The Tory group on the council claims that it is the ‘second largest Conservative opposition in London’ but it does not feel that way.
The performance of the group that enjoys over £250,000 public money in allowances per year, appears very weak under Cllr Hall’s leadership, considering what they ought to be doing but are not doing.
The opposition should work as a critical friend, assisting the administration whenever possible and suggesting healthy alternatives whenever necessary, all in the interest of effectively serving the community. But what happens is a kind of ‘punch and judy’ attitude by the opposition at the Council meetings or the Cabinet question times or through the letters in a local newspaper – all in a show of point scoring.
For example, they keep objecting major planning proposals, probably as this is the only area to stir because of the planning expertise of their planning portfolio holder in the pre2010 administration who otherwise has been kept at a distance since her come back to the council.
They have failed to suggest where the civic centre could be housed or where the much needed affordable homes could be built, instead they rubbish the council’s regeneration programme and have opposed the plans like for 318 new homes on the former post office site in College Road, Harrow.
No shadow budget has been presented thereby denying residents alternatives to the financial decisions being taken by the administration – one reason for this is because of the apparent lack* of budgeting experience and knowledge to lead meaningful debate on the Council finances.
* the budget presented by Cllr Hall during her short-lived Tory administration – a fluke – was badly defeated!

Public health, under local government control, is in a position to consider the community assets, those who deliver and benefit from services, looking beyond needs and treatments.
However, the Harrow council, like other councils, faces huge challenge to deliver an effective public health service, given worst financial settlement for local government and a contracting budget.
For some, the compound effect of unemployment and welfare cuts means worse diets, colder homes and less physical mobility, with potentially longer-term health and welfare impacts. Add to this the weak aspects of the public health in Harrow, like mental health and the health inequality gap, and the picture becomes quite alarming.
Furthermore, the cabinet meeting on 10/12/12 approved the draft budget for 2016/17 and the Medium Term Financial Strategy (MTFS) 2016/17 to 2018/19 for general consultation that includes the proposal to cut down its public health budget from around £10.7m in 2015-16 to £5.9m by 2018-19.
The proposed cuts include a 60% cut to drug and alcohol services, nearly £700,000 for staff that support non-statutory services such as workplace health, long-term conditions and unemployment, 15% cuts in the sexual health service in 2017-18 and a 93% reduction in the smoking cessation services.

Austerity Demonstration in Harrow early this year

While the Harrow council seems to be doing well in the areas like economic growth and regeneration, Care Act, ensuring an efficient and effective organisation, it is not doing well for the vulnerable.
A council performance report by the portfolio holder for performance Councillor Kiran Ramchandani (photo) before the cabinet meeting on 10 December, identifies a number of targets that have not recently been  met or where the performance in well below the target, despite the vulnerability specific council motions.
This failure suggests that although the council gathers various information about who benefits/ does not benefit from its services, effective use of the information to redress imbalances is not good enough.
Following are some of the areas where the targets have not recently been met:
• number of eligible people receiving health checks
• percentage of Mental Health clients in paid employment
• percentage of social care users with self-directed support taking up a cash payment

   option
• total number of households to whom the council has accepted a full homelessness

   duty
• first time entrants to Youth Justice System
• Child Protection Plan for 2nd or subsequent time (within two years of last plan)
• 16 to 18 year olds who are not in education, employment or training
• care leavers not in education, employment or training (19 – 21 year olds)
• termly rate of permanent exclusions of pupils as percentage of Harrow school

   population
• percentage of sessions absent from school amongst school age Children Looked

   After, in school year to date
• Children Looked After: rate of permanent exclusions as percentage of Harrow

   Children Looked After population
Also, the under-representation of black and minority ethnic (BAME) people at top level jobs as well as the proportion of disabled employees at the council remain an issue, made worst by the council not always testing the market for the senior posts.

