“We have a mental health crisis with our young people – here in Harrow and around the country. Counselling is a valuable tool in helping young people to be more resilient, stay out of trouble and build healthier, happier relationships” said Pamela Fitzpatrick, Harrow East Labour candidate, in welcoming Labour plans for a counsellor in every secondary schools, including in Harrow.
To deliver real change for young people’s mental health, Labour has pledged an additional £845 million per year for a Healthy Young Minds plan to recruit almost 3,500 qualified, on-site secondary school counsellors to ensure accessible pathways to mental health support.
“This is what real change for young people looks like – and it’s what the next Labour government will deliver” Pamela Fitzpatrick added.
Announcing the Healthy Young Minds plan, Jeremy Corbyn, Leader of the Labour Party, said: “As a country, we have to start treating mental health as seriously as physical health. If we don’t help our young people, we are not only failing them, but storing up problems for the future for a whole generation”.
The number of children experiencing mental health problems is increasing, with one in eight 5 to 19 year olds diagnosed with at least one mental health disorder in 2017. An estimated 95 per cent of teachers believe that they have taught a child experiencing anxiety, while 60 per cent believe that at least one of the children they have taught are self-harming.

Researcher for the Harrow Monitoring Group who is a retired inspector of schools, inspecting for Ofsted, said, “good pastoral care arrangements in schools helpfully supplement academic care – it can only be good for the schools to have in house professional counselling”.
Regarding the other aspects of children welfare, Labour will provide 30 hours of free childcare to all 2 to 4 year olds, open 1000 new Sure Start centres, cut class sizes for all 5, 6 and 7 year olds, scrap SATs for key stage 1 and 2 and provide free school meals to all primary school children.
The  Institute for Fiscal Studies research found that where Sure Start offered high levels of service in poor neighbourhoods in England, visits to hospital to treat injuries fell among all children of primary school age, and by a third of all 11-year-olds.

As the UK is likely to leave the European Union (EU) next year, Harrow council advised the European resident who plan to continue living and working in the UK after 30 June 2021 to apply to the government’s EU Settlement Scheme.
Home Office figures show a million of the estimated 3 million EU citizens in the UK have yet to apply for settled status, which will allow them to stay in the UK.
The Guardian also reports that the security minister, Brandon Lewis, has threatened EU citizens with deportation from the UK if they do not apply for settled status after Brexit.  Watch Solidarity with EU migrant’s footage here.
In Harrow, based on the figures released by the government, Harrow Liberal Democrats inform that of the 19,910 EU nationals across Harrow who have applied for permanent residency, only 9,990 have been offered settled status. 5,980 have been granted pre-settled status, which only gives the temporary right to stay in the UK.
Another 3,870 EU nationals living in Harrow have applied for permanent residency but are still waiting for a final decision to be made.
2,690 of the applications for settled status in Harrow were for children, i.e. those under 18.
“Too many EU nationals in Harrow are deeply anxious about their right to stay. It’s disgraceful for the Conservative government to leave them in legal limbo like this” Liberal Democrat candidate for Harrow West Lisa-Maria Bornemann commented.
“The Leave campaign, during the referendum, promised that rights of EU citizens living in the UK would not be affected. This has been shown to be yet another Leave lie” Liberal Democrat candidate for Harrow East Adam Bernard added.

Many say that Tory candidate for Harrow West Anwara Ali is unlikely to win but is being used to secure Tory votes in a certain community by using her religious background and supporters.

However, Anwara Ali, a Bangladeshi promoted by the Conservatives Friends of Bangladesh, has uphill struggle because of the divisive nature of the party. Following are further examples of ‘bigotry’ in the Tory party:
In a latest move, Baroness Warsi, the former Tory party chairman who has led criticism of the Conservative hierarchy’s response to Islamophobia within its ranks, accuses Matt Hancock of ‘whitesplaining‘ in Tory Islamaphobia row.
Wakefield Tory candidate Antony Calvert quits over Facebook comments.
The BBC highlighted over 20 new cases to the party, who said all those found to be members who shared or supported anti-Muslim posts on Twitter and Facebook were suspended immediately.
Unhelpful messages are in circulation urging to vote against Labour. Chair of the Labour Party Ian Lavery in his letter on 11 November 2019 has emphasised that divisive issues abroad must not be allowed to divide communities here.
In the local context and for improving Tory party chances elsewhere, particularly in Harrow East marginal seat, a toxic Tory councillor for Belmont (Harrow), unlikely to win though could please far right,  has been selected for Brent North, the native constituency of the Tory candidate for Harrow East who is well known for his divisive conduct for gaining votes.

