“Be responsible as Covid cases soar” appeals the Harrow council leader Cllr Graham Henson.
“Cases of Covid-19 are rising rapidly in Harrow and, while I don’t want to alarm people, I strongly urge you to be aware of your surroundings, understand the nature of risk and act sensibly” he said.
As of 28 July 2021, the following is the Harrow picture, as per the simple summary for Harrow published by the UK Government:
Between 22 July 2021 and 28 July 2021, 758 people had a confirmed positive test result, while 95 new cases on 28 July 2021 alone.
Between 12 July 2021 and 18 July 2021, 48 went into hospital with coronavirus. This shows an increase of 37.1% compared to the previous 7 days.
There were 40 patients in hospital with coronavirus on 20 July 2021 alone – 4 on the mechanical ventilator on that day.
Between 22 July 2021 and 28 July 2021, there have been 1 death within 28 days of a positive coronavirus test. This shows no change compared to the previous 7 days.
Overall picture: cases – 7-day average of 2,080 on 20/4/2021 has increased to 26,624 on 28/7/2021; deaths – 7-day average of 28 on 5/4/2021 has increased to 60 on 28/7/2021.
All this Covid-19 situation in Harrow, despite 166,488 people in Harrow had been given a first dose and 134,299 a second dose by the end of 27 July 2021.

Such an information should have been readily available at the Harrow council website and as an attachment to the Draft Economic Strategy that claims to have distributed £62m in government grants to over 900 local businesses.
This public information would have helped for everyone to see that the public money has been appropriately and fairly dispersed for the benefit of those who need it most, and not for any political gains or on the basis of who knows who, in the council election year.
Precisely for these reasons, the council’s grant allocating regime under previous administrations used to publish a list of who gets what grant and for what purpose.
Similarly, the tax-payers have a right to know how and for whom the following incoming Covid-19 money has been used:

For gaining public confidence in Harrow council’s handling of the Covid-19 funding, what stops the  council to have a dedicated web page, linked to the council website’s index page, to publish total Covid-19 money received, who decides how and where this has been/should be used, and a summary of who have benefitted from this additional funding.
By taking these simple steps (Covid-19 pressure not a valid excuse), Harrow council could reassure transparency in handling money matters, unless it has something to hide!

Labour’s recent London Conference has opened up all conflicts and contradictions in the Labour Party under ‘selected by some for some’ leader Keir Starmer.
“Labour has outraged members today by shutting down its London conference in the middle of the outgoing Conference Arrangements Committee chair’s speech, apparently because she was speaking critically of Keir Starmer – and, ironically, of the party’s anti-democratic conduct.” reports SKWAWKBOX (SW).
“The benefits of a July Zoom conference, being able to pull the plug on speakers compared to a November in person conference as was already agreed by the outgoing London REC, which we argued for on the NEC” informs the Labour NEC member Mish Rahman (@mish_rahman).
The Zoom meeting made it possible to kept off the agenda issues like the delay in publishing the Forde report, the rules prohibiting CLPs from discussing certain issues, the recent wave of proscriptions and much more.
Harrow councillor Pamela Fitzpatrick, socialist, trade unionist and member of the Labour national women’s committee, tweeted:
Ms Fitzpatrick has long and bitter experience of what has been happening in local Labour, especially in the Gareth Thomas (Blair/Starmer faithful Lab MP) Harrow West constituency.
(Sad that the silencing tactics of the national party show up at the council level – for example, critical voices are curbed by playing ‘victimhood’ and alleging targeting when cabinet members (at over £30K) are asked searching questions about their concerning conduct or performance.)
“Southside finally pull the plug, as members refuse to be silenced” Michael Calderbank reports .
“But if we’re to build an effective, united opposition to the Tories, then deeply factional and unnecessary attacks on socialist activists are clearly a major obstacle – and those responsible must be held to account” he said.

