Brent and Harrow Transport Services to merge

Brent Cabinet will tonight consider a proposal to merge the Transport Services of the two brooughs that are used for children and adults with special needs to transport them to schools, colleges or day centres.

The overall aim is to make savings in both Councils' budgets. £1.13m will be saved between the two councils over 3 years and there may eventually be redundancies of drivers, escorts and front line operatives.  This will depend on attempts to market the service more widely.

Consultation in Brent produced different results from families with child users and adult users:

The report says that adult users will be reduced by changes to provision moving away from the use of day centres.

The report LINK states:

This merger of SEN transport services presents a business opportunity for both councils to gain the benefits of economies of scale in contractual arrangements, greater efficiencies in operational front line staffing (drivers and escorts), shared policies from cross working with seconded staff, route sharing and rationalisation and systems and processes. It also provides the opportunity for better utilisation of Harrow’s premises to reduce the operational costs of the combined service. 


 This merger will deliver cost reduction in the following areas:

·      Premises 


·      Route sharing and route reduction and the related front line operational 
costs 


·      Vehicles – greater economies of scale with vehicle contractor and reduced 
running costs 


·      Systems and processes 
 
·      Contractual arrangements – ( the current BTS taxi contract and the labour 
supply contract expires this year and must be renewed) and provides 
opportunities for better contractual terms given the larger value contracts


·      Business development and growth including hiring out spare capacity and 
further collaborations. 


In addition to the operational and contractual efficiencies, there is scope to achieve further savings from demand management activities. Achieving desired outcomes here would require actions to be taken by the commissioning directorates/departments, i.e. children and adult services in both councils and a shared approach being adopted. The implementation period would include the finalisation and agreement of a joint policy built on shared resources. 


The overarching proposal is that the SEN transport services for the two boroughs are merged and operate under the umbrella of Harrow and Brent Special Needs Transport Service (HB SNT). The service will be hosted by Harrow Council and run from Harrow’s Central Depot. The management of the business will sit with Harrow and will include the secondment of any relevant Brent staff to Harrow under a secondment agreement. 


The report recognises that changes may present initial problems for users:

Current users of BTS are likely to have a learning or physical disability and be elderly or young. Any changes to the current service will have an impact on them. The current service is not being withdrawn. It will stay, but as a service run in partnership with Harrow. From the users’ side, not all the changes that come with a shared service will be noticeable. 

What may noticeable is the bus, the driver and the escort and any variation in pick up and drop off times or other occupants on the bus. Routes will be looked at, so there may be more of a change for some users than others in regard to the above. Some users may find any initial change in driver, for example, unsettling for a while. Once the new service is underway, every effort will be made to ensure consistency in drivers and escorts, so users will hopefully soon become accustomed to the new service. The change should not be very noticeable because Harrow and Brent already share some routes, some Brent back office employees will still be in place as will the current drivers and escorts. 


Get involved in Yellow Pavilion one-off activities

The Yellow Pavilion is off Olympic Way

Here’s some ways to get involved in the Yellow Pavilion in the next few weeks. They are mostly one-off activities we’re looking for help with so your time commitment is limited. We offer a friendly welcome, a chance to meet local people and be part of your community and of course we’ll show you what to do.


Children needed to play football!

Do you have a 3-8 year old who’s into football? We’re looking to try out a possible new instructor.  and have a trial session to see if we like what they’re offering. It’s this Thursday 17th March from 5-5.45pm. Please let me know if you and your child or children (boy or girl of course) would like to take part. It’s and is free and indoors with a small ball.
  

Open Mic

Do you want to organise an Open Mic with musicians, maybe poets and other performers? We’ve some interest from performers and people to help and are looking for someone who can take a lead with help.


Help with arts and crafts workshops over the Easter holidays. For all of these we already have someone leading the activity and they’re looking for help:

 
Organise a local table tennis league
 
We’re looking for a volunteer or two to start a table tennis competition to find the best player in Wembley Park using our outdoor table. Skills needed are being well-organised, enjoy emailing and can use your email account for this and good with communicating. We can help with publicity of course.


Fixing electronics

We hope to run an event in May with volunteers helping people fix electronics such as monitors, smartphones or vacuum cleaners. If you have skills or an interest in this area let me know please.

To find out more about any of these please email or phone me.

