CHURCH FARMHOUSE MUSEUM (1955- 2011) R.I.P - A guest blog by Gerrard Roots

On 1 April 2011, Church Farmhouse Museum, despite protests from people locally, and far beyond, was shut down by Barnet's Tory council. Since then, the Museum's collection has been sold off, and the Grade II* Listed building, one of the most significant in Barnet Borough, has become offices for Middlesex University. A small but important gateway into the rich and varied past of our area was barred to the public forever. Today is a dismal anniversary, and one which Barnet's Tories are marking with plans to shut down yet another public amenity in Hendon. Hendon Library, on the Burroughs, once the purpose-built flagship of an extensive and much-admired library service, is to become Middlesex University's Business School, whilst local readers will have to make-do with a library in a shed on a car-park.

When I have described the actions of Barnet's Tories to people who live outside this Borough, they have often commented that they must be corrupt. I always answer 'no'. Barnet's Tories do not need to be bribed to do the dreadful things they do. They do these dreadful things because they WANT to do them. (When Church Farm was fighting closure in 2010, a member of the Friends of the Museum said to then then Barnet Cabinet Member for Culture: 'but you really can't close the Museum'. His response: a gleeful 'Oh yes we can'.) The closure of Church Farm was the proving- ground for all that was to come over the next ten years.

Barnet's Tories are not corrupt- they are lucky Since the closure of Church Farm a sucession of horrendous national governments- from the Coalition onwards- have brought us the needless brutality of 'austerity', the farce of Brexit, and the shambles of the response to the pandemic. All have created a useful smokescreen for the Tories in Barnet, behind which they have continued their self-appointed task of turning much of our Borough into a joyless concrete wasteland, whilst ensuring that enough dainty green enclaves survive to accommodate their wealthy Tory power-base in comfort. I hope their luck at last runs out in May 2022.

Gerrard Roots

Ed Note - I made this video with Gerrard ten years ago on the day of the closure. This shows what we've lost. It is the saddest video I've made for this blog. 

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Gerrard was curator of Church Farmhouse Museum at the time of it's closure.Guest blogs are always welcome at the Barnet Eye

Hendon Development - A guest blog by Gerrard Roots

Hendon in recent years seems to have become a mere adjunct of Middlesex University (MU). It now appears that MU's domination of the area is to be extended even futher. Plans are afoot to demolish the former Meritage Club (now Well-being Hub), and adjoining buildings (including the Citizens Advice Bureau and the Mencap respite house) at Church End NW4, to be replaced with halls of residence for some 260 students; to demolish the Ravensfield House and Fenella buildings (currently used as MU offices) and nearby shops on the Burroughs, to be replaced by halls of residence to house twice that number of students; and to create a new office block behind Hendon Library (on the site of the old children's clinic) to accommodate the MU staff displaced from Fenella and Ravensfield. (The plans claim that the essential services, and the shops, will - eventually- be reinstated.)

These plans were inadvertently revealed when a 'restricted' document, appended to a report on the Hendon Development, to be discussed at Barnet's Assets, Regeneration and Growth Committee on 13 June, appeared openly online. The document was overnight retrieved, and resticted once more. However, I had read the plans and felt that as now they were in the public arena they should be discussed by the ARG Committee in public. I submitted a question about the plans, was asked- courteously- by the Head of Governance- to withdraw it ,but refused to do so. (How could I 'un-read' what I've read). My question was put on the agenda, with a written reply saying that the plan had been revealed by 'human error'. I attended the meeting, asked a supplementary question, only to be told that as the document had only been revealed by mistake there could be no response from the Committee The whole agenda item (initially designated as 'public') was then discussed only after the removal of the press and public from the meeting.

This raises two points. Church End is one of LBB's Conservation areas. With St Mary's Church and Church House, the Model Farmhouse and its former Milking Parlour, Rose Cottages, the Greyhound pub, and Church Farm House (formerly LBB's museum) it is one of the few tangible reminders of Hendon' s rural past. Its survival is essential. No-one would argue that the 1970s Meritage, etc, buildings, were in themselves attractive, but they are small-scale, and they currently house important services to the public. Their replacements will be three four-storey blocks ('world-class' of course as so obviously all MU new buildings are) which will overshadow everything around them and largely serve only the University. There will be no parking places, as MU's policy is that that its students should not have cars. Any resident of Church End/ Greyhound Hill and envirions will know that MU students have, shall we say, a different view.

The second point regards Barnet Borough's attitude to this farce. I have been told that the agenda item was merely to allow councillors to vote to approve a Strategic Outline Case or SOC: i.e an exploration of the financial impications of the plan. I was told that there would be extensive committee debate once the plans were fully framed, and a public consutation before any final decisions were made. So what? The scheme will happen because the scheme suits Middlesex University, and this small, senstive area of old Hendon will beyet further bombarded with buildings and traffic. I have no grudge against MU, far from it, but the University is just one other organization that Barnet's Tories are in thrall to. In Hendon it's MU, elsewhere in the Borough, it's the major building developers,' free' school chains, even Saracens RFC. (Of course, internally, Barnet is under the thumb of Capita.) This suits Barnet's complacent, ignorant and idle Tory councillors perfectly. Let such organizations decide what they want, and then simply vote in favour of it. Curiously, the only group that Barnet's Tories are not in thrall to is the Borough's ordinary residents; they are of no importance and may be safely ignored.

Here is a small film I made with Gerrard on the day Church Farmhouse museum closed.

