East London & the Olympics 10 years on - where next? Unmesh Desai AM

 Yesterday evening there was a reception at London City Hall (Newham!) hosted by East London & City Assembly Member, Unmesh Desai. The theme was about the Olympics 2012 legacy. There was a number of interesting speakers and it was good to meet up face to face again with colleagues from across London. 

There was of course the obligatory photo of us all from Newham Labour :-) 

Zoom call with Thangam Debbonaire MP, Shadow Housing Secretary & Labour LG Housing Leads

This morning I took part in a virtual meeting with the new Shadow Housing Secretary, Thangam Debbonaire MP, chaired by Cllr Darren Rodwell (Leader of Barking & Dagenham Council). The Leader of Labour Local Government, Cllr Nick Forbes, also presented to the meeting.

It was a really useful and informative meeting. We have similar but different housing problems and it was good to hear from Thangam what she is doing to hold the government to account as well as how Labour Councils and opposition Groups across the land are tackling the crisis.

I had sent comments in beforehand and made a number of points, including that we must make it clear to the government that they need to give local authorities the resources to deliver on their Covid-19 promises. In particular, if they want to keep rough sleepers off the streets long term and ensure that families in temporary accommodation have suitable permanent self contained accommodation, then we desperately need the extra money to deliver on this.

It was really good to meet our new Shadow Secretary of State, Thangam, who was on top of things and clearly wanted to work with Labour local government. 

A great start and look forward to future meetings (apart from the fact that such virtual meeting photos make us all appear as if we are on some Crimewatch "Most Wanted" list).