About Lynne Featherstone

I'm a Liberal Democrat member of the House of Lords.

Three out of five police stations in Haringey cannot be contacted

Posted on 23rd Mar 2007 by Lynne Featherstone

Haringey Liberal Democrats have expressed concern following the publication of new research showing only two out of the five Haringey police stations answer phone calls.

The research was carried out by Liberal Democrat London Assembly members between 26th February and 17th March 2007.It showed that only Hornsey and Tottenham stations answered calls when tested.

Liberal Democrats have welcomed the fact that Haringey’s response rate is above that of the London average. However the actual time taken to answer non-emergency calls at the two police stations contacted was significantly higher than the London average – 3 minutes 20 seconds compared with 20 seconds London-wide.

The research shows that 46% (65 out of 141) of police stations in London do not answer the phone for non-emergency enquiries. The research follows a similar survey carried out in 2003 by Lib Dem MP Lynne Featherstone whilst she was a member of the Metropolitan Police Authority.

Cllr Ron Aitken, Lib Dem Crime spokesperson comments:

“It is imperative that police stations can be contacted in order for the public to report non-emergency crimes. If the public are faced with silence at the end of the line then confidence decreases and intelligence may be lost. These figures really do need to be improved.”

A double dose of speaking in Parliament

Posted on 22nd Mar 2007 by Lynne Featherstone

Managed on Thursday to get called (after an hour of bobbing up and down) in Business Questions and asked the Leader of the House (Jack Straw) to give time for a debate – a proper debate – on gang culture, the problems of which have recently been highlighted in Haringey with 60 – 80 youths rampaging down Lordship Lane. Jack Straw agreed – but that doesn’t mean we will get the debate.

In the afternoon I led for the Liberal Democrats in a three hour debate on the sixth report from the International Development Select Committee which is on ‘Conflict and Development: Peacebuilding and Post-conflict Reconstruction‘. The Select Committee was and is chaired by my Liberal Democrat colleague Malcolm Bruce who presented the Committee’s report. It is a substantive piece of work on an area – conflict resolution – that is tough to address.

The key issues I raised were around the abuse and rape of the natural resources which conflict states are often so blessed and therefore cursed with – and trying to ensure that our UK companies are behaving properly. I also raised education in conflict states and the issue of the Department for International Development right hand not knowing what the Department for Trade and Industry left one is doing. Cross-departmental goals might be helpful and selling sophisticated and very expensive radar air control units to countries that don’t need them but to whom we are giving aid is just stupid and counter-productive.

Gordon Brown: too little, too late

Posted on 22nd Mar 2007 by Lynne Featherstone

And I know – I haven’t mentioned the budget – but there is much coverage in the news today. I always find it interesting the day after when we have all had time to read the small print. In short though – nothing to narrow the widening equality gap between rich and poor and little on climate change action – the two great challenges we face. Perhaps that heralds the Brown style of leadership – too little and too late!

Major gang fight in Haringey

Posted on 22nd Mar 2007 by Lynne Featherstone

Since I posted the piece on meeting three representatives from Haringey’s Youth Council and Youth Parliament and said how knife and gun crime was a key issue that worried them – we have had a major gang fight between gangs from Wood Green and Tottenham yesterday afternoon with four stabbings. I will try and get this raised in Parliament – as for all the Government’s knife or gun summits, the problem and the causes of the problem stumble on untouched. The police work hard – but it is clear that what is needed is a massive effort and resource – a continuing focus not just when the headlines hit if we are to impact this at all. So many issues involved – and they all need addressing!

Modern slavery in Haringey

Posted on 22nd Mar 2007 by Lynne Featherstone

Early start with the Freedom Breakfast – organised by Pastor Nims Obunge of the Peace Alliance. These are uplifiting occasions when Nims forces us (the Haringey community) to raise our eyes above our daily grind and brings out our better selves as we wrestle with really trying to make the world a better place. This year the ‘breakfast’ is focused on celebrating the abolition of slavery 200 years ago. A variety of speakers take the podium and each table also is posed three questions to discuss and then feedback to an invited panel – politicians, police chief, a representative from Amnesty and myself.

My speech (read in full here) was really focused on the continuation of slavery in modern terms – i.e. human trafficking, which is increasing and endemic and is alive and sick in Haringey as elsewhere. In fact the police busted a big trafficking gang locally who were charging people between £3,000 and £5,000 to come here and were then sold into mainly prostitution.

So whilst we have come a long way since the slave trade per se – but clearly still have a long way to go.

Dismay as award-winning residents' association loses funding

Posted on 21st Mar 2007 by Lynne Featherstone

Liberal Democrats in Tottenham have expressed dismay that the end of the financial year on 31st March will also see the end of funding to the Ladder Community Safety Partnership (LCSP), an award-winning residents’ association.

Lib Dems say the news is all the more surprising, given that in the spring of 2006, Haringey Council, through “the Better Haringey Building Safer Communities Together” awards, named the it as Haringey’s “Most Proactive Residents’ Association.”

Yet by December, Haringey Council, through the Safer Communities Partnership under the Chief Executive’s Department, confirmed that it was cutting the 2006 grant in half, and that there would be no funding at all from 2007.

The LCSP, which co-ordinates the work of several neighbourhood watches and residents’ associations in the Harringay Ladder, between Finsbury Park and Turnpike Lane, has for many years brought local residents, Council officers and the police together to benefit the community.

“The LCSP has acted as the eyes and ears of the Council and the police,” says local councillor Karen Alexander (Lib Dem, Harringay ward). “It has identified pockets of anti-social behaviour, helped to improve Harringay Passage, a mile-long passageway through which children walk to school, and has acted as a whistle blower against unlawful developments and late-night openings.”

