Now Cricklewood Llbrary land and building to be sold off

After the controversy over the attempted sale of Kensal Rise Library, Cricklewood Library is now up for sale.  As the library is an  asset of community value there is now a period in which community interest groups can lodge notice that they are potential bidders

Brent Advocacy Concerns is looking for new trustees

                                    

Are looking for New Trustees

   BAC has been supporting Disabled People in Brent since 1988 and are looking for trustees who can help take us forward in these challenging times.

  We are seeking people who:

·      Feel they can support the aims and objectives of the organisation and the social model of disability.

·      Have a knowledge of disability issues either by personal experience or by close association with disabled people (75% of our trustees should define as disabled)

·      Are able to commit to 6 meetings a year at a mutually agreed time.

·      Feel a connection to our work and will spread the word

·      Would like to help to develop the organisation

·      Could be pro-active in helping to raise funding, sponsorship etc.

·      Could support the organisation with any skills they may have e.g. experience of disability, organising, IT, website design, management or business skills, legal knowledge, accounting, social media etc.

·      Live in the GLA area

We can offer:

·      Disability, equality awareness training

·      Management Committee training and out of pocket expenses

·      The chance to make a difference for disabled people in Brent and surrounding areas.

·      An opportunity to improve skills.

If you, or anyone you know, is interested in joining us please contact John Healy by 3^rd April 2015.

020 8459 1493

bacadvocacy@outlook.com     or       innit67@icloud.co

Brent Advocacy Concerns, Willesden Centre for Health and Care, Robson Avenue, London NW10 3RY. Registered Charity Number 1001369

Emperor's New Clothes Rap - Cassetteboy

The future of local government should be an election issue

Readers may be interested In this editorial from the Local Government Chronicle LINK :

“Britain is walking tall again,” declared George Osborne in his Budget statement last week. For much of the past five years local government has felt a long way from walking tall after being targeted in a series of cuts that have diminished councils’ ability to provide for their local populations. “Local government is walking small and lean,” is a fair representation of its fate.

The chancellor made much in his speech of the projection that in 2019-20 public spending, as a share of gross domestic product, will be at the same level as it was in 2000, three years into the Blair administration. However, this line from his speech – a response to the critics accusing him of taking public spending back to 1930s levels – hardly tells the whole story.

Further swingeing cuts take place in the next few years before, according to the Treasury, spending perks up in what is set to be the year before the next general election. Any respite from austerity seems a long way away.

Councils will contrast their current position with that of 15 years’ ago. Their spending power is far lower, at a time the ageing population and growing awareness of the scale of need in children’s safeguarding leads to a far greater demand for services.

The Local Government Association this week revealed a projection stating that adult and children’s care would take up over 60% of councils’ tax revenue in 2019-20, leaving far less available for other services. Environmental services, libraries, roads, regulatory services and culture, in particular, face a very rough ride.

Little wonder then that the sector has been making its case for a sea change in both the government and the public’s attitude to the sector. Shortly before the pre-election purdah begins, this week saw the LGA launch its Future Funding campaign to raise awareness of the 40% budget cuts councils have experienced in the past five years and warn that we face “difficult decisions about which services continue”. Both it and the Special Interest Group of Metropolitan Authorities have produced slick but powerful videos explaining councils’ financial predicament.

Some may note the irony of a sector spending money on publicising the fact that it has little money. However, this expenditure really is a drop in the ocean. It is vital that everything possible is done to make the public – the voters – aware of the impact of councils’ financial hardship. This is not to make a party political point; it is equally entirely right that the Conservatives and Liberal Democrats point out the impact of the state running a massive deficit.

As Rob Whiteman points out, election debate too often takes the form of a lightweight and unbelievable soap opera. Discussion has focused on Ed Miliband’s two kitchens, with too little debate on the housing crisis which means that far too many people have no kitchen of their own at all. Sector leaders need to make their case loudly and clearly in an election crucial to local government’s destiny.