"A dark day for students of the future" - Caroline Lucas

Responding to the news that a cap on university tuition fees in England will be set at a maximum of £9,000 a year, Caroline Lucas, MP for Brighton Pavilion, said:

“Today is a dark day for the students of the future – and for Lib Dem voters who have seen, yet again, their Party’s leader make a shameful u-turn on a key election pledge. The Greens are now the only main political party that support free education for all. A cap of £9,000 is simply unacceptable for a country that values social mobility and inclusiveness. This announcement will mean our public degrees will be among the most costly in the world. Many people will be priced out of going to university – and those who do go will be saddled with huge debt. All this at a time when our young people are facing increasing unemployment and anxiety about the future.

“A more progressive policy to address the challenge of funding our higher education would be a business education tax levied on the top 4% of UK companies, which would generate enough annually to abolish tuition fees and take our public investment in higher education up to the average in other comparable countries. As MP for Brighton Pavilion, I am determined to work hard to protect students and staff at Sussex University from creeping privatisation and devastating cuts.”

Brent Cross - Flawed Plans and Wasted Opportunity will Destroy Local Communities

The Coalition for a Sustainable Brent Cross Cricklewood (BXC) Plan has condemned last Thursday’s decision by a single unelected official at Barnet Council (leader Lynne Hillan -pictured below) to approve the fundamentally flawed planning application.

Lynne Hillan

The BXC Coalition fears the demolition of hundreds of local homes and road works on a massive scale will cause devastation to local communities.

Pauline McKinnell, Chairperson of  Cricklewood Community Forum and Hendon Way resident, says, “This scheme will cause huge disruption to the community for years to come. Hundreds of homes will be destroyed, with residents not knowing where they will be moved to. Home owners, many of whom have lived in the area for years, will be offered shared equity deals if they wish to stay locally, but details have not been worked out.

“The area is bounded by major roads - the North Circular, A5, A41 and Cricklewood Lane - that already experience frequent traffic congestion.  Adding 7,500 new housing units and 27,000 jobs will lead to complete gridlock.

 Boris Johnson who ridiculed protesters

“The concentration of new housing in such a small area is ludicrous. The only way you can get 7,500 homes into the area is to build enormous blocks of flats all over the place. Who on earth would choose to live in a tower block overlooking the North Circular?”

Navin Shah, Labour party Assembly Member for Brent and Harrow says, “The scheme fails to conform to a significant number of key planning policies. It is unambitious, and wastes the opportunity for a successful, green, long-lasting alternative to the car-orientated Brent Cross plans of the 1960s, by exacerbating that outdated vision.

“The planning process has been a complete shambles from start to finish, and required a much closer scrutiny by Barnet Council, the Mayor of London and the Secretary of State. This has not happened, and as a result the residents and stakeholders of Barnet, Brent and Camden have been left exposed to a bleak future.

“The green light for the project means a huge letdown for my constituents in Brent and Harrow, and thousands of residents in other parts of London. Every single authority responsible for the assessment of the planning application has abjectly failed. Barnet Council’s entire process was a complete mess.

“Super-hub projects such as this are condemned in the recent London Plan amendments, but Mayor Boris Johnson rubber-stamped approval of the application, and the Coalition Government too has shown no vision, and let people down by not calling a public inquiry.

“My constituents are now left facing the prospect of hugely increased traffic and congestion, and an incinerator with a 140m high chimney, equivalent to a 50-storey tower block on their doorsteps.” 

Eric Pickles

Dr Shahrar Ali, Brent Green party spokesperson for Environment and Planning says, "Secretary of State Pickles, Mayor Boris and now Barnet Council seem determined to put the building of giant shopping malls ahead of the future sustainability of the planet. This decision betrays the short-termist political ideology of local, regional and coalition government. Local residents will renew their campaign to kick this over consumptive fantasy into the long grass!" 

Demolition of the Whitefields Estate, Clarefield Park, Claremont Way and the Rosa Freedman Residential centre, one of the biggest day care centres in Barnet, is part of phase one of the development, due to commence in 2014.  Many residents face a highly stressful future because of the developers’ failure to offer adequate compensation for the demolition of their homes and the cost of relocation.

The Coalition will continue to fight the plans building by building to ensure a sustainable scheme – one that the local community wants – is put in its place.  The developers have now suddenly stated that they want “meaningful engagement” with the local community and the wider area. This is laughable, because it should have happened years ago, before the plans were set in stone.   Instead, we face the existing housing and modern sports centre, and the modern parts of local schools, all being demolished.   We face future light railway and cycling routes being destroyed, with major increases in road congestion instead.  And we face toxic chemicals being emitted every day by the Brent Cross domestic waste incinerator.

To date, there has been no press release about this £4.5-billion redevelopment from Barnet Council.  Given the enormous impact on the Borough, and the rather minor nature of SOME of their releases, this is amazing.  After all the justified criticism perhaps Barnet is now too ashamed to publicise its folly.

Beyond Brent's Brain

The Brent BRAIN Community website closed on 24 September 2010. This Saturday a FREE course starts at Willesden Green Library which will teach voluntary organisations and others interested in how to set up a FREE community website. The courses are on Saturdays 6th and 13th November 2-4pm or Saturdays 20th, 27th November and 4th December 2-4pm. Ring 020 8937 3400 to book a place. 

The first 4 sessions are to show people how to create a general community website using word press. The last session in December is on how to add posts and community events to the new site. Kathy Ferris (former Brain manager will run this session in a personal capacity as a tutor~)
http://brilliantbrent.wordpress.com/

  
Relevant community information for Brent has been migrated onto the Brent Council Website www.brent.gov.uk.
 
