Don't let the Hillingdon Tories take our parks away

The Tory Hillingdon Council propose to build a school on Lake Farm Country Park / Botwell Common. This is a green belt site and as a park it has green flag status. There are alternative sites for schools but the Tory council are determined to sell those sites off .

 

Meanwhile they propose to build over every green space in an already very densely built up area of Hayes.

John McDonnell, Labour  MP for Hayes and Harlington is collecting signatures for a petition and on Saturday 25th Februray at 10:30am John will be leading a Demonstration and March. 

 

The Demonstration will be at the Arch on Lake Farm and the March is into Hayes Town. If you are free on Saturday morning, Please feel free to come and join the demonstration and the march and show the Tory Council that we are not going to take this destruction of our  parks and the erosion of the green belt.

This proposal can be stopped but it needs local people to demonstrate the strength of feeling in order to stop it.

Come and join us and dont let the Tories take our park away

For details of Lake Farm Country Park click here 

Hillingdon Labour leader demands crack down on rogue landlords

Councillor Mo Khursheed, leader of the Hillingdon Labour Group writes:

'With the economy essentially in recession and Tory cuts beginning to bite, there is mounting evidence to suggest that families are struggling to meet the cost of decent affordable housing. Those who cannot are placed in a catch 22 situation; either they approach the Council for statutory help and risk being shunted to other parts of the country or are forced into substandard and overcrowded ‘sheds with beds’.
 
Hillingdon is characterised by mixed and diverse communities, it’s what makes this Borough great. However welfare policies being introduced by the government will change the face of our Borough; by 2016 only 49% of Hillingdon will be affordable to recipients of Local Housing Allowance. It is inevitable that this will force more people into these so called Sheds with Beds. The quality of accommodation can be so bad, it not only poses a risk to the inhabitants, but to surrounding properties and residents through unsound construction and fire hazards. Isn’t it about time we tackle this problem and highlight the threat these unlawful buildings pose?

I have asked the Council for data on the suspected illegal use of outbuildings as homes throughout the Borough, only to be told there is no database that can provide this level of detail – how can this be? How can a responsible Council not have access to this information? Our Borough has merely 2 enforcement officers progressing enforcement notices and prosecutions on specifically tackling this one issue. Is it any wonder then, that members enquires on the issue from Labour Councillors have gone unanswered?

May I suggest that Councillor Puddifoot and his Cabinet take a look at neighbouring, Labour controlled, Ealing. Since October its planning team have inspected over 700 suspected illegal outbuildings used for residential purposes, completed 252 investigations and issued 73 enforcement notices. By pledging £250,000 and 6 dedicated enforcement officers, Ealing Council, who are making similar budgetary savings, have shown our Council how to tackle this problem.

It is to simplistic to hope that by just cracking down on rogue landlords the problem will disappear. As demand for housing continues to outstrip supply, it is imperative that affordable housing continue to be supported. Indeed, at last month’s Council meeting we put forward a motion affirming Labour’s commitment to affordable social housing, only for the Tory majority to demonstrate how out of touch they are by dismissing it out of hand.

Hillingdon Council must take a tougher stance on this issue. It must ensure proactive inspections of suspect properties, it must do more to enforce existing laws, and it must respond to tip offs from residents. However a tougher stance can only be demonstrated through action; Hillingdon Council needs to provide sufficient resources so that unscrupulous landlords can be prosecuted.   

 

My aim is not to weaken the rights of landlords. It is about doing what is right. This means tackling the minority of landlords who are unscrupulous, rogue and are profiteering from the exploitation of the desperate and the most vulnerable by housing them in the 21^st Century’s slums. As we mark 200^th anniversary of Charles Dickens, do we really want a return to the conditions he so vividly described?

Londoners shiver because of Boris Johnson’s broken insulation promises

According to new research from the House of Commons Library, almost 200,000 homes in London have missed out on lower energy bills, as a result of Boris Johnson's failure to take advantage of three major energy schemes: (1) Carbon Emissions Reduction Target programme, (2) Community Energy Saving Programme and the (3) Warm Front programme.

Nationally, approximately £7 billion has been available from these three schemes during the Tory Mayor's time in office (2008 – 2012). Had London received its fair share based on the number of people living in the capital there should have been approximately £846 million invested in better insulation – and therefore lower energy bills.

House of Commons Library research commissioned by Tessa Jowell (attached) has indicated that London is set to receive just over half of its entitlement (£396 million).

For example, so far 132,000 London homes have benefited from the Carbon Emission Reduction Target (CERT) programme, 4.2% of all homes in the capital. Across the UK, however, 10% of homes benefited from the programme. If the same proportion of homes in London had been treated as in the rest of the country, approximately 182,000 additional London households would be comfortably warm during the current cold snap, without having to worry about the cost of turning up the heating.

