My own personal blog. UNISON NEC member for Housing Associations & Charities, HA Convenor, London Regional Council Officer & Chair of its Labour Link Committee.
Newham Cllr for West Ham Ward, Vice Chair of Local Authority Pension Fund Forum, Pension trustee, Housing & Safety Practitioner.
Centre left and proud member of Labour movement family. Strictly no trolls please.
Promoted by Luke Place on behalf of J.Gray, Newham Labour Group, St Luke’s Community Centre, E16 1HS.
Off message but after a week in Dublin I spent a wonderful week walking in County Kerry, Republic of Ireland. Hired a cottage in the tiny former smuggling port of Portmagee. A drop dead gorgeous, relaxed and friendly part of the world. Reminded me of Madeira.
"This is the blog of the three Labour councillors for Forest Gate North ward, in the London Borough of Newham. We are Seyi Akiwowo, Ellie Robinson and Rachel Tripp. We have created this blog as a way of keeping residents informed about our work for the ward and for Newham. Here we hope to blog about meetings, all kinds of issues from very local to national, queries and concerns, and anything else we are involved in that we think you might want to know more about. We hope that you find it useful; please get in touch and let us know".
What a great local blog. Will suggest tomorrow at ward meeting that we have a West Ham one!
This is the latest front cover of the long standing anti-fascist and anti-racist magazine "Searchlight".
I think we all know what it shows and compares.
Tonight we heard of yet another cowardly murder of a journalist, Steven Sotloff.
Searchlight is absolutely right to compare the butchers of the Islamic state with that of the Nazi SS.
They are all the same - fascist scum and we need to stop them.
The IS are no more Muslims than the German SS concentration camp guards were Christians - they are all just fanatics and common murderers.
In Britain recently a number of respected Islamic scholars have declared IS a "heretical” and “an oppressive
and tyrannical group... and religiously prohibited to support or join”.
In view of the Nazi slaughter that happened in the lifetime of my father and mother, I don't think that those of us who are not Muslims have any cause to be complacent or smug.
Last week UNISON Strikers from Care UK in Doncaster tried to lobby the owners of their company, £8.7 Billion Private Equity firm Bridgepoint Capital.
Care UK won the contract to run former NHS care services in Doncaster. The strikers are trying to get a decent pay rise (following savage cuts in their pay and conditions -up to 35% of pay for some staff) and also a living wage for all new employees.
In the light of such questionable employment practices I wondered what the Bridgepoint's stated policy is on ethical investment issues? I found here that apparently "We believe that it's good business practice to have strong
environmental, social and corporate governance (ESG) principles -
and that building these principles into our business practises is
good for our investors, employees, investee companies and their
stakeholders in the long term. Our approach is led by our
core values, which we expect our teams to adhere to in the way they
conduct themselves and represent Bridgepoint - and wherever
relevant, in our environmental, social and governance policies".
also here I read that Bridgepoint "works with management teams to implement
appropriate social policies in their operations and procedures.
Typically, these focus on worker health and safety, labour rights
and welfare". Oh, they are also "a signatory to the United Nations' Principles for
Responsible Investment"
hmmmm - what twaddle. How can slashing wages and making its workers broke and homeless be "good business practice"? How in these circumstances do they "focus on worker health & safety, labour rights and welfare". What hypocrisy.
Of course companies that treat their workers like rubbish also treat their clients as rubbish as well.
Check out UNISON news here and Observer article here
Finally, I am willing to bet that a number of pension and insurance funds invest in Bridgepoint. Do you really want your retirement funded by exploitation and misery?
It made me think since I was surprised to read there are 1 million people living in the UK with Iberian American roots.
They also point out that there are even more British living or owning property in Spain and Portugal.
I wonder how many Brits are currently on holiday in a Spanish or Portuguese speaking country as well? By coincidence a nephew is currently working in Brazil.
During the 5 weeks there will be religious services, parties, sport events, conferences and festivals. I hope the events go well and we all celebrate the contribution made to the UK by Iberian Americans.
Another powerful TV advert from UNISON explaining the many advantages from joining our union. One of the worse things about being a union rep is explaining to people facing redundancy, bullying, disciplinary or sickness proceedings, that I am unable to help them because they are not members or have only joined after they were aware of an issue. (UNISON has like every other union has a waiting period before representation).
If you value your job then join a union. Union reps do not have any magic wands but believe me it can be so frightening and scary if you have a problem at work and have no one to turn to for help. Even in the very best of employers.
