Exclusive: Protest threat over Hampstead Heath ladies' pond access
Plus: another Olympic bid, more fallout from the Toby Carvery oak felling, and spending five years building London in Minecraft
Morning — the City of London is reviewing its policy on trans access to the Hampstead Heath ladies’ pond, following the recent Supreme Court ruling on the legal definition of a woman. Trans women have been allowed to swim at the natural bathing spot under formal guidance since 2019, and the policy has been backed by votes from the local swimmers’ association. But long-time opponents believe the ruling has given them their strongest case yet. We’ve learnt they are preparing for protests — an “occupation”, in their words. The fresh fight looming over the ladies’ pond is after your round-up below.
Plus: another Olympic bid, more fallout from Toby Carvery's tree felling, and spending five years building London in Minecraft.
PS: Apologies for the recent lack of emails, but the Spy team has been on a much-needed holiday abroad. We're now back in sunny London and back to our usual schedule ☀️
What we've spied
🏅 Sir Sadiq Khan wants London to bid for the 2040 Olympic and Paralympic Games. "My ambition has always been for London to be the sporting capital of the world," the mayor told the Times earlier this week, after City Hall published a report showing sports events last year including the Champions League final and NFL games generated £230m for the capital's economy. While a formal bid for the 2040 Olympics hasn't been submitted, Khan has said he is now actively seeking support from the UK government and the British Olympic Association, which includes lobbying for London to host the 2029 World Athletics Championships as a stepping stone towards the Olympics. We're some way off from a formal decision — the host city for 2040 is due to be selected in 2027 — and quite a few other capitals have put their name in the ring, including Berlin and Warsaw. But if Khan's efforts pay off it would mean London becoming the first city to host the Summer Olympics four times. The mayor faces a challenge in persuading some parts of London though, given the controversial legacy of the 2012 Olympics and lingering concerns about gentrification, displacement and value for money. But Khan’s pitch is “the greenest Games ever," given that 2040 could rely on existing facilities from 2012, rather than constructing stuff anew.
Elsewhere for Khan: the mayor has been accused of a "power grab" over his plans to pedestrianise Oxford Street, which will involve him wrangling control of the area off of Westminster council. Both figures within City Hall and Westminster have been speaking to the BBC's Tom Edwards about Khan's proposals, which are subject to a public consultation ending tomorrow (May 2). "I am deeply concerned this is a power grab from the mayor to take away power from local residents," says Andrew Boff, who chairs the London Assembly's planning committee. But on Wednesday the mayor's plans got a vote of confidence from one notable retailer — the UK boss of IKEA backed pedestrianisation, on the same day the company opened its new flagship Oxford Street store. Time Out have published an inside look at the new shop here.
🏃 More sport: a tonne of records were set at this year's London Marathon at the weekend. For starters, the 2025 event set a new world record for the number of marathon finishers, with 56,640 runners crossing the line after completing the 26.2 mile route on Sunday. Another milestone was the number of entries — a record 840,000 people applied to the race this year, up from 578,000. In terms of individual competitors, the autistic athlete Angus Leckonby became the fastest man with an intellectual disability to complete a marathon, clocking a time of three hours, 36 minutes and 38 seconds. Meanwhile, Zoe Cowell-Jones became the fastest woman to complete a marathon as a mascot, with a time of three hours, 19 minutes and 18 seconds while dressed as Bernie the Lion, a mascot for the children's cancer charity Dear Toby Trust. On that, the Guardian had a fun piece getting into the sweaty details of what it's like to run the marathon in a novelty outfit — "The costume develops its own microclimate," says one runner. The other big headline of the event was pro-Palestine protesters getting arrested after throwing red paint on Tower Bridge during the marathon.
🌳 The fallout from the felling of a 500-year-old oak tree in north London by the Toby Carvery restaurant chain continues — an official investigation has been launched. Last Thursday junior environment minister Sue Hayman announced that the Forestry Commission, the UK's public woodland manager, had started an investigation into the felling — specifically, to investigate the claim by Toby Carvery that the Enfield oak had been cut down for safety reasons, because it was dead or diseased. The Commission has the power to impose fines or launch a private prosecution over the incident. Announcing the investigation in the House of Lords, Lady Hayman said the felling "has opened up a nerve in the country about how important it is that our really ancient trees are properly protected." The chopped-down tree, in Whitewebbs Park, was discovered earlier in April, with local newspaper Enfield Dispatch being the first to break the story. Toby Carvery fessed up to the felling, after initial speculation that Tottenham Hotspur FC could have been involved, given it's building a training ground on part of the park. The Dispatch now reports that Enfield council is considering issuing tree preservation orders for the whole of Whitewebbs park in response to a petition that's garnered 40,000 signatures from locals calling for "justice" for the oak.
