Powney misses out on Mapesbury.

Labour's Mapesbury candidates with Dawn Butler

Cllr Colum Moloney has been selected to complete the list of  Labour  candidates for the Mapesbury ward in the forthcoming local elections. He currently represents the Stonebridge ward. Three male councillors, Moloney, James Powney and Abdi Aden  were amongst the four candidates fighting for the position

New round of Brent Connects forums start next week

The next round of Brent Connects local forums are starting next week. This is an opportunity to hear about the latest developments in council policy but also to make your voice heard. You can do this by arranging to speak at a Soapbox. Book on-line or just before the meeting begins.

The format varies between meetings with some having a Question Time style section and others consisting of mainly presentations from council officers, which can be rather tedious. All would be much improved by a higher attendance of young people ands a wider cross-section of the local community.

Cllr James Powney will be giving an update on his brief at the Wembley meeting. Some of the meetings will discuss the priorities for the spending of ward working money,

The links below take you to venue details and the agenda.

WEMBLEY Tues 16th April 7pm, Patidar House, London Road, Wembley

KILBURN AND KENSAL Wed 17th April 7pm, Gaumont State, Kilburn High Road

KINGSBURY AND KENTON Tues 23rd April 7pm, Kingsbury High School, Prices Avenue, Kingsbury

HARLESDEN Wed 24th April 7pm, All Souls Church, Station Road, Harlesden

WILLESDEN Tues 30th April 7pm, College of North West London, Denzil Road, Willesden

Now it's time for James Powney to apologise

The Brent Executive approved plans to licence leafleting in designated areas, along with a hefty overall free and additional charges per leafleter, on Monday evening. Sarah Cox and I both spoke against the proposals pointing out the lack of clarity about exemptions, the impact on small businesses and those organising events, the absence of any substantial research on the success or otherwise of such schemes in the past, and the failure to give any information on how the policy would be enforced. Sarah even pointed out discrepancies within the document on charges.

Sarah Cox, speaking for Brent Fightback,  challenged Cllr James Powney's attack on the Brent and Kilburn Times in his blog LINK which implied that the campaign against the scheme  was an invention.  Sarah quite rightly pointed out that the BKT story was based on the Council's own statement to a journalist and said, 'It is absolutely right that the local press has been vigilant and brought this to the attention of the people of Brent".

However in his response to our speeches, Powney again had a go at the reporter about inaccuracy, despite her waving a copy of the Council's e-mail from her seat.

Now in today's Brent and Kilburn Times there is a letter from Michael Read, Assistant Director of Environment and Neighbourhood Services, which seeks to 'clarify any confusion about the powers the council has just agreed' and confirms that the exemption will cover campaigning for political purposes, such as local library campaigners'.

He does not admit that the 'confusion' arose from the council's own e-mail to the reporter, which followed the reporters request for clarification.

There is an Editor's note at the end of Michael Read's letter stating:

Brent Council's communication team has issued an apology to the Times for issuing an inaccurate statement on which our original report was based.

It is obviously up to the BKT to decide what to do but my personal view is that Cllr Powney also owes the paper,  and its senior reporter,  an apology.

Below are notes from the speech I made on Monday:

 Talking to people about these proposals over the weekend I was told both that they were a 'farce' and that they were 'fascist'. I think the truth lies somewhere between the two!


Cllr Powney will say we've got it all wrong - it always was meant to be 'political purposes' and not 'political parties' but the Brent and Kilburn Times reporter stands by her quote from the Council and is circulating the council's e-mail here tonight.

“Licensing will only apply to certain streets in Brent.  Charities would be exempt from these new rules and political parties would be exempt during election times."

This is not semantics. The danger is that the Council's interpretation is so narrow that it will affect campaigns. There needs to be precise definitions in the documentation.

Cllr Powney will also say that this is not new and is merely updating of powers but this is not stated in the report and there is no detail or assessment of effectiveness of previous policy.

Cllr John has said we've got it all wrong and it is only about commercial leafleting but again this is not stated  in the report.

Putting aside the political dimension what about small businesses?

Can you imagine the poor contestants of the Apprentice setting up a small shop on Wembley High Road and trying to drum up business?

Let's give out some leaflets... Oh, we have to give 14 days notice....and apply for  licence....and we have to wear a high visibility vest...oh, we have to have 'Authorised Distributor' printed on it...and a badge with our licence number...and pay £175 upfront plus £75 daily for each distributor...and check whether our distributor has been done for littering in the last year.

