Harrow council is carrying out risk assessments to see how the three Neighbourhood Resource Centres in Harrow, closed in March 2020 due to the pandemic, could be reopened safely.
Council wants these assessments detailed and include all the measures that would be needed for the safe re-opening of the buildings, including social distancing, hygiene and regular cleaning, Personal Protective Equipment (PPE), one-way systems within the buildings, and transport arrangements.
But the council alerted “We are also mindful that winter may bring some additional challenges – we wouldn’t want to reopen and be faced with having to potentially close them again”.
Opened in 2009, Neighbourhood Resource Centres in Harrow usually provide vital day care services and therapy for people with learning difficulties whilst also giving the families much needed respite from their roles as carers.
“To reopen safely we would need to use the spaces in the Centres differently – including reducing the number of people attending at any time to meet social distancing guides and to prevent the spread of covid. One way we could do this is by running morning and afternoon sessions rather than whole day sessions so that we could support more people in the centre.  We are also looking at how we could establish “bubbles” for staff and users to minimise risk” explained a council spokesperson.
Regarding the users concern about the loss of the centres services, the council spokesperson claimed “We are in regular contact with our clients and their families keeping them updated on the status of the centres. We have been carrying out social work reviews to ensure care plans are adapted to provide the right care and support needed. We have also developed outreach and community activities for some of our citizens, including home visits and taking some people out for short trips or walks and have moved some activities online using WhatsApp and Zoom”.
However, all users are not happy with the arrangements. A local GP whose severely disabled brother attended a local neighbourhood resource centre for many years, reported to the Harrow Monitoring Group that ‘poor communication has resulted from these closures as well as failure to negotiate the alternative services offered’.

As previously reported, Harrow has secured London mayor funding to deliver more pedestrian space to help with government required social distancing. This includes pavements in some areas are to be temporarily widened by using barriers as confirmed by the deputy leader of Harrow Council, Cllr Keith Ferry.
The extra width of the temporary pavements will allow pedestrians to pass each other while social distancing since public safety is a priority during the coronavirus.
No doubt coronavirus preventive measures, like use of the barriers in some parking spaces to widen spaces for public movement, have implications for businesses,  but most are not selfish and support the measures.
Given the significance of the barriers in ensuring public welfare and safety, the Harrow opposition’s play that the barriers ‘will upset a lot of people’ looks unpleasant point-scoring, as it used to be under Cllr Hall’s confrontational leadership of the Tory group.
As the opposition leader Cllr Paul Osborn seems more worried about a ‘decrease in footfall at shops’ because of restricted parking and his deputy  Cllr Marilyn Ashton about the possibility of  ‘more businesses forced to close’, it looks they are towing their party’s practice ‘money before people’.
However, Cllr Ferry on the basis of a council survey,  has said that ‘widened pavements are likely to attract more customers’.

“Covid-19 has had a huge impact on all parts of the economy, with potentially damaging consequences for London. By implication, the Mayor’s Budget has also been significantly affected, forcing the Greater London Authority (GLA) to make savings across the board” alerts Navin Shah, Brent and Harrow assembly member.
London mayor Sadiq Khan has warned that City Hall faces making up to £500m in cuts to public services if the government fails to provide financial support to local authorities.
The London Mayor has called upon central government to do the responsible thing and provide the urgent emergency funding needed to protect policing, fire and transport services, but this has not been forthcoming, Mr Shah shares his concern.
Further savings are possible by relocating the City Hall to the ‘Crystal’ building based at the Royal Docks. This is estimated to save £55 million over 5 years.
“As Chair of the London Assembly, I am working on a cross-party basis to scrutinise the proposals to relocate City Hall and have written to the Mayor and Chief Officer of the GLA on the back of concerns raised by Assembly Members at a recent Oversight Committee meeting” he informs.
Regarding  the government’s short-term ‘bailout’ of Traffic for London, forcing TfL to suspend free peak hours travel for over 60s and abolished free travel for under 18s, Mr Shah says he  has been working with Age UK, alongside other campaigners to oppose these punitive conditions.
In a money saving measure, London mayor has taken a 10% pay cut as he called for Boris Johnson to bail out local authorities facing funding shortfalls due to coronavirus.

