Pickles to be urged by Brent Council to call-in Welsh Harp development

The development site

The motion below is being put to tonight's full Council meeting by Cllr Roxanne Mashari. I understand it will have Liberal Democrat support but I don't know the position of Conservative councillors:

West Hendon development

This Council opposes the West Hendon Development plans which have recently been approved by Barnet Council and the Mayor of London.

Members note that the Welsh Harp Reservoir and Nature Reserve is the only site of special scientific interest (SSSI) in Brent or Barnet and has London wide and national ecological significance.

Members note that Barratt Homes has failed to address concerns raised by Brent Officers, community groups and wildlife organisations who have opposed these plans, which will lead to 6000 new residents moving into tower blocks up to 29 storeys high and the construction of foot bridges leading directly from the site into the SSSI. Members agree that the scale and design of this development amount to an act of environmental vandalism.

This Council notes that the scale and design of the proposed development contravenes official guidance in both the Barnet and London plans.

This Council wishes to reaffirm the value of our Welsh Harp Nature Reserve and reservoir and its belief that this site must be preserved for future generations.

This Council therefore urges the Secretary of State for Communities and Local Government to call in this decision with the utmost urgency. This is in light of the numerous and grave concerns raised by a number of professional and community bodies which remain unaddressed.

Sarah's secret: A Lib Dem reflection on Sarah Teather

I have published Labour and Green views on Sarah Teather's decision not to stand again. Here, in a guest blog, is the view from Alison Hopkins,  Liberal Democrat councillor for Dollis Hill

Sarah called me on Saturday to tell me personally of her decision not to stand again in 2014. I was and am very saddened, both on a personal and professional level. I’ve known her for many years, first coming into contact when, like thousands of other Brent residents, she helped me with a problem that no one else had managed to fix. I then got to know her better through her sterling and invaluable efforts to help the campaign against the Brent Cross plans, which meant chaos for Dollis Hill and the wider Brent area. I still remember how trenchant and forthright she was at public meetings with the developers and I realised then that this was a woman with a sense of purpose, fiercely intelligent and not afraid to say what she thought.

As a result of getting to know her better I decided to enter politics properly, having campaigned and worked locally for decades, as I could see that far more could be achieved within a more formal role. I campaigned for her in the 2010 general election and it was one of the most exhilarating, exhausting and rewarding things I’ve ever done – only bettered by being a councillor in Dollis Hill! Our team proved that despite the predictions of victory from Labour and figures suggesting otherwise, we could turn a notional loss into a pretty good win.  I’m absolutely sure that most of that was down to Sarah’s record of working her socks off for local people, knowing Brent in minute detail – I swear she has the electoral roll in her head – and to her brilliant local office.  Brent has had the luxury of a local MP, with help accessible five days a week to constituents: how many other constituencies get that level of commitment?

Her hidden secret is she's also a great pastry cook: the Brent Cross coalition were fed amazing cookies the first time we met her formally in the Commons and she’s notorious for feeding her helpers and staff.  Most people see her serious side, but I’ve been fortunate enough to see her sitting on my dining room floor giggling uncontrollably during my by election.

I’ve not always agreed with her decisions or the way she’s voted, but I’ve never had the least doubt that she hasn't thought long and hard about everything she’s ever done as an MP. I also know that any decision she makes comes from a strong sense of right and wrong, from conscience and from an ethical and moral framework that I wish more people generally had.  She gets angry with injustice, whatever its form, and she won’t pander to the popular or take the easy way out.

One of my neighbours sent me an email about her, and I think it says it all: “Really sorry she’s going. Worked hard and kept her nose clean.”  I’ve no idea what she’ll do next, but I’m absolutely certain that whatever it is, she’ll make a difference to people’s lives for the better, just as she has for the past decade in Brent.

Barry Gardiner faces wrath of anti-Modi demonstrators

A wet Monday morning is not the most auspicious time for a demonstration but this morning's at Brent Civic Centre was lively enough. Human rights activists were protesting at Barry Gardiner's invitation to Narendra Modi to speak in the House of Commons on 'The Future of Modern India'.

