David Marsden

A couple of weeks ago, big kid sang at the Royal Albert Hall in “Ealing Together: Harmony in Diversity,” performing lyrics by Jewish socialist and renowned children’s author Michael Rosen in a new song “Ada in Ealing”, a celebration of a former Ealing resident, and the world’s first computer programmer and a pioneer of mathematical logic, Ada Lovelace.

Tonight he performed in his school’s musical version of The Pied Piper of Hamelin, a story about broken promises and failed leadership. The stage lights went out halfway through, but the show went on - the children kept singing, the story kept unfolding, and somehow the adults pulling the strings behind the scenes got the lights back on.

The biggest laugh from the grown ups watching came when the council leader overcame his cognitive dissonance about political dishonesty by not paying the piper due to budget constraints: “For a politician to lie?! It’s disgusting, disgraceful, dishonourable…. Dis could be the perfect solution!” They all understood perfectly.

Sitting in that school hall, watching children perform a story about adults who make promises they don’t keep, I realised I’d been writing about the same tale in “Perceval House W5.” The Pied Piper isn’t just a fairy story - it’s a documentary about local politics.

The council leader in Hamelin promises to solve the rat problem but refuses to pay when the Piper delivers. Sound familiar? Promise to “put people before buildings,” then close the buildings. Promise “transparent engagement,” then rewrite petition rules to stop residents asking questions. Promise to protect services by cutting them.

From celebrating Ada Lovelace - a woman who saw logical patterns others couldn’t - to performing a story about leaders who’ve abandoned logic entirely. The journey from The Royal Albert Hall to the primary school hall, from Ealing to Hamelin and back again, from songs about a mathematics logician to tales about a corrupt politician.

Ada Lovelace would have spotted the flawed algorithm immediately: spend £1 million on councillor allowances to save £750,000 on children’s centres. The logic doesn’t compute.

But she’d also have recognised the pattern in the Pied Piper story. He who pays the piper calls the tune. In Ealing, we’re discovering who’s really been programming our decision-makers.

Unelected developers and council officers concocted a plan to sell off community assets. Berkeley Group paid for MIPIM trips. The council issued compulsory purchase orders to demolish people’s homes to make way for a new road and Berkeley’s marketing suite opposite the new Elizabeth Line station. The council is “powerless” to prevent Berkeley Group poisoning the Southall community, like the rats in the nursery playground. The algorithm executes perfectly.

In the original tale, the children disappear forever when the adults break their promises. But big kid’s generation might rewrite that ending. They’ve already shown they understand the contradictions better than the politicians creating them.

When then five year old Zion asked the Council Leader directly about the gasworks poisoning and got a “too sciencey” response, he understood perfectly what was happening. Tonight, performing as part of a story about broken promises and failed leadership, he understood it perfectly, too.

The lights failed, but the children kept going. The system breaks down, but the community adapts. Sometimes the show must go on until the grown-ups remember how to keep their promises.

And sometimes, just sometimes, the lights come back on.

URGENT support to fund a legal challenge to Ealing Council’s decision to close 10 children’s centres.