Best wishes
Michael

Michael Stuart
Community Engagement Manager
Yellow Pavilion
0734 206 0976
http://wembleypark.com/news/yellow-pavilions-acitivities/yellowpavilion@wembleypark.com
Note: I usually work Monday - Thursday

Call for action by councillors to challenge cuts to local government funding

The People's Assembly Against Austerity have put forward these thoughts and actions as a further contribution to the discussion on local government cuts. This is clearly relevant to the debnate at Brent Momentum on Saturday.

The Peoples’ Assembly is completely opposed to Tory Governments cuts and campaigns against them without qualification. We aim to build a national movement to stop the cuts and will support tactics that will help to build this movement.

Local council budgets is one area that has been hit particularly hard by the Government. Some councils have faced a 40% cut to their budgets compared to 2010. This has led to hundreds of thousands of public sector job losses across the country and the closure, or privatisation, of essential services. This inevitably hits the most vulnerable in society hardest. We now face a situation where Central Government is set to impose further cuts to local council budgets and there is difficulty for councils to even provide basic statutory services.

The situation when campaigning against council imposed cuts is therefore more complicated. Our attitude toward councillors and local councils can be considered in three categories:

1.  Those that fully support the neo-liberal austerity agenda and work hard to apply cuts and privatisation of services

2.  Those that are opposed to austerity but have applied cuts locally, reflecting the budget given to the council by Central Government.

3.  Those who are opposed to cuts, vote against local council austerity budgets, try to minimise them and (the better ones) work with others to resist and challenge them.

The PA is opposed to council cuts and supports local groups in their efforts to resist these and build the protest movement. In an ideal situation hundreds of councillors / councils would fall into category 3.

However, to date, not one council has set a ‘needs budget’ or ‘illegal budget’ rejecting cuts to council budgets from the government. However, there are thousands of councillors who fall into category 2 – those that are against having to make cuts but don’t feel like there’s any other option than to set a budget with the allowance set by the government.  On the question of calls for councils to set ‘needs budgets’ or ‘illegal budgets’ we recognise that where that may be done there are legitimate concerns from councillors that the Government will impose commissioners to politically manage the budget set by Government, or simply that they have no other option than to work with the budget they have been given.  Councils will have usable reserves but, in recognising that this is likely to be a long struggle, they may not wish to spend these reserves quickly.  Others may prefer to invest the reserves in socially useful areas, such as housing, which would increase revenues, create local jobs and meet a pressing need.

The job of the anti-austerity movement should be to work with any councillor who is opposed to austerity and create a movement that can shift as many councillors from category 2 to category 3.

The PA is asking local councillors to sign the following letter. To sign follow this LINK

As Councillors we believe this Tory Government's ideological opposition to public services lies behind the deliberate underfunding of Local Authorities.

Councils have faced unprecedented cuts; Local Authority grants in England have been slashed, with £12.5 billion of cuts and half a million Council workers losing their jobs since 2010. Osborne has forced through 40% cuts to Council budgets meaning that local authorities face the reality of cutting frontline services including Adult Social Care and Children's Services, leaving those that rely on them at risk.

We believe that austerity is a political choice. We oppose all cuts from Westminster and believe Osborne’s plans for Local Government will only make a bad situation worse.

We call on the government to reverse cuts to council funding so we are able to provide essential services our communities rely on. Furthermore we call for an end to austerity that is seeing living standards for the majority fall. This is why we also support the national march for Health, Homes, Jobs & Education on Saturday 16 April 2016 in London.

LGA set out proposals on local government budgets and powers ahead of the Budget

The Local Government Association have issued the statement below which makes interesting reading in the light of discussion about how communities should resist local government cuts..

 

Councils could boost housebuilding, increase the number of school places and reduce unemployment if they are handed extra powers to run local services in this week’s Budget, town hall leaders say today.

The Local Government Association has set out a range of proposals for the Chancellor to consider as part of the Budget which would not only improve people’s lives and protect the local services valued by residents but would also deliver sustainable savings to the public purse.

The Chancellor has recently suggested further public sector spending cuts might be needed towards the end of the decade to combat slower than expected economic growth and to meet the Government’s manifesto pledge to achieve a surplus by 2020.

More than half of all day-to-day departmental spending by government – health, schools, defence and overseas aid – is currently protected. If this continues, other unprotected areas – including local government – could be hit once again as a result, the LGA said.

Councils face significant reductions to government grants over the next four years. Local government leaders are also warning George Osborne not to exacerbate these funding challenges by deepening planned cuts as part of his Budget this week.

