Yuppification is the name of the game, Brent Regeneration's aim is the same

OK, I go on about Quintain's failure to build the much needed and much promised affordable housing in their regeneration project around Wembley Stadium, but this really is a slap in the face for local residents.

Vulnerable children may be shipped out of Brent for schooling as Council closes Primary PRU at 3 week's notice

As the Scrutiny Committee discussed setting up a Task Group to investigate how the Pupil Premium, ear-marked funds for disadvantaged children, are used in Brent schools last night, they were leafleted by staff who care passionately for an arguably even more disadvantaged group who are about to be shipped out of the borough.

The Primary Pupil Referral Unit currently housed at Ashley Gardens is for children excluded from mainstream school.  The classrooms were previously used as temporary accommodation for the primary unit of Preston Manor All-through School.

The Primary Unit came about after the Key Stage 2 (7-11 year olds)  PRU in Stonebridge was closed down at the end of Spring Term 2014 as no longer necessary. Within weeks, there were already 6 excluded children at Key Stage 1 (5-7 year olds) and Key Stage 2 in need of education. The Ashley Gardens facility was set up for them and high quality, experienced staff were recruited on the understanding that the unit would continue through the current academic year.

Brent's Primary EBD(Emotional and Behavioural Difficulties) school, Vernon House, closed some time ago and a new school opened in its place for chidlren on the autistic spectrum.

The authority has said that the classrooms are needed for children without a school place, despite Preston Park Primary having expanded, the new primary school at Preston Manor and a four form entry primary school being built at Wembley High.

Most of the Ashley Gardens children will be placed at the Family School London, in Kings Cross. This is a free school being opened by the Anna Freud Centre, with home to school transport provided for each child.

On Thursday of last week Ashley Gardens staff were told that the Unit would close by the end of this month.

Staff have major concerns about the closure decision and the way it is being implemented. This is what they said:

1. The time scale for closure is extremely rushed and risks causing unnecessary distress to children and their families.

These are amongst the most vulnerable and emotionally challenged children within our education system. Three weeks does not give us proper time to prepare them for this major change. we have an excellent team who have worked very hard to build up relationships of trust with the children and their families and the children are now settled and beginning to thrive in the unit.

We are concerned that this hasty decision, driven it seems more by the borough's need for our accommodation than by the needs of the children, will cause unnecessary emotional trauma to children who have already had more than their fair share.

2. There has been no consultation on this decision with the staff of the unit, including the Teacher-In-Charge, nor more senior staff within the Inclusion Service, and no individual case-by-case review to assess whether the provision at the Anna Freud Family School is appropriate for all the children who will be placed there.

3. We understand the longer term policy is to provide support for chidlren at risk of exclusion with the Brent School's Partnership, with the aim of preventing exclusions. This provision is still not in place. Where will any excluded chidlren be taught and supported in the meantime? This is exactly the situation that led to the formation of the unit at Ashley Gardens.

4. What about children who are excluded in spite of all the best efforts of the new provision? The Family School has only 4 places available this year in each key stage, and 4 more available next year and demand could come from anywhere across London.

The Ashley Gardens staff make a strong and professional case which clearly has the interests of vulnerable chidlren at its heart.

Brent Council's commitment to social inclusion means that there should be proper consultation with teachers, parents and professional agencies in such a situation, and at the very least a thorough Equalities Impact Assessment should be carried out.

None of this has happened and until it does, and the resulting report has been discussed and adopted by Cabinet, the closure should be suspended.

I would add a further concern about children being bussed out of the borough. They are already excluded from mainstream schools and will be further excluded by being educated far away from their home community.

I get to speak to a Brent Council meeting!

For the record. after the Full Council deputation debacle that required 5 full working days notice for a deputation, I emailed Brent Council last night at 2 minutes to 5 asking to speak at Scrutiny Committee that evening.  Scrutiny begins at 7pm.

I was granted permission by the Chair  and spoke to the Committee about the Task Force being set up to investigate the use of the Pupil Premium in Brent schools.

