Green Party: Holistic approach to education and poverty will redress the balance for children

Responding to Tristram Hunt's article on Green Party education policy, Green Party schools spokeperson Samantha Pancheri said:

Tristram Hunt’s attack on our education policies demonstrate how out of touch Labour are with ordinary people and suggest that schools should take on the responsibility of mopping up the damage caused by soaring inequality.

When we have teachers taking food into class to feed hungry children , or consoling sobbing pupils at the end of the day because they don’t want to go home to a cold, dark house, it is startlingly obvious that there is a much larger problem in today’s society. Teachers are not social workers, and we should not be placing these demands on them. It is only by looking at the problem holistically, and by taking bold steps to eliminate poverty that we can begin to redress the balance for children.

Our education policies work in tandem with those designed to lift families out of poverty and close the wealth inequality gap. By taking that strain off schools and teachers, we can begin to support all children in accessing the same high quality education that teachers strive to deliver.

Teachers have welcomed our policies and recognise that the focus is on providing a child-focused school system, relieving the workload on teachers, and reducing bureaucracy to put accountability into local hands. The academy system, introduced by Labour and furthered by the coalition government, has failed to improve standards for schools and outcomes for children.

With 40% of newly qualified teachers leaving the profession within 5 years, and 25,000 unqualified teachers working in state schools and academies, our education system is floundering and is in urgent need of sensible reform.

Samantha will be answering questions on Green Party policy for the Education Guardian. Here are the details:

In the run-up to the election, Education Guardian has arranged for readers to interview education spokespeople of the political parties. Is there a key question they seem to be avoiding so far? Do you feel they need to provide some evidence for their views? Ask whatever you like. First up is Samantha Pancheri of the Greens. Coming soon: other parties. Tweet us your questions using the hashtag #guardianeduGreens, or email alice.woolley@guardian.co.uk with GREENS in the subject field.
We can’t wait to see what you come up with … Questions by noon on Friday 30 January please. Over to you.

Questions of accountability for Barham Park Trust meeting tomorrow

The Barham Park Trust will be meeting tomorrow to consider its future governance arrangements and recommendation on the future of the buildings in the park.

Having spent possibly thousands of pounds on advice from Bircham Dyson Bell, specialists in the law of trusts and charities, five options are discussed, and maintenance of the status quo recommended by officers.

This maintains a structure which gives control of the Trust to Labour Cabinet members with no alternative councillor or community trustee voices.

Titus Barham of course gave his home for the benefit of residents of Wembley and future use of the buildings is passionately disputed.

The Trustees will be considering a number of recommendations to market the buildings. 

Recommendations
2.1       That the Trust approve the marketing of the Card Room (Unit 1) for a possible Café A3 and/or D1 use and to authorise the Property Adviser to the Trust in conjunction with the Trust Chair to select and let the unit to a suitable tenant on terms to be agreed.
2.2       That the Lounge (Unit 4) be marketed for a D1 and/or an A3 Use depending on the outcome of the marketing of the Card Room, or marketed in conjunction with the Card Room as a D1 use and to authorise the Property Adviser to the Trust in conjunction with the Trust Chair to select and let the unit to a suitable tenant on terms to be agreed.
2.3       That the Trust directly lease the Snooker and Billiard Rooms, (Unit 2), to the current occupiers, The Barham Park Veterans’ Club (Wembley), under appropriate leasing arrangements to ensure compliance with the aims of the Charitable Trust. The terms of the lease to be as set out below in Para 3.6 or as amended by the Property Adviser to the Trust in conjunction with the Trust Chair/
2.4       To obtain an independent valuation of the terms proposed between the Council and the Trust so that another application can be made to the Charity Commission for consent to lease the Children’s Centre (Unit 8) to the Council as Nursery Education Grant funded childcare open 5 days per week with children centre sessions being delivered in evenings and at weekends and to agree the Council can sub-let the space to a third party for similar use only. 

The 15 year lease granted to ACAVA (Association for Cultural Advancement through Visual Art) for a number of units on the site has been opposed by many local people as not benefiting local people in the spirit of Barham's legacy. This followed a Planning Appeal that cost £9,000 which I understand the Trust (and it is claimed therefore Brent Council) will pay, rather than ACAVA. The rental income (before service charges) is below that officers first projected.

In the light of the controversy over the Welsh School's bid to set up their school on the Bowling Green Pavilion site at King Edward VII these proposals are clearly important in terms of setting a precedent for other parks.

The Friends of Barham Library have been campaigning for the use of one of the Barham buildings as a community library having successfully run libraries at Sudbury Town station and a shop in Wembley High Road.

The report states:

The Trust has already received an offer from the Friends of Barham Library, (FOBL), for the Card Room and the Trust maybe minded to pursue this offer as the FOBL has charitable status with similar aims, in certain respects, to the Trust’s.

Alternatively the Trust could suggest to the FOBL that they may wish to consider participating in the tender process, should the Trust decide to approve the recommendation to instruct officers to conduct another marketing campaign for this Unit.
As mentioned above the Vets currently make occasional informal use of this space and they will be similarly advised of the intention to market the space should the Trust so approve.

