LOCAL COUNCILLOR SLAMS COUNCIL FOR LACK OF CONSULTATION OVER INTRODUCTION OF PARKING CHARGES IN FINSBURY PARK

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Stroud Green Councillor Laura Edge has criticised Haringey Parks Department for failing to consult on plans to introduce parking charges between 8am and 8pm in Finsbury Park.

Details of the plans first came to light last week and it was proposed that they should be implemented in the week beginning Monday 11th October. Park users were not consulted over the charges and details of the scheme only became known after Councillor Edge passed them on to the Friends of Finsbury Park.

The introduction of parking charges in Finsbury Park has been on the table since the award of Heritage Lottery Funding for the restoration of the Park. The terms of the grant required Haringey Council to commit to increase the annual maintenance budget for the Park and a resolution to raise part of this revenue from parking charges was agreed by the Executive in October 2002. However, there has been no effort since to consult with park users over the proposals, which many believe are excessive.

Cllr Edge says:

“The current plans are ludicrous; one of the supposed aims of the scheme is to prevent commuters from parking in the park following the introduction of Controlled Parking Zones in surrounding streets. However, it is proposed that the scheme operate from 8am to 8pm, which is longer than the hours of operation of the CPZs in those streets. If you want to deter commuter parking why not introduce charging for a shorter period in the middle of the day? It’s a classic case of using a sledgehammer to crack a nut and will have the effect of penalising genuine park users.”

The Council has now admitted that it bungled the consultation process and has promised to revisit the plans and take on board the comments made by users in order to come up with a more acceptable scheme. Whilst welcoming the change in approach Cllr Edge says:

“Mistakes such as this understandably generate considerable mistrust among local residents and illustrate that Haringey Council simply does not take consultation with local residents seriously.

“The political will is needed to establish an efficient council-wide approach to community consultation involving the creation of a genuine, constructive dialogue with local people rather than the current top-down approach.”

Citizenship ceremony

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Bump into my sister and brother-in-law at Haringey Civic Centre where he has come to take British Citizenship. Dan is American and has been here for decades and finally decided to do this. Very significant day.

I am there to meet a member of the Bangladeshi community who wanted to talk to me about a range of issues. Very interesting meeting followed by meeting with a young guy who wants to set up a Welfare to Work program in Tottenham for unemployed, young ethnic minority residents. I wish him well and support the idea. Finding funding will be the issue.

Then off to the Metropolitan Police Authority (MPA) for a meeting of the EODB (Equal Opportunities and Diversity Board). We discuss informally the work program for the next few years. Loads of good ideas around for investigation and keeping the Met to account ranging from policing terrorism to forced marriages.

At end of meeting get to gossip with the members about who will be the next Commissioner. The members who are on the interview panels will not divulge anything to us who weren’t. So we adjourn to the pub – where still not a word passes their lips!

Transport in West London

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Informal workshop with Transport for London (TfL) looking at traffic modelling in West London to see if you can ram a tram without causing a jam. So far – they can’t. One interesting notion came to light. TfL’s traffic modelling consultant kept assuring members of the Transport Committee that people made choices that meant once they couldn’t use the tram route, they would change the way they drove, where they worked, the mode they travelled, etc, etc.

When I pushed him in saying that if you stick a giant tram down a main road – people actually had no choice but were being thus forced to change their life patterns – he conceded. I wish they could get over some of the pinch points – but I don’t see them being able to do it well enough not to ruin their business case for the tram. The business case is shaky anyway and hugely expensive. They ought to take a look at a modern electric trolleybus for one quarter the price. Particularly as the experts said at the formal scrutiny session that the tram would be out of date virtually by the time it was built.

Anyway – it was a really useful meeting and the TfL director of the project is really working hard to try and get this through. In the end, if the Mayor says it goes ahead, it does – regardless of consultation. We’ll see. I don’t think he will have the money anyway. Ken can faff about for a few years with inquiries and feasibility and on and on. By the time to real funding is needed who knows where we will be…

(To see further details of my view on the tram, have a look at http://www.glalibdems.org.uk/news/178.html).

Hornsey Town Hall

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Just a note about the Hornsey Town Hall Advisory Panel meeting on Wednesday 6th October for information.

There was a presentation from a ‘developer’ – but a developer with a difference. She had a heart and developed in partnership with the community and the needs of that community – whilst still making a living.

This was Sylvie Pierce from a company called Capital Providence. Sylvie told us about her work, specialising in the development of heritage buildings. Shoreditch New Deal for Communities Trust had come to her and asked her to look at buildings in the area. She’d identified a Grade II listed building she felt she could develop well.

The similarity with Hornsey Town Hall was that in order to make the development work, 20% of the site had been allocated for residential development. This provided the funding for making the best of the rest of the site – including both a community space and a restaurant called the Hoxton Apprentice involving Pru Leith (a bit like Jamie Oliver and his training restaurant). The restaurant profit goes to running the whole scheme. She put two super-duper apartments on the top to bring in some loot – and Bob’s your uncle.

