Hello again Londoners — it’s great to be back with you on this jolly Monday morning. Traditionally, the news cycle tends to slow during December, but here at HQ we’ve been busy purchasing gowns, candlesticks and nightcaps, preparing ourselves to Scrooge our way through Christmas, typing frantically until our RSI finally takes us out of the game.
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We hope you enjoyed Miles Ellingham’s weekend report from down in the tunnels. Since rejoining the surface world, he’s seemed somewhat haunted, muttering to himself about the darkness and the echoing hairy metal closing in… And we’ve got some interesting items coming soon: Hannah Williams is busy debunking London pub orthodoxy, and Andrew Kersley is currently hunched over a particularly exasperating book.
Anyway, before we get to the briefing, we’ve got a new open newsroom call out for you. Please don’t hesitate to get in contact if you can help us or if you’d simply like to send us a nice message. If it’s the former, remember that we will never name you or identify you without your consent.
- We’re doing a story around office Christmas parties. Ever been involved in one that’s gone wrong, or gotten wildly out of hand? Drop us a line and tell us your story.
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Big story: The end of the eternal fires of Arnolds Fields?
Topline: Campaigners fighting an East London council’s inaction over air pollution from a never-ending trash fire have won a major legal victory in the High Court, after a judge ruled the situation merited a full judicial review.
The story so far: Last month, we reported on the endless series of underground fires at an illegal landfill in Arnolds Fields. Its noxious fumes were drifting into nearby homes and nurseries, choking residents and leaving them scared of the impact it was having on their health. Since the fires began, the fire service has attended over 150 incidents at the site, with more than 4,275 firefighters attending. Havering Council has so far failed to stop it, claiming that because the dump is on private land, it’s not in their jurisdiction.
Legal battles: Local resident and founder of Clear the Air in Havering, Ruth Kettle-Frisby, decided to take the council to court over its lack of action, with help from law firm Mishcon de Reya. Not long after our story was published, the High Court ruled in Kettle-Frisby’s favour, saying the council’s failure to deal with the problem merits “consideration at a full hearing”.
What’s next?: The judge labelled the claim “significant,” meaning it is likely to progress through the courts quicker than expected, and the public hearing is likely to hit in early 2025. The council has until Boxing Day to contest the ruling.
Clean air for all: “Rainham is one of the most deprived areas of London and is a dumping ground for developments such as quarries that directly and indirectly pollute the air,” Kettle-Frisby said. “I believe that clean air should be a human right, not a privilege that is dependent on where you live. The children of Rainham deserve to breathe clean air as much as any other child.”
Your news briefing
💋 Heard the story of the strip club war hitting the streets of Soho? Some of you may have seen that The Windmill, Soho’s instantly recognisable, neon-clad strip joint, has just been shut down by its new landlord. What you may not have known is that the new landlord in question is none other than Spearmint Rhino, which used a shell company to take over the lease of the venue that has fallen into significant rent arrears. Our friends at The Upsetter (who you should go and subscribe to for news on all things criminal, corrupt or the otherwise seedy) report that the infamous strip club chain not only shut down its competition, but plans to move one of its own venues into the building. Spare a thought for the local parish and school who wanted the venue shut down as it was causing “upset and disgust”. We wonder how they’ll react to knowing the venue is being shut down, only to be reopened as another strip club…
🔍 Worrying news from homeless charity St Mungo’s. A Londoner source reached out to express some concerns about the homeless charity’s alleged use of Section 21 eviction notices on its vulnerable homeless tenants during the sale of one of its London shelters earlier this year. The Londoner understands all of those evicted were eventually found new accommodation, but it’s not the best look for a charity that has been campaigning to ban the practice, and whose chief executive has called no fault evictions “detrimental” and a driver of homelessness. St Mungo’s told us that sometimes "it becomes necessary to provide notice to tenants" and no fault eviction notices are currently "the only available route for us to do this," but have only been used "on a small number of occasions".
🇯🇵 The Royal Albert Hall has been selected as host for one of the only professional sumo contests to ever happen outside of Japan. The event, which will come to the capital next October, is only the second time a professional sumo wrestling competition has left its homeland — the last time being a 1991 event also at the Royal Albert Hall. “It’s what the Royal Albert Hall was built for,” Royal Albert Hall’s chief executive James Ainscough told the media. “It says on the outside of the building [that] we were built for all nations, and so part of our job is to enable the British public to encounter different cultures and different experiences.”
Got a story for us to look into? Please get in touch.
