This week: 10, 20, 30 years ago

10 Years Ago

 A group of cyclists from France rode into South London to highlight the role dads play in their children’s education.

The 13 dads from the Antony Berni Cycling Club in Paris headed to the capital, arriving at Lewisham Town Hall in Catford on Saturday.

It follows an event last year when 10 dads from Dads Uniting Cycling and Kids (DUCK) rode from Lewisham to Paris in 24 hours.

Antony, a suburb of Paris, is also celebrating 50 years of being twinned with Lewisham.

The dads from DUCK Cycling Club met the Antony cyclists at Newhaven in East Sussex and cycled to Lewisham for a reception hosted by Lewisham council chairman, Councillor Obajimi Adefiranye.

Mile Jedinak will not kick a ball again for Crystal Palace this season – but he still has some football left to play before his summer break.

The midfielder, 27, suffered a grade two abductor tear against Derby in March which ruled him out of the Championship run-in.

But Jedinak is still working hard to get back to full fitness as he looks to be involved in three upcoming games for Australia.

Health bosses have said spiralling debts could force them to abolish a home for life policy for elderly people with severe mental illness.

Figures from NHS Lewisham show the body, which commissions health services in the borough, is projected to be £90million in debt within four years.

As a result, it is making £4.75million worth of cuts between now and April 2014.

One of the areas facing cuts is the provision of services for older people with severe mental health problems.

A combination of these cuts and a shift in Government policy for the care of the elderly mentally ill, will see the abolition of the concept of a “home for life” in Lewisham for people with dementia, schizophrenia or chronic depression.

There has been a steady decline in the number of beds for older adults with mental health problems in the borough since the 1990s.

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20 Years Ago

Police organised a reconstruction of the last minutes before the Brixton nail bomb was detonated.

The attack in Electric Avenue became the first of London Nail Bomber David Copeland’s attacks on minority groups around the capital.

No one was killed by the blast in Brixton on April 17, 1999, but 45 people were badly injured.

Over the following fortnight, Copeland would strike twice more in Brick Lane, East London, and at the Admiral Duncan pub in Old Compton Street, Soho.

At an appeal in 2007, Copeland was told he would spend at least 50 years behind bars.

Campaigners launched a push for Crystal Palace station to be linked to the Underground via the East London line.

They reacted angrily when plans to run trains from Surrey Quays to Wimbledon and West Croydon were announced without Crystal Palace being included in the plans.

The line connecting Surrey Quays and Crystal Palace would be more than 15 years in the making, and the line finally opened in 2009.

Gardening star Charlie Dimmock took time out from a busy filming schedule to help residents transform a patch of wasteland.

The presenter of BBC’s Groundforce got her hands dirty with volunteers at the Tulse Hill Community Centre. The project was filmed by the BBC as part of a new series. The group cleared the site before landscaping it.

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30 Years Ago

Three teenagers were arrested after a rally for the far-right National Front.

The two 14-year-olds and a 15-year-old were arrested for handing out racist literature during the rally outside Bermondsey Tube station.

The party members had to be kept apart from a band of Anti-Nazi League protesters and needed a police escort as the rally passed the Drummond Estate.

The marchers, many of whom were skinheads, chanted extreme political statements as they marched with banners.

Plans for a borough’s first licensed sex shop looked set to go ahead after the council received no objections.

An Essex-based company applied for permission to set up shop in Lewisham Road, Ladywell. But the decision was deferred by councillors so they could speak to representatives from the company.

A similar application lodged with Lewisham council 19 years earlier for the same premises had been thrown out.

A £4million hostel for homeless women was opened. The Central and Cecil Housing Trust’s new refuge for down and out women was opened in Waterloo Road, Bermondsey, by MP Simon Hughes.

It had rooms to provide warmth and shelter for up to 46 women. The housing trust also planned to offer counselling and advice to destitute women.

 

 

Pictured: Police at the scene of the nail bomb explosion outside a supermarket in Brixton, south east London, on 17/04/98, which caused injury to numerous people. Inset. David Copeland, nail bomber