I am publishing the Agenda for tonight's Kilburn Connects on-line meeting as it was not published on the above Brent Council website page.
There are several important items including an update on Kilburn Square Regeneration proposals and an interesting 'New Community Review Panel for Planning'. After recent events it would be good to see some specific actions under Keeping Young People Safe'.
In a unique event in Brent, around 100 people gathered in Willesden yesterday to negotiate the demands of Brent Private Renters for action by Brent Council against landlords who failed to remedy damp and mould in their properties. The meeting was a mixture of a detailed questioning akin to a Scrutiny Meeting, and a US style Town Hall meeting with passionate testimonies by renters about their treatment at the hands of their landlords and Brent Council officers.
One contributor said that this was an attempt to hold the council to account and to their credit Muhammed Butt, Leader of the Council and Cllr Promise Knight, Lead member for Housing, took on the challenge. It is a strategy that other campaigns may do well to sdopt.
The councillors and representatives from Brent Renters sat around a large table on the stage and the lively audience witnessed the proceedings from the floor. The recording below gives you a taste - it is dark because slides were projected to show the evidence that had been gathered.
Images of damp and mould projected on the wall
It was clear that Brent Renters had managed to organise a very broad cross-section of the community and I was struck by the passion and eloquence of the several Somali women who spoke, sometimes in Somali, with controlled righteous anger about their experiences.
Brent Renters had set out the basic facts and their demands:
Most of the
Private Rented housing stock in Brent is old and very badly maintained. 65.7% is preWWII
(relating to more than 100,000 residents), much of that 19th century. Landlords
have no incentive to do repairs when the power to evict is so great, the demand
is so high, and the punishment is so lacking.
The council
estimates that 10,108 family homes have a serious health hazard in them, In the
areas with the most dangerous housing (those that a selective licensing scheme
has just been agreed within - Willesden Green, Dollis Hill, and Harlesden and
Kensal Green) the council aims to deal with at most 10% of the most serious
hazards this year.
.
In the vast
majority of the borough (everywhere outside Wembley Park) 1 in every 5 private
rented homes contains a serious danger to the health and safety of tenants,
more than double the London average (9%).
In the worst
wards, there are an estimated 2374 properties with at least one Category 1
hazard. The council’s plans for this year involve dealing with 250 hazards of
any severity- many properties have multiple hazards, and many hazards are
category 2, so in fact the council is likely to make far less than 10% of these
properties free from serious risk this year.
It’s
outrageous that many of us are paying £2000 a month in rent to get asthma and
mould poisoning - our housing shouldn’t make us sick.
We are all
paying the price for dangerous housing. Because landlords aren’t reinvesting
rental income into maintaining their properties, taxpayers are footing the NHS
bill for the health problems they are causing. We can’t go through another
winter like the last - our children deserve better.
Poor housing
cost the NHS £340 million last year. The average cost of dealing with damp in a
property is £3590 (BRE report). The total annual cost to the NHS is over £38
million, which would be paid back within 7 years were damp to be remediated.
The total annual cost to society of damp is £96 million, which would be paid
back within 2.8 years.
Brent
Council must:
○Agree a timeline with the London Renters Union for dealing with the 10,000
unsafe private rented homes in Brent, and recruit the staff to do it.
○Ensure
that Environmental Health cases can never be closed before sending a report on
what has been done to the tenant and confirming it with them.
○Make
interpretation available for the PRS enforcement team, especially in,Arabic, Somali, Portuguese, Romanian, Urdu
and Hindi.
○Inspect
ALL properties where a landlord has applied for a licence within 1 year,
instead of 50% over 5 years.
○Issue
Improvement Notices that protect us
from eviction while dealing with disrepair, and fine the landlords that refuse
to fix up.
The renters wanted faster action on the Category 1 homes that include a danger to life and pointed out that many homes have multiple hazards at Category 2. Renters spoke out about their own illnesses and those of their children as a result of damp and mould and the sometimes unhelpful assessments that has been made. One example was a claim by officers that the condition of one property was due to 'condensation' when they had been sent video of a leak.
Responding Cllr Butt referred to government cuts in council funding and £18m savingsthe council had to make. Cllr Knight said that the council were going to increase the number of enforcement officers by double the existing number (12 instead of 4) which would enable more inspections to be made. Cllr Butt said that rather than instantly fine landlords they had to give them the chance to remedy defects.
