News from The Barnet Society

A dramatic backdrop at the RAF Museum at Hendon provided the setting for a marathon election count which upended local politics as the Labour Party haemorrhaged seats and Barnet Council slipped to no overall control. Labour and the Conservatives finished with 31 seats each.

Pride of place at this year Barnet Classic Car Club’s annual show in the top car park at The Spires shopping centre on Sunday 17 May will be some of the much-cherished vehicles which the club’s committee members have carefully maintained over the years – from run-arounds to the high-end motors of yesteryear.

Painting and caring for the Battle of Barnet banners which are displayed along the High Street each summer is an historic legacy for the town which volunteers at Barnet Museum hope might gain international recognition.

Such was the success and respect for Barnet’s former weekly newspaper, The Barnet Press, that a century ago it published an emergency edition on sale each evening in central London during the 1926 General Strike.

Barnet Market stalwart David Bone, who has been selling fruit and vegetables since he started as a boy at the age of seven helping on his father’s stall, has been awarded a 2026 Borough of Barnet Civic Award for Lifetime Achievement.

A renewed attempt is being made to get up to date information on the future ownership of The Spires Shopping Centre in High Barnet following a second intervention by the High Court appointing administrators for companies involved with its leases.

A road closure most parents might welcome would be when the street outside their homes is transformed into a safe play space for small children free of traffic.

When Charles Dickens was forced the spend the night at the Red Lion in Barnet he faced some harsh truths – a challenging story line delivered with style and conviction by the cast of Between the Lines, which had its first night at The Bull Theatre in a run of sell-out performances.

A service of commemoration and laying of wreaths marked the 555th anniversary of the Battle of Barnet – a service researched and devised by the recently appointed rector of Monken Hadley parish church, the Reverend Francesco Aresco.

The tsunami of tall buildings that started 20 years ago in West Hendon and Brent Cross is now breaking on the northern suburbs of Barnet. Above are samples: High Barnet Place and Great North Leisure Park, both refused by the Council but called in by the Mayor of London; and Edgware town centre, approved by the Council. Their transformation of our borough, visually and socially, should surely be a local election issue on 7 May.

Young musicians will be to the fore during a summer season of concerts to be held at several High Barnet venues including the parish church of St the Baptist. Barnet viola player Inis Oirr Asano (above), who lives in Underhill, will be appearing with the Elmore Quarter during the High Barnet Chamber Music Festival in June.

Residents of two narrow streets of mainly small cottages and terraced homes claim they have been ignored and abandoned by Barnet Council which has imposed double yellow lines at the junction of Sebright and Calvert Roads without proper consultation.

A special 263 Sunday service to Barnet Church – in support of Comic Relief – provided bus passengers a chance to step back in time and hop on board an iconic Routemaster.

Star Pubs say they hope that the Black Horse – now protected by metal grilles across doors and windows – will reopen by at least mid-June in time for the start of televised football matches in the FIFA World Cup. Several potential tenants are being interviewed by Star’s management team.

An application to build a six-bedroom house in a protected wood between Sunset View and Hadley Green has been rejected by Barnet Council on the grounds it would cause unacceptable harm to a woodland habitat.

Terminally ill householders in the London borough of Barnet will be removed from council tax if they qualify under a new relief scheme which takes effect in April.

Litters pickers from Barnet Residents Association fanned out across the town in one of the association’s regular clean ups – the kind of initiative which the Chipping Barnet MP Dan Tomlinson hopes will be encouraged by his new community action network.

Work has started on foundations for a new studio which is being built for the Barnet Guild of Artists as part of the housing development which is underway in the Whalebones fields and woodland off Wood Street, Barnet.

Imagining how the great Victorian novelist Charles Dickens might have spent an evening in the bar at the Red Lion public house in Barnet is the highlight of a new production at The Bull Theatre.

Since Barnet Council decided in December that it was minded to refuse Barratt London’s planning application, the Mayor of London has called it in for review. A public hearing seems likely directly after the local elections on 7 May 2026. The Barnet Society & Barnet Residents Association are greatly concerned that the Mayor’s decision won’t be impartial, and has sent the letter below to our MP, Barnet Councillors and its Greater London Assembly Member.