Alan Kilburn obituary
My father, Alan Kilburn, who has died aged 89, was an influential figure in the social housing sector.Under his leadership in the 1980s the housing association North Housing undertook a series of major regenerative projects, including the renovation of several Georgian and Victorian terraces in Newcastle upon Tyne.Throughout, Alan always insisted to tenants that they lived in “our house, but your home”.He also served as president of the Chartered Institute of Housing in 1982-83, and was a participant in the Duke of Edinburgh’s Inquiry into British Housing (1985), later introducing Prince Philip to tenants at Deckham in Gateshead.The 80s also saw the drastic reduction of government grants to housing associations.
When faced with a seemingly insurmountable barrier, Alan’s response was “we will find a way”,He pioneered the use of private finance to support social housing, raising £65m for North on the money markets and carefully attracting long-term investors who could make the scheme viable,He subsequently expanded North beyond its roots in the north-east of England and Cumbria, changing its name to Home in 1995,Alan was appointed OBE in 1990,He retired in 1998, but remained active as a non-executive director of the commercial housebuilder Barratt, the North of England Civic Trust, the Northern Rock Foundation and the international Centre for Life.
From 2003 to 2010 he was chair of the housing association William Sutton Trust, subsequently Affinity Sutton.He was one of the founders of Azure, a charity established at Cramlington, Northumberland, to provide training and employment opportunities for people with disabilities, retiring as its vice-chair only in 2022.Alan was born in Old Shotton, County Durham, the eldest of the three children of Eddie, a labourer and later a stableman with East Durham Co-operative Dairies, and Ethel (nee Doidge), a housekeeper and cleaner.He grew up in the lodge of Shotton Hall, a house with few amenities, and attended Wellfield AJ Dawson grammar school in nearby Wingate.At the end of 1952 he joined the development corporation building the new town of Peterlee, and the next year began training in housing management.
From 1963 he was successively housing manager at Ashington, Knottingley and Felling urban district councils, before joining Newcastle upon Tyne city council as assistant director of housing in 1969.In 1973 he moved to North British Housing Association, but in 1974 went south to Nottingham as its deputy director of housing.In 1976 Alan returned to Newcastle as chief executive of the North Eastern Housing Association and its sister organisation North Housing Group.In 1980 the two merged to form North Housing, then the largest housing association in Britain.He was respected and even loved by colleagues, who recognised in him someone committed and serious, encouraging and listening, and an example of how someone in a senior position should relate to his staff.
Alan enjoyed playing cricket, football, rugby, table tennis and golf.For some years he was a local preacher in the Methodist church, through which he met Doreen Gratton from the nearby village of Thornley; they married in 1963 and had two children.After Doreen’s diagnosis with Alzheimer’s in 2014, Alan looked after her at home, with the support of my sister Jessica and me.He is survived by Doreen, Jessica and me, and his sister Margaret.
