Brent Greens call for independent investigation into Brent Council revelations

Brent Green Party issued the following statement this morning:

Brent Green Party is deeply concerned about recent revelations concerning the Corporate Management Team at Brent Council. We call on for an independent investigation of:

1. Corporate Management Team officers being paid through their private companies rather than normal pay roll
2. The contractual arrangements for CMT officers and interim appointments
3. Previous employment and business connections between senior offices appointed by Brent Council on an interim basis
4. The working culture of the Human Resources department
5. Brent Council's Whistle Blowing Policy to ensure that it adequately protects whistle-blowers from harassment and retribution

We further call on Council election candidates to pledge to press for this investigation if elected on Thursday.

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Truce called as election opponents unite against UKIP's racism

 

Supporters of the various parties and campaigns fightinfgthe elections in Brent took time off this afternoon to unite against the racist and Islamophobic views of Heino Vockrod, UKUP candidate for Dudden Hill, revealed by the Kilburn Times LINK 

Labour leader Muhammed Butt, was joined by Pete Murry of the Green Party, Sarah Cox of SWP and TUSC, Alex Colas of Make Willesden Green, and L:ucy Cox of TUSC.

Leaflets urged residents to use their vote to keep out UKIP in the upcoming local and European elections.

Cllr Butt with the welcome message at Neasden Shopping Centre

The Brent Election Green Manifesto - There is an Alternative

We are the alternative, not just in Willesden Green but in every ward across the borough

We will:
· Campaign for REAL accountability
· Fight cuts to local services
· Tackle climate change
· Combat air pollution
· Press for affordable housing for local people
· Oppose bedroom tax evictions
· Support our local schools and oppose their privatisation
· Protect and enhance our local green and  urban spaces
· Press for restoration of  local library provision

Safeguarding local services Brent has already lost millions in funding under the Coalition. The 2015-2016 Brent budget is likely to require cuts that will cause untold damage to the local population. The Green Party is anti-austerity and pro-social justice and so opposed to the Coalition’s attack on the poor and vulnerable. We will oppose any such cuts.

Accountability and Transparency  Many residents have experienced being ignored, bulldozed or mislead by Brent Council. We will make sure the Council is accountable for its  actions and transparent in its dealings with the public. We’ve signed up to Keep Willesden Green’s pledge to submit ourselves, if elected, to recall by 51% of the votes cast in a ward at this election.

Climate Change Greens are working at a national and international level to combat climate change. We will also press for local action including, encouragement of green jobs through a Brent Green Industries zone with start-up subsidies, a programme of energy  efficiency in council and BHP properties including double glazing, insulation and solar panels and a pilot Low Carbon Zone.

Clean Air Air pollution is not just an irritant, but an unseen killer, strongly linked to asthma, lung cancer and cardiovascular illness. Over 4000 Londoners die early each year as a result of it. We will work with Green Assembly members for action at the London level to tackle high polluting vehicles and reduce dependency on cars. Locally we support the London Cycling Campaign’s ‘Space for Cycling’ initiative, will press for better public transport to reduce car use, especially the ‘school run’, and encourage a diversity of shops in our local high streets to encourage ‘walkable’ local shopping.

Housing We will support local developments on viable brown field sites that include at least 50%         genuinely affordable housing and that are accompanied by infrastructure improvements including health and education facilities to support the additional population. We will press for the urgent  delivery of the delayed family housing in the Wembley Quintain development. We will oppose evictions of tenants who have defaulted on rent payments because of the unfair bedroom tax.

Education We would strengthen the role of the local authority and its accountability in terms of school improvement and Special Educational Needs provision and campaign for it to be able to build new schools where needed, rather than rely on the costly and undemocratic free schools and academies. We will support the emerging collaborative arrangements between schools that aim to improve the quality of teaching and learning across the borough.

Green Spaces Brent’s increasing population makes green and urban open space even more important and extreme weather requires flood management for Brent’s streams and rivers. We will defend those green open spaces where they exist and insist on their sustainable maintenance as well as supporting the creation of new pocket parks and town squares. New developments will be required to provide play spaces for children and growing spaces for residents. The new Chalkhill Park has shown what a major impact a green space can make on a community both environmentally and in terms of bringing a community together.

Libraries We will press for restoration of accessible local libraries across the borough.

YOUR GREEN CANDIDATES

Alperton - Yusuf Akram, Barnhill - Giovanna Dunmall,  Brondesbury Park- Rai Shamon, Dollis Hill - Pete Murry,    Dudden Hill - Simone Aspis, Fryent - Claire McCarthy,   Harlesden - Simon Erskine, Kensal Green - Sally Ibbotson, Kenton - Graham Allen,

Kilburn - Nas Belazka,   Mapesbury - Scott Bartle, Northwick Park - Mimi Kaltman, Preston - May Erskine,

Queensbury - Adlen Biloum,  Queens Park - Alex Freed, Stonebridge - Brian Orr,   Sudbury - Manish Patel, Tokyngton - Khalid Akram, Welsh Harp - Jafar Hassan, Wembley Central - Kolos Csontos,

So what have Greens been doing since the last election?