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Gerrard Roots is a resident of Hendon and the former curator of Church Farmhouse Museum. Guest Blogs are always welcome

Guest Blog - Open Letter to Barnet Councillor Melvin Cohen - Treat the public with respect by Gerrard Roots

A guest blog by Gerrard Roots, 
Former Curator of Church Farmhouse Museum



Dear Cllr Cohen

I have been attending LBB Council meetings for forty years, but last Tuesday's meeting was unquestionably one of the worst.

John Dix and I had submitted, within time, questions about agenda item 8 (* Barnet Eye note:  Agenda item 8 concerned the proposal by Barnet Council to require ten objections before a planning application is referred to the planning committee for approval. Applications where there are less than ten objections will be decided under delegated powers by the Capita lead planning department) , and had both indicated that we would be present at the meeting and would ask supplementary questions. 

However, at the beginning of the meeting, you suddenly announced that item 8 had been removed from the agenda, and so questions could only be addressed to it at some future- unspecified- time. Although your decision must have been made well beforehand, no one had had the courtesy to inform Mr Dix or myself about it: we wasted our time in coming to the Town Hall.

That, in itself, was a discourtesy, but more importantly, your decision to disallow any discussion- by councillors or by the public- on proposals designed to yet further reduce the ability of Barnet residents to comment on Barnet Council's actions was simply shocking.

You offered no justification for your decision, but, with the exception of one Labour councillor's comment, your Committee supinely accepted it. When, on leaving, I remarked that the meeting was a disgrace, you said that that was 'just my opinion'. I have since mentioned the meeting to a number of people, and they all agree with me: the meeting WAS a disgrace. You and your fellow Committee members should be ashamed of yourselves .

Yours

Gerrard Roots

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Gerrard Roots was the Curator of Church Farmhouse Museum in Hendon, until its closure by Barnet Council. The museum has been converted into offices for Middlesex University and much of the collections were sold off with some disappearing without trace.

Guest Blogs are always welcome at The Barnet Eye.

Here is a video we made at Church Farm Museum on the day it closed featuring Gerrard

Guest Blog - An Update from the retired Curator of Church Farmhouse Museum by Gerrard Roots

Dear All

As expected, Barnet's Assets, Regeneration & Growth (ARGhhhh!) Committee voted last night to offer Church Farm to Middlesex University on a 7-year lease, rent-free, and also cough-up £280,000 towards the costs that Middx has identified as necessary for refurbishments- refurbishments needed only because Barnet has so grossly neglected the building for many years.

I, Theresa Musgrove (blogger 'Mrs Angry') and Jeremy Teare submitted pertinent written questions to the Committee, and Theresa and I were present to ask supplementary questions. We might as well have stayed at home. One might have thought that with the consignment of Cllrs Rams & Coleman (the main architects of Church Farm's demise) to the political graveyard there could now be a sensible discussion about the future of Church Farm: but, no- the effluvia from their rotting corpses still permeates the 'debating-chambers' of Barnet council.

Chairman Cllr Daniel Thomas proved, if more proof was needed, that he had no understanding of history, of the importance of museums, or of the common good, but  ,perhaps, even more disturbingly, his new mantra,  'protecting services, not buildings,' revealede that he, like the rest of his cloddish Tory chums, is incapable of recognising that the Council has a 'duty of care' towards any listed buildings it owns. The responsibilty is statutory, not optional, but why should the Deputy Leader of the second biggest borough in London be expected to be aware of that?

Of the Committee members, only Labour Councillor Pauline Coakley Webb spoke about Church Farm as a much-loved museum, and as a significant historic building. In reply, Cllr Thomas stated that it was obvious  that nobody really cared about the Museum, because Hendon Ward (in which Church Farm is sited) had returned, yet again, three  Tory councillors at the elections last May. The fact that Church Farm, which had by that time been shut for three years,  was an asset not just for Hendon but for all of Barnet (and beyond),  and that his- increasingly beleagured and flouncingly defensive- collection of Conservative 'colleagues' snuck in to control Barnet in May by one seat seems not have impinged on this wannabe (anywhere-else-but-in- Barnet) Conservative MP.

After the meeting, a former Chair of the Friends of the Museum, aptly quoted Oscar Wilde: 'They know the price of everything, but the value of nothing'. Moreover, in Barnet, only Barnet's Tories actually know the price: the rest of us, the humble oiks who pay these posturing dolt's allowances, were excluded from the deliberations on the financial details of the lease between two publicly- funded bodies: Barnet Council and Middlesex University.

Middlesex  University has, despite Barnet's claims otherwise, no proven expertise in dealing with an old and 'vulnerable' (English Heritage's description) Grade II* building. But then two baboons with lump-hammers would have been more adept at preserving Church Farmhouse's fabric than Barnet Council has. Perhaps Middllesex will make a better job of it.

Now, to me, there remain two major issues: Barnet claims that the lease to MU includes 'community use' of the building in the evenings, and at week-ends. There were no 'consultations' with the 'community' before the Council report (after all, this is Barnet) but Cllr Thomas reassured us that these would be forthcoming at some unspecified time.  If such  'consultations' actually materialize  then we must engage withe them. More importantly, we need to know what Barnet Council ( if it is still in existence in 2021) intends to do with  Church Famhouse when the lease runs out. Perhaps we should make our overtures to London Borough of  Capita now: 'Please sir, can you return this lovely !7th century building that we have all paid for into a public museum? Please, sir! Oh, please, sir!'

regards

Gerrard


Editors Note : This is a video we made with Gerrard Roots Earlier this year

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Guest Blogs are always welcome at the Barnet Eye