Taking a cue from police investigators and reality TV shows looking to create a scandal, Harrow Council in northwest London has started to use voice risk analysis -- a type of phone-based lie detector -- to try and catch fraudsters claiming unneeded benefits from the Department for Work and Pensions. How does it work? "The technology detects changes in people's voice patterns such as hesitation or avoiding direct questions, and identifies them as a......

This Week In London’s History Monday – 17th December 1983: An IRA car bomb explodes near Harrods in Knightsbridge, killing six people (including three police officers) and injuring a further 85 Christmas shoppers. Tuesday – 18th December 1890: The world’s first ‘deep-level’ electric tube line opens, connecting Stockwell and King William Street. As we mentioned last year, the City & South London Railway would later become a part of the Northern Line as we......

This Week In London’s History Monday – 10th December 1907: Anti-vivisectionists march through central London to protest at the dissection of a brown terrier dog several years earlier. The ‘anti-doggers’ clash with police at Trafalgar Square, in what would become known as the Brown Dog Riots. Tuesday – 11th December 2005: Much of London is covered by a vast plume of smoke, following a series of massive explosions at Buncefield Oil Depot in Hertfordshire.......

This Week In London’s History Monday – 3rd December ????: Nothing of any interest has ever happened in London on this date. Sorry. Tuesday – 4th December 1882: The Royal Courts of Justice on The Strand are opened by Queen Victoria. Wednesday – 5th December 1905: Part of the roof of Charing Cross station collapses, killing six people. Thursday – 6th December 1983: Britian’s first heart and lung transplant operation takes place at Harefield......

It happens at the worst of times, always. You'll be in that changing room of Topshop, jeans straddled around your hips, or on that tube platform, waiting for a train with a requisite five minute delay and then it strikes you - the urge to pee. Out of your comfort zone (the zone of knowing where the nearest cubicle is), the fear magnifies tenfold. You could surreptitiously enter that local restaurant, and negotiate the humiliation......

Irusia Armattoe of Teddington was dealt a heavy blow when a fire not only claimed her house and badly injured her, but also took the lives of 16 of her 30 beloved bunny rabbits. Yesterday, however, she thanked her neighbours for proving that some of us took those 'Love Thy Neighbour' stitched samplers on our grandmother's wall to heart. Mrs Armattoe, 65, was badly burned in the fire that broke out nearly two weeks......

This Week In London’s History Monday – 26th November 1983: An armed robbery at the Brinks Mat warehouse near Heathrow Airport becomes the largest heist in British history, as £25 million worth of gold bullion is pinched. Tuesday – 27th November 2000: 10-year-old schoolboy Damilola Taylor is stabbed in the leg and dies in Peckham, south London. The following six years would see several trials and re-trials over the killing, finally culminating in the......

A Putney cottage designed by Erno Goldfinger has been illegally destroyed. Arbus Ltd, of Croydon, applied for permission to pull down the building in 2002, but was refused. Living up to his surname, Director of the company Rajiv Laxman paid little heed to the order and the building’s Grade II listed status, demolishing the cottage anyway. He’s now been ordered to pay £11,000 and forced to rebuild the property using the same design and......

This Week In London’s History Monday – 19th November 1558: Queen Elizabeth I travels to Highgate on her accession to the throne. She is met by the bishops and escorted through London. Tuesday – 20th November 1992: Fire sweeps through Windsor Castle, causing £40 million worth of damage to over 100 rooms. Wednesday – 21st November 1695: The great composer Henry Purcell dies at his home in Westminster. The cause of his death in......

Blues skies aside, winter is upon us - the halcyon days of summer a distant memory; thermals and visible breath a present reality. Therefore what better way to raise darkened spirits during these darkened days than going to the comedy and loosing yourself in laughter? We at Londonist certainly think this is a great plan (we’ve been on a not-so-secret comedy revival mission for years), and good news for us, Stewart Lee is playing at......

