UPDATE Brent Labour MPs 2-1 against Welfare Reform Bill

Dawn Butler (Brent Central) and Tulip Siddiq (Hampstead & Kilburn) defied the Labour whip last night and joined 46 other Labour MPs in voting against the Welfare Reform Bill. Liberal Democrat MPs also voted against.

Tulip Siddiq had signalled her intention in a Channel 4 News interview earlier that evening.  Renowned local Tweeter Pukkah Punjabi revised her Storify posting in  the light of Siddiq's stance. LINK

As far as I know ultra loyalist Barry Gardiner (Brent North) obeyed the whip. Gardiner's one attempt at rebellion was against Gordon Brown and unfortunately was ill-timed - just a few days before Big G 'Saved the World' during the economic crisis.

UPDATE Barry Gardiner has told the KILBURN TIMES that Tulip Siddiq and Dawn Butler fell into a Government trap by voting against the Bill:

He explained: “Either we voted for the bill because we supported those of our policies that they’d incorporated into it but in so doing we voted for unacceptable changes to the benefits system such as three million families that are going to lose £1000 or impact on carers from the benefit cap. Or we voted against those regressive policies in the bill but in so doing voted against our own on apprenticeships.

“It was meant to trap us. It was a false choice designed to force us into either opposing our own policies or supporting the evil policies they were putting forward. I’ve always considered that if you’re asked to choose two unacceptable positions the sensible position is to refuse both. That is why I abstained."

The revolt perhaps gives some indication of the core support Jeremy Corbyn may command in the Parliamentary Labour Party. Labour Mayoral candidates Diane Abbot, Sadiq Khan and David Lammy also voted against the Bill.

Ahead of the vote Green MP, Caroline Lucas, said: 

“The Tories are attempting to dismantle our welfare state, and cut back on support given to those who need it the most.

“The bill will slash support for people with ill health including many with mental health problems – new claimants of Employment Support Allowance in the Work Related Activity Group, will see payments cut by almost £30 a week. This is very harmful for people with long-term fluctuating mental ill-health.  It will lock in child poverty for those born into larger families and it will leave Ministers significantly less accountable for their policies by scrapping the current legally binding child poverty targets.  

“It’s also deeply concerning that the bill includes a clause which would allow the Government to further lower the cap on benefits without properly consulting Parliament - thus potentially plunging more children into poverty without MPs even having a debate on the issue.

“It's now down to MPs from all parties to look beyond the politics of today’s debate and focus instead on the devastating impact that this piece of legislation will have on people up and down the country. 
"Our crumbling social security system is on the brink – now is the time to take a stand.

“George Osborne is playing politics with poverty. Failing to stand up to this regressive Welfare Bill would be an utter betrayal of the principle which says that those in need deserve support.  I’ll be joining many MPs from across the parties in voting against the Government’s Bill and making a stand for our welfare state.”

Lucas has spoken of the need for a 'Progressive Alliance' to challenge neoliberalism and austerity and yesterday's vote  gives some indication of the potential extent of that alliance in Parliament. 

Before the vote Owen Jones released a video making the case for voting against the Bill.

The Benefit Cap, Tulip Siddiq and Election Promises

Leeks the most interesting item at Brent Council meeting

A satirical local activist presented Brent Council's Cabinet members with a leak each just before the formal start of last night's Full Council meeting at Brent Civic Centre.

The presentation followed mounting concern in Brent Labour Party over leaks from the Labour Group and meetings of the party to Wembley Matters.

The councillors instantly realised what was meant by the gesture and took it in good part, appearing to laugh it off:

Most of the meeting went according to the script published in my previous blog LINK with planted questions from backbench Labour councillors and pre-prepared answers from Cabinet members. There was what appeared to be a genuine question from Cllr Neil Nerva asking about the extent and quality of consultation over the Constitutional Amendments that had been tabled.  He was concerned about the impact on whistleblowers. One of the amendments, as Cllr John Warren pointed out for the Brondesbury Park Tories, bars council workers from talking to councillors about employment issues.

The report of the chair of Scrutiny Committee was noteworthy for its almost complete lack of content.

The Council approved without discussion a report on Council Tax Support. Although this put put forward only minor changes it proposed a full review before the 2016-17 financial year.

This follows a report on the same day that revealed that Brent Council had only spent 20% of its local welfare assistance fund which is meant to be crisis support for vulnerable families.

Discovering local democracy on-line, the Brent Council way

Guest blog by Philip Grant
 

Although Martin has shared his experience of Monday evening’s Brent Council meeting with you in his blog on “The death of Brent Council”, I am writing to share some personal thoughts, and images, of following part of the same meeting on-line.

At 6.50pm that evening I went onto Brent Council's website to watch the Full Council meeting, so that I could see and hear what (if anything) Cllr. Butt had to say about the Employment Appeal Tribunal's decision to reject the Council's appeal in the Rosemarie Clarke case, and hoping that he would finally make a public apology to Rosemarie, on behalf of Brent, for the harm she had suffered at the hands of Cara Davani and other senior Council officers. I was in for a disappointment, as the “Live Streaming” web page showed:

I have never followed social media before, but it seemed that #BrentLive was my only option, so I spent the next half-hour or more watching a column at the right hand side of the screen. The first tweet to appear was from Cllr. Matthew Kelcher (one of the new Labour intake in May 2014), just before the meeting began, to say that he might be making his maiden speech. Thereafter a slow succession of #BrentLive tweets, all apparently from people at the meeting, began to scroll down the column. 

