North Paddington illustrates well why the City of Westminster, as a local authority area, is not all about the Houses of Parliament, the West End and enclaves of phenomenal wealth. Its Harrow Road, Queens Park and Westbourne wards in the north west of the borough are among those marked by high levels of disadvantage.
Addressing these has been a priority of Westminster City Council since, in May 2022, it came under Labour control for the first time in its history. The administration’s North Paddington Programme is a group of initiatives designed to help people living in the three wards. Its latest phase has just been approved by councillors. What is the programme and why does it matter?
A total of £20 million has been allocated to it, and the council is stressing that it has been devised in close collaboration with local residents, businesses, charities and the police to help with employment, housing, health and reducing crime.
A partnership board, chaired by Neale Coleman, once a Westminster Labour councillor and more recently a senior figure in the administrations of London Mayors, has brought together housing, arts and youth work specialists and overseen community engagement efforts.
The council says that during its first year, the programme funded the £300,000 overhaul of a basketball court at the Avenues Youth Project, the retrofitting for energy efficiency of 300 social rent homes, the installation of solar panels on the Warwick housing estate and projects ranging from a soup kitchen to digital mentoring (with help from Bloomberg, Goldman Sachs and others) and breakfast clubs.
The next phase, backed by £10 million over a three-year period, has earmarked £4.5 million of that sum for local organisations to apply for to fund building projects.
It has already committed £1.5 million for two community hubs – the Bayswater Children’s Centre on Shrewsbury Road and at Ernest Harris House, a Notting Hill Housing Trust property on Elgin Avenue – plus £300,000 for additional community gardens in the three wards, over £200,000 to provide jobs and training for young people and over £400,000 in all to revitalise Maida Hill market and put on events in the public space there.
Westminster leader Adam Hug says the council’s investment in North Paddington “represents a major change in the way this council works to improve our communities – not making decisions behind closed doors, but sitting down with people to discuss problems, and more importantly come up with solutions”. He calls it a “place-based approach” which will be the model for all of the council’s future regeneration schemes. It also forms part of the Labour administration’s wider “fairer city” ambitions.
Making a success of such a project requires forms of cooperation and degrees of co-ordination that can take patience and persistence to achieve and may be novel for local authority bureaucracies. Adam Hug and his colleagues will hope Westminster’s “place-based approach” pays welcome dividends for local people and becomes an example other councils will want to learn from.
OnLondon.co.uk provides unique coverage of the capital’s politics, development and culture. Support it for just £5 a month or £50 a year and get things for your money too. Details HERE. Threads: DaveHillOnLondon. X/Twitter: On London and Dave Hill. Photo from Westminster’s 2021 vision for Maida Hill market document.