Are the Tory Government making the same mistakes about Monkeypox as their predecessors made about AIDs?

 

Brent Liberal Democrat councillors and the Liberal Democrat Diversity Officer have written to Dr Melanie Smith (Brent Director of Public Health)  and Cllr Neal Nerva expressing concern over the prevalence of Monkeypox in the borough and suggesting joint action to push the Government into action.. 

Diversity Officer.  Edan Powel, said:

The Government’s seeming inaction shows a lack of care towards the most at-risk communities. To me and the Brent Liberal Democrats, it is sadly unsurprising that the Government are not taking Monkeypox as seriously, given that it is currently mainly affecting men who have sex with men. Parallels can be drawn to the way previous Conservative Governments responded to the AIDS crisis in the 1980s, a period of time that still haunts our community. We need urgent action now to prevent mass contagion.

The letter to Cllr Nerva and Dr Smith said:

We are writing to you with huge concerns about rising Monkeypox cases in Brent and across London. According to data released by the UK Health Security Agency on the 9th August 2022, our Borough is in the top 10 in London with the highest number of confirmed cases. This is alarming.

The World Health Organisation has already declared this a public health emergency of international concern. Therefore, we believe the Council must put pressure on the Government and the Department of Health and Social Care to make smallpox vaccines, approved for use against Monkeypox, available to eligible groups, especially in areas where the virus is currently increasing the most.

To date, impacted groups have very limited places to go to get the vaccine. A small Monkeypox walk-in vaccine clinic was open briefly at Guys’ Hospital, which was overflowing with people willing to get themselves and those around them protected. The Government’s seeming inaction shows a lack of care towards the most at-risk communities, and the DHSC’s disregard towards the NHS Constitution principles of bridging the health inequality gap.

As we know, Monkeypox can affect all; however, it is very important to recognise that it is currently disproportionately affecting men who have sex with men. It is not unsurprising therefore that the Conservative Government is not taking this seriously, given their party’s track record of discriminatory policies during the AIDS crisis of the 1980s.

People’s health and lives are not a game. We must collectively call for urgent action to protect the health of all. COVID has been a real wakeup call and even though many have recovered from the COVID virus, some still live with the damage that the virus has done to their bodies. We should not wait to find out what the long-term impact of mass contagion of Monkeypox could be. There is an opportunity to contain the spread of Monkeypox – let’s work together to push the Government to act now.

Kind regards,

Cllr Anton Georgiou, Leader of the Brent Liberal Democrata , Cllr Paul Lorber, Deputy Leader , Cllr Hannah Matin, Liberal Democrat Councillor for Alperton, and  Edan Powell, Brent Liberal Democrat Diversity Officer

I undesrtand that no response has been received as yet but will publish when available.

Information about Monkeypox from Guys and St Thomas' Hospital on this  LINK

'Betrayed' Brent Lib Dem councillor defects to Labour

Open letter from Councillor James Allie – Alperton Ward, Brent

It is with great sadness that after more than 10 years as a Liberal Democrat Councillor, this week I have resigned my membership of the party. I joined the Liberal Democrats because I wanted to help make Britain a fairer, greener and more equal country. I no longer believe that the Liberal Democrat Party has the will or the ability to make this happen. They have betrayed the values that I once shared with them.

However, I believe that the Labour Party, under Ed Miliband in Westminster and their new Leader of Brent Council Muhammed Butt, shares my values and that I can as part of a Labour administration, once again work to improve the lives of the people I represent. 

I have always struggled to lend my support to the devastating policies the Coalition is inflicting on Britain. I have also been sickened by the hypocritical things the Liberal Democrats do and say here in Brent. While my feelings about this have built up over the past two years, there are three issues that have finally pushed me to take this decision:

1. The people I represent in Alperton are struggling more than ever under this government, but the Liberal Democrat Leadership in Westminster is prioritising reform of the House of Lords instead of a plan for economic growth.
2. The closure of the A&E at Central Middlesex Hospital under this government is an astonishing betrayal. Brent MP Sarah Teather campaigned to keep the A&E when it was not under threat of closure. Now she is in government closing it. I am only sorry that I trusted her back then and I am sure that a number of her constituents feel the same way.
3. The Leader of the Liberal Democrats in Brent, Paul Lorber, also knows very well that had the Lib Dems won the Local Election in 2010 they would have faced the same pressure to close the six libraries in Brent that have caused such a stir. It is the Coalition’s cuts to local government that have caused this problem and Cllr. Lorber’s posturing on the issue is just an insult to the library campaigners and the people of Brent.

I recognise that some of my constituents in Alperton will feel let down by my decision. I apologise to them if they feel I ought to have nailed my colours to the mast more firmly before the election. Equally I trust that many of them voted for me because they knew of the hard work that I have done as a councillor over the years.  I pledge to them that I will work harder than ever to improve the lives of everyone who lives in Alperton.