The on screen details said that councillors would ‘be able to reply to tweets’, but it appeared that Cllr. Kelcher had a whole list of tweets ready to issue, each one praising a positive story announced by the successive Cabinet Lead Members who presented their reports to Council. Cllr. Roxanne Mashari even re-tweeted his comment on her positive story! 

One “tweeter” at the meeting commented that although many councillors appeared to be busy on their tablet ‘phones, very few of them seemed to be involved in posting tweets on #BrentLive. An exchange of tweets with another “tweeter” wondered whether they were sending DM’s to each other (perhaps someone will add a comment to let me know what a DM is!). The other replied that they might be playing Candy Crush, which I think is probably a reference to the actions of a Westminster MP, but again I am ignorant of such social media or on-line games terms.

 

Not all “tweeters” were convinced by the views put out on social media by Cllr. Kelcher, especially when it came to the report by the Leader, Cllr. Muhammed Butt. With all of the # and @ references in Matthew Kelcher’s tweets, I got the impression that he must have prepared them in advance, but perhaps he really is a social media whizz-kid (as opposed to my social media dinosaur), and can compose them far more quickly than I can write emails. 

 

Pukkah Punjabi showed that she is not just an anti-Labour “tweeter”, with her comments about the response from the opposition Conservatives. I seem to remember something about a cure for insomnia.

By this time I was finding #BrentLive a bit slow, without the live pictures and sound from the Council Chamber to let me hear exactly what my elected representatives were saying about important issues. Perhaps it would have been better if I had made the effort to be there in person. But then again, perhaps not, if the final tweet I read was a fair reflection of proceedings.

And I never did find out if Cllr. Kelcher made his maiden speech.

Philip Grant

DM equals Direct Message. Tweeters who follow each other can send each other private direct messages.

Is retail really the answer to Brent's economic development?

London Designer Outlet, Christmas Eve, 11.30am

If you wanted a little bit of peace and quiet away from the last minute Christmas shopping crowds then Wembley's London Designer Outlet (the LDO) was the place to be this morning. I popped in to see how things were going after visiting Wembley Library - the library was more crowded!

Of course the LDO has only just opened (but so has the library) and the weather forecast was poor (but that affects library users too). The library is for local people while the LDO is intended to attract crowds from within the M25 so transport disruption affects the latter more.

Despite this one would have expected more shoppers. The store doing the briskest trade was the Tesco Local just outside the LDO on Wembley Hill Road. There is still time for things to pick up and perhaps the post-Christmas sales will help, although of course products are heavily discounted anyway.  However there are vital questions to be raised.

I had a sharp little exchange with Cllr Muhammed Butt, leader of Brent Council, earlier this week when I criticised his frequent tweets urging people to shop at the LDO - I suggested he had becomes its PR mouthpiece. He retorted that it provided jobs for local people and Cllr Pavey flew to his support accusing me of having no sense of fun and praising the LDO as a great addition to the local economy. The initimable tweeter PukkahPubjabi joined in, asking how many of the jobs were on zero hours contracts and the London Living Wage.

I responded: 

We have different views on what constitutes a viable, sustainable local economy. Reliance on retail is not the answer.

And that perhaps sums up the differences between me and Brent Labour on this. At the beginning of the Quintain regeneration I suggested that an emphasis on retail in a period of recession and debt was not a good idea and that the kind of jobs that would result were not of sufficient quality for our young people. Brent Greens put forward a suggestion for a Green Enterprise zone in the regenerated area, offering incentives for green industries to be set up, contributing to combating climate change and with pay-offs for residents in terms of energy saving technologies and adaptations.  There could be links with local colleges for training and apprenticeship schemes. The result would be skilled jobs of high social value contributing to the wider economy.

This is of course based on clear differences in our assumptions about future economic development. In the face of diminishing natural resources and the need to cut back on carbon emissions as climate change accelerates. Greens are looking for more sustainable economic models not linked to every increasing consumption and debt.  Socially useful production geared to needs not wants. A more equal society with less division between the rich and the poor.

Labour is still signed up to the neoliberal model with their challenge to capitalism little more than trying to give it a human face. They do not question the strategy of expanding the economy through consumption and borrowing. Despite the 2008 crisis they have little to say about the reform of banks or the City of London, reducing the ratio between the lowest and highest paid in corporations, or ending the privatisation of the public sector. On a local level Muhammed Butt doesn't recognise the contradictions of pushing discounted designer shopping to a population suffering income decline and thus easy prey for the loan sharks he is pledged to control.

That difference is what makes me an eco-socialist within the Green Party.

When we submitted our views on Quintain's and Brent Council's retail vision for the Wembley Park regeneration we described it as high risk but at the time it did include social provision such as family housing, health centre swimming pool and a new primary school. These remain to be built and would surely be of more benefit to Brent residents than retail units offering 60% off kitchenware!

When is a Brent consultation NOT a consultation?