Active Communities 2017 - grant funding scheme There are grants of up to £10k available to groups and clubs for projects aimed at encouraging inactive people to get active. It's initially aimed at a limited number of boroughs, of which Greenwich and Lewisham are two. The deadline is 25th Sept, 12 noon. Overview of grant criteria: "We are keen to encourage activity within communities and to support a diverse range of organisations, not just the more traditional sports groups. In addition to meeting the main Programme Aim of getting more inactive people active, we also want to support groups who harness sport and physical activity as a way to connect with their communities; to engage and inspi

This morning I went down to New Cross Learning. A group of parents and their kids are going on a coach trip to Clacton organised and paid for by the library and the New Cross Gate Trust. Some of those children have never seen the sea or been out of London. At their age, I’d been to Skegness four times, had embarrassing pictures taken of ice cream faces and being washed in the caravan sink. My parents did not have much money, but they had access to a 1 week trip a year from Sheffield to the Lincolnshire coast. As a country and society we are supposed to move forward not back. But what is happening is back stepping into history, where some of our fellow citizens and residents are trapped in an

As we commemorate the Battle of Lewisham, 40 years on we still live with racism either direct or indirect. My first experience of racism was at the age of 14. My sister’s husband was from Jamaica, and one day, when he was heading out of their flat where they lived, my sister Diane noticed that he’d forgotten his hat. Well it was the early 1980s. She ran after him. Suddenly I heard a scream. I ran out and this kid had thrown a rock and he was bleeding from his head. My sister was shaken and I took off my jumper to stop the bleeding and told my sister to go back to the flat and call for an ambulance. I remember the blood on my hands and the grace that he had despite being attacked by a child.