Modi (see previous posting LINK) is charged by activists with not intervening in, or even supporting, the 2002 massacre of more than 2,000 Gujerat Muslims. His Hindu nationalist party, the BJP, is denounced by many as fascist.

Barry Gardiner is Chair of the Labour Friends of India and issued the invitation in that capacity, However his critics suggest that the invite was aimed at securing the substantial Hindu vote in his Brent North constituency and to be based on enhancing business opportunities rather than human rights principles.

Modi has said he cannot come to the UK at present but the invitation is still extant. The demonstrators want the invitation to be officially withdrawn.

Gardiner came outside to meet the demonstrators and to distribute a statement. He was surrounded by angry activists who tried to talk to him to the background noise of chants of, 'Barry Gardiner, Shame, Shame/Inviting Modi, Not in Our Name; Barry, Barry, Don't Lie/Modi Guilty of Genocide.'

It does seem that Barry Gardiner has introduced a potentially explosive and divisive element into UK politics with his invitation and an issue that could impact on local community relations.

Digging up Kingsbury’s secrets at Blackbird Hill

My Aunt Muriel was a farm labourer at different farms around Kingsbury and Edgware so I am pleased to publish this Guest Blog by local historian Philip Grant about a dig at Blackbird Hill Farm just around the corner from where she used to live.

 We still need to save Brent's remaining farm building at Old Oxgate Farm in recognition of  Brent's agricultural past.

 

Blackbird Farm House c1880  (Brent Archives)

Planners are often criticised for the developments they allow to be built, but sometimes they deserve some praise. For two weeks from Monday 9 September, behind the blue hoardings opposite the Lidl supermarket on Blackbird Hill, archaeologists from UCL will be working to uncover clues from the past of a historic site. A block of flats will be built soon where the “Blarney Stone” (formerly “The Blackbirds”) public house stood, but for hundreds of years before the pub was built in the 1950’s, there was a farm here.

When the controversial planning application to redevelop the pub was submitted in 2010, Brent’s planning officers identified that this was a site with archaeological potential. A desk-based assessment of this potential was required as part of the application documents, and after representations were made on behalf of both Brent Museum and Wembley History Society, officers recommended that a proper excavation should be carried out on the part of the site before the new development could go ahead.

Blackbird Farm was only an old farm, so why is this excavation so important? In 1952, an old “mansion” opposite Kingsbury Green was demolished to make way for blocks of Wembley Council flats (Mead Court). After the bulldozers had cleared the site, bits of old pottery, some medieval and two large fragments of Roman amphorae, were found in the heaps of earth. Had they been buried for up to 1,900 years, or were they items collected only a century or two before by a previous occupant of the property? It was too late to find out, and a key opportunity to learn more about our distant past was lost.

There were farm buildings on the “Blackbirds” site from at least the sixteenth century, and there may be even older material buried here which could tell us about the lives of Kingsbury’s earliest inhabitants. Blackbird Hill was part of a track which was known as “Eldestrete” (the old road) in Saxon times. When the nearby St Andrew’s Old Church was built around AD1100, rubble from the Roman period was used in its walls, so there may have been a building in this area nearly two thousand years ago.

An extract from the 1597 Hovenden Map, showing the farm, then called Findens and the surrounding area (note that north is on  the right hand side, not at the top).(Source and copyright: The Codrington Library, All Souls’ College, Oxford) 

 Although part of the farmyard site was destroyed when the pub was built, there is an area close to Old Church Lane which is relatively undisturbed, and that is where the archaeologists will be excavating. There is no guarantee that they will discover anything of significance, but this is the last chance to find whatever is there before an underground car park is constructed for the flats. 

Whatever is found, properly identified and interpreted, will help to fill gaps in our knowledge of local history.

Wembley History Society and Brent Archives had hoped to arrange with the archaeologists for an open afternoon, when local people could come and see the “dig” for themselves. Unfortunately this has not proved possible, as this is an active construction site, with other contractors at work, so the developer will not allow public access for safety reasons. We will make sure, however, that any information about what is found is made publicly available, so that the efforts of local planning officers and heritage enthusiasts to bring about this excavation are not wasted.