(iii) It should be noted that The Card Room, is of a simple timber frame construction.  It is in poor condition and will require considerable expenditure to secure any long term use. Any ingoing tenant will need to not only install catering facilities, but will also need to expend a comparatively large sum of money on the Unit to carry out basic and essential improvements. Thus if a suitable tenant is not procured through this marketing process, it may then be necessary to consider demolition of the building as the cost of repair would not be economic for the Trust to undertake as a speculative project.

Local people have argued for some time that the Trust had been neglecting the buildings and letting them fall into disrepair as they prevaricated over their  future.  There are claims that after spending £220,000 on repairs and refurbishment that water has damaged newly refurbished floors and ceilings.

Black Lives Matter: Film, Discussion, Entertainment, Food - Friday January 30th, Kilburn

Hunt's neo-liberalism distorts his understanding of education policy

Tristram Hunt's Guardian attack on the Green party's education policy LINK , characteristising it as 'total madness', seems to have spectacularly misfired today. Guardian readers looking up the detail have come back to comment favourably on the policy.

Our policy does of course mark a clear break with the neo-liberal policies of the three main parties which support competition and marketisation of schools based on what Chomsky recently called the 'grading of students and teachers'.

Labour of course began the marketisation of schools with their sponsored academies and this, along with the privatisation of the NHS, was a key element in Blair's New Labour strategy.  Hunt, along with Lord Adonis, is essentially a Blairite and we cannot expect him to offer a fundamental critique of what the system, instigated by them,  has become.

So what is this 'madness' Hunt has found:

Delaying the start of formal education until the age of six

There are many countries in the world where children start later than in England and Wales and achieve just as well, if not better, with less anxiety. The Green Party takes account of such evidence and understands the importance of play and exploration in early childhood rather than the testing and ranking at ever earlier ages supported by the neo-liberal parties.

Ending SAT tests in Primary Schools

SATS are essentially a way of grading teachers and schools putting them and their students under intense pressure. This has had the effect of narrowing the curriculum, deskilling teachers who are under pressure to 'teach to the test' and removes much of the joy from teaching and learning. Greens have a much broader view of what constitutes education.

Hunt suggests that children's progress would no longer be monitored, but of course SATs are not the only way to monitor and evaluate progress and tell us little about the individual child compared with other systems.

Abolition of Ofsted will end accountability

The  Green Party would replace Ofsted with a collaborative system ending much of the stress, illness and rushed judgements associated with Ofsted:

The Green Party will instate a system of local accountability using continuous, collaborative assessment of schools. We would replace OFSTED with an independent National Council of Educational Excellence which would have regional officers tasked to work closely with Local Authorities. The National Council would be closely affiliated with the National Federation for Educational Research (NFER).

Where pupils’ attainment and progress is reported as part of a school’s holistic report to parents and the wider community it will include assessments, including value-added, moderated by the National Council of Education Excellence and the Local Authority’s School Improvement Service as well as the school’s own self evaluation.

Education cannot compensate for society
 
In a variation of Michael Gove's 'enemies of promise' labelling of his opponents, Hunt suggests that Natalie Bennett speaks the language of 'low aspiration and defeatism' because she recognises that schools cannot compensate for all the ills of an unequal society.

This is what Natalie actually said:

I am gravely concerned about low exam results and high dropout rates from children from disadvantaged backgrounds. But I understand that even wonderful schools can’t fully compensate for severe poverty and stress at home - which is why making the minimum wage a living wage, affordable and warm homes, and ensuring decent benefits are available to all who needs them, are education issues as well as social justice issues

More than 40 years in teaching and school governance has certainly taught me the importance of material conditions, and I would add a daily hot meal and a place to study to the list. These make an impact on levels of energy, motivation and self-worth. We have to work on both improving education and improving living conditions and increasing equality.

The focus on individual progression in education with its blame for failure on pupils, parents, teachers and schools, serves to let politicians off the hook over increased inequality, child poverty and inadequate housing.

What Hunt didn't say

Hunt failed to attack the Green Party's policy to end academies and free schools, integrate existing ones back into the Local Authority system, strengthen LAs through better funding and increased democratic accountability,  restore LA's ability to build new schools where they are needed and end Performance Related Pay for teachers.

Perhaps they were too popular for him to advertise?

Green Party Education policy is HERE

Rosemarie Clarke’s missing votes: Cara Davani refuses to tell

Guest blog by Amir Tahir

On 22^nd December last I submitted a Freedom of Information request to Brent Council asking for the following:

1. The number of nominations/votes received by individual Brent Staff Achievement Award winners 2014                                                                                                                                                                          2. The number of nominations/votes received for Rosemarie Clarke for Brent Staff Achievement Awards 2014.

By return I received the following acknowledgement from Cara Davani:

‘Thank you for your information request. We (sic) will forward it to the relevant department who will contact you shortly.’

On 21^st January  I received the following from Brent Council HR department.

