Harringay, Haringey - So Good they Spelt it Twice!

Haringey Elections Results

Results as they come are available at Haringey Votes.

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Permalink Reply by Chris Setz on May 23, 2014 at 20:51

Where are you off to then, OAE? Olympus?

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Permalink Reply by Laura Miller on May 23, 2014 at 13:10

In St Ann's I thought the BNP was on the ballot , but there are no votes for them in the list. Does this mean they got nul points? (I hope)

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Permalink Reply by David on May 23, 2014 at 20:31

Thank you to all those who supported TUSC in the elections in Harringay. And congratulations to Matt Cuthbert for increasing the Green vote in the ward.

The vote for Labour yesterday gives them a mandate to continue their plans to sell off council housing and to cut jobs and services. A possible general election victory for Labour in May 2015 will only accelerate the process. We cannot wait another four years for an opportunity to vote for an alternative to Haringey Labour. We need to continue to campaign against council land and property sell-offs and cuts in jobs and services.

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Permalink Reply by Chris Setz on May 23, 2014 at 20:39

>> their plans to sell off council housing

They promised to build 1,000 new homes - they don't have the cash to build more, otherwise they would. Are you saying that they are so crazy that they will sell off fit council houses for no good reason, just to cheat the homeless because they are fundamentally evil?

>> and to cut jobs and services.

How many of the cuts are down to the Council and how many to the ConDems? The way it works is that the Govt give the Council money and the Council spend it according to their legal duties (almost all of it) and influenced by the ruling party's manifesto (not legally binding). So, if the govt cut their budget, they have to spend less - guess what, for purely ideological reasons, the Govt cut their budget massively! Worse, they made cuts that cost more money than was saved! Who do you really think want to sack local people, the Council or the Government?

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Permalink Reply by Alan Stanton on May 24, 2014 at 13:05

Chris, who says that the reason for Council Estate demolition plans and social cleansing is because some people are "fundamentally evil"?

The KoberTories are not "evil". They are simply, well, Tories. Their supporters in the Labour Group may also be Tories. Or they may more interested in who is going to be in the Dear Leader's cabinet, or have one of the consolation prizes in the party bag. Like Scrutiny; or being the Mayor.

They may even be genuine progressives or left-wing people who believe that Neocon programmes of housing demolition and displacement are good for people. One of the main failings of these believers is often a lack of knowledge; or lack of curiosity about valid and evidenced critiques of such programmes. Critiques which say that the programmes: (a) Don't tackle poverty and social exclusion; (b) Can leave untouched or worsen the position of people at the bottom of the pile; and (c) Are far more likely to serve the interests of the rich and powerful.

Of course, these critiques may also be wholly or partially wrong. So we then get on to a fundamental failing - an unwillingness or outright refusal to gather or try to look openly and fairly at factual evidence.

TUSC and some of the Greens have been the only parties willing to consider the evidence and pose this critique.

The word "paradigm" is grossly overused. But a writer I have enormous respect for is Robert Chambers, who uses the phrase "paradigmatic flip" to describe what happens when deeply rooted and widely-held beliefs which appear to be common sense, turn out to to be wrong. Or if not wrong at least highly questionable.

Very sadly Haringey Council is a failing Council. But not in the sense that the LibDems got it right. They are just another variation on the Tories, with similar beliefs. And just as timid, unimaginative and lacking in creativity as the Koberites.

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Permalink Reply by Chris Setz on May 24, 2014 at 14:50

>>try to look openly and fairly at factual evidence.

Alan, you are stating beliefs as facts, then building premises on those 'facts' - rocky ground!

Ms Kober is not a Tory. The Labour Cllrs are not Tories.

By your definition they may be, but is your definition any more valid than those who disagree and, if not, who is correct as a matter of fact? Left and right are relative terms, it's a consensus arguably better described as 'progressive'. You can be a Tory and support the form of communism we know as the National Health Service. You can be Labour and wealthy and have a title (even if some give it up for Labour, as Tony Benn did).

Originally 'left' referred to where the reps sat in relation to the French monarchy. The spectrum of left-wing thought encompasses a wide variety and is a moving target. It includes mistakes such as the support for Eugenics expressed by both Churchill and George Bernard Shaw. It concentrates on inequality rather than hierarchy - it's the modern way. You give what you are able to give and you take what you need. Labour doesn't want right-wing 'neo-liberalism' where your value is in direct proportion to your wealth, where the government imposes severe restrictions on workers to maximise profit at their expense. We don't think the needy bring it on themselves.

I think what you mean is the Labour in Haringey are not 'left' enough for you. I ask you this:

As they presented themselves as Labour and were elected as such, is that not the ultimate test of their right to be called Labour politicians?