I know I have truncated the story – but the picture painted was of a different approach to development from the usual approach of developers. It was one where the developer worked with a trust and with brilliant architects. They delivered a great project and produced something which generated the money to pay for the scheme.

Now, there’s been some questions about Haringey Council’s attitude towards the town hall. At the meeting, Judy Bax (the Labour councillor who chairs the advisory group) said Haringey’s position is “no profit, no loss” – they won’t put money into developing the site, but neither are they going to insist on making money out of the site either. Many people have campaigned against any plans to just sell-off the Town Hall, so that was good news to hear.

We then had a look at the proposed planning brief for the site. It was only tabled at the meeting and is quite long and complex relating to Haringey’s planning policies etc. It covers what sort of developments on the site would be allowed. It’s really just a framework outlining what sort of things can be done on the site.

This will be presented at the next Crouch End / Stroud Green Area Assembly. It is very, very general – and no one should get the idea that this is in any way the detail of what would be on the site.

The formal consultation on the planning brief runs from 16th October until 15th November. It will be exhibited at the library and the town hall and Haringey Council will be writing to residents most affected. The council are still discussing how far and how wide the consultation in terms of individual letters to residents will be.

It will also be more fully presented at the next Advisory Panel. It will be available on the council website and there will be adverts in the press notifying of all of this.

There was then a presentation by one group with a suggested way forward for the period when Haringey Council moves out and before the new development is ready.

In brief, there was a proposal for an interim management committee to move into the site and let what space could be let for commercial rents (offices, rehearsal rooms, meeting rooms etc) and have some artistic enterprises using some of the space so that there was no down time or loss of earnings during the 3-5 years the project might be likely to take.

Everyone thought a swift operation was necessary – but how and who should do this was a matter to be gone into further.

As for long-term arrangements – this was the crux of the matter as far as I could see. The Advisory Panel has to put a report to Haringey Council Executive in the relatively near future. This is the area which will touch on who makes the decisions, how much is developed for community and how much for commercial; whether the council retains control and chooses a developer etc or whether a charitable trust with skilled trustees carries this all forward.

Andrew Travers, who is the Director of Corporate Finance at Haringey, had made it quite clear that the council itself would not support the trust idea.

However, the clear will of earlier meetings had been for a trust and to remove it from the auspices of Haringey Council. Several people said that the trick would be to get the Labour councillors who form the Council Executive (who will make the decision) on board and that they would be scared of a trust because of their experiences with Ally Pally.

They were reminded by a member of the panel that Ally Pally Trustees were actually councillors and it was effectively still run by the council as trustees – and that this was quite different from the bulk of a new trust which would have mostly independent trustees.

This got batted around for a while. I voiced the view that we had to make a clear statement of the vision (which everyone virtually agrees on as an arts/education/community etc space with some commercial parts) and make it very clear that an independent charitable trust is the only way forward. However, there was a need for a changeover period while the long-term development got up and running.

It was also understood that Haringey Council could not simply ‘give’ a £20million asset directly and without safeguards to a trust – however brilliant that trust might be. By the same token if the trust was to have total control in the end – it too needed to have a transfer program, business plan etc. Additionally, during any transitional phase decisions that would have to be made would have to be joint so that both parties had some controls and safeguards. The third way one could even say!

It did seem that there was some forward movement on this as a way forward to move from council to trust control.

The next meeting is in a few weeks time, so I’ll update you on further progress as it happens.

Profits on the Tube

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Interview for London Tonight on the obscene profits made by Tubelines in their first year of running the Northern, Jubilee and Piccadilly lines. To add insult to injury, their Chief Executive, Terry Morgan has received GBP100,000 bonus.

Now the profit was expected. That’s the consequence of Labour’s tube privatisation scheme, with GBP41million profit taken out of the tube rather than reinvested in the infrastructure.

But in this first year, Tubelines failed to reach 27 of their 39 targets. Of course, the Chief Exec’s bonus was for delivering the profits to shareholders rather than delivering an improved service to London’s poor tube users.

Strangely enough, Mayor Livingstone – erstwhile opponent of the PPP – made no comment. Well – now he’s a Labour Mayor…!

DNA testing

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Off to Sidcup in Kent for a briefing from the Senior Met Detective in charge of Operation Minstead. In short, this is a police operation to catch a serial rapist of elderly women in South London. The crimes have been committed over the last 12 years and the police have the criminal’s DNA but have not been able to catch him.

My involvement in this case is to do with the so-called ‘voluntary’ collection of DNA to try to catch him. There is a cutting edge technique being used to genetically identify from DNA the genealogical origins of an individual.