Council funding cuts in recent years have had a knock-on effect on other parts of the public sector, such as the NHS, which are being left to pick up the pieces leading to a number of false economies. As a result, the LGA insists that ring-fencing certain budgets no longer makes any sense and could put the very services being protected at risk.

Lord Porter, LGA Chairman, said:

“Councils have more than played their part in trying to balance the nation’s books in recent years and all councils will have to continue to find substantial savings from local services to plug funding gaps over the next four years. Extra council tax powers and transitional funding will help some but won’t be enough to completely offset the full impact of funding pressures.

“Giving councils the option to fix longer-term funding settlements has been an important step and rightly recognised by government as being essential to give councils the financial certainty they need to protect local services. It would be perverse to then undermine this with further cuts handed down just one month later.

“Cutting local government to prop up other departments is a false economy. The Government should carefully consider the effect council funding cuts have on other parts of the public sector and whether to tear down the ring-fence around health and education spending.

“Pumping money into the NHS while councils receive less social care and public health funding is a false economy. A properly funded social care system is essential to alleviate the pressure on the NHS while schools and councils also need to be able to pool resources to ensure children are school ready, reduce drop-out rates and improve children’s physical and mental health.

“The Government should use our submission as the blueprint for empowering local government to play a leading role in balancing the nation’s books while improving public services and local economies.”

Students and teachers unite to support tomorrow's 6th Form College Strike

There will be a national strike of NUT members at 6th form colleges tomorrow. The strike us supported by the NUS. The government is attempting to take legal action against the strike which was supported by an 86% Yes vote on a turnout of 44%. The government is also trying to bribe colleges into becoming academies by offering exemption from VAT if they convert.

This is what the NUT said about the action:

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About the 6th form college funding campaign

 
Cuts to 16-19 funding have been much greater than cuts to school funding. Sixth form colleges are under threat. Teachers in sixth form colleges are facing threats to pay, working conditions and employment. Students in this extremely successful sector are facing threats to their education. You can read more about the issues in this briefing document. Use it and the other materials on this page to raise awareness of the issues with your colleagues, friends and the public and build support for the campaign. It is vital that we put pressure on MPs and Ministers to tackle the post-16 funding crisis. MPs across the parties are expressing support for sixth form colleges.

What the NUT is seeking:

1. Restoration of 16-19 funding to the levels which existed before the Coalition Government started its cuts programme
2. Exemption from VAT for colleges – without them having to apply for academy status
3. Removal of the threat of closure or merger – and recognition of sixth form colleges’ achievements.

- See more  HERE 

Some vital additional information on South Kilburn for Brent Cabinet

The South Kilburn Regeneration is on the Cabinet agenda tonight and members are updated on progress. They are given an officer's report that went to Scrutiny Committee but not a report from Scrutiny Committee itself.

So that they can be informed I print below the Minutes of that meeting including points made by Pete Firm for the residents and tenants and the Committee's request for further information.

Readers may be interested to hear that another report reveals that the South Kilburn Trust has c£6m in its coffers LINK  

The Chair invited Pete Firmin, Chair of the Gorefield and Canterbury Tenants and Residents Association to address the committee.  He referred to the circulated report and stated that whilst it updated the committee there was no reference to some of the problems that had arisen from the redevelopment of the area.  There was a need to critically appraise the project, review the balance between the provision of private and social housing and the implications of the delays to the project.  He stated that the experience of contractors working with local people had not been all good.  A new health centre was being provided but this was needed for the existing population before it increased from the new housing being provided.  Pete Firmin also referred to a lack of consultation on the changes resulting from HS2.  He felt that as the regeneration project moved forward there needed to be a new commitment to work with local residents.  In response Richard Barrett (Operational Director, Property and Projects) replied that the report before the committee provided a broad outline of activity.  He acknowledged that there was now a need to engage local people in the review of the South Kilburn masterplan.  Councillor McLennan (Lead Member for Housing and Development) reminded the committee that the remit of the South Kilburn regeneration programme was to provide new housing with every secure tenant being offered housing within the redeveloped scheme.  She responded to the suggestion that there was a lack of consultation and assured the committee that there was engagement with the local community and the regeneration scheme was giving hope to people that things would get better. 

Questions were asked regarding how many units of social housing were being provided as compared to private housing.  Councillor McLennan undertook to provide this figure.  It was pointed out that successive schemes within the project appeared to result in the provision of less social housing. Concern was expressed that as budgets got tighter less social housing would be provided.  Richard Barrett clarified that the target was to provide 50% social housing within the regeneration scheme overall. 

