Lammas Land Defence Committee: 1, London Development Agency: 0

The first set back for the Olympic games developments came on Wednesday evening at Waltham Forest Town Hall.

The LDA wanted to temporarily move the Manor Park allotment holders to Marsh Lane playing fields. As previous written about on this site, the allotment users are absolutely against any move.

The land proposed for the temporary allotments is part of the Lammas Land: land bequeathed to the commoners of Leyton by Alfred the Great.
Defence of the land erupted on August 1, 1892 when 2,000 men, women and children gathered to defend the encroachment on the area by a railway line. The tracks were torn up and in the resulting melee two local councillors were arrested by the police – obviously local councillors then were made of sterner stuff than todays pathetic breed!

Lammas Land users and the Manor Park allotment holders have come together on this issue – they do not want their local environment and communities destroyed only to be replaced by the gigantic Disney-style sports theme park that is to be home for the 2012 Olympics.

For further background information please read the following article on the Games Monitor site:
http://www.gamesmonitor.org.uk/node/167

The Lammas Land Defence Committee has released the following communiqué:

‘CELEBRATION 12 noon, Sunday, Marsh Lane
GOOD NEWS!

Last night the Borough of Waltham Forest’s planning committee turned down an application by the London Development Agency to fence off about a fifth of Marsh Lane Fields in Leyton to relocate allotment-holders (who don’t want to move!) from a lovely 85 year old site at Bully Point in Newham. The campaign against this was led by the Lammas Lands Defence Committee, with a lot of help from other interested groups in the borough.

We had already planned a rally on the marshes on Sunday before the announcement that last night’s planning committee meeting would be deciding the application, and we therefore propose to hold a PARTY on the fields. So bring party stuff – champers, ribbons, etc. – if there’s any snow we can build a snowman or have a snowball fight! And please bring polo mints, carrots or apples for the horses that graze there – they’ll appreciate it immensely this time of the year when it’s muddy and the grass doesn’t grow very fast.

THE PARTY WILL BE A GREAT OPPORTUNITY TO SOCIALISE AND NETWORK AND PLAN OUR NEXT MOVE!

This is the first real bloody nose the LDA have got over the Olympics, and there are planning applications due to come up soon in Hackney and Newham – a lot of people from those boroughs came to support our defence of the Leyton Lammas Lands last night and we should now work together with them to help where we can with the ongoing evictions and demolition at Clays Lane housing estate and the threats to Hackney South Marsh.

If you don’t feel “political” but would like to come and find out more, please come and join us on Sunday and help celebrate saving the fields.

We’ll be meeting at the junction of Seymour Path and Marsh Lane, just west of the Eton Manor Athletics Club car-park (beside the Dagenham Brook).

Drinks afterwards at the Hare & Hounds (great Sunday lunch grub too!) if you can’t make the actual event.’