Demonstrate for a People's Budget: Downing Street Wednesday

The Queensbury Pub planning commitee voting record

Readers have asked for details of the Planning Committee vote which saves the Queensbury Pub in Willesden Green from development for the time being. I am grateful to the Kilburn Times for this list:

Voted for the plans: Cllr Ann John (Stonebridge) and Sandra Kabir (Queensbury).

Against: Cllr Abdi Aden (Barnhill), Michael Adeyeye (Queens Park), Mark Cummins (Brondesbury Park), Sami Hashmi (Mapesbury), Dhiraj Kataria (Welsh Harp) and James Powney (Kensal Green).
Abstained: Cllr Ketan Sheth (Tokyngton).

Cllr Powney has written a comment about his vote against the plans on his blog LINK which mentions his participation in many planning decisions regarding the Mapebury Conservation Area. The selection of a new Labour candidate for Mapesbury Ward is taking place after the withdrawal of one of the three candidates for personal reasons. Cllr Powney was not reselected for his present Kensal Green seat.

Ain't no use to sit and do nothing, babe... U3A is all right!

The Kenton and District branch of the University of the Third Age (U3A)  will have its first meeting is on Wednesday 26th March, 10am at the Century Bowling Club in Logan Road, Wembley (off Preston Road). 

The U3A is a member run, self financing organisation that runs courses, activities and social events for those who have finished with full time employment.

The new group will initially have groups for current affairs, genealogy and family history, cookery, music, board and card games and more.  Additional interest groups will be set up according to demand from members.

The video below gives more information on U3A

 

People's Assembly makes itself fit for purpose

Today's recalled People's Assembly Against Austerity  began with a warm minute of standing applause for Tony Benn and Bob Crow which seemed to set the tone for a serious but friendly day in which the organisation sorted out its  aims, structure and priorties in an atmosphere refreshingly untainted by sectarianism.

I could have been there wearing one of several different hats but settled for the Green Party Trade Union Group which had put forward a resolution committing the PAAA to campaign for effective action against climate change. Natalie Bennett's moving of the resolution linking austerity, neoliberalism and clinmate change was well received and the resolution was passed overwhemingly.

The Assembly adopted the People's Charter for Change which states:

We need a government to reverse damagaing austerity and replace it with a new set of policies providing us with a fair, sustainable and secure future. We can no longer tolerate politicians looking out for themselves and for the rich and powerul. Our political representatives must start governing in the interests of the majority in the direction outlined by this statement of aims.

The aims were:

1. A fairer economy for a fairer Britain
2. More and better jobs
3. High standard homes for all
4. Protect and improve public servies
5. For justice and fairness
6. For a secure and sustainable future

Supplementary motions were passed adopting the People's Charter; supporting the  nationalisation of those firms and banks that do not invest to build a high-skilled, high-wage, high employment economy; supporting house building, rent capping and opposing fixed term tenancies and 80% market rents in Council and Housing Association properties and supporting regulation of rents, conditions and tenancies in the private rented sector;  stepping up campaigns to defend the NHS and abolish the NHS and Social Care Act, brnging privatised NHS services back under public ownership and control; and resolving to campaign for money to be spent on welfare rather than warfare,

The structure that was agreed created a body to be known as 'The Assembly' which would manage the PAAA between conferences and would be made up of one representative from each signatory group and one representative for each local, national or group assembly and this will nominate a management group to be endorsed by the Assembly. The Assembly will meet at least twice a year.

A supplementary motion from  the Coalition of Resistance was approved which set out the People's Assembly's commitemnt to be a broad united campaign against austerity, cuts and proiatisation in workplaces, commity and welfare services based on general agreement on the signatories' Founding Statement. It was made clear that the PA would be linked to no political party and would be committed to open non-sectarian working.

An amendment to adopt a less formal, decentralised structure with participatory democracy and consensus decision making, on the lines of Occupy, across the PAAA was defeated.

Two slightly contradictory motions were passed on Finance with some confusion about what constituted membership and membership fees, and whether these should be paid centrally or locally. This will need sorting out in the near future.

The Assembly adopted a future programme based on mobilising hundreds of thousands of people in activity and coordinating national events, days of action and support groups,

It was agreed to work to set up new People's Assembly groups, strengthen local groups and central organisation (finance will be essential for this) to hold 'meetings, rallies, protests and actions in every locality possible' and to mobilise for the following national events:

• March 19th Budget Day Demonstration 
• March 22nd Stand up to racism demo
• March 26th Support for NUT strikes
• April 5th Day of Action Against the Bedroom Tax
• May Day Events
• June 21st People's Assembly National Demonstration (support by the NUT)
• August 31st NATO Protest Cardiff
• September 28th Tory Party Conference protest
• October 18th TUC National Demonstration

 The day ended with a rousing speech from Christine Blower, General Secretary of the NUT, making a strong case for community based campaigning in the form of the Stand Up For Education camaign that has seen NUT members out engaging with the public at high street and market places stalls throughout the country.