Of course, the key thing about joining a trade union is that the more of us in the union in any employer, the better the deal we will get - the better the pay, the better the health and safety, the better the pension, the better the maternity pay, the better the sick pay' the better the flexible working - the better all fringe benefits and employment policies.
This is something our Grandparents knew but has sadly be lost in recent decades but I think workers are beginning to realise again that they cannot rely on their employers or the courts for justice at work, they can only rely on their union and their work colleagues.
So if you work for any (none civil service) employer providing public services, don't delay and look to join UNISON now! (online 24/7). Do not leave it until it is too late!
Tonii is a dedicated and hard working candidate who is super nice and will make a great local
Councillor for Beckton.
I am back from holiday but laid low with a Lergi (aka "Man's flu") so not been out "on the knocker" since back from leave.
Hopefully, I will get better soon. If you can help out - see message below from agent : -
"Saturday 30th August
Windsor Park Community Centre 18-20 Warwall, East Beckton , E6 6WG at 11am.
Monday 1st
St Marks Centre , 218 Tollgate Road, E6 5YA at 6:30pm - 8pm
Tuesday 2nd
St Marks Centre, 218 Tollgate Road, E6 5YA at 6:30pm - 8pm
Wednesday 3rd
The junction of Kirkham Road with Dunnock Road, E6 5SX 6:30pm - 8pm
Thursday 4th
Windsor Park Community Centre 18-20 Warwall, East Beckton, E6 6WG at 6:30 - 8pm
Additionally......
If anyone is free during the day (or evening) to deliver the 2nd leaflet that would be a great help. Please email me at newhamlabour@gmail.com and I will make arrangements for delivery.
Election Day 11th Sept
We will be knocking up our vote throughout the day on election day. We need people who will knock on doors, deliver leaflet reminders or be a teller at a polling station.
Please let me know if you are free on polling day and let me know which times you are available, from the early morning until late evening".
(published on and on behalf of Newham Labour Party, Trinity Centre, East Avenue, E12 6SG)
Earlier this month I spent a week on holiday in Dublin, the capital of the Republic of Ireland.
You could spend an entire summer in Dublin and still not experience everything that you should.
While expensive and seemingly packed full of even more tourists than London, it was a great base for a holiday.
For the historic and politically minded I recommend first a visit to the General Post Office (GPO) in what is now known as O'Connell Street (bottom right of college) which was the headquarters of the 1916 Easter Uprising, when rebels (or "patriots" depending on your view) tried to win independence for Ireland from Britain in the midst of World War One. This ended in defeat and the leveling of many parts of central Dublin by British artillery. You can still see what appears to be bullet holes on the outside pillars of the GPO.
Further along O'Connell Street (Daniel O'Connell was known as "The Great Liberator" in the 19th Century but who always opposed the use of violence to bring about political change) you see the statute of trade union leader, James Larkin, who led the famous "lock out" strike in Dublin during 1913.
I went during the early afternoon to the Kilmainham Gaol where the leaders of the Uprising (and some of the losing side in the later Civil War) were executed but it was fully booked for the rest of that day. Next time in Dublin I will go early and book a timed ticket for the tour then go to the Irish Museum of Modern Art (MMA) near by and wait for the tour to start. I found the MMA interestingly in parts but a bit weird and wonderful (Modern Art not my cup of tea but - who am I to say).
Take another bus to Glasnevin Cemetery and walk amongst the 1.5 million graves of the famous and the unknown. See the grave of charismatic Irish revolutionary leader Michael Collins who was killed in an ambush by his former comrades during the Irish Civil War in 1922. The lovely and peaceful National Botanic Gardens is next door.
Another time you should walk along the River Liffy to what is now called the (Michael) Collins barracks. This used to be a major British army barracks and at over 300 years old, is the oldest military barracks in the world, now the home of the National Museum of Ireland. There is a very even handed display on the Easter Uprising inside.
While immediately outside is a museum containing the beautifully restored sailing yacht "Asgard", in which London born Irish Protestant, Erskine Childers, had smuggled arms and ammunition from Germany to Irish nationalists in 1914. Erskine had fought for the British in the Boer War and afterwards was to be decorated for bravery while fighting against Germany in the First World World. He then became an opponent of the partition of Ireland and was executed during the Civil War by former comrades, possibly in revenge for the death of Michael Collins.
Before his execution Erskine made his son promise to visit all the men who had signed his death warrant and shake their hands. His son eventually became President of Ireland. Erskine also shook the hands with each of his firing squad and said to them before they shot him "Take a step or two forward, lads. It will be easier that way".
