Big Society is in tatters at Pickles’ favourite council


by Guest    
11:20 am - February 7th 2011

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contribution by Andy Slaughter MP

Conservative-run Hammersmith & Fulham Council, known as “Cameron’s favourite Council”, was described as the “apple of his eye” by Eric Pickles two weeks ago in Parliament.

Its Cabinet is meeting today to rubber-stamp the sale of four major community hubs in the face of opposition from tens of thousands of local residents.

This is an act of cultural vandalism by the Council.

They are selling off invaluable community assets at a time of depressed property prices. And they are acting against the central tenet of their own government – the Big Society.

I will be there on Monday protesting their short-sighted policies and hundreds of people, of all political stripes from all parts of our community, will be there too.

And they truly are of all political stripes. It’s been a pleasure to engage with people that normally vote Conservative or Liberal but share my view that community comes first.

Hundreds of local residents, campaigners and members of the voluntary community will rally outside the Town Hall from 6pm on Monday to protest the sales. Join us – the more of us there are, the louder the Tories will hear our voices demanding that they stop their radical agenda or pay the price come Election Day.

Where the cuts will fall
Palingswick House is home to over twenty charities that serve communities throughout Hammersmith & Fulham. Toby Young’s controversial West London Free School has been identified as the likely buyer.

The Irish Centre is an internationally recognised, self-funding arts and cultural centre that Labour built when they controlled the Council with support from the Irish government. 7,000 people signed a petition asking the Council to reconsider.

Sands End Community Centre is a vibrant multi-function community centre with a library, arts and craft centre, a Sure Start centre and gym serving a distinct area of the borough. 7,000 people signed a petition asking the Council to reconsider, meaning virtually everyone in the area had signed.

Shepherds Bush Village Hall is a major community hub, serving a very deprived part of the borough.

It is currently used by 47 local organisations, alongside offering Sure Start services and the Shepherds Bush Families Project. Supporters made an offer to lease the building commercially under a charitable trust but have had no response.

—
Andy Slaughter is Labour MP for Hammersmith and Shadow Justice Minister

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Reader comments


1. Falco

I don’t know enough about Hammersmith & Fulham to comment on whether these cuts are good or bad. However this cannot be correct:

“The Irish Centre is an internationally recognised, self-funding arts and cultural centre”

If it was self funding then cuts wouldn’t affect it. Perhaps you mean that it is self funding bar paying rent for a large space in central London, that’s no minor subsidy.

2. Tim Worstall

“The Irish Centre is an internationally recognised, self-funding arts”

Quite, I think this is a new meaning of “self funding”, one I’ve not come across before.

Their accounts are here:

http://www.charity-commission.gov.uk/ScannedAccounts/Ends87%5C0001122387_ac_20100331_e_c.pdf

50% of their money comes from room hire, fees, bar sales etc. The other 50% is grants (so, not “self funding”) largely from the Irish Government.

Oh, plus they don’t pay rent on their building to Fulham and Hammersmith: they get it rent free.

That rent not charged is money that the council can’t spend elsewhere, isn’t it? So they’re subsidising one ethnic group to jump up and down singing “fiddle di dee” while not having the money to, say, run needle exchange programs, monitor kids at risk or leave money in the pockets of the ratepayers.

Ho hum.

3. Richard

Surely the Tories will therefore be swept aside at the next local elections?

4. gastro george

Those damn “ethnic minorities” and their fiddle-de-deeing. About time they learnt the proper British way to tug their forelocks and accept their squalor.

5. J

Some good coverage of this on Newsnight.

Unfortunately, they chose a shot of several children playing fiddles to highlight the plight of the Irish Centre… *Sigh*

Quite why anyone would vote for Tories is beyond me.

6. Les Kipper

Big Society has already been a roaring success, having achieved the Government’s objectives.

It can therefore now be jettisoned. No doubt the Government will be congratulating itself on how well this simple approach has worked.

It has successfully:

- Kept the cuts out of the limelight since May 2010 and created the space for them to implement the cuts programme unhindered – right up to the end of the financial year (March 31st in a few short weeks)

- Created the space for a mass privatisation of the NHS, Universities and activities previously done by the voluntary sector

- Decapitated the NHS, regional and sub-regional bodies responsible for much of the devolved spending at a local level, and disabled local government for the indefinite future and with it key services relating to social care and young people’s services

- Put in place (via the Localism Bill) the means to over-rule local councils whenever the Secretary of State feels like it

- Terminated most of the programmes that relate to equalities and social cohesion

- Fooled large voluntary organisations and charities who would otherwise have lobbied against the cuts.

Big Society has served its purpose admirably.


Reactions: Twitter, blogs
  1. Brian Moylan

    RT @buddy_hell: Big Society is in tatters at Pickles’ favourite council | Liberal Conspiracy http://bit.ly/icKqCR #BigSociety #localcouncils

  2. Sue Marsh

    RT @brianfmoylan: RT @buddy_hell: Big Society is in tatters at Pickles’ favourite council | Liberal Conspiracy http://bit.ly/icKqCR #Big …

  3. Rachel Hubbard

    Big Society is in tatters at Pickles’ favourite council | Liberal Conspiracy http://t.co/wPVznOn via @libcon





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