Due to earlier technical vexations of a non-Stratford-related variety, Monday Miscellanea is a bit later than usual today... This Week In London’s History Monday – 12th November 1974: A 9lb salmon is caught in the Thames – the first time that such a fish has been caught in the dirty old river since 1834 – and sent to the British Museum for identification. Improvements in the water quality are hailed. Tuesday – 13th November......

Croydon Council want businesses to rent out their toilets to the public and display signs to alert passers-by that they can relieve themselves in those very spots. The badness of this idea starts in the very notion of 'renting' toilets - after the Joe Orton proposal in Islington, such tomfoolery around public conveniences should surely have been nipped in the bud but dammit, bizarre and badly thought out plans for the public's full bladder......

This Week In London’s History Monday – 5th November 1605: Following a tip-off, a party of armed men led by a Justice of the Peace discover Guy Fawkes guarding a large amount of gunpowder and incendiary materials in the vaults under the House of Lords. Tuesday – 6th November 1869: Queen Victoria opens Blackfriars Bridge, and then Holborn Viaduct. Wednesday – 7th November 1783: John Austin, having been convicted for ‘cruel highway robbery’, becomes......

Something is stirring in the catacombs beneath London Bridge. A cache of skeletons has been uncovered close to the steps where Nancy betrayed Bill Sykes. And construction workers on the site of a new museum are too afraid to work as tools go missing and lightbulbs explode. What sounds like the cover blurb of a Neil Gaiman novel is being presented as fact over on the BBC. Apparently, two Kentish brothers building a new......

This Week In London’s History Monday – 29th October 1986: The M25 ‘London orbital’ motorway is officially opened by Prime Minister Margaret Thatcher, at a ceremony at the last section to be completed (junctions 22 and 23 in Hertfordshire). Tuesday – 30th October 1883: A group known as the Fenian Dynamiters detonates a bomb on the Metropolitan Railway, injuring 62 people. Wednesday – 31st October 1971: An IRA bomb explodes on the 33rd floor......

This Week In London’s History Monday – 22nd October 1809: The Croydon Canal, linking Croydon to Deptford via Forest Hill, is opened. Requiring 28 locks to overcome the gradients of the route, it would never become a commercial success, and would be closed just 37 years later. Tuesday – 23rd October 1731: A fire breaks out in Ashburnham House in Westminster, damaging much of the Cotton Library – a renowned collection of Middle English......

This weekend Bloomsbury erupts with the Bloomsbury Festival celebrating this famous area. Well known for its literary and historical significance it is also a thriving haven for arts and artists and packed full of beautiful, quirky, intriguing buildings and organisations and the chockerblock programme reflects every aspect of life in Bloomsbury Quarter. Check this out: The Egypt Exploration Society, Foundling Museum, Charles Dickens Museum and the October Gallery are among the "Open Houses" over......

This Week In London’s History Monday – 15th October 1881: The Royal Comedy Theatre (now simply known as the Comedy Theatre) opens in the West End. Tuesday – 16th October 1987: In the early hours of the morning, a huge storm of hurricane intensity wreaks havoc across London (and much of the rest of southern England). Wednesday – 17th October 1814: At the Horse Shoe Brewery on Tottenham Court Road, a colossal vat containing......

This Week In London’s History Monday – 8th October 1965: The Post Office Tower (now known as the BT Tower) in Fitzrovia becomes operational as a major hub for national microwave telecommunications. Today it is the only building in the UK that is legally allowed to be evacuated using its lifts. Tuesday – 9th October 1975: An IRA bomb explodes at a bus stop near Green Park tube station, killing one person and injuring......

More than 30 horses were rescued from a burning barn early Friday morning in the Hertfordshire village of Bricket Wood. When firefighters arrived things looked pretty bleak for the horses, trapped in one end of the barn while the fire burned in the other. Fortunately the fire brigade got down to some pretty serious business. They sprayed a ‘water curtain’ around the barn to prevent the fire spreading to other buildings, a digger went......