All a bit mystifying.

Central Middlesex closes its doors for the last time and the community loses yet another amenity

It was significant that last night on Twitter someone reacted with shock to the news that Central Middlesex A&E will be closed today saying 'but that's my local hospital. I've it used since I was a kid!'

The remark indicates both our failure to get the message out in time to more people and thus moblise them, and also the sense of ownership that local people have for what many call 'Park Royal'.

Photo Sarah Cox

Symbolic protests took place this morning at  Hammersmith and Cen tral Middlesex A&Es to mark their closure.

On Monday the Council called for the closure to be delayed until Northwick Park A&E was in a fit state to take over Central Middlesex's role.

Yesterday evening at the Brent Council Scrutiny Committee, Cllr Mary Daly tore into the 'men in suits' behind the closure accusing them of failing in their 'duty of candour'.

Today the Central Middlesex A&E is closed.

In truth Brent Council was very slow to recognise the negative impact of the closure and while Ealing Councl was leafleting residents and advertising on buses, it was left to Brent Fightback and other campaigners to get the word out in Brent  with street leafleting and public meetings.

Campaigners attended consultations and  repeatedly pointed out the degree of deprivation of the population that used Central Middlesex; the health statistics for the area; low car ownership and poor transport links to Northwick Park; the presence of the large industrial estate at Park Royal with a high risk of industrial accidents; Wembley Stadium and major railway lines with the potential for major incidents (remember the Harrow train crash of1952 which killed 85 people?) and the strain on the ambulance service when, with only an Urgent Care Centre on the Central Middlesex site, needy patients will have to be transferred to Northwick Park.

After months of consultations and meetings none of these issues have been satisfactorily addressed and the Care Quality Commission's (CQC) report on Northwick Park and Centrasl Midddlesex Hospitals has added further doubt. Northwick Park was given a 'requires improvement rating' and Central Middlesex A&E a 'good'.

The 'men in suits' quickly moved into PR mode following that report, and before the closure, with a 'feel good' story about the new Northwick Park A&E, faithfully carried by the Kilburn Times LINK.

In fact the new unit will not be ready until November at the earliest and full operational changes until 2015.  There are concerns about the intervening period and Scrutiny called for further reports from the Hospital Trust.  Meanwhile some members of the Clinical Commissioning Group, with interests in  out-sourced services, are keen to bad mouth the hospitals and claim that they can offer something better.

Unfortunately the privatisation of health means that doctors and other staff often have private interests in health provision and there were calls from the public gallery last night for these interests to be declared at such meetings. 

I agree. 

Hospital Trust officials claimed at Scrutiny that the CQC's concerns were being addressed and that 20 new beds at Northwick Park would come into use today and help clear the backlog at Northwick Park A&E.  It would improve bed capacity by 20%.  They claimed that a new clinical and medical leadership team was now in place and would result in improvement.

In remarks that were not fully explored Scrutiny were told that the Trust would improve capacity at Northwick Park for the winter by looking for additional beds outside the hospital on other sites. This raises the prospects of the elderly being sent further afield during the peak illness periods which coincide with severe weather.

Will the next Brent Cabinet be a walk in the park?

The next Brent Cabinet meeting will be held at a new venue - the Roundwood Youth Centre, next to Roundwood Park in Longstone Avenue, Willesden.

The meeting is on Monday September 15th at 2pm and has a crowded, and potentially controversial agenda, as can be seen below.

The full Reports Pack is available on the Council's website HERE

The Press and Public can attend this meeting. Requests for deputations should go to anne.reid@brent.gov.uk Tel 020 8937 1359.

'Divorced' Tory Groups bicker at Brent Council as Labour continues to subvert democracy

The importance of effective opposition and scrutiny when Labour has a huge majority on Brent Council has been stressed repeatedly on this blog. Following my gagging last night things took an even more ludiucrous turn with Labour using its majority to determine which of the two rival factions of Conservatives would be the 'official opposition'.

