Dear neighbour,

We hope this finds you well. As the nights get darker and colder, and the spectacular fireworks in Battersea Park have danced in the sky for another year, Christmas will be upon us before we know it! We’ve got a list of local Christmas events as our first items in this month’s update - so you won’t miss out on the local festivities.

We know that many people are struggling with the soaring cost of living. We’ve sign-posted some trusted sources of Government financial support and advice– so please take advantage of any support you may be entitled to, and forward to any friends or neighbours who you think may benefit.

Read on for:

1.     Your essential Northcote Christmas Guide: what’s happening locally, and when.

2.     Success for our Lime Bikes campaign: but there’s still more action that Wandsworth Council needs to take.

3.     Help with the cost of living: a guide to the Government’s financial support and other trusted advice sources.

4.     Climate success for Wandsworth: Wandsworth becomes the only inner-London borough to receive an A grade for climate action from CDP in 2022

And as ever, if there is anything we can be of help locally, please don’t hesitate to get in touch.

Best regards,

Cllr Aled Richards-Jones

Cllr Emmeline Owens 

Your essential Northcote Christmas Guide.

What’s happening, and when?

Northcote Christmas officially begins this Friday 25th November with the Northcote Road Christmas Lights switch-on. Carol singers from four local schools will sing their way along Northcote Road from around 4.30pm, meeting to sing together by the giant tree on Abyssinia Close at around 5pm. There will be many events along the road, such as the Hamptons Christmas Grotto, Rampton Baseley reindeer, and the St Michael’s Church donkey (we haven’t seen him since Palm Sunday!).

Later that evening is the Battersea Ball – the biggest charity party in Battersea. The black-tie ball has become a local institution over the years, raising funds for the Battersea Crime Prevention Panel charity, which funds the Battersea Summer Scheme and many other projects. Full tickets for the ball are now closed, but "After Dinner" tickets are available for £20. These allow entry from 10pm for some late night partying, cabaret, dancing and dodgems, as well as the ever-popular Magic Tree – all until 1am!

On Saturday 26 November, Santa Claus is coming to (Wandsworth) Town! (Okay, not quite Northcote, but still cool.) The Wandsworth Town Christmas Festival returns with festive fun for everyone, including the annual Christmas light switch on! Festivities start at 11am with the Christmas Makers Market at Ram Quarter, Backyard Cinema’s Arctic Express experience and festive film, Wandsworth Town Library’s Christmas Quiz at 3pm, Southside Wandsworth’s Mrs Claus experience for little ones, and the Christmas light switch on at 4:30pm on Southside Piazza.

For the first time since 2019, the Northcote Road outdoor Christmas Market is delighted to return on Sunday 27 November from 10am – 5pm and invites families, friends, and visitors to reconnect and celebrate the spirit of the festive season. The Northcote Road Christmas Market has delighted locals and visitors alike for a number of years with its festive inspired gifts, lip smacking food, drinks, and live music. The market creates the ideal atmosphere to mix and mingle and provides the perfect treats and gifts this Christmas. If all this shopping tires you out and you fancy a chill in the warm, then why not pay a visit to number of independent bars, restaurants, and cafes - they would love to see you! 

On Friday 2nd December from 5pm, the Parents Association are hosting the Bolingbroke Festive Fayre at Bolingbroke Academy, Wakehurst Road. There ain’t no party like a Bolingbroke Academy (we know – we remember the Bolingbroke Summer Fete!). The Christmas Fayre will offer festive food, mulled wine and warm apple cider, stalls with stocking fillers galore, a tombola and lucky dip, and offers from popular local vendors such as Graveney Gin, Lush bath products, Fred Mae The Label sustainable t-shirts, Crafts by Kym, Eat Well kitchenware and Lavienbelle jewellery. There’s a Christmas Lights Switch-On at 4.30pm on Bellevue Road just across the Common beforehand – so dash across after the switch-on for some Bolingbroke mulled wine!

On Saturday 3rd December, Belleville School is hosting its Christmas Bazaar and Tree Sale, and Honeywell School is hosting its Christmas Fair and Tree Sale – local primary school Christmas Fair and Tree Sale crawl, anyone? And remember too that Saturday 3rd December is Small Business Saturday, so please show our small independents on Northcote Road, Webb’s Road, Wakehurst Road, Battersea Rise and beyond some love!

Saturday 17th December at 9.30am sees the Home-Start Santa Dash on Wandsworth Common, meeting at the Skylark Cafe. Home-Start Wandsworth’s Santa Dash is the perfect way to get into the Christmas spirit and burn off those mince pies! It is a fun event for all the family to enjoy, including the dog! You can choose how to “dash” – maybe you’ll run, walk or scoot the 5km route whilst wearing your own Santa hat, Santa outfit or Christmas jumper. Registration is free although a donation on the day would be appreciated.