Socialist Campaign Group of Labour MPs has recently signed a letter expressing solidarity with migrants, including refugees and asylum seekers, and affirming the moral and legal right for refugees to claim asylum in the UK.
The letter, signed by over 30 Labour MPs, articulates that it is often aggressive wars led by the UK and our allies that forces people to flee their homes and that this gives us a special responsibility to these people.
As expected the letter has not been signed by Harrow West Labour MP Gareth Thomas who actively supported Blair attack on Iraq that killed innocent people and damaged the country. He was also one of the  Labour MPs who voted for bombing in Syria , out of line with their then party leader Jeremy Corbyn, and  remained active in undermining Corbyn.
The letter says rather than treating these people with hostility, with threats to deploy military vessels to deter crossings, the UK should provide safe and legal routes to people seeking to claim asylum.
As usual, the government is playing ‘immigration’ card when chips are down.
Latest drive by the Conservative government is a blatant attempt to distract from their calamitous handling of Coronavirus, which is leading to economic turmoil that will devastate working people’s livelihoods, reminds the letter.
The work of the social campaign group is supported by many including the Socialist Campaign Group of Labour Councillors – the national convenor Brent councillor Jumbo Chan and a prominent  member Harrow councillor Pamela Fitzpatrick. The group believes acting as conduit for socialist values in local government.
Although the Labour ‘civil war’ under its present leadership is not that big in Harrow, the next Harrow elections would be quite interesting as many Labour voters associate the party with socialism, and could react to the in-party drive against the socialists and might not vote.

A total of £683K has been allocated to Harrow for the programme to deliver pedestrian space, low traffic neighbourhoods, strategic cycling and school streets as the government is keen to reopen the economy, despite concerning spikes of Covid19 cases in the UK (1,328 cases in Harrow).
The Mayor of London launched the London Streetspace Programme with government funding support to transform London’s streets to accommodate increases in cycling and walking as government C19 restrictions are eased.
Harrow could do with more and better physical exercise as the evidence indicates that a third of people in Harrow do very little physical activity and two thirds are overweight and both these factors increase the risk of developing diseases such as diabetes and/or cancer.
According to a Traffic and Road Safety Advisory Panel report, the Harrow programme aims to support the changes in the way the public travel during the health crisis through the measures including:
(a) To reallocate carriageway to pedestrians by suspending sections of  barriers to extend pedestrian space in 9 key locations in the borough, including Station Road, Harrow – Civic Centre, shops & Mosque, and High Road, Harrow Weald.
(b) To support the delivery of strategic cycling measures e.g. meaningful measures that reallocate road space from vehicles to cycles and provide physical segregation – primarily at Honeypot Lane, Sheepcote Road, Greenhill and Uxbridge Road Harrow Weald.
(c) Restricting the streets surrounding a school to traffic at opening and closing times except for local residents living in the street – three primary schools and one secondary school have been proposed – Grimsdyke School, Newton Farm School, Marlborough School and Park High School.
Apparently an online information and engagement portal was set up by the council in June 2020 to be a focal point for residents and businesses with regard to the Harrow Street Spaces Programme but not well publicised as usual. Very interesting that only the percentages of comments rather than the number of people participated in the  ‘Public Engagement Portal Feedback’ have been documented – therefore no way of knowing the level of public ‘engagement’!!

Harrow council has made bold and somewhat ambitious commitment to becoming an anti-racist council (council meeting 11 July) by improving how council works and cares.
Key areas of focus include learning programme for councillors and staff on race, racism and unconscious bias; the BAME (‘Black, Asian and minority ethnic’) workforce, their pay gaps, their representation at senior levels, and developmental and mentoring programmes for them.
Another key area is to review and amend council policies which particularly impact on BAME residents.
Perhaps this Labour administration stands a better chance to drive the anti-racist agenda as previous similar initiatives finished up being photo opportunities, self promotion and fizzled out, needing to start fresh in July 2020.
In a Labour administration eighteen years ago: “The London Borough of Harrow is committed to achieving equality of opportunity both as a large employer of people and as a provider of service”: Forward to London Borough of Harrow Race Equality Scheme 2002 – 2005, signed by  leader of council Archie Foulds and chief executive Joyce Markham.
To implement this, the chief executive appointed two senior officers for overall responsibility for the day-to-day management of the scheme who were to report directly to the chief executive. In addition, a ‘steering group’ was set up to oversee the process and to help co-ordinate different activities.
Nothing substantial resulted from this well defined programme. All this becomes more concerning considering that there have been two Asian leaders of the council in the past fifteen years (their experience is not a pleasant story though) and the civic centre diverse population has rapidly increased.
Without a shift in the ethos of the council and criteria of its services and provisions, effectiveness of the diverse council members and officers has not been any different than others.
Big challenge for the council has remained, how to practise ‘different needs are equally important’ in policy formation and determining the criteria for the services the council provides – first step in becoming an anti-racist council.

