Agree our News Release for the Evening Standard of our policies to make Congestion Charging better. The headline is our proposal to double the CC charge for 4 x 4s. The point being that figures have just come out on safety etc which put these vehicles in a very poor light. If you are hit by a 4 x 4 you are twice as likely to be killed as by another car. Of course, they also guzzle fuel, hog road space – and quite frankly – look pretty silly for the school run. However, they are hugely popular with 1 in 7 cars being bought being a 4 x 4 and London buying more than anywhere else in the UK. In Paris they have voted to ban them in the centre. I don’t much believe in banning things – but our proposal is a move to get the Congestion Charging on its way to differentiating between ‘good’ cars and ‘bad’ cars in environmental, safety and health terms.
Met meetings
First meeting of the Performance Committee of the Metropolitan Police Authority on which I have sat for four years and am continuing in this new term of office. Very poor show by the Met as the agenda is huge and there is no one from the Met to speak to most of the papers. Considering the number of people attending and the effort that goes into all of this – no point if the relevant officer leads to each paper are not available.
TUBELINES URGED TO THINK AGAIN OVER STATION FENCE
Highgate Lib Dem councillors are asking Tubelines to think again over plans for a six-foot fence adjacent to Highgate Tube station. Cllr Bob Hare, who is also the Lib Dem Environment spokesperson, says that despite Tubelines’ own acoustic report throwing out the case for a solid six foot high acoustic fence along the top of the Highgate station cutting, the company says they’re going ahead with it.
The fence, which is designed to reflect sound, will stretch from the top of the escalator (beside the Woodman pub on the corner of Muswell Hill Road) all the way to Shepherds Hill.
It will be six feet high for much of its length, although lower at the Shepherds Hill end (where there is no ‘drop’ behind it). Cllr Hare says that such a fence will block views of the greenery alongside Highgate Station.
It will look rather like a fence around a building site, but would be permanent.
Acoustic fences are often used alongside motorways where sound protection is needed for residents. It is designed to reflect traffic noise, in this case back towards the shops and the pavements.
The acoustic report was only sent to Cllr Bob Hare and distributed by him to others after the meeting. This report says:
“There has been no significant effect on traffic noise levels at residential properties around Highgate Station as a result of the removal of vegetation for the embankment stabilisation works.”
The local representatives of the Highgate Society, the Highgate Conservation Area Committee, the Shepherds Hill Association and of Jacksons Lane also oppose the Tubelines plan.
Cllr Bob Hare points out there was no-one at the meeting to represent either the shops and businesses or the many residents who live above the shops – the people directly affected. Before the meeting was held, the Highgate Society wrote to Tubelines asking them to make sure representatives from Archway Road were present.
Cllr Bob Hare has called on Tubelines to hold a further meeting at which the businesses and residents of Archway Road are present. This has been refused by Tubelines, who say they are going ahead with the existing proposal.
Cllr Bob Hare said:
“We have an inequitable result – the people most affected by a decision have not been consulted or even notified. These businesses and residents are alongside Archway Road and must be allowed to participate in a decision that will profoundly affect them.”
“If a six foot acoustic fence is put up, there will be more noise for Archway Road, and even more important, not only will everyone lose much of the pleasant view of greenery, but it will inevitably be ‘open house’ for endless graffiti and posters. The quality of the environment for residents will be greatly damaged and businesses will suffer as a consequence.”
A four-page petition from businesses and customers has been sent to Tubelines, but this has also been ignored.
Cllr Neil Williams adds: “The acoustic report has removed the justification for such a damaging fence. The businesses and people who will be affected must be given the chance to put their views forward.
“Consultation has been severely flawed. At the beginning of these works, Tubelines started without liaising with Transport for London – who, had they been asked, would have allowed the reinforcement works to be done from Archway Road itself instead of from the bottom of the cutting. This would have avoided nearly all of the noise problem because the vegetation and lower tree branches and even several trees would not have needed to be completely removed. Now, there is still time to re-think. We strongly urge them to do so: they are going to be judged by the end result.”
Lib Dem baby
Pop into Cllr Susie Oatway to see the new baby. He’s gorgeous – and this is our first LibDem baby in Haringey. Susie and Mike met through the LibDems – so we are all thrilled. Susie is councillor in Alexandra Ward and also Chair of the local party and leading on the Dukes Avenue Traffic Consultation – as all of these came to the boil virtually at the same time as the GLA/Euro elections and the forecast arrival of baby Alex – we all think she did marvellously to avoid having the baby until after the election!
