Apologises for the
lateness of this report and not attending all of this meeting but after
presenting my report and answering any questions, I will go to the Forest Gate
North ward meeting where I am the Vice Chair.
Instead of just listing issues
and events I have attended in a chronological order (as I have done in the past) I have tried this time to report back on “themes”
which I think are important and of interest to members. Please let me know what
you think about this new format?
Casework
Housing issues continue
to dominate casework from surgeries, emails and telephone calls (and even
Facebook and twitter). Residents have contacted me about overcrowding, homelessness,
pending evictions, urgent health applications, allocations policy, anti-social
behaviour, and disrepair. Also planning, parking, council tax benefit, LOBOs,
the privatisation of council services and specific complaints about other
Council services.
I have managed to help
residents get legal advice in order to prevent/suspend evictions and forced
moves for Newham homeless families to Birmingham; I have undertaken (with other
ward Councillors and residents) housing estate inspections, parking meetings with
residents and officers and will be attending a Newham Council Local Development
meeting in support of residents over a serious and long running planning dispute.
Council Meetings
I have continued to press
the case (with other Councillors) for the Council to take action against the
deception and rip off of the Council by the so called LOBO loans by the Banks.
We have over £500 million of these toxic 50 year plus loans which were sold to
us by the Banks at the same time that some of their staff (who have since been
criminally convicted) were fixing interest rates that were detrimental against
us. There are also allegations of secret “kickback” payments between various Banks
and Council financial advisors over such loans, and we are trying to find out
if this affected Newham. In the last financial year the “fair value”
(redemption cost) of these loans rose from £1 billion to £1.25 billion. A
number of concerned Councillors are trying to get the Executive to agree to
meet financial and legal experts who have even offered a possible “no win-no
fee” arrangement for Newham to sue the Banks and stop us being ripped off.
I have also submitted a written
report to Cabinet and members (copy available) on my concerns about this year’s
budget and the proposed privatisation of Council services, lack of social
housing, Mayoral advisers' allowances, air quality, Council tax increase, lack
of youth club provision and welfare rights' advice.
I will be contacting
Executive members about the level of Council tax benefit that Newham residents
on low incomes receive, exemptions and what appears to be an excessive level of
Court summons and use of Bailiffs. Other Labour Councils act very differently.
Other Council related work
Early this year I was part
of a Greek Solidarity Campaign delegation (self-funded) to Athens.
The delegation included
Labour Party & UNISON activists, David Lammy MP and Jon Lansman. The theme
was local government and trade unions. We visited Solidarity centres, and
make-shift refugee shelters in the port, met Greek Government ministers and
various MPs at Parliament and ministry buildings, Greek Mayors and Councillors
at local town halls, national and public sector trade unions. I have written a
report on what was a fascinating but at times a very distressing visit (copy
available).
Party work
I was involved in the
successful campaign to elect, Anam Islam, as Councillor in Forest Gate North
and the (unsuccessful) campaign to “Remain” in the European Union. While I
fully accept the result for Brexit I am very angry at the frankly appalling local
campaign in Newham and that we had the lowest vote in London to “Remain” for a
Labour authority. We only had 52% for 'remain' compared to over 75% in Lambeth,
Hackney and Haringey.
I have also campaigned in
the successful London Mayoral/GLA campaign for Sadiq Khan and the Hackney Mayor
by election.
Recent Suspensions/Expulsions of members
While I have been
horrified at some of the completely vile and unacceptable abuse on social media
(by all sides) during the recent leadership campaign, I am aware of individual West
Ham CLP cases where members have been suspended or even expelled on evidence
which I find, to say the least, unconvincing.
I also think this is
unfair since I know that serious and substantiated allegations of violent,
abusive, sexist and racist behaviour has been made against members in the
recent past to the Party yet it has so far failed to act.
Re-election of Labour Leader Jeremy Corbyn.
I congratulate Jeremy on
his victory. He has clearly earned the right to lead the Party into the next
General Election. I hope that the Party will now pull together behind him and
that we will do everything we can to defeat the Tories in 2020 (or sooner). I
am concerned about the proposed boundary changes and that the historic name for
a parliament seat “West Ham” is also at risk.
John Gray
West Ham Ward Councillor 
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