Attack of the Tube ads
Plus: a borough faces bankruptcy, dog contamination on Hampstead Heath, and the BBC’s glitched hurricane forecast for London
Morning — it's been a pretty hectic couple of days for TfL's advertising department, who've been dealing with multiple controversies over what's been on display on the Underground. Pasta sauce, a preacher and a UFC fighter are at the centre of the rows. The attack of the Tube ads leads your round-up below.
Plus: a borough faces bankruptcy, dog contamination on Hampstead Heath, and the BBC’s glitched hurricane forecast for London.
In case you missed it: yesterday we published Tom Duggins’s look at the last days of London’s pedicab wild west. A particular highlight was his chat with a former driver called Tom, who rode a rickshaw back in the 2000s while a student:
Tom says that during the two days of training he had to complete to be allowed to rent a bike, his instructor was keen to “test my tolerance for Soho vice”. “A guy said to me: ‘If someone comes up to you asking where to buy heroin, here’s a number you can call.’ I made it clear I wasn’t going to do that, but I had no problem taking lads on a stag do over to one of the gentlemen’s clubs.”
If a male passenger asked where they could have a good time, there would be an obvious answer. The strip clubs would happily give the door to drivers, handing over the cash once their fares were safely inside. “There was a place on Old Compton Street, a fiver to get in, and they’d take almost anyone.” SophistiCats, a still extant club on Brewer Street of, in his view, questionable sophistication, required a more refined clientele (smart shoes, no obvious drunk and disorderly behaviour) but paid £25 for every visitor.
What we've spied
🍅 Two Tube ads proved controversial recently for very different reasons — first, an ad for pasta sauce that led to an apology from Heinz. The ad, pictured at the top of this email and seen at Manor House and Vauxhall stations, features a white man as the groom seated with his parents but a black woman as the bride with only her mother — leading to criticism on social media that ad was "erasing" black fathers. A spokesperson for Heinz told the Independent: “We understand how this ad could have unintentionally perpetuated negative stereotypes. We extend our deepest apologies and will continue to listen, learn, and improve to avoid this happening again in the future". TfL didn't comment, but just as the dust was settling, another ad row: this time for finance startup Wahed, which featured a controversial Islamic preacher and a UFC fighter surrounded by burning US dollar notes (pictured below). The preacher, Ismail ibn Musa Menk, has been banned from entering countries like Singapore and Denmark over his "divisive" teachings and in 2013 UK universities cancelled a speaking tour over anti-LGBT statements. Former Tory candidate for London mayor Susan Hall was among those criticising the ad, contrasting it with TfL's ban on junk food ads on the Tube: "If Wahed had wanted to advertise their platform with a high-calorie meal on the Tube, it would be banned, but apparently a preacher banned from other countries for promoting religious discord is fine". In response, TfL defended its decision to allow the ad: "This advert was reviewed and found to comply with our advertising policy, which reflects legal requirements". There was another bit of Underground controversy this week, though not officially an ad — on October 7, pro-Israel activists put up posters featuring a mock-up of a Tube map for Gaza made of Hamas underground tunnels. One last thing: someone's spotted an ad for the Revolutionary Communist Party on the Tube.
🚇 More on London transport: Sadiq Khan has said he wants to expand the Night Tube to Thursdays, but that TfL finances are currently too constrained to do so; a man who pushed a woman onto the tracks at Oxford Circus earlier this year has been given a life sentence; and a group of Tube fall and bus crash survivors have issued a joint call to TfL to improve safety on the network.
🗺️ FROM THE BOROUGHS 🗺️ The desperately dire finances of Newham council were laid bare this week, after its leadership proposed a programme of extreme cost-cutting measures to help plug a huge budget hole. Cuts to Christmas and Eid lights funding, the end of free coffee, tea and biscuits for staff and a property portfolio selloff are all on the table for the east London council, which is now in bailout discussions with central government, according to documents presented at a meeting this week. The council is also proposing to raise all of its fees and charges except parking and commercial rents by 20%, in order to make up for a shortfall on its books of £175m over the next three years. The council has blamed its homelessness bill for the budget hole — around 6,500 families are being supported in temporary accommodation by Newham.
Meanwhile, it's been revealed the Kensington & Chelsea councillor who oversaw the cut-price refurbishment of Grenfell Tower has donated to Kemi Badenoch's Tory leadership campaign. Quentin Marshall, who chaired the council's housing and property scrutiny committee between 2010 and 2016, has given £5,000 to Badenoch. Marshall has also been accused of dismissing resident complaints in the run up to the fire. One Grenfell survivor tells the Guardian: “I am appalled that a councillor implicated in the Grenfell Tower tragedy with the loss of 72 lives would support a candidate that is promoting deregulation". A spokesperson for Marshall said the donation "reflects his support for Kemi Badenoch’s vision and policies”.
Elsewhere: City Hall has overruled Wandsworth council and granted permission for 449 new homes in Tooting. The council had initially rejected the Springfield Village development, arguing it would put “unreasonable pressure on public transport and surrounding road networks”, but London's deputy mayor for planning has now given the green light, saying the project would make "a substantial and positive contribution" to the capital's housing targets. More housing controversy for Waltham Forest, where environmental activists are mounting a campaign against a proposed development on Hackney Marshes. Lastly, an embarrassing turn of events for Southwark council, which has announced it's having to spend £1.7m fixing the leaky roof of the Canada Water "super-library" it built just 13 years ago.
🎆 City Hall has announced a new ‘tourist tax’ for London’s New Year’s Eve display, as well as an extra charge for ‘premium’ views. For this year’s display, visitors from outside the capital are being charged an extra £15 compared to Londoners. In addition, while standard tickets will cost £20 for Londoners, tickets for premium viewing areas — Victoria Embankment, between Westminster Bridge and Golden Jubilee Footbridge, and from Waterloo Bridge and Westminster Bridge — will cost £35 for Londoners. Tickets are going on sale at midday next Friday, October 18. More from City Hall: Khan has announced a new deputy mayor for policing, after the previous one quit for a role in the Ministry of Justice.
🐶 A study has found that dogs are polluting some of the ponds on Hampstead Heath. Researchers from Imperial College London have found pesticides harmful to aquatic life in the three ponds on the heath where dogs are allowed to swim. The prime suspect is flea and tick treatments on the dogs washing off into the ponds. The two pesticides, imidacloprid and fipronil, were actually banned from agricultural use in the UK in 2019 because of their toxicity to bees and other insects. More from London's green spaces: Richmond Park has told visitors not to approach the park's deers, after a man and child were seen "dangerously close" to a stag.
🔍 And finally, we leave you with:
The BBC mistakenly forecasting a hurricane in London (Sky News)
me on the DLR (X)
The Northern Lights over Hyde Park (Standard)
"Sadiq Khan is wrong. The last thing London needs is its own Times Square" (Telegraph £)
KSI torturing London (TikTok)
A Primrose Hill resident mistaken for Maggie Smith (Camden New Journal)
Buzz Lightyear on the Tube (TikTok)
A campaign to save an east London mechanic (Standard)