Renters said that upping the number of fines would raise funds that the council could reinvest in enforcement, creating an income stream enabling employment of more enforcement officers. At present monies raised were not reinvested in the service. They also suggested an extension of landlord licensing across the borough and a higher licensing charge in line with other boroughs (£640 vs £750). Muhammed Butt said the 2024-25 budget was in the first stages of drafting and without promising anything he would look at the possibiltiies.
It was clear from the contributions that intimidation from landlords and threat of eviction if they complained was a real problem. If evicted, homeless families then had to deal with housing officers who had a huge workload. The council was urged, 'Put more people out there so officers are not so over-stretched that they treat people badly.'
At present the licensing system covers only three wards: Harlesden and Kensal Green, Willesden Green and Dollis Hill. Renters wanted to see the number increased but Prmise Knight said that this would have to be agreed by the Secretary of State. She urged that residents provide evidence to the council to help them make their case.
800 people have signed the Brent Renters petition and this shows the strength of feeling. One renter summed up, 'People have complained and feel like Brent Council doesn't listen to them. Perhaps, here today, maybe they are listening.'
After the meeting London Renters commented on what they had gained from the meeting:
What did we win in our negotiation?
🔰 A plan with targets on dealing with Category 1 hazards and unsafe homes for borough-wide licensing by the end of the year
🔰 A commitment to a pilot project in Harlesden and Kensal Green, Willesden Green and Dollis Hill, including increasing current targets for dealing with unsafe homes.
🔰 Council leader Butt to talk to finances side of council about increasing enforcement capacity, and whether income from fines can be included to increase budgets.
🔰 Improvement notices to be issued every time there is a Category 1 hazard!
🔰 Interpretation to be offered for main languages so that people can access the Private Housing Service and complain, and forms reworked in plain English.
🔰 An aim to ensure that cases are not closed before speaking to the tenant, by discussing with senior officers and creating a concrete plan.
I wrote about concerns over the Government's Anti-Boycott Bill some time ago LINK so I was pleased to see that Islington Council last night approved a motion opposing the Bill and pointing out its difficulties. The initial motion was moved by two Green councillors, and amended by Labour. The final motion (below) was passed unanimously:
This Council notes:
The “Economic Activity of Public Bodies (Overseas Matters) Bill”, otherwise
known as the "anti-boycott bill", is slowly making its way through Parliament,
and passed its second reading in July.
The government’s planned anti-boycott bill poses a threat to local democracy,
freedom of expression and civil society campaigns. It will shield states involved
in practices that many people in this country find abhorrent, including genocide
and occupation.
If approved, the bill will restrict the ability of public bodies such as local
authorities, universities, and some pension funds to make ethical decisions
about investment and procurement. It will violate the rights of individual pension
holders to invest their pensions in line with their values.
The Labour Party tabled an amendment to the bill which sought to allow public
bodies to make their own investment and procurement decisions and remove
the threat of fines, ensuring that that such decisions are in accordance with an
ethical investment framework that is applied equally across the board. This
amendment was defeated in the House of Commons
A broad coalition of over seventy organisations including charities, trade
unions, human rights and faith organisations are working publicly to stop the
bill, alongside the Scottish government.
Sacha Deshmukh, Amnesty International UK's Chief Executive, called the bill
“pernicious” and said “it will close off a key means to hold companies to
account and once again show that this Government thinks little of the plight of
persecuted communities around the world.”
Lisa Nandy, MP for Wigan, revealed that the Labour Party has taken legal
advice over the bill, calling it “bad law” and stating that lawyers had raised
concerns that the bill could lead the way for endless litigation in the courts over
the practice of Boycott, Divestment and Sanctions (BDS).
This Council further notes:
Procurement of goods and services is an important part of councils’
expenditure with third party revenue expenditure totalling around £60 billion a
year across local government. This council spends £650million with almost
6,000 providers.
In our progressive procurement strategy – adopted in 2020 – we seek to
encourage and amplify the award of work, supply and service contracts to
companies and professionals that perform public contracts with a business
model based on ethical behaviour, and to promote democratic participation and
drive social innovation.
The framework incorporates a series of mandatory ethical requirements that we
expect of ourselves and from those who want to do business with the council.
By ethical behaviour, we define this as decent wages, fair employment
practices, safeguards against modern slavery and environmental sustainability.
