Campaign for Barclays to lose its banking licence launched

Following yesterday's revelations an e-petition has been launched on the government website asking that Barclay's banking licence be withdrawn.

The petition reads:

Within a capitalist economy banks perform a vital function in facilitating the production and exchange of goods and services. In return for fulfilling this role responsibly they are allowed to hold a banking licences, which brings them great benefits in terms of the ability to create money through making loans. The systematic manipulation of the LIBOR value to serve its business interests makes clear that Barclays is not a fit company to hold a banking licence. We call upon the government to withdraw Barclays banking licence.

The petition can be found HERE

RBS IT failure may affect Brent council tax transactions

Following from Brent Council:

Brent uses the Royal Bank of Scotland (RBS) as its clearing bankers.

On Wednesday, 20 June, a software upgrade at the bank failed, resulting in services being unavailable. This was a nationwide problem affecting individuals and businesses that bank with RBS, NatWest and Ulster Bank.

The problems affecting reporting systems meant that whatever transactions were undertaken, neither customers nor bank staff could accurately identify transactions or balances.

As a result we have been unable to verify some customers' payments including Council Tax. This could result in us writing to some customers to recover 'debts' which have actually been paid.

We will do everything possible to minimise the impact on customers and at the moment we are not aware of any transactions that have either failed or been duplicated. We will keep customers informed as more information becomes available.

Support Romayne Phoenix for Green Party leader

I am pleased to be able to support Romayne Phoenix's election campaign for the leadership of the Green Party and Will Duckworth as her running mate for the deputy leadership.

My endorsement which is on the campaign website HERE reads:

In a time of unprecedented global climate and economic crisis and with the welfare state under sustained attack, the Green Party needs a leader with grit and determination, firmly rooted in campaigns for environmental and social justice. Romayne Phoenix has demonstrated that she is able to forge alliances with other groups and trades unions, communicate across the social spectrum, and inspire all those in struggle. She would make an excellent leader.

Among others endorsing Romayne's campaign are:

Peter Tatchell (Human Rights campaigner)
Sasha Khan (Croydon Green Party)
Shan Oakes (Equalities and Diversity Officer, Green Party executive)
Lindsey German  (Stop the War Coalition and Coalition of Resistance)
Paul Mackney (former NATFHE General Secretary and the Coalition of Resistance)

 Romayne and Will want to position firmly in the anti-austerity movement:

The Green Party must be at the heart of the battle against austerity, becoming centrally involved in anti-cuts campaigns where they already exist and encouraging their formation wherever absent. We must also work towards such campaigns including a Green agenda, for instance seeking to defend and expand public transport provision in localities as part of the fight against public spending cuts.

Our position against austerity remains a fundamental differential between us and the other parties. We must have an effective campaign strategy, led by a dynamic and properly resourced campaigns committee. We should seek to involve trade unions, tenants associations, community organisations and students in broad and inclusive organisations at local level.

Since its creation in 2010 Romayne has chaired the Coalition of Resistance, a broad grouping of organisations and individuals who are building a national and international movement of opposition to cuts, privatisation and the victimisation of the most vulnerable in society. These connections and experience make Romayne and Will ideally placed to build the network needed to secure this alliance.

By becoming more effective allies in their defence of jobs and living standards we might hope to become the party that nurses, teachers and transport workers identify with most.

The Campaign FACEBOOK page is HERE

NOTE: I give this support and endorsement as an individual member of the Green Party. Other members of Brent Green Party may well support other candidates.

Save Hopscotch Nursery

News from Gurgle.com LINK

Brent parents are up in arms. First the council decided to close two valued nurseries, Treetops Children’s Centre in Willesden and Harmony Children’s centre in Neasden, and now they are planning to close a third, highly sought after nursery. Another blow to the community in troubled times. Hopscotch Nursery, which was awarded 'outstanding' in it's ofsted report in 2011 and 2012, has been in the Queen’s Park area for 20 years and has been providing parents with a private nursery and also daily stay and play facilities, much needed by parents in the community.

Leigh Steckler 36, has 3 children and lives in the local area, 2 of which have been at Hopscotch nursery.