Harrow council video-linked meeting (11 July), resolved to welcome the decision to light Harrow Civic Centre purple in solidarity with the Black Lives Matter movement globally.
Labour motion for ‘commitment to fighting systemic racism’, carried despite voted against by the Tory opposition, reminded that the killing of George Floyd at the hands of American police has created a powerful global movement around the cause of tackling systemic racism in society.
The motion included series of measures needed to address racism and what the Harrow council could focus upon, including to stand united against racism, injustice and racial inequalities, recognise the contributions that all communities, races and cultures have made to Harrow in the past and will continue to make in future and to give its support to the Black Lives Matter movement.
Mentioned in the motion is that the Harrow council has a plan to tackling entrenched inequalities, which disproportionately impact people from BAME (‘Black, Asian and minority ethnic’) backgrounds! Town hall archives are full of such plans, collecting dust – hope Harrow is an exception.
Racism affects black and while people both, but differently, and it is this specific focus on the difference that is missing from the Tory group’s motion and which is too general. However, in proposing and seconding the Tory motion good example was set for their group members to see how to speak sensibly, avoiding any racist overtone! For example, to learn that a toxic reference to the Black Lives Matter movement could be taken as anti-Black.
Harrow council ex-leader Cllr Sachin Shah, highlighted the key differences between the Labour and Tory motions: (click to listen)

A special Harrow council video meeting on 7 July marked the commitment and diligent service of Alderman Keith Toms as a councillor of the London Borough of Harrow, and unanimously conferred on him the Honour of Freedom of the Borough.
“I’m greatly honoured by the Freedom of the Borough in a safest and most diverse borough where people respect others and the law” said Alderman Keith Toms.
“We have worked hard on race relations and pleasantly experience very positive communal relationships” added Mr Toms who stands for social justice and equality.

Alderman Keith Toms was first elected Harrow councillor in 1974 and served continuously until 2006 when he stood down having completed 32 years as a councillor of the London Borough of Harrow.
As a councillor, Alderman Toms served on all the major council committees and was Leader of the opposition. He was Harrow Mayor in 1996/97.
From 1998-2002 he was deputy leader of the council and in this role he presented Harrow on the Association of London Government. The Association appointed him Ambassador for London in 1998.
In July 2006 Harrow councillors unanimously voted to invest him with the title of Honorary Alderman. He has been warmly and actively performing this honourable civic duty since.

Harrow East MP Bob Blackman (photo) voted against commissioning specialist domestic abuse services for victims and perpetrators of domestic abuse.
Tory majority at the Commons voted down to add the commissioning clause to the Domestic Abuse bill on 6 July.
This new clause would have established a statutory duty on relevant public authorities to commission specialist support and services to all persons affected by domestic abuse, including refuge and community-based services; specialist services for groups with protected characteristics; services for children and young people; services for perpetrators.
The services were to include counselling and other support, advocacy services, access to welfare benefits, perpetrator programmes, financial support, legal services and helplines.
The clause was to legislate that it is the duty of relevant public authorities in England and non-devolved relevant public authorities in Wales in the exercise of their functions to commission sufficient specialist services for all persons affected by domestic abuse regardless of status.
The clause would have ensured compliance with the duty where public authorities must regularly assess population and support needs changes in their area as well as take account of any strategy to end violence against women and girls adopted by a Minister of the Crown and to co-operate to discharge the duty.