“People who are simply fed up with Tories can’t stomach them anymore – lots of people say they just can’t vote Conservative” said Labour’s MP Candidate for Harrow East Pamela Fitzpatrick who was canvassing in the Canons ward, a Tory stronghold.
“So much more – there are issues about homelessness, there are issues about poverty in Harrow” she was responding to the question ‘what sort of messages she is getting from the door steps’?

Residents are disappointed to find that Bob Blackman, incumbent MP for Harrow East, in his recent letter to them has mainly relied on bitter attack on Jeremy Corbyn rather than explaining what has he done to counter the chaos Tory party policies/practices have created or to address the real challenges that Harrow faces.
In glorifying Boris Johnson character over Jeremy Corby, he failed to mention that the Metropolitan Police have passed a file of criminal evidence against Boris Johnson and Dominic Cummings’ Vote Leave campaign to the Crown Prosecution Service.
Shivered by the fact that his majority was badly slashed by Labour at the last general election, his letter once again stirs up emotions to capture Indian and Jewish background voters by alleging that the Labour leader has failed to root out anti-Semitism and an anti-Indian culture in his party  (ongoing smear/scaremongering campaign recycled by right-wing media controlled by few).
(Such is the level of Tory campaign that Boris Johnson has been accused of stoking “the politics of division and nationalism” after Conservative election strategists urged their candidates to tell voters the Liberal Democrats “are not proud to be British” and would “make our country more vulnerable to terrorist attacks”.)
Mr Blackman’s divisiveness is well known!
He remains unconcerned by brutal force of Tory spreaded austerity that has slashed the expenditure of local government – Harrow council has lost £50m.
The Tories have cut millions from schools in Harrow since 2015 but Mr Blackman is least interested in working towards reversing these callous cuts so that hard-working teachers have the funds they need to ensure Harrow children have the first-class education they deserve.
Donald Trump endorses Boris Johnson because the NHS and medicine pricing is on the table in a future Trump trade deal costing our £500 million a week.
Mr Blackman has not really done anything to ease huge pressure on A&E at Northwick Park and after a decade of Tory cuts, record long waiting times for Harrow women for breast cancer care.
Mount Vernon Hospital is in crisis; too dilapidated and not enough staff to provide a safe service and yet the government won’t prioritise giving the funding to make it safe.
Harrow CCG is almost £40 million in the red and its financial position worsening, resulting in three walk-in centres have closed or are closing. Mr Blackman has not supported residents concerns regarding the closure but is rather pleased that the clinics are now appointment only GP services.
After rubbishing Jeremy Corby, his letter poses a question: would the residents vote for him who has “actively represented” them or “Jeremy Corbyn representative in Harrow”?
Most probably Pamela Fitzpatrick, Labour’s Parliamentary Candidate for Harrow East, would not respond to such lowness as Jeremy Corbyn at the launch of Harrow East Labour campaign articulated “if they go low, we go high – if they go lower, we go higher”.
Regarding Mr Blackman’s claim to represent constituents, he remains for Brexit even when reminded that majority in Harrow East voted for Remain!!

“Whilst I welcome the opportunity the election brings to end the incompetence and disastrous policies of this Government, I would have preferred Parliament to make progress on Brexit first” says incumbent Harrow West MP Gareth Thomas.
“I cannot and would never support a Brexit deal that I think would harm jobs, rights and living standards in Harrow and across the country” he said.
Mr Thomas for a long time has advocated a People Vote in which he would again vote to remain. He first proposed a Bill in Parliament and led a debate on delivering a People’s Vote in May last year and has been working closely with Best for Britain and the People’s Vote campaign, including twice marching through London.
Harrow has voted for Remain and unlike Harrow East incumbent MP Bob Blackman who remains committed to Brexit, Mr Thomas respects this.  Not only this but he also respects people demand that ‘our NHS is not for sale’.
“Once again, we see why Boris Johnson can’t be trusted as the Tories risk costing our NHS an extra £500 million per week by pushing up the price of many lifesaving drugs as part of a sell-out attempt to secure deal a Trump trade deal” said Mr Thomas.
“If drug prices go up as a result of a Boris/Trump Trade deal Harrow’s NHS already millions in the red will face huge increases in costs. Little chance then of sorting out problems in Northwick Park A&E or getting our walk-in services back” Mr Thomas alerts.
Harrow has already seen its walk-in clinics closed.
Boris Johnson’s deal appears worse than Theresa May’s Brexit deal. For example, very recently published NIESR (National Institute of Economic and Social Research) analysis of the Government’s Brexit deal found that the UK economy would be 3.5% smaller in the long run with the Government’s Brexit deal – £70 billion worse off by 2029.