🥾 Elsewhere for London's parks: local residents in Lambeth have launched a legal challenge against the borough council over music festivals and private events in Brockwell Park. The group, called Protect Brockwell Park and publicly backed by the actor Sir Mark Rylance, is launching the action in the High Court in response to large-scale festivals in the park like Mighty Hoopla, Wide Awake and Field Day. Locals claim the events are "damaging our trees, disturbing wildlife, compacting the soil, and fencing off huge areas of the park for weeks at a time," according to their crowdfunding page for the legal challenge, which has so far raised £34,000. If the campaigners win, commercial events in Brockwell Park will start needing full planning permission before going ahead — a process with more input from residents that could in turn lead to smaller or less frequent events. A spokesperson for Lambeth council has reacted to the challenge by stressing the economic and cultural benefit of the festivals, while the company Brockwell Live, which organises the festivals, emphasised the remedial work it undertakes after festivals.
💰 Just while we're on Lambeth council: it's come to light that the borough's disgraced former chief exec left with quite the golden goodbye. Bayo Dosunmu resigned from his £190,000-a-year job at the Labour-run council last year after being arrested for drink-driving and fleeing the scene of a collision during an incident in central London. The Telegraph now reports that Dosunmu received a payout of £87,879 after stepping down from the role. "It's an absolute disgrace that a council boss on a six-figure salary was handed nearly £90,000 of taxpayers' cash after being convicted," a spokesperson for the TaxPayers' Alliance told the paper. A spokesperson for Lambeth council said Dosunmu "received payment in respect of his notice period, untaken annual leave and for his work as acting returning officer for the general election and a by-election. These were paid in line with his contract and for work already completed."
👮 The UK's policing watchdog has ordered the Met Police to hold a misconduct hearing for the firearms officer who shot Chris Kaba in south London. Sgt Marytn Blake, 41, was last year cleared of the murder of Kaba, a 24-year-old Black man who was shot in the head in his car in Streatham in 2022 when he attempted to drive out of a police roadblock. The jury's acquittal of Blake was followed by protests and a national debate over police use of force and racism, amid revelations about Kaba's violent past. While legal proceedings are finished for Blake, on Wednesday the Independent Office for Police Conduct (IOPC) directed the Met to hold a gross misconduct hearing that could result in disciplinary sanctions against Blake, including dismissal. However, the Met had been arguing against further action with the IOPC. "We recognise the significant impact of Mr Kaba's death on his family who continue to grieve the loss of a loved one," began a statement issued by assistant Met commissioner Laurence Taylor in response to the IOPC's directive. It continued: "We made strong representations that he should not face any further action due to the extensive evidence tried and tested at court and the not guilty verdict returned by the jury". The Met also said that a chief officer from another UK police force will be chairing the hearing, to ensure independence.
📖 Free book exchanges have returned to some Tube stations, after the schemes were controversially suspended over fire safety concerns. TfL has announced that 15 surface-level stations including Hammersmith, Morden and Willesden Green will be getting book swaps back, but this time in special cabinets that represent "suitable fire-proof storage solution". A few weeks ago it came to light that the London Fire Brigade had ordered TfL to remove many book swaps across the Underground given the risks posed by "combustible material". And indeed, while TfL has announced the new compliant cabinets for surface-level stations, it says it's still working on a solution for sub-surface stations, where restrictions are more stringent. If you want to track their return, the Londonist have put together a nice detailed map of every London book swap, in Tube stations and beyond, here.
🔍 And finally, we leave you with:
Spending two years trapped in a central London car park (BBC)
Graham Norton selling his £4.95m Wapping home (Daily Mail)
A deal to save the Crystal Palace dinosaurs (Standard)
The difference between upper class Clapham and the hood (TikTok)
A new Morley's opening in Balham (Instagram)
'I lost £200,000 on my Peckham cafe's failure. Here's what I learnt' (TikTok)
After trans ruling, fresh fight looms over Hampstead Heath ladies’ pond
Just when it seemed settled, the debate over trans women swimming in the ladies' pond at Hampstead Heath looks to be reignited by the recent Supreme Court ruling.
Last week the organisation that owns and operates Kenwood Ladies' Pond, the City of London Corporation, issued a statement saying it was "carefully considering" the court ruling, which found that the legal definition of a woman in the 2010 Equality Act refers to biological sex rather than gender identity.
Compliance with the Equality Act was cited by the Corporation in 2019 when it issued formal guidance stating that trans women could swim in the 100-year-old pond, and the policy has remained in place despite minority efforts to overturn it.
Trans rights groups tell the Spy they do not believe the latest ruling requires barring trans people from the ponds. They also question how a ban could be enforced humanely, pointing to the prospect of hiring security guards or involving the police to intervene.
