Category Archives: Blog

Muswell Hill Library

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Straight into surgery at Muswell Hill Library. There is still no disabled access to the upstairs – which means this isn’t an ideal venue for me to use to let members of the public come and meet me. But as I hold most of my surgeries in the more accessible Wood Green Library, I do sometimes also use venues like this one – which means I can get round to the various parts of the constituency, not all of which have a perfect venue.

But this morning one constituent reminded me (inadvertently) how pressing it is for buildings to be accessible. He had no legs – so had to walk up the stairs (almost impossible on the prosthetics) – but also carrying his seven-year old severely autistic and non-walking son. Of course, had he let us know in advance, I would have made special arrangements such as a home visit. He was more worried about going downstairs carrying his son after the appointment so I got a very kind guy from the library to help and carry the boy down the stairs.

The 'ramp' with steps at Muswell Hill LibraryI mention this incident because it is years now since Haringey Council first made promises and talked about restoring and renovating the building and making it properly accessible – but all words and no seeming action (other than the bizarre incident a few years ago where they put in a new ramp – but, as you can see from the photo, it had steps!).

So, I will again – as they say – make enquiries. Last time I went to a meeting about the library’s future the plans were big (bigger than needed) for a restaurant and an extension – and all-singing, all-dancing – but I haven’t heard anything since.

A blogging pause

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Wasn’t it just the loveliest weather over the Easter Weekend? I won’t be blogging again until after next weekend as am taking a few days to do things with my daughters! No doubt the world can wait.

A new Hornsey Hospital film

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I had a good Good Friday. I didn’t do any work. Well – just a few blue envelopes for a good cause. Reading in the Guardian this morning Michael White‘s take on Brown’s modus operandi. Michael gets it right. Gordon won’t be pushed around by the media. He uses the example of the hoo ha over Brown’s stealth pension raid which rumbled on in the press from last Monday without comment from him, M’s thesis being that Brown waits ’til all critics have critiqued – then enters the fray to put a (hoped for) definitive full stop with no come back on the subject. Psychologically sound analysis of Mr Cautious Annie I say!

The hospital site after demolition work started
From the health of the nation to health locally (!), I see that the film for which I was filmed about Hornsey Hospital has made it to the net. Clearly a lot of work has gone into the film, talking to lots of different participants and editing it all together nicely. You can view it here.

Teachers Without Borders: would you change the name?

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Am rung with the news that GB (not Great Britain – but he who would be PM) has announced £20 million for children’s education in war zones in Africa. So three cheers! I cannot help but notice that since the introduction of the Liberal Democrat campaign to set up an education version of the Red Cross Gordon has been a bit more visible on this issue.

Which reminds me – I am mulling over the name of our campaign. Perhaps we should call it the Ed Cross instead of Teachers without Borders? When I was looking for a catchy title for an International emergency education response team – an education version of the Red Cross in fact – someone suggested the Ed Cross, but I thought it might upset the Red Cross at the time. However, as our campaign progresses I have come round to thinking that Ed Cross expresses what we are trying to deliver much better than Teachers without Borders. What do you think?

Anyway – back to Gordon’s £20 million for African war zones given to Unicef. Save the Children – who are leading the campaign to get the government to accept education as part of first humanitarian response – identified that out of 80 million children not in education in the developing world nearly 40 million are in war or conflict-affected zones. That means Gordon’s beneficence – whilst very welcome – is delivering about 50p per war zone child without education – albeit that his money is earmarked for Africa only whilst the 40 million children I refer to are across the whole developing world. So – not looking a gift horse in the mouth – but there is much more still to do.

Dinner in Blackheath

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Invited to a lunch by Carol Stone (political society hostess) on behalf of Camelot. Whilst it was Chatham House rules in terms of the discussion – so can’t say a word – can say that it was mainly peopled by bright, shiny Tory PPC wannabees, no Labour, two other Liberal Democrats and me! It was a girls only affair. And what was absolutely wonderful was that the lunch was healthy and low cal! A salmon fillet with a few roasted vegetables and then a beautifully laid out plate of bits of delicately cut fruit for each of us. Soooooooooooo much better than boys meals!

In the evening is was over to Blackheath Liberal Democrats Supper Club. I was the guest speaker, talking about international development. As ever with this area, there are experts in bits of the field everywhere I go – so I often pick up good info from the audience – and this being no exception.

