Category Archives: Blog

And Ethnic Mutual makes it five police investigations

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Today’s Independent brings news that the fate of money given to Ethnic Mutual is now the subject of a police investigation – bringing to five the number of bodies funded by the GLA / London Development Agency which are being investigated by the police over allegations of financial irregularities.

And – once again – the LDA’s press operation doesn’t seem to be telling us an accurate story:

In a statement, an LDA spokesman said: “We referred Ethnic Mutual to the police last year and they are now investigating it.” But this was contradicted by the Metropolitan Police yesterday, who said that Ethnic Mutual had only been referred to them this month.

As our Mayor, Ken Livingstone has a responsibility to ensure that our money is spent well and wisely. So far from his reaction to the mounting pile of allegations, that seems to come very low down his list of priorities – if indeed he has actually got his head round the fact that there are real, substantive questions about misuse of money, which simply mouthing off about “right wing smears” doesn’t address at all.

The £1.9 billion bill that could haunt Gordon Brown

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Tube trainAs if the £50 billion plus pumped into saving Northern Rock wasn’t enough, this week brought more bad news for Gordon Brown’s record of prudence.

The Commons Transport Committee published a report into the collapse of Metronet (and good to see Brian Paddick getting into that story too – read more here). Metronet was one of the private contractors foisted on London’s tube at the insistence of Gordon Brown and his inner circle, who were determined to part-privatise the tube network come what may.

The result? A badly thought out, badly implemented and hugely expensive scheme. Just setting up the deal cost huge amounts of money – putting together mindbogglingly complicated contracts and running up extra borrowing costs. In 2004 the National Audit Office put the cost put introducing part-privatisation at approaching £1 billion – yes billion: £455 million in legal etc costs in drawing up the scheme and £450 million in extra borrowing costs.

So – Metronet collapsed,upgrade and maintenance work in doubt and a huge bill floating around that someone will have to pick up. Not exactly a proud track-record for Labour when it comes to London’s public services!

The Westminster Hour: Sunday, 10pm

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Appearing on Radio 4's The Westminster Hour with Carolyn QuinnI’m back on The Westminster Hour this Sunday: Radio 4, 10pm.

If you miss the show you’ll be able to listen again on their website.

If you want to get advanced notice of my media appearances like this one, you can use the media events service at Flock Together. You’ve got three choices:

  1. Using this feed: http://feeds.feedburner.com/LiberalDemocratsMediaAppearances, or
  2. By email: register at FlockTogether and pick “Media appearances” as one of the categories of events you want to be emailed about. (If you are an existing Flock Together user you can also change your preferences – login and then click “Edit your preferences” in the left-hand menu; you need to tick “Media Appearances” under “Email options”), or
  3. On the web: take a look at the dedicated Flock Together page.

Action for Kids visit

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Fantastic to have this exemplar charity – which recently celebrated its fifteenth birthday – operating here in Hornsey & Wood Green.

It now covers about seventeen boroughs and young people with a variety of challenges come there to work. They feel loved and supported and develop skills that can really help them. In that encouraging atmosphere they have even seen miracles – as when someone who hadn’t spoken for years started to speak again. They also supply specialist equipment, chairs and so on to those who need it.

Now the real problem for Action for Kids is that they are totally a charity. And do you know – the councils that send kids there don’t pay a penny. They want to find a way of charging and I don’t blame them. They work totally off of charitable donations – but with some basic funding could expand their operation – which is clearly in demand and excellent.

And really scandalously – the Government will pay businesses £80 per day to take young people like this – and businesses refer them on so that they spend the day free at Action for Kids – but the businesses keep the dosh. Disgusting!

Channel 4 political awards

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They are being broadcast tomorrow night (Sunday), but were recorded during the week. So on Wednesday it was a matter of dashing off from a meeting with Nick Clegg and Brian Eno (who has agreed to advise the party on youth issues) to the recording – which was enjoyable.

Having been nominated just after arriving at Parliament in the Rising Stars category (only done once per Parliament) and lost to Michael Gove, I can tell you that it is far more pleasant sitting there not having been nominated and therefore not having to have a camera stuck in your nose when they announce the winner – when just like the Oscars you clap wildly and ensure fixed grin remains on face.

Always a really well-attended do with lots of the great and the good and celebs. Cheeky Girls – needless to say with Lembit in tow, Jeremy Irons and Angela Rippon – to name but a few. I sat next to Michael Cockrell who confessed to having omitted making any of his documentaries about Lib Dems since the year dot. I offered to remedy this omission by sending him some ideas – and I will do Michael!