I know that there are many people who voted Lib Dem at the last election and indeed many Lib Dem members who feel as betrayed as I do by the party’s record in the coalition. I urge them to join me and to join the Labour Party.

Regards,

Councillor James Allie

Missing, presumed losing...Brent Lib Dems

I asked nearly  month again why the Liberal Democrats were not standing in the Barnhill by-election. This week they broke their silence telling the Brent and Kilburn Times that they did not stand in order to focus their efforts on the London Assembly and Mayoral elections.

Strangely enough I haven't received any leaflets from them on the GLA and Mayoral election. It has been refreshing to fight a by-election without a plethora of Lib Dem leaflets  and their often misleading presentation. The candidates in the Barnhill by-election have been straightforward with more of a focus on policies.

 I suspect that the Lib Dem leadership recognise that in Alison Hopkins in Dollis Hill they had an exceptional candidate with deep local roots and connections but who nonetheless had a narrow win. They have retained Cllr Rev David Clues in Dudden Hill despite his move to Brighton, thus avoiding putting a Lib Dem seat at risk.

Missing Lib Dems: cock-up, cop-out or conspiracy?

Despite queries from our assiduous local newspaper reporters, we still don't know why the Lib Dems aren't standing in the Barnhill by-election on May 3rd.

Greens will be pleased though as the failure of Lib Dems to stand will mean that several forests will be saved given the usual scale of their leafleting in by-elections.

Perhaps they realise that they have contributed to a rise in Brent Council's recycling rates through their Wembley Central and Dollis Hill campaigns and no longer want to contribute to Cllr Powney's PR offensive.

If anyone out there knows more about this political mystery please drop us an e-mail or comment below.

Lib Dem mystery in Barnhill by-election

There is no Lib Dem candidate listed for the Barnhill By-election according to Brent Council's website. I will be standing for the Greens, Michael Pavery for Labour and Ratna Pindora for the Conservatives.  There is another candidate named Venilal Vaglela with no party or other description. Vaglela stood as a Conservative candidate in Queensbury ward  in 2002 which Labour won.

Unless Venilal has made a clandestine switch to the Lib Dems this means there is no Lib Dem candidate for the seat which Labour unexpectedly won from the Conservatives in 2010.

In Dollis Hill some reckoned that tactical voting by Tories for the Lib Dems enabled Alison Hopkins to win. The Tory candidate's voted was slashed. Lib Dems won 16% of the vote in Barnhill in 2010 with Labour only 10% ahead of the Conservatives at 44%.  Where those 16% of votes go will be of crucial importance.

Cllr Krupesh Hirani has  tweeted that this may be a Lib Dem tactic to help their Coalition partners but two Tory candidates (or one current and one ex-Tory)  looks like a shot in the foot.

Dollis Hill shenanigans continue with scurrilous leaflet

Following the controversy over the Lib Dem leaflets with a near invisible imprint which was last week  raised in Parliament via a Labour attack on Sarah Teather, a leaflet emerged this weekend with no imprint at all.

Printed on one side of A5 in black and white it is is headed  GUILTY . Beneath that word are portraits of Sarah Teather and two Lib Dem councillors and a list of their alleged misdemeanours it goes on to urge 'Vote for whoever you want. Don't vote for Lib Dem losers'.

I am not sure of the legal situation regarding this particular leaflet but it does not state who has produced it nor have any details of the printer.

As the leaflet makes a couple of environmental points I should make clear that it has nothing to do with the Greens and we disassociate ourselves from its contents.

We have distributed the London Green News in some parts of Brent, including Dollis Hill, but are delivering only one A5 leaflet for the by-election.  This is at the most 1/20th of the Lib Dem's distribution per household!

When is a Lib Dem leaflet not a Lib Dem leaflet - see for yourselves

In a previous post I mentioned Pete Murry's puzzlement at an anti-Labour leaflet that came through his door without any advocacy of another candidate or party. He eventually discovered after forensic analysis where it came from. Here is the evidence as requested by someone who commented on my earlier posting LINK

The leaflet distributed in the Dollis Hill by-election

Now here is a challenge. Can you find the imprint which is required by electoral law? Put on your specs or get out your magnifying glass. Still can't see it?

Okay, look carefully at the fold on the first page of the leaflet.... can you see what looks looks like an ant's footprints? Yes?

Well done - you have won the '2012 Spot the near anonymous Lib Dem leaflet imprint competition'.

How dodgy is that? If cigarette manufacturers tried the same trick with the 'Smoking Kills' warning they'd be hauled through the courts.

Alison Hopkins to fight Dollis Hill by-election for Lib Dems

Alison Hopkins

Brent Liberal Democrats have selected Alison Hopkins as their candidate in the Dollis Hill by-election.