 

“If Hopscotch closes, there just isn’t an alternative nursery in the area. There is a serious lack of nursery places in our area, and I was lucky to get my son into Hopscotch in the first place. Brent Council seem to have given up on the situation arguing that they don’t have a duty to keep Hopscotch as it’s not council run.. it’s very sad for all the local parents”

Interestingly, Brent do in fact have a statutory duty, under the 2006 childrens act, to ensure sufficient childcare for working parents. The act says that local authorities must take the strategic lead in their local childcare market, planning, supporting and commissioning childcare by working with local private, voluntary and independent sector providers to meet local need.

So, families in Brent have grounds to require that Brent council provide childcare, but what can be done; a full campaign has been launched to save the long running nursery which sets out to highlight the real lack of nursery provision in the area and the terrible loss to the community if the nursery and drop-in were to close.

Another Hopscotch Mum, Claire Hind 31, says

“I had just moved into the area and had a new baby. I was slightly daunted at the prospect of meeting other mums but I found the drop in details online and went along. I met so many local mums, all with the same age children as me, it was like a little community”

The situation in Brent

• Brent has a high and increasing birth rate relative to the national average and to the London average.
• 30% of families who already use childcare predicted their need for childcare will increase in future (compared to 10% who said it would decrease.)
• 38% of Brent families surveyed need childcare between 8am and 6pm
• 25.8% of parents surveyed reported they were unable to find childcare within the hours they required

The situation in the area surrounding Hopscotch

In the report, 'Kilburn' means Kilburn, Brondesbury Park, Mapesbury and Queen's Park.

All points below were true at the time of publication (Feb 2011.)

• There are 3, 253 nought to four year- olds in Kilburn.
• Compared to other Brent localities, families in Kilburn require the most hours of childcare (average = 28.1 per week)
• Kilburn has no childcare places at playgroup or pre-school (Kingsbury and Wembley have more than 100.)
• It has the lowest number of childminder places in the borough (120 compared to 222 in Willesden.)
• It has the lowest number of vacancies in the borough at both childminders and nurseries
• In 2011 there were only 12 part- time nursery vacancies for 2- 5 year- olds and only two for children over 3 (full time nursery vacancies not reported.)
• In a survey, Kilburn families were the least satisfied in the borough with availability, choice and ease of obtaining childcare
• 54% of Kilburn parents disagreed with the statement: 'there is plenty of childcare available.'
• The report concludes that:

“there may be a lack of choice of childcare (in Kilburn) compared to other localities (and that) The availability of childcare may be more of an acute problem faced by families in Kilburn than it is for families in the rest of Brent.”

This ‘acute’ problem faced by family’s needs to be addressed by the council in providing more childcare in the area and making available there facilities to make sure parents have access to daily drop in centre’s and have a choice about their childcare. Having no option is not an option.

Parents also relayed their fears for affordable childcare if plans to close Hopscotch go ahead. Parents in the borough say that many of them will be forced to give up jobs because of a shortage of affordable nursery places. While Hopscotch costs £33 a day, other local nurseries are said to cost up to £70.

In a report written by the Director of Children and Families in Brent, it states,

“A growing body of evidence shows that good pre-school childcare gives children a head start and leads to better outcomes as they move through school. It also allows children to take part in a wide range of interesting activities that foster their personal development in a safe environment”

Brent are obviously well aware of the advantage of the children in their borough getting the best start in their educational and social lives, so putting parents and children under financial and emotional stress by giving them no alternative childcare seems illogical.

For more information about the possible closure of the much loved Hopscotch nursery, please click here.

To join the Save Hopscotch Nursery campaign, please click here http://savehopscotch.org.uk/

Lib Dem councillors give verdict on the Coalition

If only......

Lib Dems wake up to school places crisis but where's Teather?

It is good to see that Brent Lib Dems have woken up to the school places crisis with their press release today (see below). Other urgent issues still remain to be addressed regarding academies, free schools and the future of the School Improvement Service. See my recent posting HERE

Liberal Democrat councillors are demanding urgent confirmation from Brent Council Education chiefs about whether there will be enough reception places available for four and five year-olds due to start school in Brent this September.

