''Last Whites of the East End'' is a documentary which aired on

BBC One BBC One is a British free-to-air public broadcast television network owned and operated by the BBC. It is the corporation's flagship network and is known for broadcasting mainstream programming, which includes BBC News television bulletins, p ...

on 24 May 2016. It presents a portrait of the

London Borough of Newham The London Borough of Newham is a London borough created in 1965 by the London Government Act 1963. It covers an area previously administered by the Essex county boroughs of West Ham and East Ham, authorities that were both abolished by the s ...

, a part of the

East End The East End of London, often referred to within the London area simply as the East End, is the historic core of wider East London, east of the Roman and medieval walls of the City of London and north of the River Thames. It does not have uni ...

with the lowest percentage of

White British White British is an ethnicity classification used for the native white population identifying as English, Scottish, Welsh, Cornish, Northern Irish, or British in the United Kingdom Census. In the 2011 census, the White British population wa ...

people in the country, due both to immigration and the migration of long-time residents, particularly to nearby

Essex Essex () is a county in the East of England. One of the home counties, it borders Suffolk and Cambridgeshire to the north, the North Sea to the east, Hertfordshire to the west, Kent across the estuary of the River Thames to the south, and G ...

. Before and after its broadcast, the documentary's content and claims were criticised by Newham officials, including

Mayor In many countries, a mayor is the highest-ranking official in a municipal government such as that of a city or a town. Worldwide, there is a wide variance in local laws and customs regarding the powers and responsibilities of a mayor as well a ...

Sir

Robin Wales Sir Robert Andrew "Robin" Wales (born 18 January 1955) is a British Labour Party politician who served as the directly elected mayor of the London Borough of Newham from 2002 to 2018. Prior to taking up that newly created role, he was leader ...

. The BBC maintained that it was a balanced broadcast.

Synopsis

The BBC's description of the programme states "Newham has been shaped by immigration for generations, but the past 15 years have been defined by it, as Newham welcomed the highest numbers of new residents anywhere in the country. At the same time more than half the white British population have vanished – breaking apart the tight-knit families their community was built on." The area's last

working men's club Working men's clubs are British private social clubs first created in the 19th century in industrial areas, particularly the North of England, Midlands, Scotland and South Wales Valleys, to provide recreation and education for working class me ...

is described as "a hidden world of

tea dance __NOTOC__ A tea dance, also called a ''thé dansant'' (French for "dancing tea"), was a dance held in the summer or autumn from 4 to 7 p.m. In the English countryside, a garden party sometimes preceded the dance.''Party-giving on Every Scale ...

s, boxing and drinking in the last club left – an oasis for those left behind". Usmaan Hussain is a father from

Silvertown Silvertown is a district in the London Borough of Newham, in east London, England. It lies on the north bank of the River Thames, Thames and was historically part of the parishes of West Ham and East Ham, Becontree Hundred, hundred of Becontr ...

whose family emigrated from Bangladesh. Despite the racial abuse faced in his youth, he considers himself equally Asian and British. His white friends from his childhood have moved away, and he feels that the

Cockney Cockney is an accent and dialect of English, mainly spoken in London and its environs, particularly by working-class and lower middle-class Londoners. The term "Cockney" has traditionally been used to describe a person from the East End, or b ...

culture will die out soon. However, the demographic changes in his area mean that he can run his own Muslim prayer group without having to travel elsewhere to go to the mosque. His children attend a primary school where 43 native languages are spoken, and he feels that a cohesive "

Britishness British national identity is a term referring to the sense of national identity, as embodied in the shared and characteristic culture, languages and traditions, of the British people. It comprises the claimed qualities that bind and disting ...

" between all of the communities "has gone. And I don't think it will ever return". The school's headteacher states that children learn English quickly and get along by being too young to have developed prejudices. Business owners describe the change of demographics on their finances. Richard Nathan owns a fourth-generation

pie and mash Pie and mash is a traditional working-class food, originating in the Docks of London. It typically consists of a minced beef pie, mashed potato and a parsley sauce known as liquor. Pie, mash and eel shops have been in London since the 19th centu ...

shop, which is not frequented by Asians and Eastern Europeans, but sees more business when people return for

Mothers' Day Mother's Day is a celebration honoring the mother of the family or individual, as well as motherhood, maternal bonds, and the influence of mothers in society. It is celebrated on different days in many parts of the world, most commonly in the ...

. Due to its position near

West Ham United West Ham United Football Club is an English professional football club that plays its home matches in Stratford, East London. The club competes in the Premier League, the top tier of English football. The club plays at the London Stadium, hav ...