Alison Hopkins has been active in the Campaign for a Sustainable Brent Cross Development, was critical of the revised Brent waste strategy and its use of co-mingled collections, and  campaigned against the closure of Neasden library.

Lib Dem Councillor Joins the Greens

This is a statement from Hampshire County Councillor Alan Weeks who has decided to leave the Lib Dems and join the Greens:

When I was campaigning local voters made it clear to me that they were angry about the way they have been let down by the national Lib Dem party. What they were saying was right. I have been a Lib Dem (and Liberal before that) for about 25 years and it is not me that has changed. It is the values of the national Liberal Democrats that have changed. For example, on the tuition fees issue, it was untrustworthy for MPs to break personal pledges that they had made.

It was a tough decision for me to resign and join the Green Party after almost 25 years of service as a Lib Dem councillor. But my heart has to be in what I do and I could no longer support the direction taken by Lib Dem leaders.

Now I am looking forward and I am excited to be joining the Green Party. I realise that Green Party values of putting people and the environment before profit, provision and not privatisation of public services, promoting renewable energy and a high priority for animal welfare are in line with mine.

The Big Crunch on Climate Targets

As the government's position on climate change targets remained confused after differing reports over the weekend, protesters gathered outsiide Lib Dem Head Quarters at 8am this morning to deliver the following letter to Nick Clegg:

We in the Campaign against Climate Change organised a demonstration outside your party headquarters on hearing the news that there could be a risk that recommendations of the Committee on Climate Change might not be accepted. We are still dismayed at the position reportedly taken by Vince Cable on this issue.

However we are relieved to hear that the government has now decided to accept the recommendations of the independent committee for the 2023-27 carbon budget – because to allow short term economic considerations to take precedence over the Committee’s recommendations at this stage, would have set a precedent that could have effectively undermined the whole of the UK’s emissions reduction program.

Nevertheless we feel it will be a big mistake to disregard or delay acceptance of the Committee’s recommendation for a cut of 60% by 2030 (we would say at least) and even more important the recommendation to tighten up the nearer term targets (2013 to 2023) because above all we need strong action as soon as possible.

Further to that we would like to take this opportunity to warn you that the recommendations of the Committee are still in themselves insufficient, and to demand yet more robust action on climate. We appreciate how difficult this is to achieve politically but we believe there can be nothing more compelling than the spectre of a climate catastrophe that could kill billions. Our reasons for believing that the recommendations of the Committee are inadequate include three main considerations.

First, the recommendations include an increase in agro-fuels – that is biofuels produced through intensive agriculture. Already the increased demand for agrofuels is boosting the rate of deforestation and destructive land use change in Indonesia, South America and other places. In climate change terms we believe the increase in use of agrofuels will do substantially more harm than good. So called sustainability criteria are ineffective and probably unworkable on the real world.

Second, the Committee do not take into account the UK emissions that have effectively been outsourced to countries like China as they feed our increased demand for consumer goods.

Third, the targets enshrined in the Climate Act are now themselves, inadequate in the light of the latest climate science and represent un an acceptable level of risk. There is a good chance they would be insufficient to prevent a catastrophic destabilisation of global climate that would be devastating for human populations around the world, especially, and most immediately, the poorest and most vulnerable. This is the clear implication of those at the sharp end of climate change research like Professor Kevin Anderson of the Tyndall Centre who suggests that we should be aiming at something more like a 10% cut in emissions per year1, or Doctor James Hansen who heads NASA’s research effort on climate change and who says that two degrees of warming represents too great a risk.

We could add to that a fourth, namely that the international situation around the climate negotiations currently looks bleak, so that there is an even greater need to set a conspicuously bold example to break the deadlock and move things forward.

We therefore believe that the quite unprecedented situation that we find ourselves in amounts to a global emergency and requires a quantum leap in the scale of our response, over and above what the Committee on Climate change are currently recommending. The Campaign against Climate Change, for instance, are calling for an end to agro-fuel use, ten per cent cuts in emissions per year and a more or less fully decarbonised economy in a “Zero Carbon Britain” by 2030.

To do any less is still to court disaster.

Defend the Planet Against Government Hypocrisy - before breakfast!

The Lib Dems look as if they are going to renege on yet another promise - is it double figures yet? Environmental organisations have called an emergency demonstration for Monday - a good one for the early risers amongst you:

EMERGENCY DEMONSTRATION

8.00 am at Lib Dem HQ, at 4 Cowley Street, Westminster Demand the Lib Dems stand up for their environmental principles!  Or are they just poodles to the Tory right? 
8.45 am  Move on to Downing StreetDemand that Cameron stick by all he argued for when he supported the Climate Act. Or was that all just green posturing? Is this the most green-backtracking government ever?