Deputy Labour Leader Michael Pavey said on Twitter that the Council had been trying to get the two groups to decide between themselves which of them would take that role for three months without success.

In the event it was the 'old timers' of Kenton who Labour chose much to the anger of John Warren 'leader' of the Brondesbury Park faction.  Warren had done most of the opposing during the meeting - including opposing the Kenton faction.

Warren spoke despairingly about what the Conservatives had been reduced to in Brent and denounced as 'woolly' a motion on the Garden Tax proposed by the Kenton Tories.

The Kenton Tories joined Labour in voting for the 25% allowance increase and the Brondesbury Tories and Helen Carr voted against.

A number of Labour councillors were absent and some of those absences may have been to avoid publicly voting against their party line on allowances. We will wait and see how many donate the increase to charities.

Brent, the 'Listening Council', refuses to let me speak but answers an unasked question

Just to keep readers up to date on Brent Council's refusal to let me speak as a deputation last night.

Seconds before the meeting Muhammed Butt, leader of the Council,  came over and took me aside to say he couldn't allow me to speak but he would address my 'question' in his report to the Council.

I had never asked a question but had requested a deputation:

I would like to speak to Full Council on September 8th on the subject of the appointment of a permanent Chief Executive.

There's a touch of Alice In Wonderland here when you are not allowed to speak but the Council decides what question is implied by your request to speak, and then proceeds to answer it.

In fact I would have spoken about the background to Christine Gilbert's Acting Chief executive position and sought assurances about the transparency of the appointments process and the involvement of parties other than Brent Officers and Brent Cabinet members  in that process.

In his report Muhammed Butt gave the statement that I reported here yesterday evening.

I have received no written reply to my non-question from Fiona Ledden or Muhammed Butt although other correspodents have been told that this would be done. The only correspondence has been Fiona Ledden's attempting to justify my not being allowed to speak.

In response to Councillor John Warren (Brondesbury Conservatives) who asked about my delegation being refused she said: 'The matter has been dealt with by correspondence between myself and Mr Francis'.

The implication appeared to be that the issue was closed. 

I received this from Fiona Ledden on September 5th while I was away at the Green Party Conference in Birmingham:

Dear Mr Francis

Thank you for your response.

I note your comments in relation to the tweet, I will ensure in future that the tweet alerts go out at least 2 weeks before a relevant council meeting I am sorry that did not occur on this occasion.

In relation to the calculation of working days within the definition section of the constitution it confirms that days mean full clear working days which would mean that the deputations need to be received on the Friday before Council on the following Monday.

I confirm again the leader will write answering the question that you have raised

Yours etc

FL

Following the Council Meeting I replied this morning:

 Dear Ms Ledden,

I would like to put on record that I am not satisfied with this response as Brent Council, on its official Twitter feed,  quite clearly gave a deadline of September 1st.  As no other deadline was readily available to the public and deputations were on the agenda for the meeting commonsense, natural justice and the public interest should have resulted in a decision to let me speak.

I do not accept, as you implied in answer to Cllr John Warren’s question at Full Council, that our correspondence on this matter concludes the matter.

I am now considering how to take this further.

Appointment of permanent Chief Executive delayed until new year

I was not allowed to speak to the Full Council about the appointment of a permanent Chief Executive of Brent Council that should have started straight after the May local elections.

Instead of allowing me to speak Cllr Butt, leader of the Council addressed the issue in his report at the beginning of the meeting. He said Christine Gilbert, Acting Chief Executive, would be busy over the next few months working on the Borough Plan.  However, he said the Council was now stable and a recruitment process would start in the new year and be completed by the AGM.

This will amount to another extension of some six months or more.

When the issue of the 'tweets in error' and subsequent speaking ban was raised  by John Warren of the Brondesbury Conservative Group, Fiona Ledden told him, 'The matter has been dealt with by correspondence between myself and Mr Francis'.