There is clearly a massive amount to do but the day left me feeling that we now had the beginnings of a structure to build a movement and the sense of shared purpose that can make it happen.

Email Fraud: Will the new broom reach into some murky corners?

Guest blogger Meg Howarth continues to press for answers in 'The Case of the Fraudulent Emails'. It should be straightforward but...

New brooms generally sweep clean, so it's to be hoped that Brent police's freshly appointed borough commander, Chief Superintendent Michael Gallagher, has already put his officers to work on a thorough investigation into this affair (WM 13 March). Brent Council may technically be the 'victim' of this email scam but it's local residents whose addresses were stolen and abused (alongside some out-of-borough suspect comments). It's they who are the real victims. 

It shouldn't be forgotten, either, that it's Brent's incompetence that allowed its IT planning system to be spoofed in this way. While the council may have now got its online act together, some of its constituents are awaiting an answer to the question: who stole their addresses in an apparent attempt to aid developer Andrew Gillick's change-of-use planning application for Kensal Rise Library? Would matters have been cleared up sooner if the council originally passed all of its information to Action Fraud (WM 27 Feb, also 4 & 6 Feb)? Residents, not procedures, must now come first.

Given the on/off, toing and froing over this business - from no inquiry on 31 January to a change of police mind, the involvement of Kensington and Chelsea police, and finally Brent - the sad reality is that it seems as if the sifting of what police have termed the 'complex' evidence of apparent fraud has fallen to the local force. If its investigation can't be completed before Mr Gillick's latest planning application - submitted on 7 March - goes before Brent's planning committee, the developer's application must be put on hold pending the outcome of its inquiry. This is in everyone's interests, including that of the applicant himself. 

To date, the council has argued that under the provisions of the Town and Country Planning Act 1990 it

'has a responsibility and obligation to consider any valid planning application that is put forward from any individual(s). It must consider each on its merits in accordance with its statutory obligations'. 

As a member of Brent's Planning and Regeneration team has admitted, attempting to influence a planning decision (itself a criminal offence) through fake emails is 'not mentioned in the [1990] Act'. Bizarrely, instead of drawing what most would see as the obvious conclusion - putting an application on hold until an active police inquiry is complete - the officer concludes: 

'...consequently the LPA [local planning authority, in this case Brent] could not decide to decline any application that was submitted to it for consideration, providing that it met the validation requirements that apply to all planning application submissions'...!

Why not? Isn't an active police inquiry sufficient reason - just as someone might be suspended from a job while an  investigation into his/her conduct is underway? If Andrew Gillick is exonerated, his planning application can then be considered free from this long shadow. 

Footnote: Michael Gallagher began work as Brent's police boss on 3 March. A one-time member of Scotland Yard's Specialist Crime directorate, his previous posting was in Lewisham. Prior to that he was deployed in Lambeth.

Brilliant 'Gove Must Go' rap by Chester MC

The fight is not just against Michael Gove but against the whole neoliberal Global Education Reform Project (GERM) supported by all three main political parties, nevertheless this is FUN!

EDUCATION NOT FOR SALE: TUC report condemns profiteering from education

...

 The government's free school and academy programme has cost taxpayers nearly £80m in consultants' fees according to a new TUC report published today.

The research – which analyses official Department for Education (DfE) figures –shows how since 2010 ministers have signed off £77m of public funds to lawyers, head-hunters, accountants, estate agents and management consultants.

The report says the additional bureaucratic cost of starting up free schools and academies is diverting money away from children’s education.

The findings come as the TUC and its education unions prepare to launch a new campaign against privatisation and profit-making in schools, colleges and universities.

The report raises a series of concerns about the government’s education reforms including:

The use of private consultants – £76.7m of taxpayer funds (which might otherwise have been available for children’s education) has been paid to 14 private firms to provide additional services to free schools and academies since the government took office.

These include PKF UK Ltd, an accountancy group whose parent firm BDO UK claims on its website to offer “offshore tax planning” to “high net-worth individuals”.  PKF UK Ltd was paid more than £8m in public funds between December 2010 and June 2013.

Another company to receive millions in public money is Veredus, which is part-owned by outsourcing giant Capita. Veredus, which specialises in head-hunting, has received over 4.7m from the government.

Value for money – the government has expanded its free school-building programme despite the fact that many remain under-subscribed.

Between October 2012 and December 2013 it spent over £200m of taxpayers’ money to purchase land and property for free schools, bringing the total spent on free school-building projects to over £500m since 2010.