STATION CLEAN UP – LIB DEM LYNNE PUSHES FOR MORE ACTION IN LATEST TOUR
Lib Dem Parliamentary Spokesperson Lynne Featherstone has secured agreement for further action from Network Rail in the ongoing battle to improve the state of local train stations.
She identified further problems in a third tour, with Mick Murphy of Network Rail, of Harringay, Hornsey, Alexandra Park and Bowes Park stations on Friday 9 July.
For the last two years Ms Featherstone has been continually pressing Network Rail to deal with the dumping, broken fencing, litter and general poor state of the four local Haringey Stations.
This latest tour of inspection showed that many of the improvements requested by Ms Featherstone have now been implemented by Network Rail – although there is still some outstanding work to be carried out.
Commenting Lynne Featherstone says:
“Things have really improved since I first took Mr Murphy around the four stations – but there is still a long way to go. Network Rail must finish its clearance of the sites and introduce regular litter picks. Haringey Council must empty the litter bins regularly and sweep adjoining areas.
“It is really important to keep our stations and their surroundings nice. If our stations look well kept – people will not only feel better, but behave better when using them.”
Note:Lynne’s requested programme of works and report from her visit is as follows:
Harringay station
The area between the station and the road at the top of the station (Quernmore road end) has been cleared of dumped rubbish with new grey fencing. The rubbish was finally cleared from the site behind the new railings but a litter pick is needed again and a regular litter pick maintenance program is required. Network Rail are going to be asked to create a permanent litter pick team.
There are four new Finsbury Park Trust bins that have now been installed at the corners of the short roads leading to the station both sides. The other rubbish bins by the railway land are overflowing and the overspill is making its way behind the fencing. I am pursuing this with Haringey Council as now having got new fencing and cleared the dumping, the overflowing bins are letting down the improvements. I will be asking for a daily or twice daily if necessary collection from these bins.
The next stage will then be to persuade Haringey Council to resurface the road and repave the short stretches of road leading to the station top and bottom and co-terminus with that, persuade the shops working with the Council to be tackled for the graffiti problem.
The fence at the bottom end of the railway bridge next to the big bins needs to be repaired as it appears to have been reversed into. Network Rail is issuing an order for this and for a cleanse behind the fencing. Haringey Council need to clean the edge of the fencing street side.
Hornsey station
Brown wooden fencing needs to be repaired and another clean up around the embankment – both of which are promised by Network Rail.
Area next to taxi office (with generators in) is full of railway spares which should be stored elsewhere. It has been added to recently with more parts. Network Rail are actioning this.
Rubble under the stairs to the station should be cleared. Sleepers and other waste next to line need to be cleared.
Alexandra Palace station
New green pallisade fencing in place and area behind it is much cleaner, having been cleaned recently with vegetation cut back. Handrail has now been replaced on slope.
The fencing has stopped larger items being dumped but continued litter picking is necessary.
Bins either side of the bridge are needed to stop litter encroaching on cleared Network Rail land. I will again request these from Haringey Council
Needs regular litter picks behind the new fencing to maintain appearance.
Bowes Park Station
Green expamet fencing has been installed on Bounds Green side of the station. Network Rail has requested it be extended the length of the path as more dumping is visible when the new fencing stops. Less evidence of rubbish behind fencing, but some large items have been dumped which Network Rail will order clearance.
Dirty Stations
Meet Mick Murphy of Network Rail – who is my Network Rail hero. For about two years now in my mission to get Harringay, Hornsey, Bowes Park and Alexandra Park stations cleaned up, re-fenced, dumping removed, bins provided and so on – Mick has been the man who has helped me get it done.
We toured, for the third time in the last year, the four stations and real improvements have now been delivered. There are still ‘issues’ – like Haringey Council appear not to be emptying the bins that I got put in – and Network Rail need a regular contracted litter pick at all stations – but it’s all in the right direction. Hurrah!
LIB DEM COUNCILLORS WELCOME THAMES WATER RENEWAL OF VICTORIAN WATER MAINS, BUT EXPECT STRONG PERFORMANCE FROM COMPANY
Thames Water are about to undertake one of the most ambitious mainsrenewable programmes the area has seen for over a century, say Lib Demcouncillors, who have welcomed the move. The utility briefed localcouncillors on the issue at a meting last night.
