Defend Council Housing 2009 Dates

Dear Defend Council Housing supporter ,

Lambeth councillors are pressing ahead with plans for a £12 per week rent rise on top of 130 job cuts to housing services due to the crisis in the Housing Revenue Account.

Lambeth tenants, leaseholders and trade unions are holding a protest at the full council meeting on FEBRUARY 9th at 7pm at Lambeth Town Hall against this latest attack on council tenants. Use the attached petition and return it to 56 Foxley Square SW97RY , or email me and I will arrange to collect from you.

Lambeth Defend Council Housing meeting February 14th at the Brixton Recreation Centre, Station Road, Social Rooms Level 5 from 1.30 pm -3.30 pm with speakers from DCH , Tenants Council and trade unions on the housing crisis plus election of DCH committee. All welcome.

If you would like to stand for election as secretary , chair or treasurer to the DCH committee please email me asap - you are also welcome to stand for the committee as a 'general member'. The committee meets about every three months , or as and when necessary.

The House of Commons Council Housing Group is holding an enquiry at the House of Commons on 25th Feb 12-8pm and is asking all tenants, leaseholders and councillors to give evidence about the current state of council housing. Lambeth DCH are organising a delegation - watch this space for more details.

Happy holiday to you all !

in solidarity
Stephen

Lambeth Living Chair arrested

Dear councillor

You may be aware that Asuman Ozkan, Chair of Lambeth Living, was arrested earlier today. The allegations against Ms Ozkan are to do with fraud.

We are not in a position to comment on the details of the case but wanted to let you know that she has been written to today by Lambeth Council asking her to step down as Chair of Lambeth Living. We do not wish to prejudge the case but in light of the arrest we believe that it is not appropriate for her to stay in post. If she does not step down we reserve our right under the management agreement to remove her from the role.

I would also like to make it clear that the issues involved do not relate to her role as Chair of Lambeth Living.

Regards

Derrick Anderson
Chief Executive

"Lambeth faces fraud inquiry into £22m housing black hole"

Yesterday's Evening Standard reports how council bosses are under investigation for the catalogue of cock-ups that have led to the massive projected overspend in Lambeth's housing department in the 2008/9 financial year.

Until now, it has been Lambeth tenants, leaseholders and staff who have paid the price - job cuts across the board, services cut back, repairs not done.

And of course, Council Leader Steve Reed is blaming the whole mess on the Lib Dems - how pathetic! Grow up, take some responsibility, have the decency to fall on your sword.

Click here for the full story

Steve Reed, Leader of Lambeth Council...

…has been elected to the London Councils' Executive, with responsibility for housing! What a joke!!!

This is the same man who presided over the introduction of Lambeth's ALMO, "Lambeth Living", contrary to the wishes of tenants. The same man who is responsible for a deficit in housing of over £20 million, and the subsequent slashing of services and jobs. The same man who is trying to privatise even more council services by giving private contractors ten-year deals with no consideration for how those contracts will be monitored.

Click here to read the full story

Lambeth UNISON votes for solidarity with Adrian Swain

This motion was passed unanimously at our branch committee today:

This branch notes:
Adrian Swain is an NUT rep at St Paul’s Way School in Tower Hamlets. He is currently being disciplined by management for failing to comply with the school’s dress code. The code was imposed on staff in the autumn term with no consultation whatsoever. Adrian has been given a final written warning for misconduct (for failing to obey a “reasonable instruction” of the headteacher) and he faces a hearing in December which could result in his dismissal.

This branch expresses its solidarity with Adrian Swain and agrees that:

• The head teacher at St Paul’s Way School should stop the victimisation of Adrian Swain, halt the disciplinary procedures and reverse the previous decision to discipline Adrian Swain.

• We offer our full and unconditional solidarity to Adrian Swain and the NUT group at the school in resisting this victimisation.

