SE22 Councillors

Councillor James.McAsh | James.McAsh@southwark.gov.uk | @mcash

In February, the council passed its budget for 2023-2024. This is always quite the ordeal and we only informed about our settlement at Christmas, and we need to finalise the budget just two months later.

Closer to home, we Goose Green councillors have just decided our ward-specific budgets. Unlike many local authorities who have cut such funding, each ward in Southwark has access to three annual budgets for the local councillors to spend as we see fit. The first, the “Neighbourhoods Fund” is revenue funding, to be spent on activities. The remaining two are for capital projects, or for things. One is “Cleaner Greener Safer”, which can be used for any investment in making our area, well, cleaner, greener or safer. The other is “Devolved Highways”, which can be used for anything on our streets. In addition to these three annual pots, there is also funding from the “Community Infrastructure Levy”. This too is capital funding but unlike the previous ones it is not allocated equally; wards with more urban development get more so places like Goose Green do not have a lot.

So what have we spent this money on? Every year, we invite applications from local residents, community groups and institutions like schools and churches. Then we have the difficult job of deciding which worthy projects to fund.

The Neighbourhood Fund has supported some of the most well-known events in the East Dulwich calendar, like the Dulwich Festival, the Goose Green Coffee Morning at St John’s Church, and Link Age’s Gentle Exercise programme for our older residents. Some of the projects have been less well-known but equally important. For instance, we have funded three separate projects to support our young people to develop skills and form positive relationships. They’ve learned how to make films, produce music and even write poetry!

Cleaner Greener Safer has funded a wide range of projects: North Cross Road’s festive lighting, community notice boards, the cricket net at Peckham Rye Park, and safety measures in some of our side streets. Perhaps in part because I’m a primary school teacher by trade, but we’ve always tried to prioritise our local schools. Every state school in Goose Green funding has received funding from us for their playground, for air purifiers and for sports equipment. Cllr Charlie Smith has an ongoing project of installing new benches across the area, to make it easier for the less mobile to get around.

Speaking of which, we have generally used the Devolved Highways budget to improve road safety and encourage walking and cycling. The pedestrian crossing on Whateley Road was funded through this, as have been many instances of cycle storage. When you walk around the area you can see the evidence of this spending on the street. This year has been trickier. We’ve managed to continue to fund many projects like those mentioned above but we have had to say “no” too. Why? Because we’ve decided to pool together our Cleaner Greener Safer, Devolved Highways and Community Infrastructure Levy together to fund one major project: the junction of Lordship Lane and East Dulwich Grove. For years, you’ve told us about how dangerous this is for pedestrians and how tricky it is for drivers. So instead of waiting for the council to find the funds, we’ve found them ourselves. We will introduce a pedestrian crossing of some kind, and hopefully help to keep traffic moving between the two roads more smoothly –preventing build-ups on East Dulwich Grove. This will be an expensive project (over a quarter of a million!) but we think it’s worth it.

Applications for these funds will open in the autumn. For more information about all the grants available please see: https://www.southwark.gov.uk/engagement-andconsultations/grants-and-funding