Thames Water officials revealed the scale of the problems in Hornsey’s leakywater system with a massive 25% of water lost through bursts and leakages.The new equipment is designed to have a long life and reduce theinconvenience caused by pipe fractures and valve failures.
Welcoming the programme, Lib Dem Parliamentary Spokesperson and localcouncillor Lynne Featherstone said: “With such enormous leakage rates in thearea, it has been clear for a long time that system is close to the end ofits operational life. We welcome this programme of renewal and will workclosely with Thanes Water to ensure that disruption to businesses andresidents is kept to a minimum.”
Crouch End Lib Dem Councillor David Winskill also welcomed the plans, butsounded a note of caution:
“Thames water has had an appalling record up tonow in responding mains failures. Local incidents that require quite simpleattention have been known to drag on for weeks, causing traffic disruptionand major inconvenience to residents. I have made these points this week toThanks Water representatives and will be keeping a close eye on theproject.”
COUNCIL SLAMMED FOR SLEIGHT OF HAND ON WASTE CHARGES
Local Lib Dems Cllr Lynne Featherstone and Cllr Matt Davies are demandingurgent action over the unfair charges faced by residents in some blocks offlats. They will be putting questions to Labour at the next Full Councilmeeting (Monday 19th July).
While all residents have their waste collected as part of their Council Taxcharge, the provision of waste containers varies from household to household- despite all residents paying council tax at the same rate. The situationwas first highlighted more than a year ago and Cllrs Featherstone and Davieshave been lobbying Haringey Council to rectify this discrepancy.
The anomaly has been made worse since all residents not living in blocks offlats had wheelie bins provided to them at no extra charge. Residents inblocks of flats continue to pay, usually through a management company, anextra charge for the hire of waste containers. The local Lib Dem team isarguing that this is clearly unfair.
“These residents are paying for a waste collection service through theircouncil tax like everyone else,” said Cllr Featherstone (Lib Dem, MuswellHill). “It is unacceptable that one section of Haringey’s taxpayers is thenbeing charged an additional fee – for the same standard of service asothers.”
“Since the introduction of wheelie bins the unfairness of this situation hasonly been increased,” said Cllr Davies (Lib Dem, Fortis Green). “Allresidents are paying the same high rates of Council Tax but some of them areonly receiving half a waste collection service.
“It is right that waste containers are included as an essential part of thecollection process and I am happy that wheelie bins have been provided. Butother residents continue to be charged extra for hire of the wastecontainers at their flats which is an outrageous sleight of hand by Haringey Council. They must now finally face up to this issue and start dealing withall residents even-handedly,” Cllr Davies said.
“The Council has also been putting obstacles in our way, by refusing to giveus a list of those households being ‘double charged’ so that we can write tothem and make sure they are all aware this is happening,” added CllrFeatherstone.
“Perhaps they hope that we will let this issue drop – but Ican assure local residents that we are determined to right this wrong.”
Stop and search
I was pretty pleased with myself for having managed to take a recent Friday afternoon off to go to my youngest daughter’s school Open Day followed by Shrek 2 on the first day of its release. I am always being accused of never doing anything for my children (by my children) when apparently all other parents are perfect in every way.
However, the best laid plans of mice and men and politicians…
All media hell broke loose before lunchtime, as the media woke up, following the publishing of a report on the rise of police stops under Section 44 of the Terrorism Act, to the fact that stops of Asians had risen 302%.
No surprise there! As Vice-Chair of the Stop & Search scrutiny at the London Assembly, I had raised this very issue during the scrutiny itself which reported only a month or so ago. Overall, our findings showed racial bias in the police force led to disproportional stops on black and ethnic Londoners. Stops on black members of the community have risen 30%, stops on Asians 41%, whilst on whites they have risen only 8% over 2000/2001 and 2001/2002.
The Met is committed to improving its record and has been making great strides in the right direction – but clearly from the evidence it still has a very long way to go. The hard-hitting and well-received scrutiny report delivers many useful recommendations on supervision, training, leadership, monitoring and IT data collection which we now expect the Met to implement.
Normal stop and search is exercised at the discretion of an individual police officer and is supposed to be ‘intelligence’ led – the officer having to have reasonable grounds to suspect that an individual is carrying stolen goods, weapons or drugs. However, once an area has been authorised under Section 44 of the Terrorism Act, stops can be carried out by officers on anyone they please without further ado.