ROUND 2 to the residents and campaigners

Dear all,

Last night campaigners had a victory when the 'call-in' (when a decision is looked at by scrutiny) was successful. This means that the decision to put an Academy as well as the primary school on the current Fenstanton site will need to be looked at again by Cabinet.

We will have one more chance to put in our objections. This will probably be heard at a special cabinet meeting so we will need to act swiftly to get people to attend the meeting and protest. As soon as I know the date I will let you know but it will be within the next 10 days.

Thanks
Sara Tomlinson
Lambeth NUT, on behalf of campaigners.

Lambeth Council tenants face 'appalling' 17.5% rent hike

This week's Streatham Guardian features a story about the massive rent rises facing council tenants in Lambeth from April 2009.

Click here to read it

Today's South London Press features a similar story: Lambeth rent-hike is 'crushing blow'

With "Lambeth Living", the council's ALMO, already cutting services and making staff redundant, it's clear that tenants are going to be forced to pay more - for less.

Time after time council tenants have to pay for the mistakes made by senior managers who can't manage their budgets properly, while contractors rip off the council and the fat cats responsible for this mess get juicy bonuses.

Enough is enough! Tenants, working with the trade unions representing council staff, need to seize control of council housing and run it properly: for the benefit of Lambeth's 30,000 council tenants and leaseholders, not the greedy bosses.

South and South West London Anti-Fascist Group

Labour movement and anti-racist activists in south London have recently founded this group, which is sponsored by Battersea & Wandsworth and Croydon trades councils. It will be organising a lot of campaigning work, producing literature etc in the coming months. More information soon!

Email southlondon-antifascists@aktivix.org

The founding statement is below

**
We are a labour movement and community-based campaign against the BNP and other fascist, racist and far-right parties.

The group will be comprised of activists and delegates to a range of national anti-fascist and anti-racist organisations like Unite Against Fascism and Searchlight and to events co-ordinated by SERTUC. It will be committed to non-sectarian unity and to working with all political parties against fascism.

We oppose the BNP and parties like them because they stand against the interests and traditions of the labour movement. They are fundamentally anti-working class, racist, sexist and homophobic. The BNP has grown in the recent past. At the last elections they won a further ten council seats (in areas within the lowest 10% for all socio-economic indicators) and Richard Barnbrook was elected to the Greater London Assembly.

They have grown by relating to the very real crises facing working-class communities: the problems in housing, hospitals, education and public services. The BNP also exploits the attacks on immigrants and asylum-seekers from all sides of the political spectrum and the press.

We seek to build links between the labour movement and community groups in order to:

1. Mobilise the labour movement and communities to campaign against local fascist activity;
2. Mobilise against the fascists and for the defence of communities targeted by fascists eg. supporting postal workers who refuse to deliver BNP election material and organising demonstrations to stop BNP activity;
3. Expose the bigoted lies of groups like the BNP for what they are and work to extend anti-racism and other liberation campaigns within our movement;
4. Educate the community, and in particular young people, about the nature of groups like the BNP;
5. Oppose all forms of racism, including the demonisation of immigrants;
6. Develop materials and campaigns that contest the political terrain adopted by the far right - counterposing working-class solidarity to their politics of race hate;
7. Organise workers and communities, black and white, British-born and migrant, to fight back against cuts and privatisation - for decent jobs, homes, education, services and democratic rights for all.

Lambeth UNISON AGM time and venue

Dear all

I've recently received the notification for the AGM: 1:00pm, 13 January 2009, Town Hall. I'm sure the reason for this is to try and maximise attendance from Unison members in core services and functions.

However, it is very bad for others: for example, support staff in schools, many of whom cannot get paid time off and are pretty low paid. I will try to get there, but I think most members will not. Not only is this bad for branch democracy, it sends out a signal that the branch is only really interested in those core, mainly white collar sections.

When I was branch secretary at Companies House, Cardiff, we recruited the evening shift: mainly low paid women, who worked 6-midnight. So we held two AGMs, afternoon and evening. This had drawbacks: not everyone could hear all the arguments during contentious debates, for example. But it worked in keeping everyone feeling they were a valued part of the branch.