>>consolation prizes in the party bag

I think the way it works is that every party in the council has a number of roles and positions on the committees that every council uses to run their boroughs. Cllrs who make it to leader of their party get the maximum - last year the ruling party leader got £31k and the opposition leader £23k (on top of the 'basic' £10.5k all cllrs get). The Chief Exec (a council officer, not elected) gets £190k, 6.7 times the median council officer salary of £28k. I presume they have no control over the actual amounts paid for each role, and that they would probably be able to earn at least that and probably a lot more outside the public sector.

Party leaders allocate responsibilities to cllrs and those cllrs can get extra money for taking on those responsibilities. That's part of the reason they're called 'leaders'. Also, I guess that the ruling party can appoint someone from the opposition to sit on a cttee - that's presumably why there was a Lib Dem Chairing the Scrutiny Cttee I suppose, with it's £14.5k in extra pay. I guess the leader takes into account any expertise that a cllr may already possess, but, as cllrs are not required to possess any qualifications for the job, more or less all could do it. Presumably party leaders come to a decision in consultation with residents (those who run the ward 'branch' meetings for instance - they'd know the candidates well) and other senior cllrs as to whether appointing a particular cllr to sit on a particular cttee would further the political aims set for the borough.

What you seem to be saying is that the power to appoint is not used in the way you would have it used - that is is used to manage the power relationships between Labour party members on the Council. In other words, if the boss rates you, you get promoted. If she doesn't, you don't. One of her ratings might very well be, how well does the cllr respond to the party whip? If she wants you to vote a certain way and you defy her, you don't get to sit on an important cttee.

It can't be much fun sitting on some cttees. I've seen them sit for hours and hours on weekday evenings til quite late on the planning cttee. They are in a stuffy crowded room, faced with a row of people with deeply vested interests - lawyers, property experts, community leaders, residents all arguing, some quite technically and some woefully ill-informed, about matters of opinion in a world heavily weighted to developers. Easy to come to the conclusion that the cttee favours developers but the truth is that central govt stripped power from us long ago - the developers cannot be stopped. This is part of the reason for dislike of some of the things the council appears to do I think - people who don't understand are encouraged by the opposition to think the worst.

Is it that you don't accept that a party leader has the right under the system used by every council in the UK, to do what she wants as regards appointments? Is there any way we can prove that she is using them as 'consolation prizes' as you state, or is that your bitter opinion, not a fact?

>>TUSC and some of the Greens have been the only parties willing to consider the evidence and pose this critique.

I think you are saying here that, given facts, Labour refuses to consider them. An example would help. I think what you mean is that those parties are the ones who make decisions you agree with. If you disagree with the conclusions of a party, it doesn't make them wrong, sadly.

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Permalink Reply by Alan Stanton on May 24, 2014 at 17:15

Chris, you are clearly not going to believe anything I write. You prefer to preserve a naive faith in a rose-tinted cloud-cuckoo land fantasy about how the previous Labour Groups ran and why things happened the way they do.

I suggest that in, say, six months you have a chat with a few of the new councillors who are not Kober sycophants and ask them what they have observed and learned. Obviously for your own ears, rather than for public consumption.

What I wrote about the Neocon programmes of housing displacement and demolition is that it's proposed as positive for people and something which will regenerate poorer areas such as Tottenham.

I wrote that there are critiques of this approach. If you'd like to learn about them you might want to start with Anna Minton's book "Ground Control". Then perhaps David Harvey's book "Rebel City". I also ound a very helpful collection of papers called "Mixed Communities; Gentrification by stealth" edited by Gary Bridge, Tim Butler and Loretta Lees.

You can also find papers and videos by these writers and researchers online - and view or download them for free. Professor Loretta Lees is particularly interesting. I'd also recommend a short chapter from the Mixed Communities book by Sarah Glynn about Dundee. This and other material is available for free download on her website.

If you get interested you might like to explore books by Mike Davies who draws parallels with what's going on in other cities round the world. (As indeed do the other writers and academics I mentioned.) You can often pick up his books secondhand. I found some in Judd Books in Marchmont and the nearby Skoob Books in the Brunswick.

They were selling some cheap paperback copies of Tony Judt's book "Ill Fares the Land". Or you can see him online, giving a lecture which was a shorter version version of the same material. I found Judt especially useful as a non-Marxist who celebrates and values European Social Democracy and offers a way of understanding the dark time we are going through when the values and achievements of social democracy are under sustained and heavy attack from the Right - inside our heads as well as in our institutions.

Maybe I missed the local Labour Party's discussions of many or even all the areas raised by authors I've mentioned. But there again, maybe I didn't.

You say I'm criticising people in Haringey Labour who are "not left enough" for me. Well, I've never played the Lefter-Than-Thou game. And for a very good reason. If you speak to any "lefties" who've been on the Council they would tell you that I was on the right wing of the Party. I haven't changed. The Party has.