The Campaign Against Climate Change say:

This looks like crunch time for this government, and for the country on whether we will have any meaningful targets on emission cuts, or whether they will be watered down in the interests of the business lobby and short term economic interest every time…

The crucial decision will be taken at a meeting on Monday… hence the timing of this demo

Never mind that the targets - even before they are watered down - are not stringent enough in the light of the latest science, anyway. Never mind that the UK’s whole carbon-cutting strategy will rapidly unravel once regular budgets for cutting emissions like this are not maintained. Never mind that delaying emissions cuts risks putting a fatal amount of carbon in the atmosphere before we ever get to making those cuts anyway. Never mind that the fate of billions hangs on us actually getting to grips with the climate crisis and making it our number one priority. Never mind that we will never be able to influence other countries effectively if here at home we are seen to put our own economic welfare before the global environment  we share with the rest of the world….

…still it looks like short sighted, short term, economic considerations are threatening to take us down the path to misery and suffering on a colossal, unimaginable, scale…

See:
www.guardian.co.uk/uk/2011/may/09/climate-defining-green-moment-cameron
www.guardian.co.uk/environment/2011/may/09/friends-earth-ipcc-proposals-policywww.monbiot.com/2011/05/09/shaking-the-tree/
www.guardian.co.uk/politics/2011/may/09/vince-cable-chris-huhne-carbon-emissionswww.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-politics-13343055

Now Lib Dems Call for Civic Centre Library to be Scaled Down to Save Other Libraries

The new state of the art £100m Civic Centre was agreed by all three political parties during the last administration amidst claims that it was 'cost neutral' in the long term, environmentally friendly and would enhance the status of the borough. Brent Green Party was the only political party to question the project and its cost.

Labour had second thoughts during the election campaign and promised to review the project but once elected decided to go ahead. On December 16th, Reg Colwill deputy leader of the Conservative Group wrote to the local press and said, 'We don't need a new sparkling civic centre at the detriment of people's jobs and front-line services'. Kenton Conservatives launched a campaign to save Preston library. 

Work has already started on the Civic Centre site opposite Wembley Arena. Skanska the builders appointed by Brent Council have outlined their December work programme in a Newsletter. LINK TO NEWSLETTER

Now the Liberal Democrats are suggesting that  the new library at the Civic Centre should be scaled down. They argue that the proposed library is three times the size of the one at the Town Hall and would cost £3m of the total Civic Centre costs.They argue that the money saved by scaling it down could be used to safeguard the future of the six libraries threatened with closure. 


As contracts have been signed and  work has already started it is unclear whether the Conservative bid to abandon the project or the Liberal Democrat's proposal to modify it could be implemented without penalties. I think I can hear the stable door slamming shut after the horse has flown!

It is also uncertain that scale down would release 'real money' (actual cash this year) that could be used to save the threatened libraries.


With the Brent cuts now a national issue the debate will heat up over the next few weeks as the cuts and library closures are discussed at the local consultation forums.

Libraries for Life for Londoners have posted a story on the .library cuts in Brent and made the link with the Civic Centre project. LINK

SHAH GETS 12 MONTHS. BY-ELECTION SOON.

Cllr Vijay Shah was sentenced to 12 months imprisonment on Wednesday at St Albans Crown Court for a £55,000 fraud. Shah who was elected as a Lib Dem councillor now sits as an independent for Wembley Central ward.

Any prison sentence of more than 3 months disqualifies someone from office and a by-election will be called once the 28 day appeal period is up.

ARK PLAN APPROVED

The plan for a city academy at Wembley Park sponsored by a hedge fund millionaire, was approved tonight when two Labour councillors supported the Liberal Democrat's proposals.

The Lib Dem's Conservative coalition partners and a Democratic Conservative councillor opposed the plans. They were joined by Cllr. Habhajan Singh (Labour, Welsh Harp) who had earlier unsuccessfully moved for deferral on the grounds that the council should produce an Environmental Impact Assessment and provide fuller detail on traffic issues. The Brent Green Party had made the lack of an Environmental Impact Assessment for such a major project a major plank of its objection to the planning application.

It was heartening to see a councillor willing to step out of the party line to make a stand for the environment. However the actions of fellow Labour councillors James Powney and Ruth Moher means that an unofficial Lib Dem-Labour coalition exists on the city academy issue, despite the overall council being run by a Lib Dem-Conservative coalition.

The chair refused to call me to speak on the Green Party's submission on the curious basis that I represented a political party and that this was not a 'party political issue'! He also refused to call Hank Roberts of the Wembley Park Action Group and would only allow Jean Roberts to speak despite her protests that she had submitted both names. She made an excellent speech and cogent arguments were also made by local residents.

The application will now be referred to the London Mayor's Office and the battle will move on to that ground.

Brent Green Party's submission can be found on its website.