Intergenerational Summer Day – 24 August 2022

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MHA Communities South London and Croydon BME Forum are inviting the young people of Croydon to join us for an intergenerational summer day on Wednesday 24th August at the Wilderness garden.

The concept of our intergenerational workshop is to connect the old and young through activities, to build a bridge among the generations and also share their experience as well as recognizing and learning about the skills and insights of younger people.

Are your children aged between 6 to 13 years old?

Are they interested in getting involved in a fun learning day at the Wilderness garden?

We have an exciting programme of activities to take part in!

Join our Tales of two Tails; Games at the Outdoor Classroom; Wellbeing walks exploring the senses followed by a storytelling session.

Young and Old people will come together and join our exciting programme of activities, learn from each other and share and listen to each other experiences.

Details of our intergenerational summer day:
Cost: £2 per children; £5 per adult age 55 or over
Capacity: 20 children and 20 old people (MHA Communities South
London & Croydon BME Forum)
Time: 10am – 12.30pm
Location: The Wilderness garden, 17 Shirley Church Road,
Croydon CR9 5AL

To reserve your place by Wednesday 17th August, contact us by phone on: 07597135220 or email: southlondon@mha.org.uk .

MHA Communities South London – Kitchen Garden Project

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At the beginning of May, MHA Communities South London volunteers got together to create a kitchen garden.

They started with nothing but some compost and a pack of seeds. Since then, they worked very hard to support MHA Communities South London’s aim at
becoming more sustainable and to provide a space for the community to engage with nature whilst getting involved in gardening activities.

As of today, we are growing different varieties of vegetable and herbs: squash, southern kale, trail of tears beans, spring onion, chard and more but also fennel, parsley, coriander and more.

The development of the kitchen garden led to the creation of the Gardening for Wellbeing club where we help people living with Dementia, health and mental health conditions, and stroke survivors to access the benefit of gardening. What we grow gets used to prepare a healthy lunch for our members.

We would like to expand our kitchen garden and grow more vegetables to provide a weekly affordable lunch to elderly people living in the community.

Can you help us to help our local community?

We are looking for wood, containers, a glass house, polytunnel, anything that can help us develop our kitchen garden, and generate more activities for those in need and provide support to our local community.

Contact us at: MHA Communities South London at the Wilderness, 17 Shirley Church Road, Croydon CR9 5AL
Phone: 07597135220 – Email: southlondon@mha.org.uk

Planning Report – August 2022

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To find out the latest news on what is being planned in your local area, check out our latest Planning Report with up-to-date information on Planning Applications including developments in:

  • Addiscombe Road
  • The Glade
  • Gladeside
  • Land S/O Firsby Ave, E/O Verdayne Ave
  • Orchard Avenue
  • Orchard Rise
  • Shirley Avenue
  • Shirley Road
  • St. George’s Church
  • Woodmere Avenue and Woodmere Gardens.

With the all the latest information on the Local Planning Authority’s Residents’ Association Meeting, the Planning Advisory Peer Review that MORA has contributed towards and the latest news on the Draft Revised Croydon Local Plan.

Also, take a look at the MORA Planning App, which gives you an easy way to track all the current and recent planning applications within the MORA area. It’s simple to use and free for you to access

Trading Standards Bulletin – Spot the Signs of Holiday Fraud

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In May 2022, Action Fraud launched a national awareness campaign to urge the public to think twice before handing over money and personal information when booking holidays.

As travel restrictions became more relaxed, Action Fraud, the national reporting centre for fraud and cyber-crime is warning the public to remain vigilant against holiday fraud when booking flights and accommodation online.

In the financial year of 2021/22, Action Fraud received 4,244 reports of holiday and travel related fraud – a substantial increase of over 120% when compared to the previous year.

Victims reported losing a total of £7,388,353 – an average loss of £1,868 per victim.

Whilst many accommodation providers who make use of online booking platforms are legitimate, some criminals will use these platforms to defraud victims by advertising counterfeit accommodation.

Over 7% of victims reported falling victim to suspects impersonating legitimate travel companies, including clone comparison sites, airline websites and holiday accommodation websites.

In some cases, victims have searched for flight tickets online and have found a website they believed to be the company’s genuine website. In other cases, victims reported responding to an approach or advertisement on social media or using what they believed to be legitimate flight comparison websites to search for flights.

The fraudster may completely end contact after receiving payment or provide the victim with fake booking information.

Sadly, some victims have only become aware that they have been the victim of fraud when they arrive at the airport and are unable to check-in.