What can we do? Are there others in the same position?

Jeremy Drinkall

Learning Support Assistant

Lilian Baylis

Climate change or climate disaster? - Wednesday 3rd December

Members of Permanent Revolution and Green Left discuss the ever more dramatic threat to the planet and whether “ecosocialism” can provide an answer to the oncoming crisis.

Upstairs at the Ship Pub, 68 Borough Road (corner with Newington Causeway) London SE1. Starting time 7.30.pm (nearest tube Elephant & Castle or Borough).

PCS dispute - a defeat?

Some of the Lambeth Housing stewards recently said that they thought the PCS (the civil service union) had made a tactical error in calling off the strike when the government had promised the PCS nothing other than talks.

It now seems that the PCS has settled the dispute and the outcome is as some of the housing stewards had feared. See here:

http://www.pcs.org.uk/en/campaigns/national-pay-campaign/pay-campaign--members-briefings/joint-pcs-and-government-statement.cfm

http://www.pcs.org.uk/en/campaigns/national-pay-campaign/pay-campaign--members-briefings/

This seems to say that there might be some extra pay in exchange for “efficiency savings” and “significant workforce reform”. Neither of those phrases will be a positive thing for PCS members and probably mean job cuts. The PCS mentions in its statement that this means cut backs in consultants but I find it hard to believe that this is what the management and government have in mind.

A couple of quotes from a trade union web board I go on (from PCS members):

“it seems there has been a decision to settle the dispute in return for nothing at all. There are some words on 'recyclables' but these are not commitments and are linked to job cuts and performance pay. Far worse than anything I expected.”

and

“The government has avoided strike actions for some pretty vague and intangible reassurances”

The PCS statements ends by saying:

"Since 2004 we have protected pensions, won agreements on avoiding compulsory redundancies and on privatisation, and stopped attacks on sick pay.

Members should feel proud that we have now made this breakthrough on pay."

However while I can understand the PCS wanting to be positive this just isn't a rounded assessment. With pensions the PCS agreed to a two tier pension deal where new members now have a significantly worse pension, and is a recipe for weakness in future industrial disputes over pensions. Also while it is good that compulsory redundancies have generally been avoided it is the case that a huge swathe of the work force has been cut back and that has put a lot more pressure on work loads and services. And now with the pay dispute I'm not convinced there has been a breakthrough. There are no guarantees here and the underlying message seems to be that management might consider some pay increases in return for job cuts. I hope I'm wrong on this, but I can't see how else it can be read. I really don't think this should be dressed up as a victory just as UNISON tried to dress the pensions defeat up as a victory.

While the PCS has one of the best union leaderships (along with the RMT) that doesn't mean it should be beyond criticism.

I’m not pointing this out to be “sectarian” but just because I think the PCS leadership made a tactical mistake here and I think the whole union membership (no matter what union they’re in) has to look at what can be done so we can win future disputes. We can’t carry on with the current strategies as they clearly aren’t working in terms of winning disputes.

This is not meant to be uncomradely in terms of the PCS or anyone else but we can’t avoid these kinds of discussions as all union members are facing job cuts and pay cuts, and with the recession getting worse these attacks are likely to get worse.

Why we need a "workers' plan for the crisis" and a "workers' government": 11 December public meeting

7.30pm, Thursday 11 December
The Calthorpe Arms, 252 Grays Inn Road, Kings Cross, London

Organised by London Workers' Liberty

As the bosses seek to make workers pay for their crisis through wage cuts, job losses, cuts in services and repossessions, how should the labour movement respond? How do we effectively defend ourselves, and what should our broader goals be? We will be putting forward our workers' plan for the crisis and arguing that the labour movement should aim for a "workers' government", while also considering other responses on the left.