Boleyn Ground The Boleyn Ground, often referred to as Upton Park, was a football stadium located in Upton Park, east London. It was the home of West Ham United from 1904 to 2016, and was briefly used by Charlton Athletic in the early 1990s during their years ...

at Upton Park, there is expected to be a decline as the team move to the

Olympic Stadium ''Olympic Stadium'' is the name usually given to the main stadium of an Olympic Games. An Olympic stadium is the site of the opening and closing ceremonies. Many, though not all, of these venues actually contain the words ''Olympic Stadium'' as ...

Reception

East End resident Tomáš Tengely-Evans wrote in the ''

Socialist Worker ''Socialist Worker'' is the name of several far-left newspapers currently or formerly associated with the International Socialist Tendency (IST). It is a weekly newspaper published by the Socialist Workers Party (SWP) in the United Kingdom since ...

'' that "The ''Last Whites of the East End'' is based on the racist premise that ethnic diversity is a bad thing. It presents a mythical image of East End working class communities, where everyone looked after one another before the 'outsiders' came." He stated that the area had experienced different waves of immigration throughout history, and integration had improved in the last 50 years. An interviewed local student added that East End residents had been moving to suburban Essex since the end of the Second World War, and that phenomenon included

British Asian British Asians (also referred to as Asian Britons) are British citizens of Asian descent. They constitute a significant and growing minority of the people living in the United Kingdom, with 6.9% of the population identifying as Asian/Asian Brit ...

s, so talk of "

white flight White flight or white exodus is the sudden or gradual large-scale migration of white people from areas becoming more racially or ethnoculturally diverse. Starting in the 1950s and 1960s, the terms became popular in the United States. They refer ...

" was unfounded. Prior to the broadcast, initial news reports suggested that the documentary was to be negative in its content, leading to objections being raised by local authority figures in Newham. The mayor, Sir

, said that if it were as negative as made out, it would be a "distorted image" and contribute to ethnic tensions. A borough councillor who had been a teacher for 42 years said that only two complaints were ever made against diverse religious plays by schools in that time. The president of the local

Ahmadiyya Ahmadiyya (, ), officially the Ahmadiyya Muslim Community or the Ahmadiyya Muslim Jama'at (AMJ, ar, الجماعة الإسلامية الأحمدية, al-Jamāʿah al-Islāmīyah al-Aḥmadīyah; ur, , translit=Jamā'at Aḥmadiyyah Musl ...

Muslim community said that he was saddened by white people choosing to leave, saying that life would be better with diverse groups coexisting. The executive producer, Emma Wakefield, replied by stating that there was a balance of views in the documentary, including from those who were staying in the area and those who had left. After the documentary had aired, Wales wrote in the ''

Newham Recorder The ''Newham Recorder'' is a local weekly newspaper distributed in the London Borough of Newham. It is published weekly, on a Wednesday, in the tabloid format by Archant, the UK's largest independently owned regional media business, with a digit ...

'' that white people were still the borough's largest ethnic group, and a survey showed 9 out of 10 people got on with those from different backgrounds. Dr Ruth Cherrington of the

University of East London , mottoeng = Knowledge and the fulfilment of vows , established = 1898 – West Ham Technical Institute1952 – West Ham College of Technology1970 – North East London Polytechnic1989 – Polytechnic of East London ...

defended the documentary for highlighting a complex issue, but pointed out that it did not cover the impact of a decrease of social housing on the white working class. Ali Catterall of ''

The Guardian ''The Guardian'' is a British daily newspaper. It was founded in 1821 as ''The Manchester Guardian'', and changed its name in 1959. Along with its sister papers ''The Observer'' and ''The Guardian Weekly'', ''The Guardian'' is part of the Gu ...

'' chastised the show for its "absurdly provocative title", but praised it for a balance between "very illiberal opinions" and "sober, progressive voices" that turned it into "a consistently compelling watch". Despite much debate on

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about the programme,

Ofcom The Office of Communications, commonly known as Ofcom, is the government-approved regulatory and competition authority for the broadcasting, telecommunications and postal industries of the United Kingdom. Ofcom has wide-ranging powers acros ...

had received no complaints by the following morning.

References

External links

The last whites of the East End
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The Daily Telegraph ''The Daily Telegraph'', known online and elsewhere as ''The Telegraph'', is a national British daily broadsheet newspaper published in London by Telegraph Media Group and distributed across the United Kingdom and internationally. It was fo ...

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Last Whites of the East End: BBC documentary explores being a white British minority in a hub for migration
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The Independent ''The Independent'' is a British online newspaper. It was established in 1986 as a national morning printed paper. Nicknamed the ''Indy'', it began as a broadsheet and changed to tabloid format in 2003. The last printed edition was publis ...

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BBC documentary highlights white flight in Newham
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'' *{{IMDb title, qid=Q27040330, title=Last Whites of the East End, description=2016 BBC television documentaries 2016 in British television Media and communications in the London Borough of Newham