Thanks for the additional information.

It prompted me to dig out my papers and having flicked through them it is possible to summarise the history of the Honor Oak Recreation Ground.

1901 Site acquired by Camberwell Borough Council along with adjoining land for burial purposes.

1920s Camberwell New Cemetery opened followed by Honor Oak Crematorium.

1956 to 1995 Six and a half acres at the southern end of the site used as a nursery by Southwark Council. The buildings were demolished in 1998.

1991 Camberwell New Cemetery extended when Southwark take approx. 3.8 acres from the northern end of the Recreation Ground. At the time this was projected to provide enough space to last until 2010. This left eleven acres of Recreation Ground.

November 1996 Southwark decides to take three more acres from the northern end of the Recreation Ground to provide extra burial space. At the same time Southwark begins consultation on the future of the former nursery site. The three options are (A) cleared public open space with grass (B) public park (C ) mixture of private sports club and public sports facility. The deadline for comments is 20 June 1997

April 1999 Southwark launches a further consultation exercise on the future of the former nursery site using Groundwork Southwark.

July 1999 Environmental investigation by Parkman indicates that clean up costs for the former nursery site will be ?362,306.

September 1999 Sketch designs circulated for converting former nursery site to a combination of parkland and a junior football pitch.

11 October 1999 Southwark states that three acres at the northern end of the Recreation Ground will not be absorbed into the cemetery until the old nursery site is rehabilitated and becomes part of the Recreation Ground. Total conversion/reclamation/clean up costs said to be ?892,000. Southwark allocates ?150,000 from 1999 budget and proposes ?350,000 from 2000 budget to pay for this. It applies to English Partnerships for a grant to fund the balance.

December 1999 Application for funding from English Partnerships unsuccessful.

18 April 2000 A meeting of Southwark's Regeneration and Environmental committee resolves that the three acres to be taken from the northern end of the Recreation Ground be used for burials from June 2000. The steering group set up as part of the consultation exercise on the future of the former nursery site is given three days notice of this meeting and has an emergency meeting on 17 April.

By June 2000 It is suggested that the cemetery extension goes on the former nursery site.

17 November 2000 Southwark gives itself planning permission to convert the former nursery site into an extension of the cemetery. Lewisham did not object to this decision. Southwark drops its planning application to take three acres from the northern part of the Recreation Ground.

On reflection the consultation exercise was a complete farce. I can only remember one of the Southwark Councillors who was involved in the consultation meetings. That was Cllr Dominic Thorncroft. The minutes indicate that Cllr Niall Duffy, Cllr Vicki Naish and Cllr Mick Barnard were also involved. The Lewisham Councillor who was most active in trying to look after the interests of Lewisham residents who used the Recreation Ground was Susan Wise.

I didn't realise that the illegal dumping had started before the conversion of the former nursery site began. Similarly I was not aware of the physical intimidation to which you refer.

I did notice the large amounts of spoil being deposited on the site after the conversion began but I naively assumed that this was the result of ground works associated with the creation of the new cemetery. What did concern me was the apparent use of the site as a vehicle depot by a tree felling company but I did not raise this with Southwark.

I am not a great fan of conspiracy theories and so I guess the reason why the nursery site was taken for burials was because Southwark wasn't prepared to fund the ?900k required to pay for the conversion/reclamation/clean up of the nursery site into parkland.

Of course that doesn't address the dumping issue. We can only hope there is a full and transparent enquiry and that Southwark and those responsible are held to account.

Presumably the site will also have to be decontaminated. That is bitterly ironic as it was the cost of decontaminating the site that was a factor in preventing its conversion to parkland in 1999/2000.