Lib Dems mark the 100th anniversary of the Representation of the People Act

Yesterday marks the 100-year anniversary of female suffrage in the UK. Speaking on the centennial, President of the Liberal Democrats Sal Brinton said:

In the last 100 years there have obviously been massive changes for the role of women in society. We are more equal, we are treated more fairly, and we face fewer obstacles in our lives. But the job is not yet done. As women we are not yet truly equal, we are not yet treated fairly, and we still face obstacles in our lives.

“We are still behind in our politics and change must be led from the top. My granddaughters will be two this summer. At the current, glacial, rate of change they will be in their ninth decade before we have parity in the House of Commons. That is not good enough.”

Leader of the Liberal Democrats, Vince Cable added:

“Today, we celebrate 100 years since partial extension of the franchise to women. It is shocking to think that another decade had to pass before votes were offered on a fully equal basis.

“The causes both of gender equality and real democracy in the UK still have far to go. A century on, we still see unjustifiable gender pay gaps, and sexism remains a scourge in the workplace and throughout society.

“Parliament itself remains unrepresentative of society and of political opinion. The next historic battle for democratic rights in the UK is to extend the franchise to 16 and 17 year olds, and reform our broken electoral system so that every vote counts and all voices can properly be heard.”

Reporting Back: Bury Council Cabinet January 2018

Last week was the regular meeting of Bury Council’s ‘Cabinet’, the Committee of the eight Labour councillors who are Cabinet members. The two opposition leaders are allowed to attend but not vote, Councillor Tim Pickstone reports:

The main items on the agenda included:

Homelessness
The Homeless Reduction Act comes into force in April 2018. The new legislation focuses on early intervention and prevention. There are twelve clauses within the Act which means that the Councils approach to supporting people who are homelessness or approaching homelessness needs to be revised. The Council is doing a lot of proactive work preventing homelessness and doing better than most of our Greater Manchester neighbours.

I asked about what more could be done across Greater Manchester. The Major of Greater Manchester has promised to end rough sleeping completely by 2020. New figures released in January by the government show rough sleeping in the conurbation has gone up up 42% in the last 12 months. Manchester has three times the number of rough sleepers as Liverpool.

One good piece of news is that Greater Manchester has received £7 million of Government Funding to provide a number of housing projects to support homeless people.

Radcliffe Market
The Council has sought bids to run a different sort of market at Radcliffe Market, which is currently losing the Council money in an unsustainable way.

The Council is  looking to move away from the traditional market model due to a perceived lack of demand from both the public and stallholders The Council wish to put Food and Drink and evening entertainment at the heart of the offer at Radcliffe Market and is keen to expand on the number of days the site is open and also to extend its current Friday evening offer.

Radcliffe Market benefited from a £1 million refurbishment in November 2015. Now a new private sector operator will run the market with the specification including:

To hold markets on a minimum of three days a week.
To hold events on one or more evenings per week centered on food and drink. Day to day management of the market building and stallholders.

The Council will receive not rent from the private operator, but would take a small share of profits after reasonable costs have been covered by the company.

Full papers for the Cabinet are here.

Radcliffe East Lancashire Paper Mill Housing Plans
Not at the Cabinet but it did happen last week was the publication of plans to build 440 new houses on the site of the former East Lancashire Paper Mill in Radcliffe. Most of the land belongs to the Homes and Communities Agency, though some land belongs to the Council on what was meant to be the site of the Radcliffe Riverside School, plans which never happened, meaning that sadly there is no high school at all in Radcliffe.

There are some poster boards which promote the site which can be viewed here.

There is an online survey here: online survey  which will be open  until Wednesday 14th February 2018.

The Government can’t continue to tinker round the edges on surveillance

After yet another court defeat for the Government on mass surveillance, it’s time for them to overhaul the system to put protecting our freedoms & civil liberties at its heart, says Ed Davey MP:

The UK’s surveillance regime has once again been declared unlawful by the courts.

What we need is an overhaul of the system that puts protecting freedoms & civil liberties at its very core.

The Government cannot simply tinker around the edges and hope for a different result.

Liberal Democrats believe we can be safe and secure by ensuring surveillance is targeted and suspicion-led.

What we need is for our police and intelligence services to be given the resources and money they need to do their job, not endless new laws.

Regulator’s decision to block Murdoch’s £11.7bn takeover of Sky must be the end of this saga

It is not in a democracy’s interests to allow one group to have such potential power to shape public opinion. The regulator’s decision must now be the end of the Sky saga, says Vince Cable.

The Competition & Markets Authority has provisionally blocked Fox’s attempt to buy the 61% of Sky that it does not own already.

The Liberal Democrats have opposed the deal would result in a significant reduction in media competition with one family having too much power.

The CMA has reached the correct decision on the Murdochs’ attempt to take full control of Sky.

The full takeover would have concentrated too much of the British media in the hands of just one family.

Plurality of media ownership is vital.

It is not in a democracy’s interests to allow one group to have such potential power to shape public opinion.

This should now be the end of the matter.

Reducing Plastic Waste – Bury Takes a Stand

Bury Councillors made a commitment for Bury to play its full part in reducing plastic waste, thanks to a move from the team of Lib Dem Councillors .

The Council agreed to look at its own use of us ‘single use plastics’, work with local retailers and crucially to play its part on helping residents reduce plastic waste where they can.

