Ted is a print worker. He lives with his family in a rented flat in a Church Commissioners block in North Southwark, South London, close to the River Thames. His wife, Hilda, works in a local school. They have lived in the area all their lives. Ted chairs a community group worried about plans by the council to zone the area for ‘City and West End Uses’. Some students came into the community centre to offer to help. I was one of those students. That was 47 years ago.

I stayed in North Southwark working as a community planner with Ted and my colleague George. I later moved on when our grant funding was cut off to work for the Joint Docklands Action Group, in London Docklands. My journey took me into local government via a spell in the Docklands Unit at the Greater London Council (GLC) in its final years before the abolition of the GLC by the Thatcher government. I worked for local councils elsewhere in London, first, as a local councillor, then as a regeneration officer trying to make a difference from inside local government. Ted and his community group, the North Southwark Community Development Group, kept going.

‘City and West End Uses’ did come into North Southwark – with a vengeance. Flats in Ted's block were progressively sold off at West End prices to young professionals as elderly residents passed away or moved out. The area was transformed beyond recognition. All down the river, from Waterloo Bridge to Tower Bridge and then into the Docklands, land values rocketed through the 1980s and 1990s. Luxury flats, office blocks and restaurants were crammed onto the riverfront. The housing needs of local people took second place. Big money poured in as the government backed the developers time and time again. The property market triumphed. Most of the local councils caved in to pressure and some council leaders happily sat on government development boards such as the London Docklands Development Corporation; several senior planning officers went through a revolving door to work for the developers.

Ted was at the helm of his group through it all for 40 years. He died in 2014.