When you’re out and about doing your Christmas shopping, do take part in the free, augmented reality story trail around Clapham Junction this Christmas - find 10 Christmas presents located in the shop windows of 10 local businesses, collect digital stamps, choose what happens in the story and reveal the cheeky Christmas Imps in augmented reality. And if you’re in the mood for some ice skating (and who isn’t?) then there’s the ice rink in Church Square just off Putney High Street, or the utterly spectacular Glide at Battersea Power Station. 

There is plenty more going on in Northcote, Battersea and beyond. It’s really the most wonderful time of the year, in the most wonderful part of London. If we’ve missed a local event, please let us know and we’ll feature it on our We Love Northcote Facebook page. 

Success for our Lime Bikes campaign

but there’s still more action that Wandsworth Council needs to take.

Last month, we wrote about Wandsworth Conservatives’ petition calling on Wandsworth Council to take action to prevent hire bikes, such as the now-ubiquitous Lime Bikes, from obstructing pavements and making life dangerous for pedestrians, especially those with mobility or sight impairments. Thank you to the hundreds of residents who signed our petition.

Hire bikes are a new, environmentally-friendly transport option for many residents, and we want to see them succeed in Wandsworth. However, the current dockless free-for-all has led to many bikes being abandoned on the pavement in dangerous locations. That’s why Wandsworth Conservatives called on Wandsworth Council to take the following steps: (1) to work with local residents to come up with locations for designated bays in which the bikes can be left safely; (2) to allow Council officers remove rental bicycles left dangerously blocking pavements around Wandsworth and charge the rental companies for doing so; and (3) to introduce new byelaws with fines up to £500 for the rental companies for bikes abandoned dangerously. 

At the recent meeting of the Council’s Transport Committee, the new Labour Council supported point 1 (working to create designated bays). The Chairman of the Committee was not enthusiastic about point 2 (impounding obstructive bikes); however, following weeks of pressure, the Leader of the Council belatedly instructed Council officers to impound bikes that obstructed the pavement after Lime Bikes failed to heed the Council’s warning that he would do so unless the company did more to ensure its bikes were not left in dangerous locations.

We welcome the fact that the Council has listened to our campaign and taken these steps. However, we do need a long-term solution – Council officers cannot be on permanent deployment to round up dangerously parked bikes, when they have other pressing things to do. This is why we need the Council to go further and agree to our full plan, which includes point 3 (issuing fines to companies which fail to do enough to prevent the obstructive bike parking). At the Transport Committee, Labour councillors voted down this recommendation – but we hope they will now reconsider this stance in light of the action that the Council’s Leader has had to take.

We’ll keep up the pressure on the Council to adopt our full plan. In the meantime, if you haven’t already done so, there’s still time to sign our petition here. 

Cost of living support 

We know that many people locally are struggling with the soaring cost of living pressures. When seeking out support, it is important to look to trusted sources and avoid some of the unscrupulous scams that are sadly operating around cost-of-living support.

The Government has produced a consolidated list of what Government support is available to help with the cost of living. This includes income and disability benefits, bills and allowances, childcare, housing and travel. You can find this here.

Wandsworth Council has also launched a Cost of Living Hub, bringing together support offered by the Government as well as local schemes (including the School Uniform Support Scheme to help with the cost of expensive school clothes and a Discretionary Energy Rebate Scheme to help people with fuel bills) and support offered by local charities. You can find this Hub here.

Please be vigilant of scams. You may get calls, emails or messages that pretend to be from a government service or energy bill support scheme. If you get a message asking for your personal details (for example, bank details or passwords) this could be a scam. Report anything you think is suspicious.

Wandsworth becomes the only inner-London borough

to receive an A grade for climate action from CDP in 2022

It’s a special source of pride for us that Wandsworth Council has this month been recognised as one of just 123 towns and cities worldwide – and the only inner London borough – to receive a top grade for taking bold leadership on environmental action.

Wandsworth Council declared a climate emergency in 2019 when Northcote councillor, Aled Richards-Jones, was Chairman of the Finance and Corporate Resources Committee. Under Aled’s chairmanship, the Committee passed the Council’s ambitious Environmental and Sustainability Strategy which pledged the Council to be carbon neutral by 2030 and carbon zero by 2050 – 20 years ahead of central Government targets – and was renamed the “Finance, Corporate Resources and Climate Sustainability Committee.”

Environmental impact non-profit CDP bases its A-rating on actions including: being transparent about the climate change response, completing climate risk and vulnerability assessments, publishing a climate action plan and setting science-based climate targets.

Welcoming the news, Cllr Aled Richards-Jones said:

“This is a real vindication of the action that the Council has taken since 2019. In 2019, the Conservative-run Wandsworth Council took the climate emergency extremely seriously and sought to address it in practical, innovative ways – such as installing more electric vehicle charging points than the whole of Wales, sending nothing to landfill since 2012, committing to an ambitious tree planting programme, and decarbonising our £2 billion pension fund. I wish the new Labour Council every success in taking forward our bold plans, and I hope they’re guided first and foremost by the science and evidence, just as we were.” 

Published and promoted by Harry Todd on behalf of the Wandsworth Conservatives, contactable 1 Summerstown, SW17 0BQ.