In 2018, Islington became the first council nationally to sign the Charter Against
Modern Slavery
Over 80 local authorities across the UK have now signed the Charter, which
Islington Council helped draft. Addressing modern slavery is a key priority for
the council, with work on it overseen by the Safer Islington Partnership. We
have an ongoing training programme to assist staff and partners to identify the
signs of modern slavery.
We use our leverage as a major commissioner to encourage suppliers to
support and endorse accreditations and charters such as ethical procuring and
supply chain visibility.
Trade Unions have an important role to play in the fight against modern slavery
and exploitation by supporting and championing workers’ rights. Workers and
providers are frequently not aware of their rights and responsibilities. It is for
that reason that the Council has taken a stand against blacklisting of trade
union members and emphasise this requirement as mandatory.
BDS has a centuries-long tradition as a successful method of peaceful protest
and local government has played its part in following this democratic political
practice.
BDS campaigns have been used by social movements to change the course of
history for the better.
Concerned members of the public and local authorities have championed BDS
tactics in prominent campaigns such as the 1963 Bristol bus boycott, the
rejection of sugar produced on slave plantations, led by nineteenth century
British citizens, and divestment from fossil fuel companies. The best-known
boycott was the campaign to end apartheid in South Africa.
During the campaign to end South African apartheid, similar limitations were
introduced. Nonetheless, millions of people, including local councils, continued
their support for the movement.
In 2016, a UK High Court ruled that the boycotts of Israeli settlement goods by
local authorities in Leicester and Wales were not anti-Semitic, nor did they
contravene laws on equality.
Restricting the ability of local councils to engage in BDS in wrong. In a world
where Uyghur’s, undergoing ethnic cleansing, are forced to produce garments
and commodities, where local government pension funds are invested in arms
companies known to be complicit in violations of Palestinian human rights, and
where Saudi Arabia, accused of crimes against humanity, is the world’s largest
oil exporter, we need these tactics to hold those complicit to account.
This Council resolves to:
Write to the Prime Minister to share, and ask him to consider, the legal opinion
published by the Labour Party on the rights of councils to boycott oppressive
regimes and illegal practices, emphasising the need for councils to make their
own decisions on procurement and investment matters.
Continue to ensure that our own ethical procurement strategy doesn’t include
procuring goods and services produced by oppressive regimes,
The weekend's stabbings in Wembley Park and Neasden, as well as the death in Croydon, were very much on our minds last night at the Brent and Harrow hustings for the Green Party candidate for the GLA constituency.
The London Assembly Police and Crime Committee chaired by Green Assembly Member Caroline Russell, has launched an investigation into preventing violence and protecting young people. It will consider the root
causes of violence affecting young people in London and what the Mayor and
Metropolitan Police are doing to prevent violence in communities.
You can submit your own evidence to the investigation. Details from the GLA below.
How to respond
The deadline
for submission is Friday 13 October 2023.
The
Committee would like to invite anyone with knowledge or experience of violence
affecting young people to submit views and information to the investigation,
including those working to protect young people and prevent violence, giving
you the opportunity to inform the Committee’s work and influence its
recommendations. Therefore, this call for evidence is open to all who would
like to respond.
1.What are the
root causes of violence affecting young people in London?
2.What role do
non-policing solutions, including projects run by youth services, community
organisations and charities, play in preventing violence and protecting young
people in London? How do these projects help to reduce violence affecting young
people?
3.What more
should schools and education providers be doing to protect children and young
people at risk of violence in London?
4.What impact
has London’s Violence Reduction Unit had on reducing and preventing violence
since it was established in 2019?
5.How well
does the Met work with partner organisations to prevent and reduce violence
affecting young people? What more should it be doing?
6.What actions
should the Mayor be taking to build trust and confidence among young people and
protect communities that are most impacted by violence?
7.What action
should be taken to engage young Londoners in initiatives to protect and support
young people affected by violence?
The responses to this Call
for Evidence will be used to inform the Committee’s discussion with invited
stakeholders at its meetings in September and October 2023 and any subsequent
recommendations. These are open meetings which will be held in City Hall, and
anyone is welcome to attend as an audience member to watch the discussions.
They will also be broadcast online.
Following the
investigation, the Committee may produce an output in the form of a published
letter or report. Information and/or quotations from submissions to this call
for evidence may be used in this output, and we will ensure we cite you. We
generally inform those who have submitted evidence about the outcome of the
investigation in the form of link to a report or output when it is published.
Wembley Matters has written about the implications of the Building Safety Act on a number of occasions as well as putting questions to the Brent Cabinet lead member for housing.