This Week In London’s History Monday – 1st October 1868: St. Pancras Station is officially opened as the London terminus for the Midland Railway, despite its construction being incomplete. Part of the buildings would form the iconic gothic St. Pancras Chambers, which housed the Midland Grand Hotel. Tuesday – 2nd October 1909: Twickenham Stadium hosts its first ever rugby match, with Harlequins beating Richmond 14-10. Wednesday – 3rd October 1975: After three days of......

This Week In London’s History Monday – 24th September 1917: A zeppelin drops a 50 kilogram bomb that lands just outside the Bedford Hotel on Southampton Row in Bloomsbury, central London. 13 people are killed and a further 26 injured. Tuesday – 25th September 1818: The first human-to-human blood transfusion is performed at Guy’s Hospital. Previous blood transfusions had used animals’ blood. Wednesday – 26th September 1850: The first stretch of the North London......

North Kent Police are planning to plant some evidence in the near future, and are looking for suggestions as to what/who to put in the frame. To celebrate the completion of a new and very expensive police station (complete with a shopping mall and restaurants apparently)(Copper Coffee? Cop Shop? Ye Olde Bill? this could be fun) at Northfleet (which is near enough to London to make us interested), some bright spark has suggested burying......

Londonist has a case of the spookies – deathly headstones in deathly places. More specifically, Sutton Cemetery. According to This is Local London, bereaved relatives frequenting their loved one's resting place have been confronted by not-so-subtle wooden support stakes and yellow post-its informing them of the instability of the headstones, which must then either be shored up or replaced. A spokesman from Sutton council explains these actions are a response to the rising number......

Camden Town may be changing with the relentless advance of corporate chain stores (no, not those kind of chains) and glass and steel canalside developments but the Council is upholding the area's reputation for cyberpunk techno-progressiveness. It's launching webcasts and podcasts to be more accessible to the teched-up community and encourage local residents to get involved in local democracy. So, has it recorded a punchy, motivational and trendy radio show with a slurry call......

This Week In London’s History Monday – 17th September 1961: Police arrest 1,314 demonstrators at a CND (Campaign for Nuclear Disarmament) protest in Trafalgar Square. Bertrand Russell is amongst those arrested. Tuesday – 18th September 1970: Guitar legend Jimi Hendrix is found dead in his basement flat in Notting Hill, west London. A subsequent inquest records an open verdict on his death, noting that he drank wine and took nine sleeping pills the previous......

Peaceful protest: there's a lot of it about. This weekend brought news of demonstrators occupying Wembley Park Sports Ground, campaigning against plans for a City Academy to be built on the land. Faced with recent threat of eviction, the tent city teachers and other protesters are taking to tree houses to extend their occupation. The protest has already established 30 tents and a colourful garden (attracting lots of bumble bees) on the site which......

This Week In London’s History Monday – 10th September 1973: IRA bombs explode at King’s Cross and Euston mainline stations, injuring 13 people. Witnesses describe a teenager planting the first bomb by throwing it into the crowded ticket hall at King’s Cross. Tuesday – 11th September 1980: Armed robbers steal almost £1.5m worth of diamonds from a jewellery shop in Knightsbridge, west London. The haul includes a famous stone known as the Marlborough Diamond,......

In a residential road in North East London workmen in high visibility vests wrestle manfully down muddy holes with broken water pipes whilst smiling, perky local girls ferry tea and biscuits to the hard working hunks, exchanging playful banter. A scene straight out of a "Confessions..." farce? No. It's the BBC reporting on progress with water mains replacement in Walthamstow. Slow news day, then. It seems our BBC News team are astonished that local......

A punning headline that doesn’t quite work is our stock in trade. Such is the case here, where we want to highlight a band of enthusiasts who seek out tales of London’s mysterious and arcane. The South East London Folklore Society meets every second Thursday of the month at The Old King’s Head - down one of those pokey little alleys off Borough High Street. Next Thursday (13 September) Rob Stephenson will talk about......