To help you find the relevant pages here are some handy links to the new services and projects that are available on the council and B My Voice websites: 

• www.brent.gov.uk/communitydirectory - Community and Voluntary Directory
• www.brent.gov.uk/brentgoinggreen - saving energy monitors project
• www.brent.gov.uk/wwwp - learning disability photo library
• www.brent.gov.uk/voluntary.nsf/Pages/LBB-19 - link to Grantnet funding finder
• www.brent.gov.uk/partnersforbrent - local strategic partnership pages
• www.bmyvoice.org.uk/brentinspires - London 2012 Games youth project 

All other projects, interactive and information areas on BRAIN are closed and no longer available.

Protest Works - Just look at the proof

Excellent article by Johann Hari in today's Independent he reflects on the success of the Vodaphone protests over the last few days (stimulated by a comment he made about Vodaphone's tax avoidance in one of his columns):

"Protest raises the political price for governments making bad decisions. It stopped LBJ and Nixon making the most catastrophic decision of all. The same principle can apply to the Conservative desire to kneecap the welfare state while handing out massive baubles to their rich friends. The next time George Osborne has to decide whether to cancel the tax bill of a super-rich corporation and make us all pick up the tab, he will know there is a price. People will find out, and they will be angry. The more protests there are, the higher the price. If enough of us demand it, we can make the rich pay their share for the running of our country, rather than the poor and the middle – to name just one urgent cause that deserves protest."

Defend Public Services - Build a Greener Society

Councillor speaks out on how cuts will affect young people

The next open meeting of the Brent Fightback Campaign will be on THURSDAY NOVEMBER 4th 7.30 pm at Brent Trades Hall (it says London Apollo Club over the door), 375 High Rd Willesden. Nearest tube Dollis Hill 

Cllr Roxanne Mashari (Labour) will introduce a discussion on how the cuts will affect Brent's young people. Brent Fightback hope there will also be young people and those who work with them present to talk about their experiences and how they see their futures. 4,250 16-18 year olds in Brent are likely to lose up to £1,100 each year with the ending of the Education Maintenance Allowance.

Since Fightback’s  last meeting, the Comprehensive Spending Review has been announced. Councils, people who rely on benefits, the low paid, students and many others are reeling from the ferocity of the projected cuts. 

The Willesden and Brent Times this week highlighted possible areas for cuts including reduced entitlement to free school meals, a £1m cut in Brent’s Sure Start funding over 4 years, and a cut in capital programme funding for schools of 66% over the same period. This could mean the council is unable to provide additional school places.

Brent Fightback supporters have been involved in a number of protests:

• Monday 18th October: Brent MENCAP staged a small but very effective demonstration outside Brent Town Hall to alert Councillors to the anxieties of people with learning difficulties who are very vulnerable to the cuts
• Tuesday 19th October: The new Brent Fightback banner was outside the TUC's anti-cuts rally at Central Hall Westminster and a delegation including officers of the UCU, Brent teachers, Brent UNISON and representatives of Brent MENCAP lobbied Sarah Teather
• Wednesday 20th October: The day the cuts were announced, the banner and a considerable number of our supporters were on the 3,000 strong march that assembled at Lincolns Inn Fields and joined the rally outside Downing St 
• Saturday 23rd October: Brent Fightback supporters went to their local fire stations to express solidarity with the firefighters. The banner went to Willesden and many supporters then joined the march from RMT headquarters to the SE Region TUC rally.

The meeting will hear reports from these protests at the meeting.

Is Israel beyond the law? Public Meeting on Wednesday

ANTI-CUTS ACTIVISTS SHUTDOWN VODAFONE FLAGSHIP STORE IN DISGUST AT £6BN TAX EVASION

65 activists have today stopped trading at Vodafone’s largest retail store on Oxford Street, London, by blockading the doorway in disgust at the HMRC’s deal with Vodafone that have allowed them to walk away from paying a tax bill thought to be worth £6bn to the public purse.




The action started at 09:30 this morning where activists gathered at The Ritz hotel near Oxford Street following rapid mobilization over the weekend via Twitter, Facebook, blogs and text messaging.

The 65 activists confronted the minor security in front of the shop to gain entry to the shop and proceeded to blockade the entrance with arm tubes and banners before the store had chance to even receive its first customer.

This comes exactly a week after George Osborne’s Comprehensive Spending Review in which he announced that another £7bn will be cut from welfare, producing a total of £18bn of cuts from vital welfare services.

These cuts have been widely condemned by charity groups representing the most vulnerable in society, and the highly respected Institute of Fiscal Studies confirmed on Thursday last week that the coalition’s cuts will indeed hit the poorest in society the hardest.

The issue of tax evasion by corporations and the wealthy was not however even mentioned during Osborne’s Comprehensive Spending Review speech, despite the fact that it is estimated that the deficit to the public purse from tax evasion amounts to at least £12bn each year.

To add salt to the wound, Osborne also announced last week that large corporations in addition will be expected to contribute 4% less in tax to public services across the next four years through a reduction in corporation tax.

Activists on today’s action also note that Andy Halford is both a financial advisor to Vodafone and a corporation tax advisor to the treasury.

Under a banner that read “Pay your taxes - save our welfare state”, Jennifer Kyte said, “The cuts are not fair, we're not all in this together, and there are alternatives. Why not start by collecting - instead of writing off – the tens of billions owed in taxes by wealthy corporations?”

She continued, “The economic downturn was caused by the reckless greed of the private sector, but it is the public sector and those at the bottom that are picking up the bill. Is this their idea of the wonderful Big Society?”

Zeketa Darby said, “We will not pay for their crisis! The public need to join together and hit the streets to take concerted action to fight these cuts”