The Council is in danger of making itself a laughing stock. The Executive should send this poorly written report back to be properly researched and rewritten - they cannot vote for such an unclear policy.

Brent Parks Review in progress

Fryent Country Park last winter

Cllr James Powney, lead member for Environment,  has now replied to my request asking if rumours of Brent Council proposals for privatisation or part-privatisation of Brent Parks Service are true:

Ground maintenance, including parks, is subject to a review which has yet to report.  The results of the review are likely to be published in the first part of next year.

We will know more when the report is published but it is likely given the Council's budgetary situation that all possible options are being considered at the review stage, which may have given rise to the rumours. I will be watching developments closely and will report any new information here.

Willesden Green Library to close for 2 years - 0nly 5/12 Brent libraries will be left

Library campaigners have reacted angrily to the admission by a senior Council officer that Willesden Green library, including the archive collection will be closed for two years from April 2012.

Writing to Brent SOS Libraries on 3 November 3rd, Jenny Isaac, Assistant Director (Neighbourhood Services) confirmed that only a side hut in Grange Road will be left open.  It will have study space for only eight people, six computers, and only a very limited supply of books will be available. This news comes on top of the closure of half the borough's libraries last month.

Graham Durham ,Secretary of Save Cricklewood Library Campaign, said:

The boarding -up of nearby Neasden and Cricklewood Libraries - and the stripping of all books from Cricklewood - before the legal case was completed has already shown the contempt Brent Council has for local people in the area. Although  Councillor James Powney and library chiefs Sue Harper and Sue MacKenzie have refused to meet Cricklewood residents for over eight months now, they did promise that a wonderful facility would be available at Willesden Green.

This promise has now been shown to be a complete lie. In fact study opportunities and access to the internet, as well as local research and book lending, will be virtually non-existent. In their  discussion of 'pop-up' libraries  the range of overpaid Council officers and Labour Cabinet members are having a really bad taste joke at the expense of young and old who cannot afford to travel even further afield to Harlesden and Kilburn.

It was already a very difficult and expensive journey for parents with small children from Cricklewood and Neasden to Willesden Green - now that option has been destroyed for a generation of children.

The Brent Executive is due to consider a report on the redevelopment of Willesden Green Library at their meeting on November 14th at Brent Town Hall.

Further details HERE

School Crossing Patrols - a matter of life or death

I had a shock when someone told me that Cllr James Powney had blogged that he agreed with me about something. LINK I feared that I would lose all my friends in the Brent Labour Party as a result. I was reassured when I read his posting. He is at pains to write, "I disagree with much of what he says, most of the time". Phew, that's all right then!

He agreed that the Scrutiny and Overview Committee was used for political grandstanding rather than meticulous examination of policy proposals but sees that only in terms of the Liberal Democrat and Conservative opposition. Of course it also applies to the Labour administration and to Labour councillors who sit on the Committee.

I referred in my article to a Willesden and Brent Times  editorial that argued it has been residents who voted for councillors who have ended up doing the councillor's work by airing concerns about controversial decisions at council meetings.  The local press, especially the Willesden and Brent  Times, have been proactive in covering the council cuts and the library closures issue. Cllr Powney however, accuses them of being weak in not exposing Liberal Democrat hypocrisy. Strange really when the WBT editorial was commenting on its own story about poor attendance at council meetings of some Liberal Democrat and Conservative politicians.

My article covered various issues to do with local democracy LINK not least that of consultation. This is an issue that was controversial under the previous Lib Dem-Con coalition (remember the Wembley Academy consultation?) as well as the current Labour administration.

The latest example is the short consultation, over a school holiday, on the cutting of school crossing patrols. I have an interest because I kicked up a fuss about the lack of one outside Park Lane Primary School in Wembley when I worked there. The school is on a sharp bend and it is hard to see traffic coming in either direction (it used to be called Blind Lane before being re-named) and it is on several bus routes. We eventually won a patrol and Tracey, the officer appointed, became a much-loved member of the school community.

This is one of those issues which is literally a matter of 'life and death' (or serious injury) and one that deserves serious consideration. It is not enough to say that if schools are concerned they can pay for their own crossing patrol out of their hard-pressed annual budgets. The council has a responsibility for the safety and well-being of the community, especially vulnerable members such as children. We encourage children to walk to school for good environmental and health reasons but should not put them at risk. The lack of a patrol may result in parents going back to taking children to school in their cars with a resultant increase in  traffic congestion and pollution.