Separate figures reveal that Mayor Johnson's own home retrofit programme has failed Londoners even more miserably.

In November 2009, the Conservative Mayor repackaged Ken Livingstone's home insulation programme as 'RE:NEW" and pledged to treat 200,000 homes by May 2012. The latest figures show that by Christmas RENEW had managed to treat only 23,901 homes - and many of these have received only 'easy' measures, rather than full insulation.

The Citizens' Advice Bureau recently reported that nearly half - 45 per cent - of Londoners are worried that they will not be able to pay their next heating and electricity bills. The average cost of keeping a home warm has risen by £311 a year since 2008 when Boris Johnson became Mayor.

Ken Livingstone said:

"The Conservative party is out of touch with the squeeze on living standards.

"A big part of the high cost of living is the high cost of heating your home, yet the Mayor is just not getting London’s fair share of cash available to insulate homes to keep Londoners warm and save them cash.

"This is an open goal and the mayor has missed it. Compared with the rest of the country London is failing to take enough action to cut heating bills. More concerted action from City Hall would mean less people shivering in their own homes this winter.

"I will work around the clock to get the best possible deal for Londoners and cut the cost of living.”

Blog post courtesy of  'Ken for London'

Branch AGM - 8pm Tuesday 7 February

The next branch meeting is arranged for Tuesday 7 February. As well as updates on the local and campaigning issues we will hold the Annual General Meeting.

For further information on the agenda and venue email the Branch Secretary at sruislipandmanorlp@blueyonder.co.uk .

What did Ed Balls really mean on the deficit?

by Richard Murphy, author of  The Courageous State, as written on his web site Tax Research UK January 14, 2012 .


I am disappointed as the next Keynesian if Ed Balls said yesterday morning that he supports the Tories’ cuts.

He hasn’t, at least as far as I can tell. He has said:

My starting point is, I am afraid, we are going to have keep all these cuts. There is a big squeeze happening on budgets across the piece. The squeeze on defence spending, for instance, is £15bn by 2015. We are going to have to start from that being the baseline. At this stage, we can make no commitments to reverse any of that, on spending or on tax. So I am being absolutely clear about that.

This is not endorsement. This is about saying he has no choice on this matter: in opposition he can’t stop the Tories cutting and as a result the start point for a Labour government will be that these cuts have happened and there’s no point pretending now that won’t have happened: it will.
And what’s he’s also saying is that right now there is no way of predicting what Labour will make priorities for change come the time of the next election, so he won’t.

I’d be saying that too if I had his job. Not that it would make it a lot of fun.

And I also have to say, his focus on jobs is right, although forcing real pay cuts on the state sector is not sustainable forever – and he must know it. But jobs have to come first. That’s essential to the recovery – and for the people of this country.

Now, when is he going to talk the tax gap? Because that’s not a spending commitment, that’s a revenue commitment and that’s something quite different?

PS And if Ed Balls doesn’t mean what I think he means then my opinion changes. So I’m hoping I’m right.

Next branch meeting - 8pm 10 January 2012

For more information email the Branch Secretary on sruislipandmanorlp@blueyonder.co.uk

Ken challenges Boris to TV debate on fares

Ken Livingstone, Labour's London Mayoral candidate, has written to Mayor Boris Johnson today challenging him to hold a TV debate on his fares policy for Transport for London. Ken's letter follows the responses made by Boris Johnson and his aides to Ken's Fare Deal plan announced last week.

Boris Johnson
under pressure from Ken?

Ken has promised if elected next May to cut fares by seven per cent in Autumn 2012, freeze fares in 2013 and subsequently end above-inflation rises as now planned by Boris Johnson. Ken estimates his plan will save Londoners £1,000 on average by 2016.

This compares with Boris Johnson's policy of raising fares by almost six per cent next next month which is in additon to the 34 per cent that fares have already increased since he became Mayor in 2008.

After Ken announced his Fare Deal plan Boris Johnson soon announced a reduction in next month's fare rises from seven per cent to 5.6 per cent. Mayor Johnson's aides admit that fares have already increased by more than by 34 per cent since he became Mayor 2008.

Ken Livingstone

Ken has said he will use a £206 million surplus he had discovered in Transport for London's accounts to fund the seven per cent fares cut and subsequent price freeze.

Ken says in his letter to Boris Johnson "Every year you have an excess operating surplus in your budget and every year you significantly underestimate the amount of revenue you get from fare payers. At the same time you have actually under-spent your capital budget, meaning you have not even invested as much on transport as you could have.

I believe you are significantly over-charging the travelling public, at a point when the state of the economy and the impact of cuts and higher charges such as VAT are making their lives harder."