The Londoner: Time running out for Big Ben foundry

Campaigners hoping to save the Whitechapel Bell Foundry are planning a bell-ringing protest outside a crucial planning meeting in Tower Hamlets tomorrow where a decision will be made on whether the Foundry is turned into a boutique, bell-themed hotel.

“We’re asking people to try to prick the conscience of the councillors who are going to make a historic decision to either keep the foundry that made Big Ben alive, or turn it into a hotel with a rooftop swimming pool,” campaigner Adam Lowe told The Londoner.

The Whitechapel Bell Foundry in east London, Lowe claims, is “the oldest manufacturing company in Britain” and has the same corporate structure as it did in the reign of Elizabeth I. The foundry cast both Big Ben and the Liberty Bell, and was commissioned to make the Olympic bell. It closed in 2017 and the Grade II- listed building was sold to an American developer. But the UK Historic Building Preservation Trust (UKBHT) and Factum Arte, a maker of sculptures using 3D printing founded by Lowe, say they have an alternative plan. UKBHT says “a self-sustaining business” could be established “in keeping with the foundry’s history and equipped with all the tools for 21st-century casting”.

Lowe told The Londoner that Historic England, which has advised Tower Hamlets and the developers, had not considered this. Historic England countered that “a planning application for alternative plans has not been submitted”. The campaigners can point to a host of high-profile supporters including artists Anish Kapoor and Antony Gormley. Tower Hamlets council said it had considered the application to revive the working foundry, but told The Londoner that its recommendation on Thursday would be “to grant both full planning permission and listed building consent”.

Can the protesters hope for a big turnout, The Londoner asked? “ It depends how apathetic the country’s bell ringers are,” Lowe joked. “And whether it’s raining or not.”

For whom will the bell toll?

Opportunity knocks

Journalist Kate Adie had a rocky start to her career. Speaking to the Society of Editors last night, the veteran foreign correspondent recalled being sent by Radio Brighton to interview a local resident. At his door, she was twice turned away by a policeman and twice sent back by her editor to find out more. The policeman eventually explained: “He’s dead. Murdered.”

Adie informed her editor, who replied in frustration: “Dead? Like, how? Like when, like why, and possibly by whom?”

Adie went to the house a third time. “You’re new at this, aren’t you?” said the policeman.

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John Bercow may soon be back on our screens. We hear the former Speaker will be the star pundit for Sky News on election night. At last night’s Political Studies Association Awards, Bercow was coy but told us: “Put it this way, I will definitely be up all night and busy.” Watch this space.

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Aristocratic sculptor David Roper Curzon is a fan of downsizing, after swapping his 15-bedroom Jacobean pile for a more homely house on his family’s Hampshire estate. “It’s a pain when you’ve forgotten something upstairs,” he told The Londoner at the 30th anniversary of Boisdale yesterday. “It takes ages to fetch anything.” The arrangement suits others too. “My dog is much happier.”

It’s getting festive as Love comes to town

The Christmas season has officially begun now that the Fortnum & Mason ice-skating rink at Somerset House is open for business. Guests carving up the ice included actors Ophelia Lovibond (nice impression of the skating minister) and Henry Pettigrew, rappers Lethal Bizzle and Kano, Olympic champion Victoria Pendleton and comedy goddesses Kathy Lette, Ronni Ancona and Roisin Conaty.

Also spotted were Gareth Pugh and Courtney Love. Fashion designer Pugh, who has dressed Beyoncé, Rihanna and Lady Gaga, was keeping warm next to rock star Love as temperatures plunged.

The Londoner bumped into Love earlier this week in Notting Hill and, a little unsure who she was, asked if she was famous. “Yeah, super famous,” the musician replied.

Love then told us she is in town for three months, writing a new album.

Perhaps there will be an ice-skating number.

SW1A

Labour has defended its Bernie Grant Leadership Programme, founded to address BAME under-representation, after nobody from the scheme was even shortlisted to run as an MP in the general election. A Labour spokesperson told us: “We are proud that the Labour Party has more BAME MPs than all other political parties combined.” They also pointed out that the scheme, named after the former Tottenham MP Bernie Grant, is only in its first year.

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Sam Gyimah, former MP for East Surrey, is still getting used to the constituency he hopes to win — Kensington. “Best reason,” he tweeted last night, “for not revealing voting intention on the doorstep tonight: ‘I am a member of the Royal Household.’ That’s a first.”

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Tory Lord Bethell was out canvassing in Wimbledon yesterday and gave this upbeat endorsement of the Conservatives’ prospects in the capital: “London’s not a no-go zone.” It’s a start.

QUOTE OF THE DAY

‘Under socialism you will all co-operate’

Jeremy Corbyn tells press photographers that soon they won’t need to battle each other for space