After closing the walk-in service at Alexandra Avenue, Harrow Clinical Commissioning Group (CCG) ended the service at Belmont Health Centre.
Walk-in Centres and Urgent Care Centres (UCCs) are an alternative to accident and emergency (A&E) departments and treat minor illnesses and injuries, without an appointment.
Incumbent Harrow East MP Bob Blackman, has not supported residents concerns regarding the closure but is rather pleased that the clinic is now appointment only GP services.
Harrow councillor Pamela Fitzpatrick, Labour’s Parliamentary Candidate for Harrow East, had previously said that the closure of Belmont Walk in Centre could not come at a worse time. The winter is here, Northwick Park is already overstretched and local people are often having to wait weeks for a GP appointment.
Many residents joined the protest “Save our walk-in clinic” led by Ms Fitzpatrick and expressed anger over the closure of the walk-in clinic. Watch the footage below.
(Click the play button to play – fullscreen by clicking the fullscreen button – bottom right – last)

After a Tory councillor spilled out her venom against the London mayor Sadiq Khan with reference to policing situation in Harrow, another Tory councillor asked whether independent schools a good thing at the cabinet meeting on 10 October 2019, most probably  inspired by Boris Johnson political point scoring about the ‘private schools’.
It was inappropriate and waste of cabinet meeting time for the councillor to provoke talk about independent schools, mentioning Harrow School.
The councillor questions time at the cabinet meeting provides an opportunity to the opposition to ask questions about what the administration is doing or not doing but the slot should not be misused, for example,  by indulging in bickering or using it for scoring political points.
No doubt Harrow School, a local heritage, is more valued than any other independent school because of its history, traditions, elitism and for generating considerable revenue by admitting international students. But educational achievement is a different matter and comparing it with that of state schools is hardly like for like.
Independent schools have many favourable factors: (a) intake ability is mostly well above average (b) parents have high expectations of teaching and learning (c) lower pupil to teacher ratio and ample other resources assist in teaching differentiated curriculum, pastoral and extra-curriculum  which not only helps academic achievement but also in shaping pupil’s elite personality.
Educationally speaking, pupil progress in many state schools is much higher than the independent or grammar schools despite their unfavourable input indicators like the range of pupils ability and their socio-economic background. Not only the progress but academic results in many state schools match well with the selective schools.
Coming back to the local situation and considering academic attainment, while Harrow School was in the middle position in the top 100 Independent Schools by GCSE chart in 2018 in terms of A+A*, some Harrow secondary schools (academies) did much better within their class i.e. the state school sector.
One might wish independent schools to have foreign students and the money they bring in, but from the equal opportunities point and for the sake of social integration in a diverse society, children could do much better under well funded state education system.

Racial harassment is a common occurrence in British universities, finds Equality and Human Rights Commission report published this month.
Good to see that racial harassment has been acknowledged .. read more
The EHRC findings are eye opener as what happens in one setting could very well be happening in other areas as people are not blind to colour in a colour conscious society.
Like racism, racial harassment is not really admitted and subsumed under ‘hate crime’ – government funded hate crime industry is thriving though mostly being ineffective.
There were 288 reported hate crimes in Harrow, between September 2017 and August 2018, according to the latest figures from the Mayor’s Office for Policing and Crime (MOPAC) Hate Crime Dashboard, and 648 racist and religious hate crimes in the 12 months to September 2019 according to the Met dashboard.
Harrow once led good practices to address racism and racial harassment in the borough.
Till the Harrow Police and Community Consultative Group was hijacked by opportunists who eventually led it to its demise few years after, it remained pro-active in addressing racial harassment, a key concern.
For example, its home office funded racial harassment sub-committee, recognised as best practice by the Scotland Yard, launched several measures to raise racial harassment profile in the borough and dealt with it effectively.
(Photo of the launch of the sub-committee in July 1991 at the civic centre Harrow (L-R) Lord Ferrers, minister of police; Ross Simpson, chair HPCCG; Husain Akhtar, chair Racial Harassment sub-committee; and the host Harrow Mayor late Cllr Don Green)
One of the HPCCG remarkable initiative regarding racial harassment was periodically published declaration ‘Racial Harassment is Anti-Human Rights’ which was signed by hundreds in the borough, including community organisations, politicians, local authorities and businesses.