 8 years old though I seem to recall his battles were with the Romans not the Normans.  Lets quickly look right now.

Life & Times of Hereward the Wake
By Geoff Boxell
H E R E W A R D
T H E      W A K E
Legendary Fenland Hero

Most English know of Hereward the Wake (meaning 'wary'), the Fenland's most famous hero, who led a revolt against Duke William the Bastard of Normandy, who had usurped the English throne after defeating the English army at the Battle of Hastings, and killing the last king of the English, Harold Godwinson, and the flower of the English nobility in the process. But what is fact and what is legend?

The real Hereward held lands in Warwickshire and Lincolnshire at the time of Edward the Confessor, left England some time after 1062, and later reappeared to plunder the Abbey of Peterborough (1070) - the Anglo-Saxon Chronicle (at this time being written at Peterborough) says simply that among those at the sack of Peterborough were 'Hereward and his crew'. At the time, or shortly after, he was holding the Isle of Ely, with its Camp of Refuge, against the Normans (1071). During this time Hereward sometimes had Danish help. He also attracted many dissidents such as the Earl Morkar, and Siward Bain. The isle took a lot of Norman effort to capture. Hereward was one of those to escape. He continued the struggle for sometime, operating in and near the Fens. Eventually he made his peace with King William.

From these sparse facts has grown the legend of Hereward, son of Leofric, Earl of Mercia (or Leofric of Bourne, Lincolnshire). In his youth he kept wild company, and when he was fourteen his father persuaded King Edward to make him an outlaw. He was brought back to England by the news that the Normans had seized his father's estates. On his return he found that the new Norman owners had not only taken the land, but also slain his brother, whose head was set above the door of the house. Like an avenging thunderbolt, he descended upon the killers and slew them all. Next day 14 Norman heads had replaced that of his brother above the door. News of Hereward's exploits spread and he became the leader of a mixed band of English and Danish warriors, who flocked to join him at his new base at the great Abbey of Ely.

William the Conqueror led his army to Ely, then an island in the Fens, and was three times foiled by Hereward in the attempt to build a causeway across the marshes. The third time, while William was encamped at Brandon, Hereward rode there on his horse, a noble beast called Swallow, on the way meeting a potter, who agreed to exchange clothes with him and lend him his wares. In this disguise Hereward got into William's camp and overheard his plans (as according to legend King Alfred disguised himself as a harper to enter the camp of the Danes). When William built his third causeway, and proceeded to send his soldiers along it to attack Ely, Hereward's men, hidden in the reeds, set fire to the vegetation. The Normans were engulfed by the flames, and those who tried to escape were either drowned in the marsh or picked off by English arrows.

But the monks of Ely grew tired of the siege and let the Normans in by a secret path. Hereward escaped with a handful of men and was soon leading a new resistance. Whilst mounting an attack on Stamford, Hereward and his men became hopelessly lost in Rockingham Forest. Then St Peter sent a wolf (St Peter animal) to show them the way, and as darkness fell, lighted candles appeared on every tree and on every man's shield, burning steadily no matter how the wind blew. This was a token of the apostle's gratitude for Hereward sparing the abbot and returning part of the treasure to the saint's own abbey of Peterborough.

Eventually William made peace with him, but he still had other enemies. One day a chaplain, whom he had asked to keep watch while he slept, betrayed him and sixteen Normans broke into the house. Though he slew fifteen of his attackers with his lance or his famous sword Brainbiter, and a sixteenth with his shield, he fell when four more knights entered and stabbed him in the back with their spears.

Like Edric the Wild, it was as a resistance leader that he first became famous, but soon frankly fabulous stories were attracted to his name. Within eighty years of the real Hereward's death, the Hereward of legend was in full cry, in the Estorie des Engles of Geoffrey Gaimar from around 1140, and the Gesta Herewardii Saxonis ('Deeds of Hereward the Saxon'). The author of the Gesta, writing no more than fifty years after William's assault on Ely, tells us on the one hand that he remembers seeing fishermen dredging Norman skeletons, still in their rusty armour, out of the fen; on the other, that Hereward once slew a Cornish giant!