Brent Greens  have campaigned on library  closures , the loss of the Willesden Bookshop, the forced  academisation of Gladstone  Park Primary School,  the Harlesden Incinerator, the free schools shambles,  protecting the Welsh Harp from over-development , construction of Chalkhill Park, and the  building of affordable housing rather than luxury  housing for overseas buyers. We opposed the cuts in street cleaning that have left our roads litter strewn. We have relentlessly  tried to hold the council to account despite not holding office. We work WITH campaigns and don’t try to take them over. Elected or not, our campaigning will continue.

London Green MEP urges support for tomorrow's 'Space for Cycling Big Ride'

London Green MEP Jean Lambert has urged cyclists to support candidates who have pledged improvements to London's cycling infrastructure in this week's council elections.

Speaking ahead of  Satuurday's  'Space for Cycling Big Ride' , she said:

A sustainable transport policy means more facilities for cyclists and pedestrians.

We know that if more people get around the city by bike or on foot it's better for everyone – both in terms of improving London's appalling air quality, and the direct health benefits enjoyed by the people concerned.

I am proud that all the Green Party candidates asked by the London Cycling Campaign support local measures to make cycling safer and easier in their boroughs – and I hope all the suggested measures can be put in place soon.

Meanwhile, I hope many thousands of Londoners get out and support tomorrow's event, which takes place between 11 and 2pm tomorrow across the capital.

Don't miss this great Brent fundraising event

 

This is always a great event in a stunning Willesden Green garden. I recommend it but have to declare an interest: I am chair of the Brent and Harrow Palestine Solidarity  Campaign which will benefit from the fundraising.

Pedalling Politics in Brent - Support for Space for Cycling

Green Party Assembly Member Jenny Jones toured the boorough with Brent Cyclists to see issues for herself

Earlier this week I spoke to Brent Cyclists at a special hustings on the Londond Cycling Campaigns election initiative 'Space to Cycle'.

I told the meeting about my experience of cycle camping in the US. Breakfasting in a diner a truck driver came and sat with me asked if I was the guy on the bike. I confirmed I was the cyclist and he growled, 'We don't call them cyclists here. We call them donors ...organ donors.'

I said that I often remembered that when cycling in Brent, especially when I tried to negotiate the canyon beneath the North Circular Road at Neasden Shopping Centre/Neasden Lane North.

I was pleased to tell the meeting that all Green party candidates in Brent has signed up to the Space for Cycling campaign and backed the six themes (above).. We supported the proposals for the various wards in principle but would want to examine them in more detail of elected.

Greens had been fighting for safe cycling and comprehensive cycle routes in the London Assembly and were frustrated by Boris Johnson's underspend of the cycling fund and the delay in cycling superhighways.

The meeting was attended by Labour, Lib Dem and Green candidates. It was rumoured that the absent Conservatives had been unable to find a place to park their cars.

In fact there was a great deal of cross-party consensus on the main issues. We talked about how to encourage more people to cycle and the importance of work in schools, specific issues around women cyclists including sexual harassment from motorists, and about the differences between the south and north of the borough.

Cycle usage is much more common in the south of Brent with easy access to Central London. In the North the distance into Central london is much greater with the North Circular a physical barrier. Car ownership is much higher in the north with concreted over front gardens serving as parking for often large numbers of cars - 'a car park with house attached'.

I told the meeting that when I was a headteacher and cycled to work and to meetings I was often given the impresson that this was inappropriate to my status - cycling was something poor people did. Turning up at a Conference at the Holiday Inn at Brent Cross I asked reception where I could leave my bike. 'Sir,  it is only our staff who use bicycles.' This stereotype did not seem to exist in south Brent and this was confirmed by the Queen's Park Lib Dem candidate Virginia Bonham-Carter who wanted a cycle path for mothers in the streets around Queen's Park.

Muhammed Butt said that the attitude was linked to cultural issues and reflected that for some people cycling was seen in the context of 'back home' where it was the poor who cycled and the car was a status symbol. He said that members of his own family questioned why he cycled when he could 'use the car'. There was an issue abut changing attitudes as well as improving infrastructure.

On infrastructure several members of the audience expressed disappointment that a chance had been missed in the Wembley Regenration to build cycling into the plans, despite submissions in the early stages by Brent Cyclists and the Green Party.

The full details of proposals for Brent wards can be found HERE

Declaratio of Interest: I am a member of the London Cycling Campaign

Victimisation, bullying, racial and sexual discrimination alleged in Davani case

From the Get West London website LINK Reporter: Hannah Bewley

A FORMER Brent Council manager claims she was discriminated against by superiors and “bullied and undermined” despite her years of experience.