Your nasty crack about my "bitter opinion" of Special Responsibility Allowances is inaccurate. It implies that I feel the way I do because I didn't get a prize from the Leader. Actually, I've never been interested in climbing the greasy pole. And I've nothing but disdain for Labour councillors who in the past traded votes in the Group for "Extra Allowance" posts. ("It's my turn". Or: "I'll vote for you if you vote for me.") And who now suck up to The Dear Leader.

In Parliament the Payroll Vote seriously weakens democratic checks on the Executive by the Legislature. Haringey Council has had a grossly ineffective LibDem Group where those checks have been almost non-existent. The challenge now is to develop effective opposition from outside the Council.

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Permalink Reply by Chris Setz on May 30, 2014 at 0:20

>>nasty crack

Not intended. You of all people are in a position to positively criticise but when I ask for specifics, you seem to sidestep. You've written damning condemnations of the leader and her cabinet in several places, notably recently over the election results, but it really feels like schoolboy name calling - you re-spell their surnames and use neologisms to mock them.

What is the substance of your criticism? That's what I want to know more about because I think you are a keen observer with a lot of experience but unless you come across with the meat of the sandwich your valuable insights will fade away, won't they?

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Permalink Reply by Alan Stanton on May 30, 2014 at 2:32

"Come across with meat in the sandwich"?

Okay, Chris, let's take my posting above. Several paragraphs outlining a cogent, comprehensive and well evidenced critique of the housing and "regeneration" plans for areas like Tottenham. Not my own original critique, of course, but a left-wing critique by academic writers and researchers.

It's a critique i have borrowed and tried to explore and reflect on. Pondering where it may and may not apply to Tottenham. On HoL I have suggested books, articles and videos which might help you and others understand this substantive critique. Which is relevant as a critique of the Tory Policies proposed by Stuart Lipton and enthusiastically adopted - something old, borrowed and true blue - by the Kober Kouncil.

It's not all stuff I've taken from elsewhere. On Hol and on my Flickr photoblog there are umpteen short pieces of my own about various aspects of how this Council fails. And about the lack of any evidence for how the Kober/Goldberg/Strickland regeneration plans will actually work or address the key issues for Tottenham - especially those raised by the riot.

I didn't re-list all the links I've previously posted as I assumed you're able to look them up yourself. But I gave one - to an article by Sarah Glyn which is downloadable. Did you read it? If you did, can you understand why her criticisms of policy in Dundee - and the assumptions made to justify demolishing people's homes - might also apply to Tottenham?

You talk about my "valuable insights" which "will fade away". But since you think I haven't "come across with the meat of the sandwich" it seems you haven't understood or even bothered to read my "insights" in the first place.

What is the substance of my criticism? Well let me turn that round. Where is there any substance whatever in the Labour Manifesto - in fact the Kober Manifesto?

For example do you believe we live in one of the cleanest boroughs in London?

How about the promise that: "every school and childcare setting will be rated good or outstanding by Ofsted". Do you know how absurd that is as a Council commitment? Absurd because so many of the schools are no longer run by the Council. So how is the Dear Leader going to ensure that happens? Because cuts have slashed and shrunk the central support which boroughs can offer schools? Absurd too because Mr Gove can change the targets - apparently at whim in order to provide a legal pretext for forced academies.

And absurd because "childcare settings" include private and voluntary nurseries - again outside the Council's control. And which are under enormous pressures to cut costs and make cash income. How can they do that? Cut staff and conditions and raise fees. You think that will lead to a good or excellent rating?

Or let's take the pledge to: "deliver over 1000 new affordable homes, including 250 new Council homes". Affordable for whom, Chris? For existing Tottenham families? And who will do the delivering? "We" Haringey Council as promised? Or private companies? Do you know, Chris, what other - real - Labour councils are planning to build? Do you really think 250 Council homes in four years is going to make a significant dent in our housing crisis? How many new Council homes has this Council built so far?

But never mind. Because nobody in the Muswell Hill Colonial administration is in the slightest bit interested in my or anyone else's insights. It's never been interested in listening seriously to Tottenham people. Just posing dishonest questions in fake questionnaires.

After all, Why bother with learning anyone else's ideas when they are perfectly happy with the same failing policies which have been repeatedly tried and failed for years. But they won the election didn't they? So why change?

And now they can just get on with the important business. Who will get which sweeties - Special Responsibility Allowances. Who'll be Mayor. Who the Deputy Mayor so they can have Buggins' turn next year? Who'll be on Scrutiny? And who are the lucky few favoured by the Dear Leader with a place in her Kobinet? Pity the poor also-rans who have to smile as they make do with the consolation prize of chairing an Area Assembly.

More schoolboy insults? Or perhaps my attempt to use humour to prick the pomposity and self-satisfaction of "Leaders" who are mostly empty nonentities.