Following 9/11 and the heightened security because of very real threats to London, this had led, unsurprisingly, to a rise in Section 44 stops on Asians. Now, whilst the long-suffering Asian community might well be able to deal with a rise in stops as a consequence of this heightened state of alert – the huge scale of the increase in stops of 302% is way beyond the acceptable. We heard evidence during the scrutiny from the Chair of the Islamic Human Rights Commission to the effect that people were being stopped because they ‘looked muslim’.
Nearly 18,000 people have been stopped under Section 44 powers, but this has resulted in only 9 arrests for terrorism and there is no data on whether those 9 arrests led to successful prosecution. It is no wonder that the Asian community is questioning the use of these powers. All of us want protecting from the terrorist threat – but there is also a real need to better protect our communities from any inappropriate use of the necessary but swingeing powers of the Terrorism Act. It is a very difficult balance to get right.
I was still fielding media calls as I left for school Open Day. The last call I took was from a TV station sending an outside broadcast truck to my home especially – as I couldn’t get to their studios in time.
I couldn’t get to their studios in time because of going to Shrek 2 – although I don’t think I particularly made my reasons clear to them! It was to be live TV and it had to be at 6.15pm. I thought that would be fine as the film began at 4pm and ran 93 minutes.
Sitting in the darkened cinema, I realised my miscalculation – 25 minutes of adverts and trailers before the main feature. I abandoned the kids at the cinema telling them to get the bus home and left twenty minutes before the ending to do the interview in the pouring rain in my garden.
Hopefully, they all lived happily ever after…
Police Authority
Annual General Meeting of the new term of the Metropolitan Police Authority at which we (the members) vote for the Chair, Deputies and Chairs of committees etc.
Since the previous Chair, Labour Assembly Member Toby Harris, failed to get re-elected, Labour have been running around trying to ensure a Labour succession to the chairmanship. As at least half the so called ‘independents’ on the MPA are Labour hacks of one sort or another – Len Duvall is duly enthroned. For what it is worth, he has my support anyway. I think he’s probably the only Labour member who could do the job – and none of the other contenders could have garnered enough support.
Of course, the other member of note, was the new Home Secretary’s Independent appointment to the MPA – none other than – yes you have guessed it – that well-known, independent Toby Harris! So independent of political affiliation – not!
Anyway – rather than bore you with the rest of the nominations and positions etc, I’ll move onto the Commissioner getting a bit rattled by the discussion on Stop and Search. Having just had the explosion in the media over the rise of stops on the Asian Community under Section 44 of the Terrorism Act – he was keen to put into the arena completely different statistics.
I make my comments – and I guess we left it that we agree to disagree. I still don’t think the Met fully realise or acknowledge the extent of racial bias we found in the Stop and Search scrutiny – and I think it must be because it is subliminal – almost unintentional.
Deputy Commissioner Blair came over for a chat and to ask if I had received his letter to me in reply to my letter over the DNA testing of black men in South London to find a serial rapist who has for many years committed these crimes against elderly ladies. It is an horrific crime and the police are desperate to get their man.
However, I am of the view that this ‘voluntary’ process inviting the 1000 or so members of the community who fit the racial DNA picture to come give their DNA has some real issues around intimidation. Sir Ian Blair argues in his letter that basically the end justifies the means – and even I can see how hard it must be to know you can get him – and then not be able to do the tests. In his letter, Sir Ian says that out of ‘125 initial refusals, only need to use powers of arrest in five cases’.
I have written back to ask whether they were arrested because they refused to give DNA samples or arrested on another charge and whilst under arrest DNA was then taken. There are some very difficult issues around this taking of DNA from anyone brought to a police station whether charged or not – a result of recent changes to legislation which I believe will discriminate against ethnic communities and also begin a slippery slide to loss of civil liberties.
It is easy, when a crime is this horrific, to say it is so important that just this time we will employ effectively mandatory testing. But once protections of our rights are gone for one reason – it is so easy for them to be eroded.
I feel that the police are cross with me for pursuing this and I have had one email from an old lady in South London cross with me for questionning these tactics. But I do feel the need to follow this through.
And if it is mandatory testing – then let us have the cajones to state it outright, change legislation – but let us not have the hypocrisy of pretending there is anything voluntary about this process. And if the Government really wants a DNA database of the whole country – then let them stand on that platform and propose it publicly and have the battle. The legislation they have passed simply lets it in through the back door – and is the sort of legislation that in practice I believe will lead to the communities suffering further bias.