These purchases went through even though free school students make up a tiny proportion of school learners in England.DfE figures show that last autumn the 154 English free schools for which official data was available were teaching 21,973 pupils – the equivalent of 11 large secondary schools. This equates to just 0.3 per cent of the 7.5m pupils currently attending state-funded schools in England.

Conflicts of interest – the TUC research also reveals that at least three of the twelve largest chains of academies (schools funded and overseen directly by the government and managed independently of local authorities) have links to the Conservative Party.

Lord Harris of the Harris Federation has been a Conservative donor, Lord Fink, a director of Ark Schools, who – like Lord Harris – is a Conservative Peer and is a former Conservative Party treasurer and major donor, and the David Ross Foundation, which was set up by the co-founder of Carphone Warehouse, who has also donated to the Party.

The report also highlights how the academy sponsor and Conservative donor Theodore Agnew chairs the DfE’s academies board, an internal group aiming to boost the number of sponsored academies.

Value extraction – the report highlights how taxpayer-funded academy chains have paid millions of pounds into the private businesses of directors, trustees and their relatives.

These include Grace Academy, which runs three schools in the Midlands and was set up by Conservative donor Lord Edmiston. Grace Academy has paid more than £1m either directly to or through companies owned or controlled by Lord Edmiston, to trustees’ relatives and to members of the board of trustees.

Corporate ownership – the number of private companies applying to run free schools has tripled since 2011.

Between 2011 and 2013 applications from corporate sponsors shot up from 8 to 25 per cent. Over the same period applications from teacher-led groups plummeted from 24 to 6 per cent and applications from parent and community groups fell by a third.

TUC General Secretary Frances O’Grady said: “The government’s education reforms are being driven by free-market dogma rather than what is best for learners.

“Money that should be spent on children’s education is instead being swallowed up by private firms and in expensive property deals.

“This report highlights how companies have been allowed to cream-off millions in profits from running schools and support services.

“Let us be under no doubt, our world-class public education system is under threat from corporate interests and our schools, colleges and universities are now less accountable to taxpayers and local communities.”

Next Tuesday (18 March) the TUC and the education unions are launching Education Not For Sale – a campaign against privatisation and profit-making in schools, colleges and universities.

Education Not For Sale calls for:

•  A commitment from all political parties that no school should be run for profit, either directly or indirectly, and for this to be enshrined in legislation.
• All publically-funded education institutions must be democratically accountable to their local communities, which includes a key strategic role for local authorities.
• All pupils at state-funded schools must be taught by fully qualified teachers and all schools must be governed by the national curriculum.
• The funding and governance of all state-funded schools should be fully transparent to enable local communities to determine how state funding is being used, and potentially misused, in all local schools. This should include requiring all schools to establish a register of interests to prevent indirect profit-making by private companies
• In further and higher education, the government should introduce a new requirement that public support must only go to educational and training organisations that are not-for-profit, and should put in place a tougher regulation for those organisations owned by for-profit companies.

 Full report is available HERE

Six page campaign booklet PDF available here: LINK

Has email planning fraud probe been downgraded?

Guest blog by Meg Howarth
 

It seems that the investigation in to the fake online email support around Andrew Gillick’s original planning application for Kensal Rise Library is now in the hands of Brent police. To date, it had been understood that the Kensington and Chelsea force - the developer’s office is sited in the borough - was dealing with the matter after it was passed evidence and information about the misuse of addresses by the City Police National Fraud and Investigation Bureau (NFIB) - Wembley Matters, 27 February.

Today, however, west London journalist Hannah Bewley is reporting that the local force is now in charge of the inquiry in to whether the allegation of fraud can be substantiated. This is allegedly because Brent Council is technically the ‘victim’ in this sordid affair - it was to the council planning department that the emails were sent. 

As the council spokesman quoted in the Local Government Chronicle on 6 November 2013 stated: ‘It is clear that a number of the emails came from bogus email addresses but, unfortunately, it is not so clear that this necessarily constitutes a criminal offence’ LINK

Evidence of misuse of addresses was first brought to the council’s attention in September of last year, and today’s update suggests a police decision is likely to take some time yet: ‘Due to the complex nature of the evidence, the [Brent police] review may take a while for a decision to be arrived at’. It is six months since the matter was reported to the council, How much longer must local residents wait? 

To some local residents the handing over of the inquiry to Brent police appears like a downgrading of the affair. If Brent Council is the victim, why was the matter ever sent over to the Kensington and Chelsea force? Was this incompetence by the NFIB or a misunderstanding?

Meantime, Andrew Gillick submitted a revised change-of-use planning application for the Kensal Rise Library site on 7 March...