Members enquired about the slippage to the programme and how local residents were informed of this.  Richard Barrett stated that he attended a tenants steering group every 2-3 months to keep them up to date.  He agreed that the delays were unwelcome and led to longer periods of disruption for local people.  However, the scheme still offered local people the best opportunity for moving into better accommodation.   

Reference was made to complaints received from residents about the behaviour of some contractors.  It was explained that it was the responsibility of Brent Housing Partnership or the housing associations to work with the contractors. It was recognised that the Catalyst scheme had been the worst managed scheme and this had been raised with the developer and lessons learnt from it. 

Questions were asked about employment opportunities within the area created by the regeneration programme.  In answer to a question about Coventry Close, Richard Barratt explained that this was outside the regeneration area but the opportunity was being taken to try to influence the improvement of the area. The Committee heard how work with the police attempted to design out trouble spots within the new redevelopments.  Members were interested in receiving more information on this. 

Members were also concerned that the planned expansion of local schools would provide sufficient places for local children.  Richard Barrett explained the plans for the expansion of Carlton Vale Infants and Kilburn Park Junior schools.  He explained that discussions were ongoing to get agreement to an arrangement that both schools supported but that it was at an early stage.

Members expressed their continuing concern over the need to provide better outcomes for local people and not just provide new housing.  At the invitation of the Chair, Councillor Conneely addressed the committee and stated that local people were very concerned about the way they were being decanted and moved back into the area.  There was concern that local communities were being split up and the implication of this particularly for older people.  She wanted to see the process completed on time and people treated fairly.  Richard Barrett replied that every tenant was visited to assess their needs for the property they were moving in to.  In partnership with the housing service, decanted flats were being used for temporary accommodation.  Members asked for more detail on how this arrangement was working. 

The Chair thanked Councillor McLennan and Richard Barrett for their attendance.  

Requests for information:

·         accurate figures on the number of social housing units existing pre redevelopment and the number post redevelopment compared to the number of private units provided.

·         members to be provided with a schedule of rents for the area including a comparison with the pre redevelopment level of rents.

·         a population profile for the area showing how the number of people was projected to rise.

·         information on employment in the area so that it could be seen if the regeneration of the area was leading to a rising employment rate.

·         more information on how the plans for the area attempted to design out potential crime and the involvement of the police in this.

·         more information on the use of decanted units to house homeless people, including the number involved, the timeframes involved and the financial considerations.

Will 'Social Value' procurement take into account ethical standards?

Brent Council's strategy for Social Value in procurement will be discussed at Cabinet tonight. The documents do not mention ethical procurement except with reference to sourcing practices:

Ethical sourcing practices: Ensuring compliance with UK, EU and international standards, promoting fair trade and fair pricing policies, tackling corruption, child labour and similar social issues.

However this does not appear again in the council's glossy publication on Social Value LINK

During the controversy over Veolia's bid for the Public Realm contract there were promises by the council to look at developing an ethical procurement policy.  Veolia was opposed because at the time it provided infrastuctural support for  illegal Israeli settlements on Palestinian land. Campaigners through the public money should not be used to support such practices by awarding the company a multi-million contract.

Recently the government has moved to ban councils and other public bodies from making procurement decisions that take into account ethical issues.

Cllr Tom Miller was among signatories of an attempt  by councillors to challenge this (see below)  and other organisations, including the Palestine Solidarity Campaign, have campaigned on the issue:

 

Letter from councillors regarding attacks on local democracy

Proposed regulations would give central government powers to veto investment decisions made by democratically elected local councils if it believes that local decisions conflict with the views of Westminster politicians.

Scores of councils have in recent years taken steps such as adopting fair trade principles or excluding fossil fuel, tobacco and arms companies from their investment portfolios, following campaigns by pension fund members and local citizens.

Many councils have passed motions stating they will not procure services from companies that avoid tax, aid and abet Israeli violations of international law or from construction companies that blacklist trade union members.

The Government now aims to undermine the right of councils to make democratic decisions reflecting local public opinion and the views of local authority pension fund members, who under current proposals would have less rights to influence pension fund investment decisions than those investing in personal pensions.

These proposals fatally undermine the government’s stated commitment to transfer power to local government and communities and represent a serious attack on local democracy.

We urge the government to reconsider

London rises up against the Housing Bill

Today Londoners came out to reclaim their city from developers and the Housing Bill. They demand homes for people not profit, building of council housing, an end to social cleansing and much more. The pictures on the continuation page tell the whole story.