In Minstead’s case this is a man between 25 and 40, black and from a particular area / island in the Caribbean. Using this information, the police narrowed down their ‘persons of interest’ from an original 20,000+ to 917 men. The police want to test all their DNA so they can eliminate them from their investigations. Now, not everyone was happy to be tested. If they refused they got a letter from the Met saying that a senior officer would look into the reasons for their refusal and let them know of their decision. If they still refused and there were enough grounds to arrest the refuseniks – they did. This resulted in five arrests – although two men changed their mind at the last moment.

I have a number of concerns around all of these issues. One is the change in legislation which allows the police to keep on record DNA from persons who are taken to a police station even if not arrested or anything. I am also concerned that the word ‘voluntary’ is meaningless as it is clear that what is actually happening – albeit carefully – is mandatory testing. If we’re going to have mandatory testing, there should be a proper debate – and a change in the law and rules – rather than it happening by the backdoor.

In fact a very, very senior Met Officer was talking to me about Minstead at a meeting and, when I voiced my concern over the grey area around what was ‘voluntary’, he said – “Oh voluntary is voluntary – until they say no.” No doubt he would say he was joking. Poor judgement I say.

Another key issue raised is the actual science of genetic identification in this way. It seems to me, following my time looking in detail at the use of stop and search by the police, that any of the mechanisms in the police force that are discretionary – like stop and search – can fall prey to discrimination.

This new science cannot be applied as yet to the white European population. The group is too big and the individual components are as yet unidentifiable. Thus this new forensic ‘miracle’ may have built-in discrimination. To be pursued.

FEATHERSTONE SEEKS PM'S INTERVENTION OVER CARE HOMES CLOSURE

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Lib Dem councillor Lynne Featherstone has called on the Prime Minister this week to make an 11th hour intervention to save two of Haringey’s residential care homes.

The closure of Cooperscroft and Trentfield homes could be finalised tonight at the Council’s Executive meeting. This is despite months of protests from residents, their families and Haringey Council’s Lib Dem Opposition following the announcement of the closure plans.

The Lib Dems are deeply concerned that Haringey Council has appeared to have ignored all the concerns raised by residents and their families during the consultation process.

There is also general concern that there is already a limited service provided to elderly residents in Haringey which has been compounded in recent years by the closure of Honeywood residential home by the Labour-run Council.

The Lib Dems and campaigners say that at the time of Honeywood closure the Labour Administration made assurances that the money made from the sale would be ringfenced used to bring Cooperscroft and Trentfield up to the new standards required.

Cllr Featherstone comments:

“There is scant provision for residential care for Haringey’s elderly people and these closures will not only exacerbate the situation for those too elderly or frail to continue independent life, it will be a betrayal of the campaigners who fought to keep the homes open four years ago.

“So far the Labour Council has not listened to calls to save Cooperscroft and Trentfield. These homes must not be closed and pressure must be brought to bear on the Council to avoid this terrible decision.”

LIB DEMS BACK LOCAL RESIDENTS OF 'NEGLECTED' ESTATE

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Following a visit to Hannay Lane N8 by Lib Dem councillors for Crouch EndRon Aitken and Peter Floyd last week, patrols by police and communitysupport officers are to be increased, and discussions are to take placebetween tenants and the Housing Association that manages the estate.

Elderly residents in one of the blocks of flats recently complained aboutharassment from people who do not live on the estate, including abusivelanguage and vandalism of the door entry systems. Police have also beencalled several times in the last few months to incidents involvinganti-social behaviour on the estate.

Cllrs Aitken and Floyd are hopeful that the extra patrols will detertrouble-makers and that a meeting between residents and Housing Associationrepresentatives will resolve some of the other concerns.

Cllr Aitken comments:

“I have spoken to the Police Community SupportOfficers for Crouch End following a visit to the estate where we met many ofthe residents.

“We have also written to the Housing Association, London and Quadrantregarding a number of safety issues which need to be tackled”.

Cllr Floyd adds:

“Because Hannay Lane is on the Islington boundary it isoften overlooked when it comes to local services. It is important that wemake sure that residents here get as much support as those elsewhere in theborough.”

Care homes in Haringey

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It’s Full Council meeting in Haringey. The main thing of note for me was a sycophantic question from a Labour councillor to the (Labour) Executive Member for Social Services asking her to congratulate herself on an ‘event’ for listening to older residents and what they want at the Ally Pally.

Sick making really – as this was the night before Labour would officially take the decision to close two of the last remaining residential care homes for the elderly that serve Haringey borough. They had tried to close them around four years ago and the campaign with relatives and residents had seen them off.

Haringey had promised then to use the money from the sale of another elderly home to fund the improvements that would be necessary to bring the two homes under threat up to new required standards.

Seemingly, Haringey couldn’t remember their promises. But we all did. The relatives of residents of the home were broken hearted and trying so hard to save them. Tomorrow night the curtain will fall. Even though there are deputations from relatives – I know Labour in Haringey. Whatever they may say about ‘choice’ in old age, they’ve already made the decision. Of course people want to remain independent as long as possible – but there does come a time for some when they need more care than can be given in their own homes.