Inside Croydon

SUNDAY SUPPLEMENT: A former Music Hall performer used his modelling genius to brighten the lives of countless children in one Croydon department store, while creating famous stage dummies including Archie Andrews and Lord Charles. DAVID MORGAN looks back on the work of Len Insull

Memories and reminiscences are still plentiful when talking about the three department stores – or departmental stores, as they called themselves – which once adorned Croydon High Street.

Many of Croydon’s residents have fond memories of Kennards, which originally opened on North End in 1853.

Drug dealers McNeil Colly and Keston Redhead, who tried to buy a handgun by mail order, have been jailed following a National Crime Agency investigation.

The Taurus self-loading pistol was seized by Border Force officers at Stansted Airport in July 2023. It was hidden inside the packaging for a metallic safe box, along with two empty 9mm magazines.

Colly, 48, from Streatham, and Keston Redhead, 35, an asylum seeker from Trinidad and Tobago, were found guilty of importation of a firearm and conspiracy to import Class A drugs following a seven-week trial.

Residents who have become increasingly concerned about the climate emergency have taken their protests to the doorsteps of Croydon’s four MPs.

Campaigners from the Croydon Green Network rounded off their lobbying by meeting Croydon East MP Natasha Irons, ahead of the Climate and Nature Bill having its second reading in Parliament tomorrow.

The CAN Bill is a landmark piece of environmental legislation, with cross-party support in the Commons and House of Lords, as it seeks to address the full extent of the climate-nature crisis in line with the most up-to-date science.

Labour-controlled Lambeth Council is being taken to the High Court accused of unlawfully renting homes in the private sector under insecure assured shorthold tenancies and of having made a decision which will see these tenants made homeless – using the dreaded Section 21 no-notice eviction rule which Labour nationally has promised to ban.

The “regeneration” of five council estates across Lambeth began when Steve Reed, now the MP for Streatham and Croydon North, was the council leader at Brixton Town Hall.

New owners of The Norbury, the big old boozer on London Road that closed its doors nearly five years ago, have put forward a set of proposals for public consultation to refurbish the building as an Islamic community centre, to be called the Norbury Hive.

The landmark building on the main road between Streatham and Thornton Heath was built in the 1930s as a hotel.

More disruption for Thameslink and London Overground passengers this weekend and into next week due to engineering works.

The London Overground network is affected by Network Rail and Tube engineering works, with no service on the Weaver, Mildmay and Lioness lines, and with the Windrush line from West Croydon also affected.

Some engineering works could affect services on these lines for the next six weekends – so always check before you set off.

Windrush line

CROYDON IN CRISIS: Louis Carserides is a third councillor forced to alter their register of interests after questioning from Inside Croydon, as the long-time aide of MP Steve Reed quits his government job.

EXCLUSIVE by STEVEN DOWNES

An Inside Croydon investigation has uncovered a third Croydon councillor who has broken the Town Hall’s Code of Conduct by failing to update their register of interests promptly.

From February, Transport for London will be withdrawing the 118 route, which runs from Brixton to Morden via Streatham, Streatham Park and Mitcham.

The decision has been made following a public consultation in which, even TfL admits, there was overwhelming public opposition to the proposals.

TfL’s proposals were for the 45 route to be extended to cover parts of the 118 service. Among the objections to the changes were that this longer route could prove less reliable. TfL did not include service frequencies in its consultation.

Film star Adam Pearson says he is ‘heartbroken’ by Commons vote: ‘We have a government who are willing to help disabled people die whilst doing nothing to help them live’

All four of Croydon’s MPs – three Labour, one Conservative – voted in favour of the Terminally Ill Adults (End of Life) Bill when it had its second reading in at the House of Commons yesterday.

But some disability rights groups and activists reacted with dismay that the Bill passed this stage with a vote of 330 for and 275 against.

Tax-avoiding millionaires and newspaper owners are getting all excited about calls for another election. The same people who have said it’s too soon for another vote on Brexit, reports WALTER CRONXITE, political editor

A petition raised by a publican in the West Midlands who describes himself as “patriotic, not political” (oh, how we laffed at that!) has attracted 2.5million signatures in just a few days.

But in Croydon, barely 2% of the electorate have bothered to sign the thing, official figures show.