New here? Have a look at Miles Ellingham’s after hours dispatch from the depths of the Underground. It turns out the Tube tunnels have started growing their own hair and skin, which has to be cleaned before the morning train blows it all back onto the platform. But for many of the TfL staff, it's the spectral presence of long dead commuters that's causing them more worry... There’s also some fantastic photography from Carl Klink.
From dawn till dusk
We all know London can be unbearably huge. So every week we’ll take you through an ideal day across the city using our little black book of the best London venues. We hope it’ll be equal parts glitz to spit and Tube-dust.
Breakfast: At the side of the Waterloo bus garage sits the Bus Cafe — a Shangri-La for transport nerds and those with an insatiable hunger for fried meat alike. A canteen that, as the name suggests, is mainly aimed at nourishing London’s solitary, weary bus drivers before the start of another endless drive along the capital’s clogged arteries. And suitably, the food is the kind of industrial-sized fry-ups that deserve their own medical advisory, but for sandwiches under £3, and a full breakfast costing just £6, some things are worth risking a heart attack for.
Lunch: Opening up next to Camberwell’s Toad Bakery (more a talking point for the Brockley Brigade than a shop, to be honest — though still very tasty, according to whoever runs Sadiq Khan’s social media accounts) is Mondo Sando, a diner-style sandwich shop offering subs, Cruzcampo on draft and bafflingly delicious treacle tarts. There’s been a wave of businesses charging top dollar for increasingly complicated cross-section-friendly sandwiches recently, but Mondos are actually worth your time and money.
Drinks: Ever felt like cosplaying as Hugh Grant? Or just curious to do an anthropological study of life west of Hyde Park? The Cow is a good place to start, particularly around Christmas time. On a Saturday, at around 6pm, you’ll be able to establish a solid taxonomy of swanky west London archetypes. You’ve got dads in Houndstooth mansplaining The Specials; Ladbroke lad-blokes; Sloane Rangers reeking of hairspray; gassy chefs and the occasional literary editor — all of them drinking Guinness, which is actually pretty creamy over there.
Dinner: Rochelle Canteen provides seasonal, down-to-earth meals at above earth prices. We understand it’s expensive, but it’s really good. You can also eat there for free if you steal the identity of a culture editor and email an arts PR company. Just ask to meet for lunch to discuss ‘upcoming projects’, then, on the day, explain that you’ve fallen ill and are sending your assistant instead.
Later: Karaoke is literally always a good idea, no matter what the naysayers argue. Unfortunately, London’s offerings tend to veer towards the wildly expensive (and relatively horrible) and/or get booked up months in advance. The exception is Stokey Karaoke: a teeny little bar in Stamford Hill that you book out in its entirety for an unbeatably cheap price. The drinks are reasonable, the vibe is raucous, and the song selections can be as terrible as you like (this staffer’s go-to choice: “White Flag” by Dido).
Our favourite reads
Daniel Craig’s Masculine Constructs — Isaac Chotiner, New Yorker.
Fresh out of what GQ termed his "freaky era" and gearing up for the release of Queer (Luca Guadagnino’s take on the pulsing 1985 novel by William Burroughs) the London-native had a lengthy chat with the New Yorker’s master interviewer, Isaac Chotiner, last month. And yes, he does explain his ridiculous Knives Out accent.
Want to imagine the city of the future? Try Milton Keynes — Deyan Sudjic, Prospect.
The team at Prospect have run a lengthy tribute to Milton Keynes in print this month, and we’re die hard evangelists for London’s weird modernist niece. MK has a real distinctive character, and an excellent gallery that’s well worth the half-hour journey from Euston. In the piece, Sudjic argues that the definition of ‘beautiful’ architecture is too narrow, which sounds like a veiled insult but isn't.
To Do List
This week
The Garden Cinema are currently screening Grand Theft Hamlet, an apparently groundbreaking, Stoppardian picture following two out-of-work actors attempting to curate a performance of Hamlet inside a GTA server. The film is getting great reviews; Peter Bradshaw called it ‘a new dreamlike insight into Hamlet’s melancholy.’ There’s a sold-out live Q&A tonight, but screenings run all week.
On Saturday, the capital will be blessed by a truly great sporting spectacle. Forget Mo Farah, forget Usain Bolt. If you want to watch real peak athletic performance, head to Greenwich on Saturday, where more than 40 pantomime horses will take part in the annual Christmas tradition of racing through the centre of Greenwich for charity.
Later
Trying to remake or adapt a classic film is a tall order. All the harder when it’s a film as historic and unique as Stanley Kubrick’s Dr Strangelove. But Armando Iannucci's new adaptation, starring Steve Coogan, manages the shift to the stage well. Tickets for as little as £20 are still on sale.
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