A newsletter circulated to councillors and governors recently admits:

…we will be able to provide Reception places to all the on-time applications received and offer places for most of the unplaced children in other years.
However, this still leaves us with insufficient places for the large numbers of late applications for Reception places which continue to arrive and are difficult to predict.

Liberal Democrat councillor Barry Cheese, who sits on the Children & Young People Overview and Scrutiny Committee, said:

Every year hundreds of parents miss the main closing date in January 2012. Often this is through no fault of their own: for example they may have recently moved into Brent. This is why the council organises eight further rounds of applications between May and August.

Brent Council has received £55 million from the government to pay for extra primary school places – equivalent to a dozen new primary schools.
We owe it to local children to make sure that they aren’t stuck at home when they should be starting their exciting journey through school. We need answers from the Council.

Sarah Teather MP, Minister of State for Children and Families, has announced millions of pounds more funding for Brent Council to provide more primary school places.

Currently the Labour councillors who sit on the council’s decision-making Executive are not due to consider the school places issue until August, less than a month before the start of term.

As they have illustrated their Press Release with a picture of Sarah Teather it is pertinent to ask their position on the apparent Coalition policy of restricting funding of new schools to address the places shortage to academies or free schools, rather than the local authority community schools favoured by most Brent residents.

I hope they and other governors will bring these issues up at today's Conference for Brent School Governors at the Crown Moran Hotel in Cricklewood.

Meanwhile John Prescott and others have been active on Twitter asking why Sarah Teather was missing from the Education Debate in the House of Commons LINK

Oppose Brent Parks Service privatisation - support park workers

View across Fryent Country Park meadows to Kingsbury

I was looking at this view with a class of 7 and 8 year olds recently and telling them how we owed the preservation of Middlesex countryside in Fryent Country Park to the far-sighted councillors of Middlesex Country Council who in 1938 purchased the farmland on either side of Fryent Way to preserve some open space from the encroaching housing.

Since then this remaining fragment of Middlesex countryside has escaped proposals to build housing, a golf club, a zoo and even an Olympic Village for the unsuccessful 1988 London OIympics bid.

Now the councillors of Brent Council are making a proposal that could do considerable harm to Fryent Country Park and other Brent parks and open spaces. This week the Brent and Kilburn Times LINK confirms my fears of December 2011 LINK that the Council were considering privatising the parks service. The Council refused to answer my questions on this on the grounds that Wembley Matters was not 'official media' and then refused to answer a Freedom of Information request on the same matter.

According the the BKT the 80 park and cemetery  maintenance service workers have already received letters warning them that the Council is considering out-sourcing the service. The management of the Parks Service was merged with the Sports Service under one Head of Serice recently after the retirement of Shaun Faulkner, a champion of Brent's Green Flag winning parks and open spaces. It will come as no surprise to regular readers to hear that Cllr James Powney is the lead member for this service.

Brent Council says that it spends £3m on parks maintenance and.."we face unprecedented financial pressures, so we are looking at all our services, including saving money on grounds maintenance while also protecting the quality wherever possible". That "wherever possible" should serve as a warning  to all who love and appreciate our local parks.

It is those 80 maintenance staff who have enabled our parks to win Green Flag awards, who have got to know and cherish them and maintain the spaces sensitively, preserving and enhancing natural habitats. Although staff will have rights under TUPE,  if money is to 'saved' whilst giving the private company a profit, hours, numbers of staff and conditions of service will be reduced.

My fear is that this will result in the sort of parks maintenance that is evident in the private contractors operating in some of our housing estates where trees and shrubs are not pruned or cut-back by experts but 'shaped' by a workman with a chain-saw and grass cut whatever the weather resulting in churned up lawn areas.

In the Wirral last year there was a huge row over the privatisation of parks with Labour opposing the plans put forward by the previous Lib Dem-Conservative coalition and a dispute over the possibility of an 'in-house' bid for the contract. LINK Here Labour is putting forward the plans and although Council Leader Muhammed Butt tweated this weekend about Brent's oldest building, Old St Andrew's Church in Kingsbury, Labour has a poor record on preserving our heritage.

