Report on Full Council - 20th January - News from Camden Conservative Councillors
Continuing with the initiative of your local Conservative Councillors Group here's what happened at this month's meeting.
This will help you to understand how we represent you and try to improve things in Camden.
Contents
1 Deputations to the Full Council
2 Petitioned Debate:
3 Deputation: YMCA to close
4 Debate:
5 Speeches: Housing, Education and the Awami League
6 Written Question: a win on old planning notices
7 Our Motion: Camden New Homes Target
9 Tulip Siddiq - we demand she steps down
8 Contact your Councillors
The State of Camden Housing
Prior to the Full Council, an extraordinary meeting was held to debate the terrible Housing Ombudsman report into cases of maladministration of the Housing Maintenance department.
At last July’s Full Council, I asked a written question about the Housing Ombudsman's adjudications on cases of maladministration and severe maladministration. I had been made aware of a number of critical adjudications against Camden.
Pictured above - exemplar Camden housing repair; square light, round hole!
I wanted to bring these to light, especially knowing that the Housing Office Service delays the publication of their reports for six months after writing them. They hope tenants and residents will forget.
My question was met by a holding message about listening, transparency and the fact that the Council’s established committee structure handles these issues.
My point on the handling of formal complaints was not accepted at the time but is included in the Housing Office’s report where poor communication and systemic inefficiency are two key takeaways from the damning content.
My prime suggestion is that an annual round-up in a report to the Resource and Corporate Performance Scrutiny Committee was wholly insufficient to ensure a broad appreciation of the level of the problems and to deliver timely remedies.
I will make the point again: “The handling of many of these cases should be publicised more openly, and the Council’s response to the findings set out for all to appreciate. The Council should collect, record and publish all adjudications on its own website within a matrix that would also make clear the Council’s response to the findings and further action, to prevent recurrence.”
Petitioned Debate:
Yet again pro-Palestinian supporters demanded that the Council divest its pension of investments that support the state of Israel. The fact that the council’s minute holdings in defence industries amount to 0.15% of the total fund and that these are only very tenuously connected with actual arms did not sway those bringing up this matter; nor had the good news that the ceasefire had commenced.
The visitors left, disappointed and noisily. Hopefully this will not be a recurring event.
Deputation: YMCA to close
A deputation on keeping the Great Russell Street YMCA Health Club was brought to the council. This was passionate and articulate. There was sympathy in the chamber but it is hard to see how Camden can overturn the intentions of the YMCA in divesting their interest in the operation or convincing them to sell the site to another operator.
Debate:
The themed debate had changed its title somewhat since it was first announced. There would appear to be confusion at the heart of this topic. It asked how Camden can be helped by local institutions, organisations and businesses.
Surely, the real question is, “How can Camden help these partners in the borough?” Not “how can they help Camden”.
In any normal circumstances, it should be the responsibility of the government to enable rather than to harvest. In particular, if Camden businesses succeed, then it will follow naturally that the people of the borough will benefit. This would be through investment, employment, and eventually higher tax revenues. Worryingly, amongst London boroughs, in 2022, Camden ranked 19th by business survival rates.
The Labour Budget means business has been negatively affected by the imposition of extra costs in employers’ contributions to national insurance and the increase in the minimum wage. To make things even more unsure, the new government’s proposed changes to worker’s rights will deter many from taking on new employees, again negatively affecting business growth.
That a searching request is now rewarding this dampening of hope for ever greater support of the public sector illustrates a fundamental disconnect between the Council and the private sector.
Speeches: Housing, Education and the Awami League
The leader, Richard Olszewski, welcomed the ending of hostilities in Gaza and was supported in this by all in the chamber.
My response speech mentioned the important events that had happened since the previous meeting. The publication of the Housing Ombudsman’s report into Camden Council and the issue of the figures for Key Stage 4 school results.
The Housing Ombudsman has lambasted the council for handling complaints defensively, specifically regarding housing repairs. See above.
Councillor Andrew Parkinson asked a searching question on this vital topic. Tables on the comparative performance of London boroughs in terms of Education (Progress 8) have shown Camden squarely sits at the bottom. This is a fall on previous years and shows that statistically, a child in Camden would achieve a grade lower in exam results than a child in neighbouring Barnet. The hubristically titled Cabinet Member for the Best Start for Children and Families did not recognise this report. His response was heavy on preparation but light on recognition of this serious issue.
I expressed gratitude that the Leader is reviving the Democratic Review Group in Camden. I look forward to taking part in this and hope that it will greatly improve the balanced allocation of debate in the chamber.
And on the subject of Camden democracy, specifically the prevention of outside political interference at elections, I asked the Leader of the Council to confirm that, given the recent worrying and extensive media coverage of dubious liaisons between politicians and high business both here in Camden and abroad, by the time of the council elections next year the Labour Group will have annulled the marriage of convenience with the ousted Bangladeshi Awami League.
A previous senior Camden councillor's published acceptance that another councillor was promoted to cabinet only after lobbying by the leader of this organisation is a worrying claim. If the arrangement is shown in time to have been a Faustian pact, there should be an investigation into any improper influence on the Council. Camden should not be selling itself to foreign political influence, especially when it may be of questionable origin.
This reasonable question was met by dramatic outrage from the other side. Can it be that the Labour administration has become embarrassed by this relationship?
See below for more on this topic.
Written Question: a win on old planning notices
One small win was achieved and hidden in the bulk of papers for the meeting. The Council has accepted that the profusion of plastic wrapped paper planning notices, left up well beyond their relevant dates, should actually be removed and that Veolia and Camden officers will set about this task. These frequently sit alongside current notices illustrating that their remaining up is just laziness.
If you see any examples of this blight, please take a photo and send it to me with a location. I will happily press to have them taken down.
Our Motion: Camden New Homes Target
Our motion was as usual amended beyond recognition by the Labour group. Due to the incredibly packed schedule, again we did not reach this item but here it is in full:
'The Council notes that the government has made mandatory, the provision of the number of new homes to be delivered each year in the borough at 3,137. The demand is well in excess of what has been achieved in recent years where the target of 1,100 has been undershot so considerably that only an average of 500 have actually materialised. Of these, incidentally, under 40% were affordable.
This requirement is considerably higher than had been suggested in earlier consultation and may well be impossible to achieve.
Camden does not have large tracts of borderline green-belt land within it. There are dwindlingly few brownfield sites and the main areas of available land are the Landsec O2 site and the as yet to be developed, Murphy’s yard. The rest of the borough can only really be tweaked by marginal increased density.
The Council resolves to communicate this situation to central government and make clear that, notwithstanding their election promise to deliver 1.5M new homes in the country, no amount of hectoring will make the impossible possible.'
Yes, the country requires more housing. Yes, Camden needs to provide homes for the population. However, no amount of rhetoric will clear sites in most of the wards in Camden. Shoehorning huge overdevelopment into the few with some free brownfield space could destroy their infrastructure balance and impact outside the areas due to the inevitable height of such concentrated provision.
Interestingly, the amendment was a degree softer in tone, perhaps to prepare for the inevitable disappointment when the new mandatory housing delivery target is not met.
The references to “challenging circumstances,” “pioneering local government approach,” and “challenge set by national government” all suggest that the proposal is unachievable.
When this turns out to be so, I will remind the administration that this point has been made.
This borough is already very crowded, and our motion referred to the extent of the Conservation Area, zero Green Belt, and lack of new Brownfield sites required even to start delivering Angela Rayner's new diktat.
There are many, far more sensible and achievable ways to resolve the country’s housing problems.
After 4 hours in the council chamber, the exhausted limped home.