Changing the rules on the monarchy: 25 and counting

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Buckingham PalaceFollowing my taking up the cudgels on behalf of women in the line of succession to the throne – by calling for the current rules which discriminate in favour of men to be axed – I’ve put down an early day motion (EDM) in Parliament in order to supplement my referral of the matter to the Equalities Commission.

EDM number 710 has 25 signatories so far – including MPs from all the main parties. (Apologies to Conservative Brian Coleman, who seems to get terribly excited when I raise this issue – but yes, Brian, supporters include MPs from your own party. I’m sure in the spirit of honesty and consistency you’ll direct the same comments at them as you have at me…!)

You can lobby your own MP to sign the EDM very easily via www.writetothem.com – remember to give the number of the EDM in your message.

The story has also been picked up in the East Anglian Daily Times this week.

Ken Livingstones faces libel action

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Well – today’s Evening Standard has brought the news that Ken Livingstone is going to be sued for libel by Brenda Stern. She’s the whistleblower who highlighted a series of concerns over financial management during Ken’s reign and was sacked, raising the obvious question of whether she was sacked because she’d raised those concerns.

Mayor Livingstone has laid into her, saying, “we had to get rid of after complaints she was intimidatory to the staff working for her.”

But as the Evening Standard reports:

A complaint of bullying was made against her but in a letter seen by the Standard, LDA chief executive Manny Lewis says the allegation was investigated and was “not founded”.

Tsk tsk Ken. Not really much of a surprise that a libel action looks likely to be the outcome of this spat – but there’s also this very worrying footnote to today’s news:

The Mayor’s office hit back, threatening that if Ms Stern sued, the GLA would investigate “other matters” apart from her stint at the LDA, including her past life and previous employment.

What on earth is all that about Ken? Oh, and will it be London taxpayers’ money you’ll be spending on digging into the past lives of your staff?

What do I get up to in Parliament?

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Lynne Featherstone asking the Prime Minister a question in ParliamentIt’s a while since I’ve mentioned www.hearfromyourmp.com – one of the excellent services run by Tom Steinberg and co from www.mysociety.org. Its basic idea is to make it much easier for members of the public to find out what their MP has been doing – so whether you are a constituent of mine or not, I do encourage you to sign up in order to, as it says on the tin, hear from your MP at www.hearfromyourmp.com

One of the other sites that team runs is www.theyworkforyou.com – a now near essential way of getting information on what’s been going on in Parliament (and in many ways better than Parliament’s own site). One thing to mention in particular – you can sign up to be emailed with details of when I speak in Parliament, ask a question etc. It’s on this page.

Labour lets us down over plastic bags

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I’ve blogged before about some of the great things local communities, such as residents and businesses in Crouch End, are doing to help tackle over-use of plastic bags – with all the litter and environmental problems that flow from them.

So it’s really disappointing that this week Labour councillors in Haringey blocked moves to support more of these schemes in our borough. It’s like walking back into the worst excesses of the 1970s when a Labour councillor objects to schemes to reduce usage of plastic bags because … “unions weren’t consulted”! It’s not as if we’re talking about cuts some jobs in the council or anything – just about supporting residents and businesses with a sensible scheme to aid our environment. And how out of touch of Labour councillors to say such schemes won’t work – when right here in Crouch End we have a successful scheme that is working.

But you know what annoys me most about this? It’s a classic case of there being a problem, people getting together locally to come up with imaginative solutions and then the state (Haringey Council in this case) failing to do its bit to help. It’s that sort of narrow-minded conservatism which, in the end, damages the case for everyone who believes there’s a need for councils and government to help provide decent services for everyone.

UPDATE: The Ham & High has covered the story, with more from my colleague Cllr Bob Hare (Highgate).

Good news in Highgate bus stand saga

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Transport for London’s Peter Hendy has agreed to a TfL making a site visit to discuss the vexed question of the location of Highgate Village’s main bus stand.

The solution I’m after is an extension of the vital 271 to East Finchley – so it connects better with other local services and East Finchley tube station. This would not only create more joined-up bus services, but would also allow the removal of the bus stand – greatly improving Pond Square. Better bus services and a better space for the community – it’d be a matter of win, win.

You can read more details of the story here and you can read the Hornsey Journal’s coverage of the story here.