David Schmitz, Chair of Tottenham Liberal Democrats, adds: “The grant they received was tiny, as most of their work has been done by volunteers. However, the money paid for a part-time co-ordinator who really made things happen. It’s hard to imagine a falser economy than the cutting of this grant.

“The Council seem to be thinking that the new Ward Panel can take the place of the LCSP, but that’s nonsense. Welcome as it is, membership is by invitation only and it emphasises police-related matters, not other things like planning control and the local environment. The panel just cannot include as many people and cover as many issues as the LCSP does.”

Enthusing young people about politics

Posted on 21st Mar 2007 by Lynne Featherstone

Meeting young people in Haringey Met with three members of Haringey’s Youth Council and Youth Parliament. Bright as buttons and keen to engage with their MPs (me and David Lammy – being the Haringey MPs). We talk through some ideas such as tours of Parliament and perhaps setting up a ‘Question Time’ where the young people from all the schools can come and put questions to me and other invited politicians.

A real pleasure to meet them – and they were soooooooo on the button. Bullying, how to get young people enthused about politics and gun and knife crime were the key issues.

In the picture you can see left to right: Shayan Moftizadeh (16), Member of Yourth Parliament, Adam Jogee (15), co-chair of Haringey Youth Council, and Uniqer Redguard (15), Member of Youth Parliament.

Speaking on the Iraq war

Posted on 21st Mar 2007 by Lynne Featherstone

With Tony Benn at protest against Iraq war Did the first session of the Stop the War Coalition’s Peoples’ Assembly marking four years since the day we visited the illegal war on Iraq.

Many speakers in first session and chaired by Tony Benn. We are all on the same side here today.

My speech was really about how we need to build, or rather help Iraqis rebuild, the infrastructure of Iraq. And of course, to mention, that Tony Blair’s war to save Iraq from Saddam has precipitated a humanitarian disaster.

Slavery is not just something of the past

Posted on 21st Mar 2007 by Lynne Featherstone

Speech given at the Haringey Freedom Breakfast, 21 March 2007

Firstly – thank you to Pastor Nims – whose work to bring the world together in peace with events like these always makes us remember our better selves and what we need to strive for as human beings for the good of all in what is sometimes a very negative world.

This morning’s news about the gang fight in Wood Green yesterday with up to eighty youths involved and four stabbed reminds us sadly of how very far we have to go.

So – thank you Nims for this opportunity to say a few words about freedom; what freedom means in the ongoing fight against modern slavery; and the importance of celebrating the bicentenary of the abolition of slavery here today.

I am so thankful that Britain was at the forefront of the abolition of slavery – but so ashamed that we ever were part of it.

And yet it goes on today. Slavery is not just something of the past. Today – here in the UK there are still other forms of slavery in the UK.

Human trafficking is not relevant to the UK, but also to Haringey.

There has been enormous increase of trafficking into Europe, particularly in Britain and especially related to prostitution.

Some 4,000 women, girls and boys, some as young as 10, are trafficked into Britain alone every year for sexual exploitation.

And the problem is closer to our homes that most people probably think.

In Haringey, a two year undercover operation exposed a sophisticated criminal network that charged thousand people between £3,000 and £5,000 for a ticket into Britain. On arrival in the UK the ‘clients’ were sold into the sex trade.

Senior officers considered the network to be one of the largest, if not the largest, people trafficking gangs they have encountered in the UK. Thankfully, in this case eight members of the gang were prosecuted.

But in most cases, they remain undetected.

These terrible facts are a call for action. Finally, we have a decision by the Government to sign the European Convention Against Trafficking. This is great news.

It is great news for personal freedom.

But I now urge the Government to ratify and implement the document without hesitation. Implementation, implementation, implementation.

We need to send out a message to say that human trafficking is unacceptable in the UK. We all have a duty to safeguard personal freedom.

And the important point is that behind the word trafficking is a human being. The minute we lump people together under labels they lose their humanity. The lesson of slavery is that man’s inhumanity to man knows no bounds, it continues and it is beholden on every one of us to speak out and act against it – whether state or personal – and to remember the value and worth of each human being that lies behind a newspaper headline.

This is why I am so happy to be here to celebrate the bicentenary of the abolition of slavery today.

Because the 25th March 1807 was a beautiful day for personal freedom.

Each of you here in this room may have different reasons for why slavery is such an affront to human dignity.

But – by sharing our insight, experience, information, and expertise- we can together continue to develop a strategy to take the next step in stamping out slavery so that on the 25th March 2207, the Freedom Breakfast might truly celebrate the abolition of slavery. We’ve come a long way, but there is still a long way to go.

Hepatitis C is a time-bomb waiting to happen in London

Posted on 20th Mar 2007 by Lynne Featherstone

New figures revealed by Lynne Featherstone MP show that there has been a dramatic increase in hepatitis C outbreaks in London over the last five years.

The figures show a 124.6% increase in just five years. Ms Featherstone, MP for Hornsey and Wood Green, is urging the Government to priorities raising Londoners’ awareness regarding hepatitis C.

Commenting Lynne Featherstone MP said:

“This is a time-bomb waiting to happen.

“There is little awareness of symptoms and risk factors and this explosive increase shows that the government has clearly failed to tackle this. The problem with hepatitis C is that you can live with it for decades and it might not be obvious.

“We have a silent crisis on our hands, yet the Government is failing to inform Londoners about it. The government must ensure that people are given the information and support they deserve.”

Note: the figures come from an answer to a Parliamentary question.