The City of London… The centre of the financial world.
It’s here that some of the finest minds in global finance ply their trade.
The pressures are huge - with salaries and bonuses to match.
London’s
financial sector encompasses a whole range of commercial activity -
from banking and merchant banking to insurance and accountancy. But
central to it is the fund management industry.
It’s fund managers whom the vast majority of us entrust with our long-term investments.
They choose which stocks and other assets to invest in on our behalf - and decide when the time is right to buy and sell.
And yes, they’re very well remunerated.
In fact pay has risen sharply in the last few years.
One manager, Richard Woolnough at M&G Investments, was paid £17.5 million in 2013 - 600 times the average UK salary.
Research by the FT shows that, in the same year, pay per employee in the sector outstripped even investment banking.
At one fund management company the average annual salary was £436,000.
The standard line from the industry is that it needs to offer such large financial rewards to attract the brightest talent.
But, time and again, research has shown that we over-estimate quite how talented fund managers are and how much value they add.
For
all the talk of “star” performers, the empirical evidence shows that
only a tiny fraction of them outperform the market with any meaningful
degree of consistency.
Typical of the reports produced on this subject is this one by the Pensions Institute, based at Cass Business School in London.
Researchers
examined 516 UK equity funds between 1998 and 2008, and found that just
1% of managers were able to produce sufficient returns to cover their
trading and operating costs.
But even those managers pocketed for themselves any value they added in fees, leaving nothing for the investor.
The remaining 99% of managers failed to deliver any outperformance - either from stock selection or from market timing.
In
case you’re wondering whether those managers were simply unlucky, the
researchers found the vast majority weren’t; they were “genuinely
unskilled”.
While a tiny number of “star” managers do exist, they
are, to quote the report, “incredibly hard to identify”. Furthermore,
it takes 22 years of performance data to be 90% sure that a particular
manager’s outperformance is genuinely down to skill.
For most
investors, the report concludes, “it is simply not worth paying the vast
majority of fund managers to actively manage their assets”.
If you’re shocked and appalled by those findings, so you should be.
The
Pensions Institute report is a damning indictment of the fund
management industry which is completely at variance with the image that
most of us have of the City as a centre of investment expertise.
Since
this is only the latest in a long line of reports that have said more
or less the same thing, it also begs the question, why are so many
ordinary investors completely unaware of this scandalous situation?
In fact there are many reasons.
This a hugely powerful and largely self-regulated industry, which lobbies hard to protect its interests.
It also spends a fortune on advertising.
And
the financial media, which is largely funded by those adverts, has an
insatiable demand for stories, which the fund management companies are
only too happy to provide.
But ultimately, actively managed funds
still hold sway over cheaper, passive investments such as index funds,
because investors continue to buy them.
We think we’re paying for better performance; that greater skill will produce superior results.
But investing almost always works the opposite way round. The less you pay, the more you get back.
Yes, it’s counter-intuitive, but it’s true.
In
the course of this programme, we’re going to be looking at just how
much investing costs us; and at the performance that fund managers
deliver.
We’ll be exploring more than 100 years of academic research into asset pricing and how markets operate.
And we’ll be examining long-term investment strategies that have been shown to work.
Investing has famously been called the loser’s game, and for most people, it is. We’re going to who you how to win it.
Next time..
Nobel
Prize-winning economist Eugene Fama says: "If you're paying big
management fees, the cumulative effect of that, given the way
compounding works, is enormous."
Merryn Somerset Webb from
MoneyWeek says: "Almost all fund management is a complete rip-off. We
know that. We only have to look at prices relative to the performance."
Gina
Miller from the True and Fair Campaign says:"The very people who are
being prudent and saving and investing are not the ones who are retiring
with a comfortable pot. It's the fund managers who are becoming
millionaires and billionaires because of those profit margins."
From Inside Housing "The poorest parts of England have endured spending cuts 16 times greater than the country’s
wealthiest areas since the last election, Labour Party analysis has shows.
The London council of Newham was the hardest hit, where £1,002 was lost per household.
A Labour analysis of council spending between 2010/11 and 2015/16 shows that the budget in the 10 most deprived local authority areas in England has been slashed by £782 per household, while more affluent households experienced just a £48 fall.
The London council of Newham was the hardest hit, where £1,002 was lost per household. Its neighbour, Hackney, lost £973 per household.
The research showed some local authorities in Surrey enjoyed a rise in spending power: Elmbridge spent £41 more per household and Waverley £26".
No surprise really. Tories doing to the poorest and most vulnerable what Tories always do.