‘The requested information is exempt from disclosure under Section 40(2) of the
Freedom of Information Act (FoIA).  The information is personal data as defined by
the Data Protection Act 1998 (DPA). As it is information about individuals, we are
unable to give this to you; release of this information would constitute a breach of
Principle 1 of the DPA. Principle 1 states that personal data shall be processed
(used) fairly and lawfully and, in particular, shall not be used unless at least one of
the conditions in Schedule 2 of the DPA is met; in this case none of those conditions
have (sic) been met.* This response therefore acts as a refusal notice under section 17 of
the FoIA.’  

                                                                    * I would welcome opinions on this. AT

Obviously, my request for the total number of Rosemarie’s votes was not made out of idle curiosity; we all know that the response to the ’Vote for Rosemarie’ idea was overwhelming with Civic Centre staff and members of the public expressing  their solidarity with Rosemarie and their admiration for the way she had conducted herself in the face of what a British court has adjudged was Cara Davani and Brent Council’s racial discrimination, victimisation  and constructive dismissal. The online vote she received was massive. Nor was it my intention in any way to detract from the achievements of the other worthy winners of Brent Staff Achievement  awards.

However, the Council leadership’s mean-spirited response to the avalanche of votes for Rosemarie seems to me a missed opportunity for Butt, Gilbert and Davani finally to concede that those voting for Rosemarie possibly had a point; that Civic Centre staff and the public generally support Rosemarie for principled and valid reasons; and that an employment tribunal judge’s opinion possibly carries a little more authority than that of a small cabal of mutually back-scratching and terminally compromised senior managers  and local politicians.          

Monday's crowded Cabinet agenda covers many crucial issues

The  Brent Cabinet on the afternoon of Monday January 26th has an unusually crowded agenda with a great many detailed reports, supplements and appendices on vital matters.  It is being held at 2pm at the Pakistan Community Centre, Willesden Green.

Here are the main items with link:

Museum and Archives Strategy

Adult Social Care Local Account 2013-14

Procuring an Accommodation based Respite Framework Agreement

Rate Discount Scheme for businesses accredited to Living Wage Foundation

Brent Local Welfare Assistance Scheme

Update of Schools Capital Portfolio

Purchasing system for management of Temporary Accommodation 

Awarding of contract  for procurement and management of temporary accommodatio  for Housing Association Leasing Scheme

South Kilburn energy supplier for decentralised energy solution

South Kilburn Regenration Gloucester House, Durham Court, Chippenham Gardens secure tenancies for Phase 4

London Councils Grant

Authority to tender a contract for Health Watch

Financial report November 2014

The full Agenda  which contains many more documents is HERE

Fo! about FoI to Brent Council results in no information held!

It is rather odd that a Brent Labour councillor has to resort to a Freedom of Information request to his own Council about their performance regarding Freedom of Information requests. This is what Cllr Dan Filson did on Thursday. He got a response the next day which is amazing, However he did get fobbed off like the rest of us often are:

I am still waiting for the answer to an FoI request made on November 28th 2014. I hasd heard that the maintenance of large trees had been left out of the Publc Realm contract in which Veolia took over parks maintenance. It had been suggested to me that this was an oversight that would result in additional expenditure.

This is the  response to my intial request:

 1. State who is responsible for safety checks, maintenance, felling and replacement
of trees in Brent's parks, open spaces and cemeteries.

The Contractor is only responsible for minor tree works which can be carried out
whilst working at ground level. The Council is responsible for major tree works.
Grounds maintenance staff from Veolia and the Council’s monitoring officers
(horticulture) would look at trees when they are working in the park or carrying out
monitoring visits. The Coucnil would then engage specialist contractors to carry out
the major works.

My follow-up which is still awaiting a response:

-->

1.     Is the cost of major tree works by a sub-contractor included in
the Public Realm budget out-sourced to Veolia?

2.    If not, what is the expected annual cost of this sub-contracted
work (recognising it might vary considerably due to major weather
events such as storms)?

BREAKING NEWS: Having posted this article at the weekend I got this answer about 9.30am this morning:

 1: No
2: The Council’s street trees maintenance contractor is Gristwood & Toms. The budget for street tree maintenance works was £500,000 in 2014/15, but this is expected to fall to £450,000 in 2015/16.


 

West Hendon Public Inquiry hears comprehensive account of mistreatment of tenants

Paulette Singer, former community organiser on the West Hendon Estate, got a warm round of applause for this statement that she read out at the Public Inquiry yesterday evening:

1) I am writing this letter in objection to the Compulsory Purchase Order as the former Community Organiser on the West Hendon estate and ongoing supporter of the residents group ‘Our West Hendon’.

2) I spent a year and a half working on the West Hendon estate up until November 2014. My role, paid for by central government as part of the Community Organisers Programme was ‘building relationships in communities to activate people and create social and political change through collective action’.

3) Part of my work involved taking on volunteers from within the community whose role was to assist with the door-to-door listening process. In March last year a group of these residents formed ‘Our West Hendon’ in a attempt to both campaign about the perceived unfair treatment residents were experiencing through the regeneration process and also in order for them to have a support group in place to deal with individual housing cases. Along with several volunteers I listened to over 300 people across the estate and in the local area.