PARENTS are trying to get to get an empty community hall reopened which would be ideal for a children’s summer play scheme. The fed up families are calling on the keyholders’ to open up Teviot Hall

By Julia Gregory

PARENTS are trying to get to get an empty community hall reopened which would be ideal for a children’s summer play scheme.

The fed up families on the Poplar’s Brownfield and Teviot estates in London’s East End are calling on the keyholders’ to open up the 20-year-old Teviot Community Hall for the 42 children who can’t get summer scheme places.

At first they couldn’t get to the bottom of the mystery of who owns the building.

But it has emerged this evening that the property belongs to Tower Hamlets Council.

LEAD STOLEN

The chair of the group which runs the Teviot Hall, Lillian Collins, said it is owned by the council and had been shut for essential building works after lead was stolen from the roof.

There had been problems with a leaking roof, the floor needed re-doing and so did the electricity, she pointed out.

“We would never take risks with children,” she added.

But the mums are insisting that the hall is fit enough for a summer play scheme.

OVERGROWN

Teviot estate board chair Crissy Townsend told the East London Advertiser: “We’ve got dads who want to clean it up. The garden is a bit overgrown, but we could do something with that.”

Teviot hall opened in 1989 as a centre for youngsters and senior citizens, but was last used as a polling station for the EU elections on June 4.

The Town Hall confirmed tonight that they owned it. A spokesman revealed: “Teviot Hall is leased to a Ms Lillian Collins. We understand the building has fallen into certain disrepair and she has kept it closed because of this.”

But as yet the council insists it has not been contacted by any organisation or individual who want to bring the building back into use.