Rosemarie Clarke, 50, resigned in April last year after four years as head of learning and development, and launched an employment tribunal claim against the authority and Cara Davani, now HR director but previously on a temporary contract, for constructive dismissal, racial discrimination, sexual discrimination, victimisation, bullying and harassment and psychiatric injury.

Lawyers for the Christchurch Avenue, Harrow, inhabitent wrote in her claim: “Ms Davani’s conduct made her feel like her managerial prerogative was being continuously and seriously undermined and that her professional integrity was also being undermined.

“The claimant asserts that the respondent treated black, female managers less favourably due to their race.”

Ms Clarke cited several incidents as part of her case, for which hearings began on Monday last week at Watford Employment Tribunal.

Her claim said she and Ms Davani had a disagreement about the termination of a contract of a temporary worker, Ms M, at the council.

Ms Davani instructed Ms Clarke to tell the Ms M her contract had ended while Ms M  was on holiday because there was an issue with her performance.

Ms Clarke attempted to persuade her boss to allow a few days for Ms M to hand over to someone else after her vacation.

The claimant told the tribunal Ms Devani said: “She Ms M didn’t say hello to me in the corridor the other week, which I thought was unprofessional.”

Ms Clarke added: “It was obvious Ms Davani didn’t like [Ms M].”

Ms Clarke’s claim form said: “Despite the claimant being of the view that Ms M had done nothing wrong, Cara Davani was insistent she had to go.”

Ms Clarke also said she received an e-mail from Ms Devani instructing her to contact learning and development expert Dr Yvonne Foster, who had previously worked with Ms Davani.

Ms Clarke said in reply she had adequate staffing levels and claims Ms Davani told her she should “find her [Dr Foster] something to do”.

Ms Clarke said: “I was being pressured to contact Yvonne Foster and offer her a job in my team.”

The claimant said she “wasn’t happy” about being shouted at by Ms Davani during an Investors in People accreditation meeting.

Ms Clarke resigned after being suspended in February over allegations of gross misconduct for alleged failure to follow reasonable management instructions.

'Parking, Potholes & Poo' or politics?

At a hustings in Mapesbury earlier this week a Liberal Democrat candidate said that the local election was about efficient emptying of bins and clean streets and not about 'political grand themes'. This was a swipe at my fellow Green Shahrar Ali, whose speech had identified the democratic deficit on Brent Council and the iniquity of privatisation and the bedroom tax.

The Lib Dem candidate was right in a way:  no one is going to say they are FOR fly-tipping, overflowing bins, litter strewn streets or pavements smeared with dog excrement. However the allocation of resources to deal with those issues is a political issue - both within the Council and in terms of government resources allocated to local authorities. The extent to which services are out-sourced and the wages and working conditions of sub-contractors are a political issues. The Council's stand on the privatisation of schools and whether it makes a principled stand on the undemocratic process of forced academisation is a political issue.

It is also important to consider how these decisions are made by councillors and that brings into consideration whether decisions are arrived at through debate and rigorous scrutiny or are mere rubber stamping of officer reports. Opposition and Labour backbenchers find they are excluded from this decision making and instead have to focus on the 'parking, potholes and poo' casework. How good they are at that is not a matter of political affiliation but of personal efficiency. An added, but reduced concession, is their role in allocating ward working money.

Lastly the controversy over the Davani affair brings into sharp focus the relationship between the political administration and officers. If the administration sees itself as a management organisation - managing the cuts, managing the school places crisis, managing procurement - it puts political principle aside and the Executive and Corporate Management Team become a single management entity.

In my view this is not a matter for personal attacks, although the current issue has become highly personal because of the huge impact it has made on people's lives and livelihoods, but of questioning why some of the most senior officer positions in the council are in effect out-sourced to people who have set themselves up as self-employed consultants.

This means that at its very core the Council has acquiesced in the Coalition's privatisation agenda - handing public money over to private companies.

A further dimension is the issue, discussed on this blog many times, of the relationship between the Council and developers, or more specifically the relationshing between the Major Projects, Regeneration and Planning Department and developers. With the Council seeing its role as smoothing the way for developers, local residents find themselves locked out of the discussion and the decisions. They become mere irritants in the joint projects of the council and its favoured property developers. Behind this is the political issue of reduced funding for local government and therefore the need for the Council to find other sources of revenue through increasing its council tax base through high density, often unaffordable, housing developments; Community Infrastructure Levy and the New Homes Bonus LINK

Of course it suits the Lib Dems to focus on street level issues and to be photographed pointing at fly-tips, because it takes attention away from their role as Coalition partners in undermining the financial stability and the viability of local authorities.