But the Spy has learnt that long-time opponents of trans inclusivity at the ponds are now gearing up for a fight if the Corporation continues to permit trans women in the wake of the ruling.
They expect further protests to take place at the pond and are floating the possibility of a legal challenge, depending on how the City of London Corporation changes its guidance.
That includes Venice Allan, who last year became the first woman to be banned from membership of the Kenwood Ladies' Pond Association (KLPA), a historic community group that represents the views of pond swimmers to the City.
Allan was filmed in a viral video in March 2024 standing on a chair at KLPA's annual general meeting and shouting criticism at members for voting against a motion to exclude trans women from the pond.
On Sunday, in a post viewed 100,000 times on X, Allan wrote: "This is a public message to the @cityoflondon, if you continue to break the law by allowing men into our Ladies’ Pond, women will take it back by force."
The Spy contacted Allan to clarify her statement. She told us: "When I say 'force', I don't mean we're gonna have weapons, but, you know, occupations do happen.
"It's summer now, so it's perfect to have a swimming protest. Lovely weather — there's nothing we'd like to do more".
Allan, who has used the ponds for over 20 years, also added: "It's crystal clear what the Supreme Court ruling means: the City of London were always wrong to say that trans women, even with Gender Recognition Certificates, were legally women."
The Hampstead Heath swimming ponds have seen multiple protests ever since the Corporation began the process of formally recommending trans inclusion in 2017, though trans women had reportedly been swimming at the ladies' pond informally before the change in guidance.
In May 2018, a group of activists opposed to trans access jumped into the Heath's men's pond, some wearing fake beards, having bypassed staff by saying they "self-identify as men". They were escorted from the pond by police.
Then in August 2022, Allan organised a protest at the ladies' pond under the title "Let Women Swim" to launch a campaign aiming to restore the pond as a strictly single-sex space in time for the pond's centenary.
Their efforts culminated in the failed motion at KLPA's AGM last year, though a decision to exclude trans women ultimately rests with the City of London Corporation.
Throughout the debate the KLPA as a whole has supported trans inclusion at the pond, voting on multiple occasions to support the City's guidance. Trans women have also been allowed to join the KLPA as members.
But internal divisions within the KLPA remain. Among those against trans inclusion is Jan Williams, chair of the radical feminist group Object who has publicly claimed the KLPA has been "captured by gender ideology".
Williams has previously been elected to the KLPA's nine-person committee and, last year, unsuccessfully attempted to become chair of the KLPA, garnering 58 votes compared to the winner's 159.
In the wake of the Supreme Court ruling, the KLPA issued a cautious statement on trans access, suggesting they support the status quo while also stressing the decision was not up to them.
A KLPA spokesperson said: "The Ladies' Pond is open to all women and girls over the age of eight and, according to the lifeguards, trans women have been swimming there for many years without incident.
"The Ladies' Pond is well staffed by lifeguards and stewards who are there to ensure the safety and wellbeing of all users.
"As the KLPA is not responsible for managing the pond, including defining who is allowed to access the pond, it is unlikely that the Supreme Court ruling is relevant to the KLPA's existence or activities."
As for the Corporation, since the ruling it has added a new notice to the information page for Kenwood Ladies' Pond. It reads:
"The City of London Corporation has acknowledged last week’s UK Supreme Court ruling that the legal definition of a woman is based on biological sex. The Corporation is working through the implications of the ruling to clarify what this means in practice, for example access to our facilities, and are committed to providing a safe and respectful environment for all.
"The City Corporation’s existing policies remain in effect at this time."
Trans rights campaigners tell the Spy they expect the Corporation's decision to inevitably prove controversial, given the ponds have been a "flashpoint" for trans inclusivity for years.
A spokesperson for TransActual told us: "Any reinterpretation of the Equality Act does not directly bar trans people from any specific space. However, it might be considered to impose a duty on the body that governs/manages that space to exclude trans people.
"In the case of Hampstead Heath, this has been a flashpoint for so long that I am pretty sure that the City of London will face strong demands - from both sides - in respect of the rules they apply. Then... then it gets into the detail and nitty-gritty of enforcement."
Allan tells the Spy she believes the Corporation's statements indicate it will seek to maintain trans inclusion at the ponds — an outcome, she believes, that will likely lead to a legal challenge.
She points out that while there may technically be no legal definition of a 'lady', signs at the entrance of the ladies' pond read: 'Women Only. Men not allowed beyond this point'.
"It's an untenable position," she says of the signs in light of the court ruling.
The Spy contacted the City of London Corporation for this piece, asking for its reaction to Allan's statements and the possibility of further protest action.
A spokesperson replied with the Corporation’s original statement: “We are carefully considering the judgment and EHRC’s interim update. We remain committed to providing a safe and respectful environment for all.”