Australian supermarket chocolate ice-cream taste test: ‘My scorecard read simply: “I’m going to buy it”’
Sweet memory lane or boulevard of broken creams? Nicholas Jordan and friends sample 23 tubs in search of nostalgia, glee and chocolate excessIf you value our independent journalism, we hope you’ll consider supporting us todayGet our weekend culture and lifestyle emailI grew up in a house barren of treats – there was no regular supply of chocolate, snakes, sour lollies or caramels. There was one exception: ice-cream, and I was mostly free to eat it whenever I wanted. That constant, childhood joy was the start of a storied love affair. Later, when I had money to buy my lunch in high school, I would get a one-litre tub, a pair of spoons, and my friend and I would eat the entire thing and nothing else. Sometimes, if we were particularly greedy, we’d split a two-litre tub
Sweet dreams? Healthy ways to put pudding back on the menu | Kitchen aide
I eat healthily, but my meals are never really complete without pudding. Yoghurt and stewed fruit aside, do you have any suggestions for what will hit the spot without verging too far into the unhealthy? Wendy, by emailThe truth is, you can’t often have your cake and eat it – or not a big piece, anyway. “My main piece of advice, which maybe isn’t all that welcome, is to keep to small portions,” says Brian Levy, author of Good & Sweet, in which his recipes contain no added sugar. “My grandma would keep mini chocolate bars and have just one, but that’s never really worked for me.”’Tis the season for stewed fruit, but have you tried Melissa Hemsley’s banana slices sandwiched together with peanut butter, half-dipped in melted chocolate and put in the freezer? (FYI the same tactic also works like a dream with dates
José Pizarro’s recipe for pumpkin and spinach with pimenton
I grew up with the taste of pimentón de la vera, the smoky, fiery spice Spain embraced from the New World and made its own. Pimentón gives our food its soul. One of the dishes everyone loves back home is espinacas con garbanzos (spinach and chickpeas), which is it’s simple, nourishing and full of comfort. At this time of year, however, when the markets are overflowing with sweet pumpkins, I love adding them to the mix, too. Their gentle, autumnal sweetness lifts the spinach and chickpeas beautifully, and they combine to create a dish that we’ve been serving all month at my restaurant Lolo in south-east London
The £1 oyster: cut-price shellfish is all the rage – but is eating it advisable?
Name: Oysters.Age: Triassic – so about 250m years old.Appearance: Grey and snotty.Oysters, eh? What pearls of wisdom (see what I did there) do you have for me on the noxious bivalve? You’re not a fan, then?Absolutely not. What desperation drove early humans to think, “Time to smash open this forbidding, rock-like blob and eat whatever godforsaken, gelatinous mess it disgorges”? Well, younger diners don’t agree – they’ve gone mad for oysters
Double, heavy, pure cream? Helen Goh’s guide to baking across borders – plus a finger bun recipe
When Sweet, the baking book I co-authored with Yotam Ottolenghi, came out in the United States in 2017, my excitement at seeing so many people bake from it was matched only by my horror at what I saw them pulling from their ovens on Instagram: pale cakes with thick, dark exteriors.Posts from Australian and British readers showed no alarming results and I quickly realised something had gone awry in the American translation. As it turned out, the recipes had been converted in-house by the publisher, using a straightforward formula to change celsius to fahrenheit. What no one had noticed was that the conversion also needed to take into account the oven setting: fan-forced versus conventional heat. Many American ovens, it seems, still don’t have a fan function
Rukmini Iyer’s quick and easy recipe for beetroot, apple and feta fritters | Quick and easy
These are autumn in a fritter. Not only were they an unexpected hit with my 18-month-old, but, after trying one myself, I instantly crossed out the saffron arancini at the top of my list for an upcoming lunch party and replaced it with a delirious, “OMG make these fritters!” Not bad for a five-ingredient dish, and a lot less faff than arancini.Serve with a green salad and the dip alongside for a filling dinner on a cold evening.Prep 15 min Cook 20 min Serves 2-42 apples (I used Discovery) 2 medium beetroot, peeled and grated1 egg 200g feta, crumbled60g self-raising flour (gluten-free if you have it)Olive oil, for fryingFor the dip 3 heaped tbsp Greek yoghurt 3 heaped tbsp mayonnaise ½ lemon, juice and zestA pinch of sea saltGrate the apples skin and all into a clean tea towel, then twist and squeeze the towel over the sink to remove as much moisture as you can. Tip the grated apple into a large bowl, then add the grated beetroot, egg and crumbled feta, and mix well
Standing on their own: Cricket World Cup highlights drive to reclaim public space for Indian women | Emma John
Chess: Magnus Carlsen triumphs at historic Champions Showdown in St Louis
Warren Tredrea removed from Port Adelaide board after podcast controversy
Borthwick hopes England can emulate Bazball mentality for autumn series
Enhanced Games are dangerous and must be stopped, says Wada head
India beat Australia in historic chase to reach Women’s Cricket World Cup final – as it happened