I asked anyone there who was a GLA wannabe, a parliamentary wannabe or a Euro wannabe to identify themselves. This is a good time for socials and campaigning as those seeking selection are attending everything everywhere – and a good portion of hands went up. Well done to all of you for doing what you need to be doing!

It was a very pleasant evening – and as ever – informative. The key ‘ask’ from me was to deliver something that local activists can campaign on. Well – that is the point! I am trying to focus on areas where Liberal Democrats can make a difference – like education – as well as holding St Hilary to account! Although I suspect he’s not going to be in the job much longer – moving on to higher things when PMs change. But as I did point out to Blackheath – he is the Minister for Combating Corruption – and yet was not even consulted on the government’s decision to call off the Serious Fraud Office dogs who were about to bite BAE over the Al Yamamah Saudi deals.

UPDATE: You can read two blog accounts of the dinner here and here.

How John Prescott got it wrong – and why he should apologise to two women

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A rant that needs ranting follows the welcome High Court judgement over the sacking of two women from the Bridge New Deal for Communities (NDC) regeneration body in Haringey.

Acting as voluntary chair and vice-chair of its finance committee, Joyce and Ibiola were dismissed after they raised questions about how money was being spent. Residents got up a 600 strong petition to John Prescott – then the man in charge of regeneration. But they got the brush off – and Parliament was told that Prescott and his team were “satisfied that the expulsions were handled fairly”.

Well, that’s not what the High Court decided after looking through the evidence (more details here). So why were Prescott & co satisfied that everything was ok? What investigations did they really carry out on receipt of the petition? And then there is the issue that these two women were trying to bring to light – what happens to all that public money thrown at areas of deprivation with real need? If two people are sacked after asking questions, some tough questions should be asked about what has happened with the money they were concerned about. What shouldn’t happen is what Prescott and co did do – dismiss the petition from 600 residents and say everything is ok.

In fact, the court’s verdict reminds me of my second year as a councillor in Haringey, when I was on the Regeneration Scrutiny Committee and tried to track some of this myself. I could not understand how such large sums of funding could end up with an end result of only around nine jobs being created in the cases we were looking at. Haringey Council may be the ‘accountable’ body for this spending – but what if they are no good? Who and how and to what extent are they checked? Audit – I hear you say! But … there was no audit in this instance since 2001 up until the current date; a question for the Secretary of State I think!

Funding our health service: the future of St Ann's

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Met with Carl Lammy – Chair of Haringey Mental Health Trust. The promised development of St Ann’s (and much needed and vital development – have you seen the antiquated mess of buildings that form St Ann’s?) has run into a storm of objections from local people concerned that what this really means is a sell-off of public land. Well – yes probably.

In this, yet again, we see this Labour government’s steam-roller approach to their avowed intent – which is to remodel the health service into specialist centres with local super health hubs within which 15% of the budget will be spent on private providers.

We didn’t ever get to vote on that. If such a switch to private providers had been from a Tory government it would have brought forth a howl of protest from Labour supporters – but this is from Labour itself. Put this together with the sell-off of public land assets to finance new builds – and you get protests.

Hence the problems St Ann’s renewal is encountering: they suffer the rage of those of us who never agreed to this program – but they have no real choice or voice in this. Local campaigners together with local politicians including my Liberal Democrat colleague Wayne Hoban and others campaigned against the closure of the X-ray service on the St Ann’s site – and that bit has had a reprieve, but it is only a reprieve. We need an X-ray department at St Ann’s. The very important eating disorder services that are there – and many others – that need frequent x-rays.

Anyway – the point is that the facilities at St Ann’s are ancient and failing. To change them to modern day standards and comfort needs money – and Labour will only make funds available on its own terms, making people jump through the hoops that it wants, regardless of local opinion. And that will see land sold, I am sure.

We have seen this happen in education and in housing and now it is health’s turn. Labour’s modernisation program means – do what we say, sell-off land and involve private companies. Now – selling off land and involving private companies can have their place on occasion – who would want to die the in ditch to say that every single last square millimetre of land owned by the NHS anywhere in the UK must be kept for all time? – but the problem with Labour is that they impose, top-down, a one-size fits all solution rather than taking individual cases on their merits and listening to what local people really want.

Selling assets and involving private firms through PFI, PPP, LIFT etc is a live now, pay later philosophy – where we getting new buildings for our aging hospitals and schools but then the pain comes down the line when we are still paying high costs year after year and all the family silver has gone.