Songs were being sung about Hereward in taverns a hundred years after his death; and in the thirteenth century people still visited a ruined wooden castle in the Fens which was known as Hereward's Castle. But later he was supplanted by another outlaw-hero, Robin Hood, as a symbol of resistance to oppression.

Geoff Boxell is author of the novel: "Woden's Wolf" that deals with the English resistance to the Norman Conquest.

So then lets forget the Romans!  That was an earlier holocaust!

As for Horsten Keynes a pretty village but full of signs telling you what you can't do and the countryside tied down like a military training ground.  Like all communities of the rich it seems to scream GET OFF MY LAND!!!!
No wild swimming here mate!

How did Supermac get here?  WELL HE WASN'T SUPERMAC BECAUSE HE WAS A TORY!  Best known for his 'Night of the long Knives' when he decimated his increasingly rebellious cabinet.

A strange and warlike carving of a Bishop's staff or sceptre.  Very magical.

A tiny little ancient sculpture looking like a child's tomb.

From the back page of the great little magazine-'The Baffler'.  No I have no idea why it is here!

EXTREME CUT OFF JEANS

Apparently normal humans are queuing up to order these extreme cut-out jeans.  Am I alone in considering this complete madness?  THEN AGAIN YOU SAW IT HERE FIRST!

SOURDOUGH BREAD SCHOOL

Best for... sourdough

The Sourdough School, Northampton, Northamptonshire

I’ve long dreamt of making my own sourdough bread (I love the tang and the open texture), and after just a day with Vanessa Kimbell I was on my way. Kimbell demystifies the process with inimitable humour and sends you home with a starter, flour and a banneton in which to prove your bread. Forty-eight hours later my first sourdough loaf came out of the oven. And that was just the beginning. Kimbell’s 'after-care’ is five-star. You become part of her Sourdough Club (with access to advice and recipes) and can send her pictures of your loaves – crumb as well as crust – until you get it right. These aren’t just courses; Kimbell wants to change the bread we eat, one loaf at a time. Sourdough baking is a journey. Book your passage. Diana Henry 

£175 for a 10am-4pm beginner’s course (sourdough.co.uk; 07813 308301) 

WILLIE WONKA BY ALIE DOUGAN

WILLY WONKA BY ALIE DOUGAN

William Blake- 'The Fly'

How do you create a great Social Work Team? Or any kind of great team? By Tony Dougan

A recent Social Work Essay was invited by the Recruitment Company-Liquid Personnel with a £1000 first prize so I entered.  I was not shortlisted but here are some of my less bizarre thoughts on the subject below.

“The average ‘career lifespan’ of a social worker is just 8 years.  What can be done to increase engagement among social workers and keep them in the profession for longer?”

My title is:

How to lead, care for, and inspire great work in a social work team.

Mirror a loving family under pressure.

Train, support, develop, stretch, and trust.

Use authority with great care and sparingly.

Continually recognise and celebrate good work and achievements.

Make lots of space for laughter.  Share food a lot.

Make lots of space to meet and share.

Continually emphasise-service-to service users and each other.

Resist cultures of overwork and presenteeism.

Always accompany a negative criticism with a positive solution.

Insist that negative feelings are shared and talked through.

Continually emphasise personal and professional safety.

Grow and invest in your workers over time.

Be clear about the team’s Mission Statement.

Have whiteboards everywhere-magnetic ones!

Encourage familiarity and pleasure in research.

Create the practice of always cascading training.

Insist upon loyalty to the team as a basic expectation.

Sometimes play music in the office.

Shared lunch is positive but never obligatory.

Encourage your social workers to take breaks and go for walks.

Have regular group supervisions on complex cases.

Train your social workers to be at ease with authority in safeguarding cases and to project it with confidence but also with compassion and understanding.

Make supervision an exciting, challenging but ultimately affirming experience.

Be a leader-servant.

Encourage the keeping of a professional journal and file-including all training, qualifications and Continued Professional Development hours.

Treat all bullying and disrespect, racism, sexism and oppression as if it were a disease from whatever source.

Have Friday lunch together in the pub regularly.

Treat all students as custodians of the future of the profession.  They are treasure!