It is becoming very clear that the war drive against Syria is also to get rid of Jeremy Corbyn who has been mixed up in all this.
Like Margaret Thatcher who sharpened the colonial ‘divide and rule’ and cleverly used it on the miners, David Cameron is systematically using the Syria factor to divide the Labour Party.
David Cameron who has visited Harrow to support Cllr Hall’s short-lived council administration – a fluke*, might have learnt how to divide Labour.
Jeremy Corbyn success and public appeal ended the New Labour/ Blair era that systematically damaged the Labour and social justice ideology over the years! This of course has troubled the New Labour gurus like Tony Blair and his followers like Harrow West MP Gareth Thomas.
Therefore, no surprise that Mr Thomas who supported Liz Kendall, a Blairite, for the Labour leadership, voted for the Cameron motion to bomb Syria while even some Tory MPs, including David Davis, voted against!
Mr Thomas came close to losing his Harrow West seat at the last general election. He also contended for the London Mayor candidacy but badly lost.

A typical email response:
From: ………@gmail.com
Sent: 03 December 2015 21:46
To: Harrow Monitoring Group
Subject: Re: Gareth Thomas, shame on you!
Come next elections and I shall vote against Gareth Thomas and canvass others likewise for the single reason that he voted for bombing Syria.
R…d
*

Like now, in 2010 voters voted in Labour administration to run the council.
In mid-2013, a breakaway Independent Labour Group, encouraged and supported by the Tory group, snatched the council administration from Labour because of what has been described as the personal grudge against some in the Labour group.
Few months later, the Tory group grabbed the council administration with the support of the well groomed Independent Labour Group who voted in the Tory group through a highly controversial process which created the political mess (i.e. a hung council where both the Labour and Tory groups had 25 councillors each, and Tory minority administration was in place because of the 8 ILG councillors).

A Barnet Council’s regeneration project which the Barnet and Camden London Assembly member Andrew Dismore described as “disappointing”, “unimaginative” and “a multi story car park” design, has remained a matter of bitter concern for the residents on the Harrow side of the Stonegrove.
Stonegrove development to reintegrate the problematic Stonegrove estate, is on the edge of the green belt at the very northern edge of the London Borough of Barnet, close to Stanmore tube station and adjoining the London Borough of Harrow.
The residents expressed concerns three years ago that the frontage along Stonegrove needed better presentation as the urban ‘cardboard box’ style housing bears no relationship to any of the existing buildings or character of the area.
Since then there have been a number of added features to the development like a four-storey block. The latest being a planning application to build an extra level (which is called as “Minor Material Changes”!), despite that the objecting residents were seemingly assured of nothing higher than four.
A further concern is that this application appears to be a retrospective planning application as the work on the extensive extra floor has commenced (photo) before the planning committee permission.
The residents are concerned that increased density means implications for the character of the area, more people and increased demand on the services.
Such is the level of transparency and consultation that the residents discovered the application purely “by chance” when a large protected oak on Stonegrove was cut down on 17th October. On checking to see if there had been permission for that, they discovered that there had been an application to add a fifth storey to one of the massive buildings under construction, with patchy consultation with the affected residents.
“Most of my neighbours in Jesmond Way and Pangbourne Drive denied having received a notice” said the leading local campaigner Rhona Myers.
“The residents of Regents Court are distraught as they watch the building get even higher than the already overbearing mass directly opposite” added Mrs Myers who has been consistently airing the resident concerns about this development. Mrs Myers is set to address the Barnet planning committee meeting tomorrow.
It is disappointing the way Barnet is behaving and ignoring the residents expressed concerns. We hope this time the local planning authority would seriously consider the residents’ concerns and views in determining this application.

It can only be good that this year Harrow won the Best All Round Small Business Friendly Borough credit for its work to promote business start-ups and growth.
“This is now the best time to set up shop in Harrow as we embark on the largest regeneration programme for a generation” said Cllr Keith Ferry (middle), portfolio holder for business, planning and regeneration.
However, Harrow has a very clear identity within the West London that consists of other six borough council areas of Barnet, Brent, Ealing, Hammersmith and Fulham, Hillingdon and Hounslow, and therefore shares the challenges for West London.
A very recent West London Economic Assessment, carried out by the Peter Brett Associates LLP for West London Economic Prosperity Board, has identified a number of issues that have implications for Harrow’s business growth.
The PBA report says that there is a mismatch between the skills of the West London population and the needs of businesses, likely to become more acute over the next ten years and as the population continues to increase, this has positive as well as potentially negative economic consequences.
“The lack of affordable housing in particular risks putting a brake on economic growth” emphasises the report.
Perhaps the Tory opposition could realise the unhelpfulness of their opposition to the housing developments in Harrow.
The report alerts “West London could end up with an entrenched low-skill workforce servicing wealthier (central London) populations”.
Comparing West London with other London areas, the report highlights that:

• West London is about London average for business growth but well behind North and East London
• West London is about London average for Knowledge Based Economy employment but behind North and East London
• Unemployment in West London is not falling as quickly as elsewhere in London

The Tory opposition group on the Harrow council is not using the councillors question time at the cabinet meetings productively.
Fifteen minutes are allowed for members of the council to ask a portfolio holder a question on any matter in relation to which the Executive has powers or duties.
This established time limit allows a reasonable number of councillor questions to be answered at the meeting but lately there is an unnecessary increase in the number of questions by the opposition, some of which should have not been asked anyway as the information is already in the public domain.
In the October 2015 cabinet meeting, Tory councillors asked eleven questions, where only five could be answered at the meeting within the time limit.
Such was the nature of the questions, that one question by the deputy leader of the opposition (photo) was about the information regarding the tenants Right to Buy. The information is public and available on the Council’s website as well as via personal enquiry to the Leasehold Team.
The number of the opposition questions reached to thirty five at the November cabinet meeting, twenty nine of which were asked by the deputy leader of the Tory group, seemingly in a show-off. Obviously only seven questions could be answered at the meeting.
One of the questions he asked was about the concessions being offered to residents under the new food and garden waste collection regime. The information is in public domain .
In the public interest, they should not waste the council time in scoring political points in public.

Good that the Harrow council has taken notice of our intervention and has now amended the road marking to remove the ambiguous right turn arrow and leave an arrow indicating straight on.
The right turn arrow on the filter lane at the junction of Gayton Road and Station Road, Harrow caused confusion, resulting in a £65 fine when the motorists innocently failed to comply with the prohibited right turn signs around.
Although the signs for the restricted right turn are mounted, the right turn arrow marked on the road was more readily noticed, tempting and was therefore followed by the drivers!
The fines from this spot generated significant revenue for the council.

Harrow council could helpfully consider any appeals against the PCNs previously issued for mistakenly taking a right turn at this junction under somewhat misguided circumstances.

Lobbying MPs, offering them hospitalities and taking them out on ‘fact-finding’ trips by the interested parties is much heard about and of course the MPs have to declare any interest which someone might reasonably consider to influence their actions or words as an MP.
But it is not often that the local councillors receive gifts or hospitalities from those who have wider national or international interests, but it does happen and must be declared!
In Harrow, the following councillors have provided information about the positions they hold, and gifts or hospitalities they have received:
Cllr Keith Ferry – Lab – deputy leader of the council and chairman planning committee: 18/10/2015 – hospitality received at a Rugby World Cup Event offered by The Berkeley Group; value £500.
Cllr Ameet Jogia – Con – a new comer but in Canons ward: 07/06/2015 – delegation to Israel – 7 to 12 June 2015 offered by Conservative Friends of Israel, Embassy of Israel; value £2000.
Councillor Jerry Miles – Lab – chairman of the powerful Overview and Scrutiny Committee: 03/10/2015 – Tanglewood Monday Club 50th Anniversary Event offered v £60.
Cllr Paul Osborn – Con – very capable and influential councillor irrespective of the council administration: 24/08/2015 – VIP Tickets offered by England Hockey; 1x VIP Tickets for 24 and 25 August, 2x VIP Tickets for 29 and 30 August; value £1300.
Cllr Kiran Ramchandani – Lab – a new comer but holds a most powerful portfolio for the Performance, Corporate Resources & Policy Development: at present, this councillor is looking for the right wording to declare a trip to Israel paid by the controversial Britain Israel Communications & Research Centre.

The Tory party glossy material (photos) that has hit some Harrow letter boxes today, brands the Labour leader almost an ‘enemy within’.
The David Cameron letter says “supporters of Jeremy Corbyn have gathered an army of the far left …. as your Prime Minister my first duty will always be to protect and defend our nation and our way of life …. we can no longer trust them to keep our nation safe and secure”.
A recent YouGov poll found that Labour Party leader Jeremy Corbyn is one of Britain’s most popular public figures while Cameron is the most hated.
Moreover, there is an online petition calling for a no confidence vote in David Cameron which has attracted more than 180,000 signatures.
No doubt the party politics is expected to be nasty but perhaps not to this extent and not at this time!