You can discover more about the history of the Blackbird Farm site in an illustrated article from the Brent Archives online local history resources collection HERE

Concern over Brent Meals on Wheels transferring to community providers

Brent Council is proposing to end Council provision of the Meals on Wheels service for the elderly and vulnerable and hand the responsibility over to community organisations. They will end the contract with the present provider Apetito which will also lose the contract for meals provision at day centres.

The Council projects that it will save more than half the costs of the present service in 2014-15 although the budget may be overspent this year because of set up costs.

One issue of concern is that the proposals are based on a pilot with Harlesden Methodist Church which eventually involved evaluations by only six users. The total number of residents receiving meals on wheels currently is 187 and 1345 have meals at day centres.

The need for meals on wheels on a geographical basis is

South (Kilburn; Queens Park; Kensal Green; Brondesbury) 27
Central East (Dollis Hill; Mapesbury; Dudden Hill) 16
Central West (Stonebridge; Harlesden; Willesden;Cricklewood) 49
North East (Alperton; Wembley; Preston; Tokyngton; Sudbury; Northwick Park) 59
North West (Barnhill; Fryent; Queensbury; Kenton; Kingsbury) 36

The day care meal requirements break down as:

 Kingsbury Resource Centre 384
John Billam 430
Elders Voice 118
Hibiscus Club 24
Aspects Unit 38
Asian Disability Alliance 5
Wise Project 250
Rendezvous Club 96

The Council suggest the following provision:

Cricklewood Homeless Concern – can cover the whole of Brent, and provide Western European/Caribbean/Indian meals
- Early Bird Catering – can cover the Wembley/Sudbury/Kingsbury/Tokyngton area and provide Western
European/Caribbean meals
- Harlesden Methodist Church – can cover Harlesden, Stonebridge and Kensal Rise and provide Western European/Caribbean/Indian meals
- Catalyst Catering – can cover Harlesden, Stonebridge and Willesden and provide Western European/Caribbean meals
- Sudbury Neighbourhood Centre – can provide for day centres only and provide Western European/Caribbean meals
- Jalaram Foods – who can cover the whole borough and provide Asian Vegetarian meals

Residents will contribute £3.50 per meal as at present but payments will be via pre-paid cards with help for those who find the system hard to manage. The Council also currently contribute £3.50.

The current meal charge to the Council via Apetito is £8.52 and they project that this will be cut to £3.50 for door to door provision and £2 for day centre provision.

The Council will put aside a contingency in case of failures by any of the new providers. Apetito staff are unlikely to qualify for TUPE so will become redundant. No redundancy costs will fall on the Council.

A risk assessment is provided by the Council.

I hope councillors give this very serious consideration. I know from personal experience with my mother that both the meal itself and the person delivering it are vitally important to the housebound. The meal and visit are often the day's major event. The quality and suitability of the meal are important to maintain physical health and the friendships that develop with the deliverer, however fleeting, are socially important. Maintaining quality of meal and quality of service across many providers is going to be a major challenge.

Mixed reaction to Teather's withdrawal from 2015 election

Sarah Teather's decision not to stand for election in 2015 has come as a surprise to many but her increasing alienation from her party has been clear since her sacking as Children's minister, which itself followed her failure to vote for Government welfare reform. The Daily Mail and Tory MPs vociferously called for her resignation at the time.

Some argue that she missed her moment and should have resigned on a matter of principle at the time rather than limp on until she was sacked. Her post-sacking re-dedication to her constituents was seen by many as an attempt to rekindle local support ahead of the General Election. She was suddenly available to constituents and campaigners again after pleading that ministerial conduct codes prohibited her from openly campaigning on national political issues - she dropped letters to ministerial colleagues instead.

I had a hunch that free from these constraints she would become a more open critic of the Lib Dem's collusion with the Tories and that by 2015, if she survived the likely Lib Dem  electoral disaster, she would be in a position to contest the leadership on the basis of 'I saw it coming'. This would of course have raised difficulties about her General Election campaign and how to distance herself from the party's manifesto.

This was not to be but her position as regards her party appears confused this morning. Her Observer interview says that she no longer feels able to operate within the Parliamentary Liberal Democrat group BUT she will stay in the party. Her personal statement on her website says that she will campaign for Lib Dems in the local elections and for her Lib Dem successor in the 2015 General Election. This seems to indicate that she will not cross the floor of the House.