Top tips to avoid falling victim to holiday fraud

Stay safe online – check the website address is legitimate and has not been altered by slight changes to a domain name – such as going from .co.uk to .org.uk

Do your research: don’t just rely on one review – do a thorough online search to ensure the company is credible. If a company is defrauding people, there is a good chance that consumers will post details of their experiences, and warnings about the company.

Look for the logo: check whether the company is an ABTA Member. Look for the ABTA logo on the company’s website at https://www.abta.com/abta-member-search. If you have any doubts, you can verify membership of ABTA online on their If you’re booking a flight and want more information about ATOL protection, or would like to check whether a company is an ATOL holder, visit the CAA website at https://www.caa.co.uk/atol-protection/consumers/checking-for-atol-protection/.

Pay safe: wherever possible, pay by credit card and be wary about paying directly into a private individual’s bank account.

Check the paperwork: you should study receipts, invoices and terms and conditions, and be very wary of any companies that don’t provide any at all. When booking through a Holiday Club or Timeshare, get the contract thoroughly vetted by a solicitor before signing up.

Use your instincts: if something sounds too good to be true, it probably is.

Get free expert advice: for further advice on how to stay safe when booking or researching travel online, go to Get Safe Online.

For a full list of tips to avoid becoming a victim of fraud, please visit https://www.abta.com/tips-and-advice/planning-and-booking-a-holiday/how-avoid-travel-related-fraud.

If you think you’ve been a victim of fraud, contact your bank immediately and report it to Action Fraud online at actionfraud.police.uk or by calling 0300 123 2040.

Flight Compensation

Flight delays and cancellations have been in the news recently for the past couple of years and have recently increased due to the return of people travelling post-covid and the airports and airlines seemingly being ill-prepared.

There are rules and laws in place to protect consumers and Martin Lewis of Money Saving Expert has put together a comprehensive guide as to what you are entitled to if you experience delays or cancellations.

Please visit his website www.moneysavingexpert.com or use the link below to read his recent article following the highly publicised issues faced by consumers in recent weeks: https://www.moneysavingexpert.com/news/2022/05/easyjet-british-airways-cancellations-compensation/.

Power for People – The Community Energy Revolution

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The Problem

We are not meeting our climate change targets – the UK is way off track to meet the fourth and fifth carbon emissions budgets of the Climate Change Act. Community-scale renewable energy has huge potential to help solve this problem and benefit local economies, but it is currently blocked from doing so.

If you want to buy your electricity from local renewable sources, such as the local school or sports hall that have solar panels on their roofs, you cannot. We all buy our electricity from a utility company that sources it from anything connected to the National Grid, be it a field of solar panels in Wiltshire or a gas fired power station in Yorkshire.

Putting it the other way around – a community with local renewable generation, e.g. housing estates with solar panels or a local wind farm – cannot sell the energy they generate directly to local people, but must sell it to a utility who sells it on to customers. This is happening because becoming a supplier of energy to customers involves set-up and running costs of millions of pounds. These costs are due to things like having to grapple with the highly complex grid balancing codes and network agreements that are controlled by the largest six utilities.

The heart of the problem is disproportionate costs. It would be like you wanting to set up a business baking cupcakes in your kitchen and delivering them to people in your local area, but instead of just paying the road tax for your delivery van you had to pay hundreds of thousands of pounds to use the roads, no matter how few cupcakes you delivered. You could never start your business – this is the reality for community-scale renewable energy in the UK.

The Solution

The costs and complexity of being able to sell locally generated energy to local people need to be made proportionate to the size of the local energy co-operative’s or business’s operation. We have drafted the Local Electricity Bill which lays out a mechanism that will do this. If made law, it would give electricity generators the right to become local suppliers – i.e. sell their energy directly to local people – and make it financially viable to do so.

The Benefits

If the Local Electricity Bill became law, it would give a huge boost to community renewable energy and local economies.

  • Communities would benefit from selling local renewable energy -Significant additional value would remain within local economies, meaning more investment in things like local services and more efficient homes.
  • Communities could raise funds to build more renewable energy – Communities would have a viable business model to build new renewable energy schemes, meaning they could help ensure the UK meets its climate change targets.
  • Communities would see knock-on local economic benefits – There would be greater acceptance of the transition to 100% renewable energy, local economies would be more resilient, local skilled jobs would be created and our energy supply would be more secure due to less imports of fossil fuels.

The Campaign

To see the Local Electricity Bill made law, we need the support of around 400 MPs (which is well over half the House of Commons). So far, the Bill has gained the support of a cross-party group of 309 MPs.

We are mobilising people at constituency level to call on their MP to back the Bill. Every additional supportive MP increases the chance it will become law. We need your help with this so please sign up.

For more information, visit the Power For People website.