Create gold stars and Employee of the Week Awards but with much humour and laughter while subversively celebrating outstanding work.

Stand up for Social Work as a profession for heroes and wounded healers.

Have at least one suit for court-the best you can buy-Navy blue is best.

Teach yourself and your team to become the best possible writers.

Read and critique each other’s written work.  Remember the best writers are always the best readers.

Always, always carry a notebook and pen.

Learn to be and teach everyone to become, great note takers.

Become an expert in using technology.

Use Evernote.  Scrivenor.  Devonthink.  Ulysses.  Todoist.  Wunderlist.  Word.  Mindjet.  Pages.  Powerpoint.  Keynote.  Excel.

Always ask for the other point of view, likewise advice.  One of the most common things to hear in a social work office should be ‘what do you think?’  Director or Social Worker-No matter what your role.

Meditate every day.
Physically exercise and take care of your body through fitness and nutrition.  Have a hobby that you love!

Every social worker of eight years experience should be a highly trained and confident:

·     Meetings chair

·     Minute-taker

·     Report writer

·     Counsellor and therapist-Child or adult or both

·     Events organiser

·     Coach

·     Trainer

·     Presentations specialist

·     Theoretician

·     Self-organiser

·     Possessor of brilliantly developed interpersonal skills

·     Court Expert

·     Mediator and negotiator

Pessimism is not a good mind-set for a Social Worker.  Be always open to the almost miraculous potential for humans to undergo transformation.  Always be compassionate before your analytical brain kicks in-use both.

Practice the facial expressionism of a good actor so that from the back of a Court you leave a judge in no doubt of your feelings!

A successfully managed worker is one who is excited about coming to work in the morning.

Be proud of being a Social Worker.  Encourage pride in the profession.

Consider your Senior Leadership Team as having the best of motives.  Understand the hugely difficult decisions they must make in this time of Austerity.

Senior managers!  You need to communicate Austerity much more effectively.

Be a master and mistress of Email courtesy.

Too high caseloads mean low quality work-understand it is an inevitable equation that will lead to the loss of good people.

Review all your professional priorities at least weekly.

In order for doing to be effective it must be preceded by thinking and planning.

Never, ever, sign your name to anything you don’t believe in.

If anyone ever tells you Social Work is about covering your arse, they don’t understand it.  You can ignore them.

Regard vulnerable children and adults as priceless works of art are regarded by museums.  Not problems but the reason for your professional existence.

Avoid management-speak like the plague.  Use language to be clearly understood.  Avoid acronyms and abbreviations.

Social work skills are gradually accrued over years of practice and study.  At about eight years a social worker is coming into their power to make excellent independent decisions.  If they leave the profession at this point you lose not only them but all the knowledge that is in their heads when they walk out the door including the mysterious value of their intuition.  It is irreplaceable and to lose it is to fail as an organisation and as a profession.  Staff retention needs the profession’s best minds. NOTE: staff retention needs a better title more descriptive of its various elements.  How about- ‘The joy in the job Project?’

Social Work is not about processing forms-it is about transforming lives.

Regard an Ofsted Inspection as an opportunity to show off!  Celebrate it!  There’s nothing worse for social workers than to be contaminated with the fear of a Senior Management Team on the brink of an Ofsted visit!

Let us articulate as a whole profession what we see as our future role in our society.  Let’s be a bit more pushy about it!

Join the British Association of Social Workers (BASW).  Get involved!

We don’t do this bizarre and wonderful job for the money.  Certainly not for the prestige.  Not for the popular acclaim!

Maybe we just want to do something valuable and worthwhile? To give back something?  Maybe we love humanity?  Maybe we have traces of brokenness in our own lives that spurred us on?

A myriad of reasons and maybe no reason we can articulate yet.

But it’s a damn fine, even heroic thing to do, this Social Work!  

We should be proud of ourselves!  We should be proud of each other!  If you are a social worker reading this and resonating with it, then I am proud of YOU!

Quite simply, when we speak the truth of what we do, that is how we will keep on doing it. 

Go well, dear hearts, and shine brightly!

Tony Dougan 

December 2016



Comment me do!:  heartofbalance@gmail.com

A WALK IN THE WOODS