A big deep hole appeared on the busy Hindes Road (junction of Welldon Crescent and Radnor Road) on 17 July at the spot which had previous road problem, as the tarmac repair around the hole suggests.
The council installed barriers overnight, but has failed to carry out emergency repairs since.
Uninformed and concerned Greenhill Ward residents express disappointment: ‘Services like gas, water and electricity do carry out emergency services despite Covid-19, why the Harrow council has failed for days?”
Harrow council’s environment services are adequately staffed with skills to carry out such a repair work – why an apparent failure in this case (Covid-19 pressure is not an acceptable excuse)?
Back in March this year, National Audit Office reported that Covid has exposed the dire position of England’s local councils.  It reveals the precarious position of local government that struggle to provide acceptable services because of weak budgeting.
Councils with effective leadership and management have by now worked out how to provide good, responsive and efficient services.
Harrow council leader and the chief executive must now take an urgent notice of what has happened to the Hindes Road and arrange a long-term solution to the road condition.

“Our workforce is diverse, talented and adaptable and our local businesses are wonderful. With this support and their own skills I have every faith in them to be able to rebuild and flourish” said Cllr Keith Ferry, business, property and leisure portfolio holder as Harrow Council launched its Draft Economic Strategy which aims to respond to the economic consequences of the Covid-19 pandemic and support the recovery.
Cllr Graham Henson, Harrow Council leader added: “We have also worked hard to secure millions of pounds in external funds to deliver a range of employment, business support and infrastructure programmes.”
All this sounds well but how the strategies outlined in the plans help the small street businesses predominantly run by the cultural diversity like Afghani, Pakistani and Turkish communities?
(for example, Station Road Harrow and High Street Wealdstone are kept alive by these businesses, though not acknowledged)
The following core of the Draft Economic Strategy is of little relevance to these street businesses, considering the nature of their business.
The strategy says that in the immediate term the Council has secured over £16m in external funds to deliver a range of employment, business support and infrastructure programmes, and these include:
– An expansion of the Council’s job brokerage scheme and the launch of a vacancy bulletin supporting those who became unemployed to work with sectors, such as social care.
– Transferral of apprenticeship levy funding to SMEs to create new apprenticeships in care, health, construction, and digital sectors.
– Expansion of English for Speakers of Other Languages (ESOL) and employability provision to deliver outreach services.
– Promotion of our Jobs, Employment and Training Programme as well as the Work and Health Programme
It looks that the council still has a long way to go in developing meaningful and inclusive ethos, policies and community support across the council, which are needed as the ‘community cohesion’ cannot be achieved in vacuum.

Wealdstone ward, 75% BAME population, is one of the most deprived wards in Harrow – with overcrowding, unemployment, crime and the fear of crime being major concerns – many say it is now a ‘no-go area’ in the evenings – most didn’t even know about the Harrow council’s ‘re-generation’ plans.
Parking was another key concern identified during the filming.
Under these difficult conditions and with little support, high street small businesses (mostly Afghani, Pakistani, Turkish) are significantly contributing towards the local and borough economy. (watch video here)
But their contributions are hardly acknowledged by the Harrow council.
Harrow council’s Economic Strategy 2021-2030 says ‘Harrow is one of the most culturally diverse local authorities in the UK, with  around  60%  of  residents  from  Black,  Asian,  and  Multi-Ethnic backgrounds’ and that ‘Harrow High streets contain more than 1,200 businesses’ – but no expressed credit to businesses by these communities which meaningly contribute towards the Harrow economy. Therefore, no surprise that the strategy has no obvious or specific strategies to support and nurture these small but important businesses.
Such omissions are usually seen in the light of the dynamics of institutional racism but in this case, they look more like because of a council that has fails to practise inclusion despite layers of the cultural diversity at the civic centre which simply recycle the council’s dominant ideological and work ethos, resulting in no change in the prevailing status quo!

Affinity Water campaign Save Our Streams, staged in Harrow now, is the UK’s biggest ever water saving initiative, focused on saving incredibly rare chalk streams, and the habitats they provide for local wildlife.
The water we drink comes from the local environment, flowing through nearby rivers and streams.
“We’re not the kind of people to just go with the flow, and we’ve been working hard to reduce water wastage and help protect our unique local environment” the Affinity Water said.
“Not only do we have a responsibility to serve our 3.5mn customers, we also want to make sure we do this sustainably to protect our unique local environment and all the wildlife we share it with” they added.
They have made water saving easy with lots of free water saving devices (Buffaloo Cistern Bag, Eco Shower Head and 4-minute Shower Timer) and bespoke expert advice.