As I pointed out to that primary class, parks are part of our heritage.  That heritage should not be threatened by short-term financial cost saving to the detriment of our long term social and environmental capital.

Brent residents should oppose parks privatisation. If despite opposition the plans go ahead everything should be done to provide support for an 'in-house' bid to run the service.

Building a mass movement against austerity and privatisation

Romayne Phoenix, from the Green Party and Chair of the Coalition of  Resistance, launched last week's rally with panache and demonstrated that the Green Party, alone of the Westminster parties, is prepared to question the current ideological attack on the welfare state that is being made under the guise of deficit reduction.

Len McCluskey urged the coming together of trades unions, community organisations, churches, students and pensioners in one movement to oppose the privatisation of the NHS that is happening in front of our eyes. He urged a combination of industrial action and civil disobedience and said that the London Olympics were a legitimate target for protest.  He told the audience that People Power can bring down governments and tyrants: "Don't despair, don't let the media debilitate us, have faith in our values of truth and justice".

Mary Cross, of Disabled People Against the Cuts, said that the destruction of the welfare state is the destruction of peoples' lives and reminded that audience that anyone can become disabled through accidents or illness. Mary said that 1 in 4 families with disabled children are unable to afford to heat their homes and drew attention to the rise in hate crimes against disabled people. People under 65 leaving hospital after a stroke were being immediately assessed for fitness to work. Cuts in housing benefits were making disabled people homeless. She claimed that these attacks amounted to crimes against humanity.

Salma Yaqoob in a passionate speech drew attention to the Guardian's reports on working  families being one bill away from disaster and said that although the government did not like being told this, that they had launched a class way, and were all about  'divide and rule'. With only 10-15% of cuts made so far this was the first generation since WW2 who would be worse off than the generation before them.  Declaring that solidarity does matter she said that it was people who gave each other strength. She said, "If we do our job well we will expose austerity as a poison, just as we exposed the lies used to launch the war in Iraq".  Supporting a Financial Transaction Tax of 0.5% she said that this "would not turn the rich out of their homes" but would raise £30bn to challenge the 'need' for cuts.

A delegation from the Coalition of Resistance, which included Romayne Phoenix,  had recently visited Greece and the events there resonated throughout the rally. Vassilis Fouskas, from Syriza, was received enthusiastically. He  spoke about the conditions for left success in challenging austerity in which bail outs were really a  'bonanza for bankers'.  He said that the social devastation and poverty now hitting Greece was familiar to the people of the global South and Eastern Europe. The only original factor was that it was being applied to a country of the EU. There had been 17 general strikes in Greece over the last two years and hundreds of demonstrations and occupations. The Greek people had rejected the guilt inducing mantra of 'lazy south' stereotypes and formed alliances. Without this mobilisation the break through from the left could not have happened. Their experience led people to realise that what was needed was a proper political alternative.Syriza had become the only credible alternative on the left, present in organisations but respecting their autonomy and unifying the anti-austerity movement. Solidarity was an essential requisite for success.

In his concluding speech, Tony Benn said that he had learned a lot from the previous speakers, "What we have been doing is part of a national education campaign". He defended public expenditure saying that it was vital for democracy and transferred "power from the market to the polling station". Coalition policies were reopening battles we fought and won over centuries and that imposition of policies on Greece and the Egyptian military takeover showed that all over the world the issue was an attack on the peoples' democratic rights. What was happening was the imposition of poverty and we needed to take inspiration from previous vociferous campaigners such as the Miners Women's Support Groups.  He said that 87 he was more encouraged to go into battle now than at any other time in his life.


I enjoyed the meeting but feel strongly that although it is important to mobilise for the TUC's October 20th action that even more important is to bring together all the various groups and individuals affected by austerity, most of whom are not in trade unions.  One day TUC actions often end up in an anti-climax the day after, 'Was that it? What now?' October 20th should be a medium term marker on the way to the longer term goal of building an alternative economic and social strategy supported by people across the social spectrum.

You can see videos of the above speeches and those from other speakers HERE