Now Brent Council has written to tenants and leaseholders of all the blocks owned by the Council affected by the Act with the actions they and tenants have to take to comply. I have embedded the letter below in order to keep the QR codes intact.
As usual click on bottom right to enlarge the image.
These are the Brent Council blocks affected. In addition blocks owned by private companies and housing associations will come under the Act if they meet the criteria.
Asked by Wembley Matters to comment on the Brent Council letter a local tenant said:
I wonder if any of those receiving a letter are aware of all the other statutory obligations that the council has to send to the building regulator by Saturday.
1) Registration ---Completed
2) KBI's (Key Building information)
3) Following Registration the council have to publish their Resident Engagement Strategy, along with a Complaints Policy in order to apply for a Building Safety Certificate for each building.
4) Publish a safety case for each building, including Resident Profiles.
However the Regulator will only wish to see a safety case if there has been a recent incident, so that means the council have to send a safety case for Kilburn Square which shows the regulator what fire safety measures were in situ at the time of the fire.
All the above have to be with the regulator by Saturday the 30th September 2023.
In the letters, the council only refers to Safety Case Reports which are summaries of safety cases but they are not the same.
Safety Case Reports are not needed to be sent to the Regulator until the deadline which is the 6th April 2024.
BALLYMORE WILL SUBMIT A HYBRID PLANNING APPLICATION AT THE END OF SEPT. 2023
On September 14th we learnt that Ballymore would be submitting a "Hybrid" Planning Application to RBKC at the end of September.
A Hybrid application means that Ballymore will only submit a detailed plan for the new Sainsburys build.
Plans for the rest of the housing development will only be submitted in outline with updated plans for different parcels of land (or plots) submitted as and when Ballymore are ready.
This type of planning application is not unusual for large scale developments, but given the long list of concerns raised by residents about scale and density of the build, loss of light, traffic congestion, impact on the Cemetery, drain on local infrastructure and crucially the issue of site contamination and how this will be dealt with on a "plot by plot" basis -- its vital that we register our complaint NOW before the application goes in.
We have been advised by a lawyer that residents should have been made aware from DAY 1 of the consultation process that this was a HYBRID planning application. RBKC's failure to do so is deemed "misleading" and unacceptable.
We have also been advised we have grounds to mount a challenge and ask RBKC to start a new consultation process that this time, includes information about the proposed Hybrid application.
If you would like to register your concern please click on the link to download a TEMPLATE Letter of Complaint which you can adapt and edit as you like.
The Brent branch of the London Renters Union are meeting with Muhammed Butt, leader Brent Council, and Cllr Promise Knight, the Cabinet lead on housing on Saturday.
The aim is to negotiate action on the pressing problem of mould, damp and other health issues in private housing,
The group have produced a powerful video that shows how renters are suffering at present. LINK
The campaign is pushing for Brent Council to take much stronger enforcement action against landlords who are breaking the law. They don't think renters should be paying upwards of £2,000 a month to get asthma and other chronic health conditions.
Brent Renters urge the public to sign their petition HERE that states:
BRENT COUNCIL: Not another winter with damp and mould
More than 10,000 private rented homes in Brent have a serious health hazard. Damp and mould are making us sick, leading to asthma, respiratory issues, skin conditions, and mould poisoning.
Our children’s health is in crisis
because landlords are being allowed to get away with not keeping our
homes safe. Damp and mould mean people can’t use some rooms, and are
overcrowded in the others. This meant that Church End had the highest
Covid death rate in the country.
Brent council has a legal duty to make sure our homes are safe but their current plan isn’t good enough. In
the areas of Brent where housing is most dangerous, they’re only
promising to deal with 10% of the most serious problems this year. What
about the other 90% of renters left with unsafe homes?
It doesn’t have to be like this.
Members of the London Renters Union in Brent have come together to
create an action plan for how the council can hold landlords accountable
and keep us safe. Add your name to our campaign. Together we can win safer homes for everyone.
If you are part of an organisation,
please ask them to support the campaign by sharing this petition, and by
signing the open letter here.
Wembley Stadium will be hosting a National Football League (NFL) game between the Jacksonville Jaguars vs Atlanta Falcons this Sunday 1 October. Please read below to see how this might affect you.
Timings
Doors will open from 11:30am and road closures will be in place from 8:30am.
We expect the area around Wembley Stadium to be very busy before and after the event so please avoid the area if you can unless you have a ticket.