Very concerning to read that it took an hour and a half for a paramedic to arrive to attend a five-year-old who suffered a broken collarbone after she was hit by a falling fire door at the Stag Lane Primary School.
Yet another example of under resourced NHS work!
The incident reportedly happened at around 2.30pm on Monday (June 28), but despite an ambulance being called immediately, it took an hour and a half for a paramedic to arrive.
The published photo of the fallen door shows broken hinges. Harrow Council is investigation how and why the door came to fall off.
Good schools have regular health and safety in-house inspections, usually carried out by a team of a designated school governor, member of the teaching staff and site manager. Inspection records should be formally kept.
As reported, the London Ambulance Service has confirmed it received its first call to the school at 2.31pm on Monday, and received another call at 2.51pm. Paramedics eventually arrived at the school at 4.03pm. The girl was treated and taken to hospital. 
Apparently the ambulance service was very busy on 28 June – they said they received more than 6,500 calls into their 999-control rooms, compared with a usual ‘busy’ day of about 5,500 calls.

While the Labour Party is struggling and face atrocious decline in vote share under its unpopular ‘new leadership’, the Peace and Justice Project, led by Jeremy Corbyn and actively supported by the socialists, including from Harrow, has  grown, taking   on   new   projects, developing new ideas, and building new coalitions of campaigners, despite the impact of the pandemic and lockdown on organising and activism.
“From opposing Boris Johnson’s protest ban, to standing in solidarity with the people of Palestine, to working with food banks in Liverpool and London clothes banks Nottingham, to hosting ten thousand people at a global conference led by refugees; we’ve taken on the powerful and organised for a better world” reports the recently published Biannual Report of the project.
The  Peace  and  Justice  Project, founded by Jeremy Corbyn, is  an organisation with deep ties to the  labour  movement  in  the  UK  and overseas as well as social movements and progressive   activists.  It has a potential of becoming a political party like the Co-operative Party that has an electoral agreement with Labour Party since 1927.
“The peace and justice project is a very timely initiative. The world is in a parlous state and COVID19 has cast stark new light on the inequality and injustice surrounding us” Harrow councillor Pamela Fitzpatrick, a leading founder of the Socialist Campaign Group of Labour Councillors, said after the launch of the nationwide project.
“Jeremy Corbyn is a politician who is genuinely altruistic and has been a powerful campaigner for peace and justice for decades. I very much welcome this exciting initiative” she added.
Achievements of the project include:

• Seeing 10,000 in attendance at their global refugee voices conference, held in partnership with the ITF.
• Supporting Palestine demonstrations which mobilised up to 200,000 people and increased international pressure on the Israeli government.
• Gained thousands of signatures on their vaccine internationalism petition and brought together leading figures in health campaigning across the world at their roundtable on the issue.

The movement is working on the projects from improving independent media   infrastructure to researching the impacts of Britain’s new Defence Review, to mobilising people to support food banks.

Harrow East parliamentary candidate (Lab) last election and a dedicated socialist, Harrow Councillor Pamela Fitzpatrick  is one of the six socialist women elected to the Labour’s new National Women’s Committee.
Delighted Ms Fitzpatrick said, “I am hoping the party has some big ideas to deal with the inequality and injustice that women face today”.
Each year National Annual Women’s Conference brings together hundreds of Labour women, politicians, stakeholders and activists from across the country.
The conference enables Labour women members to better participate in policy-making and offers the opportunity to share ideas with delegates from across the UK.
The National Annual Women’s Conference 2021 (26 – 27 June), is online because of the Covid-19. There was no need to be a delegate to be part of this historic first online Conference – it was possible to apply to be a visitor (tickets started at £5) for this year’s National Annual Women’s Conference.
Ms Fitzpatrick secured 162,560 votes.
This socialist win through public vote (affiliate delegates) is yet another setback for the Labour leadership.  Keir Starmer was head-hunted to bring unity to the Labour Party but far from this, the party is now more divided in terms of left, right, centralist and socialist.
A recent tweet from Ms Fitzpatrick helps to understand why things are as they are: “The problem with letting Tories and other non-socialists into Labour is that it moves our party ever more to the right. These are the entryists into our party. They climb into positions of power feigning socialist credentials then set about expelling all the real socialists” – the tweet appeared soon after Tory John Bercow joined Labour.