Coordinates: 51°29′13″N 0°19′05″E / 51.487°N 0.318°E / 51.487; 0.318 The Thames Gateway is an area of land stretching 70 kilometres (43 mi) east from inner east London on both sides of the River Thames and the Thames Estuary. The area, which includes much brownfield land, has been designated a national priority for urban regeneration, taking advantage of the development opportunities realised by the completion of the High Speed 1 (officially known as the Channel Tunnel Rail Link) rail line. It stretches from Westferry in Tower Hamlets to the Isle of Sheppey and extends across three of the regions of England. The development is delivered through regional development agencies, special purpose development corporations and local partnerships.

The Thames Gateway comprises sections of 16 different local government districts in three regions:

The area accommodates around 1.6 million people and contains some of the most deprived wards in the country, characterised by lack of access to public transport, services, employment and affordable quality housing. Its boundary was drawn to capture the riverside strip that formerly hosted many land extensive industries, serving London and the South East, whose decline has left a legacy of large scale dereliction and contaminated land, such as around Tilbury.^{[citation needed]}

James Spencer Cleverly (born 4 September 1969) is Leader of the Conservative group on the London Assembly, the Chairman of the London Waste and Recycling Board and until February 2010 was the Mayor of London's Ambassador for Youth. He was elected for the Bexley and Bromley constituency in May 2008 as a candidate of the Conservative Party. He won by a majority of 75,237, by far the largest margin in any of the fourteen constituencies.

James Cleverly was born in Lewisham Hospital, his father is British and his mother from Sierra Leone. He attended Riverston School and Colfe's School, both in Lee, South East London and after a short time in the Army gained a degree at Thames Valley University (now known as the University of West London).

Before being elected he worked in the magazine and web publishing industry, he is the author of a long standing and well known blog. He is a Major in the Territorial Army and has been awarded the Territorial Decoration for long service.^{[citation needed]}

He had previously stood unsuccessfully in a number of elections the London Borough of Lewisham, these included the borough council elections 2002, a borough council by-election in 2003, for the Lewisham East seat for the UK Parliament in the 2005 general election and as the Conservative candidate for the directly elected mayor of Lewisham in 2006.

Fred Morrison is one of the world's leading pipers and is a globally renowned composer of music for the bagpipes.

Morrison is known for his unique, powerfully exuberant, virtuosic and highly improvisational style which combines the Gaelic piping tradition of South Uist with contemporary and eclectic influences. One of the few pipers to have achieved success in both the competitive piping and folk music scenes, Morrison is a virtuoso of the Great Highland Bagpipes, the bellows-blown reel pipes, the Irish Uilleann pipes, and the low whistle.

Fred Morrison was born in 1963 near Bishopton, Renfrewshire, Scotland where he grew up, regularly visiting his paternal family home in Geirinis, South Uist. Taught piping by his late father - also named Fred - from the age of nine, Fred Morrison Junior became immersed in the rounded-out, driving piping style of the Outer Hebrides. His father taught him through the traditional method of canntaireachd, the sung vocables used to convey pipe music before notation came on the scene, and Morrison attributes much of his approach to that. "I hear that singing in my head every time I play," he told one interviewer.