Haringey Council admitted last week that it is so far behind schedule in its plan to halve the number of residents in temporary accommodation by March 2010 that it has changed the current target.

Documents released to Haringey Council’s Cabinet meeting on 16th June 2009 showed that Haringey Council was 520 behind the 4,000 target set for this stage in the project. The response of Haringey Council has been to change the target to make it “more realistic”.

Cllr Bevan, who is in charge of the Council’s housing, seemed to be unaware of the change saying, “As far as I am aware the temporary accommodation target has not been changed.” He was quickly corrected by council officers who said that the targets had been “re-cast”.

Liberal Democrats have branded the strategy a failure and have said that fiddling with targets is a disgrace which is of no comfort to the thousands of local residents living in inadequate housing throughout the borough.

Cllr Matt Davies, Liberal Democrat housing spokesperson, comments:

“This is an admission that Haringey Council is failing so many residents who continue to be stuck in temporary accommodation.

“Instead of recognising their failure and trying to do something to improve their performance, Haringey Council has simply reduced the target to try and hide their failure.

“Haringey Labour has no solutions so instead they fall back on fiddling with targets and creating confusion – even confusing their own councillor in charge of the borough’s housing.”

Lynne Featherstone MP adds:

“Week after week I see the human face of Haringey Council’s failure – residents who have been in temporary accommodation for years with no realistic prospect of change. The news that, yet again, a Labour strategy has failed will come as no surprise to them but should not be allowed to continue.”

To show support for a campaign to allow asylum seekers who have been in the UK more than six months to work and go to university, Lynne Featherstone MP today met with young local residents to hear their personal stories and how the restrictions have affected their lives.

Save the Children’s ‘Brighter Futures Campaign‘ aims to highlight the special difficulties young asylum seekers experience when they are not allowed to support themselves and carry on with a normal life whilst their application is considered. With the Home Office sometimes taking up to ten years to reach a final decision, the work and education restrictions can be very damaging to young people’s self-esteem and future.

Lynne is one of many Liberal Democrat MPs who have been fighting for asylum seekers’ right to work in Parliament, and has recently signed a motion calling for the issue to be debated in the Commons.

Lynne Featherstone MP comments:

“It’s been inspirational to meet these amazing young people, who have gone through so much to end up here in Haringey today.

“But meeting them has also made me angry. When waiting for a decision that will determine their entire future, they have no chance to live a normal life and build up the self-esteem and sense of pride that you get from education and from working.

“That’s not right and that’s not fair. They deserve the chance to grow intellectually, financially and psychologically, and I will continue fighting to get them that right.”

In a bid to help raise awareness and highlight the hard work and commitment of Haringey’s 16,000 carers, Lynne Featherstone MP delivered this year’s keynote speech at the Haringey Carers Week Conference on Friday.

This year’s conference, titled ‘Hidden and invisible’ highlighted the hard work, love, and commitment of the almost one in 15 Haringey residents who provide unpaid care for a loved one who is ill, frail, or disabled.

The conference, which marked the end of this year’s carers week, coincided with a recent shocking survey of British carers that show almost three-quarters of carers have reached breaking point due to the pressure of their role, with many suffering severe depression and some even attempting suicide. The survey also showed that almost one in two carers are left worse off financially as a result of caring for a loved one.

Lynne Featherstone MP comments:

“There are thousands of people in Haringey who sacrifice their time- and often their health, finances, work and social life- in order to care for a love one.

“I’m proud to have been given the chance to do my bit to help raise awareness of the wonderful work carers do here in Haringey. They deserve to be recognised for the priceless contribution they make, both to our local community and to society at large.”

It has been revealed that, despite problems with fly-tipping, littering and graffiti in the Finsbury Park area, Haringey Council has ceased funding to keep the park and surrounding streets clean.

In a recent message to councillors the Chief Executive of Finfuture, an independent community-led scheme for the Finsbury Park area, said that funding from Haringey Council for two environmental officers had stopped from 1st April 2009. However, Hackney and Islington Councils, who also support Finfuture financially, will continue to fund one officer.

Local Liberal Democrats in Harringay and Stroud Green wards have criticised the Council for pulling the plug on funding and failing to recognise the ongoing need for dedicated services to clean up the park and surrounding streets. They have urged Haringey Council to reconsider the decision to stop funding the environmental officers.

Cllr Richard Wilson (Stroud Green) comments:

“Both Islington and Hackney Council have decided to continue funding to keep Finsbury Park and local streets clean yet Haringey would rather choose to fund higher councillor allowances than spend the money on keeping the local area clean. Is this an example of a front line service being cut due to the Council’s inept financial management or its perverse priorities?

“Only last week we came across a big pile of rubbish in Woodstock Road near Finsbury Park – this will only become more commonplace if Haringey Council cut cleaning services for local streets.”

Lynne Featherstone MP adds:

“Haringey Council have shown that, despite the need to keep one of our most popular green spaces and the surrounding streets clean, they are cutting this much needed service.”

Councillor Ed Butcher, Liberal Democrat Leader on London Fire Brigade and Haringey councillor (Stroud Green), commenting on the conviction of two Haringey landlords for breaching fire regulations says:

“People who rent need to know they are safe. All too often tenants have no choice but to trust their landlords. Prosecution should always be a last resort, but if someone is responsible for protecting other people’s safety, they simply cannot ignore warning after warning from Fire Officers. It is for the courts to decide the sentence on the severity of the breach. In this case they clearly thought that the breach was serious.

“Enforcement action like this is to prevent a tragedy before it happens and I hope it will make others locally and across London think twice about their duty to protect people against fire.”

Extract from press release issued by London Fire Brigade:

Haringey landlords prosecuted for fire safety breaches

Two Haringey landlords have today been sentenced to six months imprisonment and ordered to pay £5000 costs each for breaching fire safety regulations, after a successful prosecution by London Fire Brigade.

The prosecution followed a fire at a house converted into bedsits, on Hampden Road, N8, on 31 March 2007.

Sentencing of the building’s owners Michael de Havilland and Sally Fox, of Muswell Hill, took place at Wood Green Crown Court on Friday 12 June, after de Havilland and Fox pleaded guilty to the breaches.

After the fire, London Fire Brigade Fire safety inspectors found multiple breaches of the Regulatory Reform (Fire Safety) Order 2005.

These breaches included inadequate fire detection systems, lack of proper fire doors on bedrooms or the communal kitchen, no emergency lighting in the building’s stairway, lack of firefighting equipment such as a fire extinguisher or fire blankets and no fire risk assessment available for inspection.

As a result of the breaches a further inspection was arranged where it was requested that the owners were present so that these could be highlighted, and an enforcement notice was issued, explaining that the breaches needed to be dealt with.

After further contact with the co-owners and further inspections over a number of months, inspecting officers found that no work to make the premises safe had been completed.