Similarly Nick Clegg is both a 'decent bloke' who has done many good things but also someone whose stance on immigration left her 'catastrophically depressed'.

Teather's by-election victory six months after Iraq was partly due to her strong anti-war position and she won many plaudits for her progressive stance on Guantanamo and Palestine. Living locally and modestly in Willesden Green she was highly visible on local streets in contrast to Barry Gardiner Labour MP for Brent North who lives out in Chorley Wood. In opposition she won a reputation as a hard-working MP excellent at case work.

However her appointment to government after the General Election was immediately controversial as tuition fees were raised despite signed Lib Dem pledges.  Her passionate maiden speech opposing tuition fees was circulated on the net underlining her 'betrayal' LINK. Her acquiesce to Michael Gove's policies on free schools and academies, and her personal admiration for him, angered many on the left as did her later opposition to equal marriage.

Reaction on Twitter to Teather's decision has ben mixed to say the  least. Iain Dale called her 'A rather sad, pathetic hypocrite and  Alistair Campbell at his most cutting stating:

Sarah Teather- a looming lost seat dressed up as look-at-me 'principles.' Her voting record speaks louder than today's self-pitying whinge

Sunny Hundal called it a 'significant and principled decision' and Marc Cohen commented:

Agree w her politics or not (mostly I don't) as my local MP Sarah Teather has by most accounts been v good &u can't knock her principled stance

Tory MP Nadine Torries wrote:

 Hope knives stay locked away re Sarah Teather. She was never going to retain seat in 2015, has been a good constituency MP. Good luck to her

Patrick Vernon, one of the leading Labour contestants for the Brent Central Parliamentary candidate nomination in an exclusive statement said:

I understand why and appreciate why Sarah Teather has resigned as a Lib Dem MP.  As a former Minster she realises that her party has no moral compass on social justice in fighting for the rights of local people in Brent. It is a pity that she did not give the opportunity for a Labour Candidate to fight against her in the 2015 election so local people can decide on her record as a MP since 2003.

Some people have said that there should be a by election as she may not be committed to Brent over the next 20 months. This is up to Sarah to decide but I do think she does have a duty to organise a public meeting to explain to her constituents her intentions as the current local MP.

In the meanwhile a number of potential candidates including myself are putting ourselves forward as a prospective candidate for Labour in Brent. Local party members need to decide who has a track record working in Brent to build and mobilise an election campaign based on social justice and fighting against the growing inequality facing residents along with the massive cuts  and destruction of public services by the Coalition government. Also the selected candidate has to be transparent and accountable to restore confidence as a public servant to the community

Shahrar Ali, spokesperson for the  Brent Green Party and former parliamentary candidate for Brent Central said:

Having stood against  Sarah Teather as a Green in two general elections, I can testify to her verve on election platforms and her ability to mobilise the local Libdem electoral machine with a finger pointed at a heap of rubbish for good measure. I can't shake off the feeling that her decision not to stand again is as much political calculation based on party unpopularity as the frustration she now declaims with her party direction.

Now is not the time to eulogise about the high points of Teather's political career, not least when Guantanamo remains open for business. With her party in government, injustice remains rife across society home and abroad.

Yes, it is a privilege to represent the electors of Brent and one which I would like to see Teather exercising more with her new-found voice, no less than if she had been intending to stand again

Sarah Teather's full personal statement on her decision not to stand in 2015

In just over a week's time, I shall reach the tenth anniversary of my election to Parliament in the Brent East by-election. I took some time off this summer and found myself reflecting a great deal on the last ten years.
It has been an enormous privilege to serve as an MP in Brent. Indeed, for me personally, so much of the last decade has been both rich and surprising. I am not sure that I would ever have expected to be elected so young, and I certainly never expected that I would have had the opportunity to serve in Government.

The greatest privilege of my work both as a constituency MP and as a Minister has been the gift of being able to share in the private joys and struggles of so many people's lives - many different from one another and very different from my own. I shall always be inspired by the profound courage and dignity I have witnessed in people I have worked with, often in the face of the most extraordinary difficulties.