Speakers: Maria Exall (CWU national executive, pc), Steve Hedley (RMT London Transport Region secretary, pc), Sacha Ismail (Workers' Liberty)
Plus a speaker on the upcoming student national demonstration

Chair: Christine Hulme (PCS DWP West London, Labour Repesentation Committee national committee, pc)

All welcome

Don't suppport "Progressive London"!

By Sacha Ismail

Ken Livingstone has launched an organisation called "Progressive London", backed by a "broad alliance of individuals, campaigns, communities, artists, trade unions, environmentalists, political parties and groups". It is for "all those who believe in social justice, environmental protection, good community relations, cultural innovation and the many other areas in which London has made a contribution recognised throughout the world."

The CWU, GMB, Unison and Unite - or at least senior figures from these unions - seem to be backing this "campaign", and it is starting to be raised in trade union branches. Socialists should oppose support for it wherever we can (members of Workers' Liberty will certainly be doing so).

In the first instance, this is quite transparently a vehicle for Ken Livingstone to return to City Hall in 2012. In this year's election we called for a second preference vote for Livingstone on the grounds of Labour's residual links to the trade unions; but that is no reason for us to positively support the electoral ambitions of this fake left careerist. Particularly not when his fake left coat of paint is such a pale one, as the politics of "Progressive London" demonstrate.

This is a classic - though rather weedy! - example of what Marxists have called a "popular front": an alliance which ties the labour movement to sections of the ruling class in the name of "progressive", non-working class, ie capitalist goals. By doing so such alliances stifle the development of the class struggle and independent working-class politics. In some cases (eg France in 1936 and '68, Spain in 1936-7) this has meant saving capitalism's skin from the threat of working-class revolution; in Britain today it means a roadblock to the labour movement rebuilding itself after a long period of defeat.

Who could be against "social justice", "cultural innovation" and so on? The question is from what standpoint, with what class perspective, such abstractions are approached. Thus, for instance, the founding statement talks about "investment in good public services", but says nothing about the cuts and privatisation that not only Boris Johnson's administration but the Labour government are liberally doling out; it talks about anti-racism, but will criticise neither the immigration laws nor the racist brutality of London's police (who, remember, Livingstone has sought to defend from Johnson's criticism). It talks about "employment rights", but naturally says nothing about Livingstone's union-busting on London Underground.

The organisation's first "campaign" is against Boris Johnson's above-inflation increases in Tube and bus fares; no mention of the fact that Livingstone did the same thing while he was in office.
Of course, "Progressive London" cannot and has no wish to raise substantive working-class demands, being made up as it is of mildly dissident New Labour loyalists, Lib Dems, right-wing Greens and other community respectables.

Shortly after his defeat in May, Livingstone wrote an article in the Guardian that reveals the underlying character of his new organisation:

Following May 1 some people are posing the choice as between moving "to the left" or "to the right". This is not the right question. Labour must place itself at the centre of a progressive alliance that can solve the problems facing the country.

What are the key elements of this? There are three tasks for a government and a mayor - to ensure the country and London are an economic success; to ensure everyone shares in that success; and to ensure that success is sustainable in the long run through improving the environment.

Labour's campaign in London gained major support from business. The Financial Times concluded that the majority of big business in London supported my re-election. There is no way to check that, but I know from meetings that very large sections of big business supported my campaign.

No surprise, given Livingstone's record, his love in with the City and property developers etc. "Progressive London" is the organisational expression of this "progressive" business-based alliance. Livingstone must be hoping that in a few years enough London capitalists will have tired of Boris Johnson's quirkiness and unpredictability to swing a substantial section of business behind his campaign. He can then return to power on the same basis that he held it from 2000 to 2008: an unabashedly pro-business and anti-working class politician.

All genuine socialists must oppose labour movement involvement in this scheme. Instead we should fight for a labour movement alliance which campaigns to defend and extend the rights of working-class Londoners in the current crisis, and uses the 2012 elections as a platform to rebuild working-class political representation. (For some ideas see the motion calling for independent working-class candidates passed by the RMT's London Transport Region in September 2007 here.)