Of all my parliamentary work, the campaign I remain most proud of is the campaign to get my constituent released from Guantanamo Bay. I shall always count the moment my constituent walked back in through his own front door and picked up his five year-old daughter for the first time in her life as one of the most precious of my life.

In Government, the moment I count as my proudest is the one where I listened to Nick Clegg announce our intention to end the routine detention of children in the immigration system - something I worked hard to deliver, in what, at times, felt an almost insurmountable battle with the Home Office. I feel humbled too to have been able to play my part in delivering the pupil premium to schools and to extend free early education to two year olds, and perhaps the work dearest to my heart, that of reforming the system of support for children with special educational needs.

There have been so many rewards to this work -- too many to list here. But having taken the summer to reflect on the future, I feel now that at the General Election, the right time will be right for me to step aside. I wanted to explain why I have decided not to seek re-election in 2015.

I first joined the party almost exactly twenty years ago, during fresher's week at university. It was then -- and still is now - absolutely inconceivable that I could ever join any other political party. As with most party members, there have always been a few issues where I have disagreed with party policy. But over the last three years, what has been difficult is that policy has moved in some of the issues that ground my own personal sense of political vocation - that of working with and serving the most vulnerable members of society. I have disagreed with both Government and official party lines on a whole range of welfare and immigration policies, and those differences have been getting larger rather than smaller. Disagreements with the party on other areas of policy I have always felt could be managed, but these things are just core to my own sense of calling to politics. I have tried hard to balance my own desire to truthfully fight for what I believe on these issues with the very real loyalty and friendship I feel to party colleagues, but that has created intense pressure, and at times left me very tired. I don't think it is sustainable for me personally to continue to try and do that in the long term.

I want to reassure people in Brent that I shall continue to work very hard to represent them over the next 18 months until the next General Election. My constituency office will remain open five days a week, just as it has always been. I shall be out campaigning for the local elections with my local LibDem team over the forthcoming months and will campaign to get my Liberal Democrat successor elected to Parliament in the General Election. In Parliament I shall continue with my work as Chair of the All Party Parliamentary Group on Refugees and will carry on making the case for a fair and humane immigration system as Parliament considers a new immigration bill in the coming months.

I hope that I have been able to support and represent the people of Brent well as their MP, but I feel rich beyond measure to have been able to do this work here. I shall always count myself indebted to those who gave me this opportunity to serve - to the thousands of constituents who voted for me and to the many Liberal Democrat supporters and members who campaigned and walked the streets for me over three elections. I hope that, over the last 10 years, I have at least gone some way in repaying the faith that so many have shown in me.

Sarah

Brent Council doesn't know how many contracted out workers are on 'zero hours' contracts

With so many services out-sourced by Brent Council the issue of their workers' conditions of employment  is of major interest to council tax payers. Following a conversation with a Civic Centre security guard, who revealed that he was on a zero hours contract, I put a Freedom of Information request to the Council asking how many workers of organisations supplying out-sourced services to Brent Council were on such contracts.

Brent Labour councillors have voiced concerns about such contracts and the administration is committed to the London Living Wage. However, this means little if procurement procedures do not ensure that out-sourced workers enjoy proper contracts with sick pay, holiday pay and pension entitlement and at the LLW or above.

The Council, under immense financial pressure, can distance itself from poor employment conditions, by handing responsibility over to the private companies involved. However, if they have been pursuing best financial value as the main criterion for awarding contracts, they collude in insecure employment and low wages.

This is Brent Council's response to my Freedom of Information request  LINK  for information on  the number of Council employees and contractors supplying Council services on zero hours contracts:

Brent does not have employees on zero hour contracts but does utilise the
services of casual workers for specific activities.

We do not hold information on employment statuses within contracted
organisations.

My follow up request states:

I am afraid that this reply is not satisfactory. As the Council has been critical of 'zero hours' contracts and is committed to the London Living Wage I feel it is incumbent on the Council to ensure that workers in contracted organisations providing council services, enjoy the conditions that the Council advocates.

I therefore request that Brent Council follows up this request by ascertaining from contracted organisations:

1. The number and proportion of workers supplying Brent services paid the London Living Wage or higher.

2. The number and proportion of workers supplying Brent services on zero hours or casual contracts.