The Liberal Democrat team of Councillors brought a motion on Reducing Plastic Waste to the last Full Council meeting at the Town Hall. Thankfully the motion was supported by other parties and is now the policy of the Council.

Lib Dem Councillor Tim Pickstone said:
“We are using plastic and producing plastic waste at an completely unsustainable level. Not only are we using up a finite resource, but we’re polluting our environment and filing our sees with plastic waste which will be there for 100s of years.

300 million tons of new plastic is made each year, half of which is for single use plastic such as packaging and convenience foods. In many cases, such as plastic straws, takeaway food containers and coffee cups, there are practical alternatives available that are either reusable or sustainable. Estimates have shown that by 2050 there would be more plastic in the seas than fish if we don’t change soon.

“Retailer and government need to do play their part. We’re shown what can be done with a simple change through the ‘plastic bag levy’ which has meant an 85% reduction in single use plastic bags since it was introduced. Now we need to go further. It is almost impossible to go to one of our local supermarkets and not come out with unwanted and unrecyclable plastic packaging.

“Bury Council has a proud record of helping local residents recycle, now we need to go one step further and help residents reduce the amount we use and waste. The Government’s own target of removing non-essential single-use plastic in 25 years is woefully unambitious. Bury can and should do much better”

A&E doctors warn NHS patients dying in hospital corridors

Patients are dying in hospital corridors because of NHS underfunding, a group of A&E doctors has warned in a letter to Theresa May.

In their unprecedented warning, the doctors told the prime minister that more than 120 patients a day were being managed in corridors in some hospitals, with “some dying prematurely” because staff were so busy.

Theresa May must listen to this heart-breaking intervention and end the government’s chronic underfunding of the NHS.

The NHS needs an urgent cash injection so it can provide more hospital beds.

The Liberal Democrats have a clear plan to give the NHS and care an extra £6bn of funding by putting a penny on income tax.

We are also calling for a cross-party convention to find a long-term solution to the growing pressures facing the NHS and social care.

Reporting Back GM Combined Authority Scrutiny

Just to report back from the last two meetings of the Greater Manchester Combined Authority Corporate Issues and Reform Scrutiny Committee. This is one of three Scrutiny Committees that have been set up to have oversight of the work of the GM Elected Mayor and other issues that happen at a Greater Manchester level. Bury has one or sometimes two councillors on each Committee – the Lib Dem place for Bury is on the Corporate Issues and Reform Scrutiny.

Three main issues over the last two meetings:

Apprentice Levy
The Apprenticeship Levy was introduced in April 2017, payable at a rate of 0.5% of pay bill by all organisations with an annual pay bill of more than £3 million. This includes the majority of Greater Manchester’s major public sector organisations (Local Authorities, Health Trusts, Police, Fire and TfGM), with an anticipated £20 million being paid per year.

Public sector bodies, for example Bury Council, still have to pay wages for apprentices (on top of the levy they are paying to the Government), but they can claim back money for training. Bury currently has 40 apprentices, which is great, but no doubt dwarfed by the amount it has to pay in the levy.

The work of the GM Combined Authority on this will focus on:
– Theme One: Workforce Planning.
– Theme Two: Consistent & Co-ordinated Approach.
– Theme Three: Creating High Quality Apprenticeships.
– Theme Four: Integration in wider public service reform.

School Readiness
One of the biggest priorities for the Combined Authority at present is school readiness. Essentially Greater Manchester lags behind the national average the proportion of children who are deemed ‘school ready’ at the start of primary school. Previous major studies have shown that addressing this gap would have a massive impact on the future prosperity and wellbeing in the county.

Greater Manchester (GM) remains an outlier in Early Years (EY) outcomes compared to the national average, with only 68% of of all eligible children achieving a good level of development at the end of the Early Years Foundation Stage (EYFS) (reception) in 2016/17, compared with 71% nationally. This equates to approximately 12,000 children starting school this September who have not reached a good level of development.

The priorities in Greater Manchester are going to be:
– All parents will have access to the support they need
– High quality early years services
– Excellent places to play, develop and learn
– Strong leadership and systems infrastructure

Fire Service
One of the bigger areas that comes under this Scrutiny Committee is the Fire Service and at the last meeting we received a number of presentations from senior fire officers. This included an update on the Greater Manchester Fire and Rescue Service Annual Report which updates on GMFRS aims:
– Prevention – Protection – Response – Public Value – Financial Information – People

A summer of achievements last year including:
– GMFRS has provided almost 28,000 homes with face to face safety advice including fire risk, crime prevention and health.
– The number of non-domestic fires has fallen by 6% this year and 34% since 2009/10.
– Despite falling budgets and a small rise in the number of fires GMFRS is around a minute quicker than the national average response times for fire and rescue services.
– Community rooms on Fire Stations have been used almost 6,700 times by charities and community groups. • GMFRS volunteers have provided almost 36,000 hours of service.
– GMFRS carbon footprint has reduced by a massive 40% since the 2008/09 baseline.

Full papers are here. Any questions please get in touch!

 

Universal Credit will drive up homelessness as people stuggle to rent homes

The Government’s roll-out of Universal Credit risks causing chaos in the rental market and increased homelessness. It’s time for urgent reform.


The Conservative’s roll out of Universal Credit risks driving up homelessness.

That’s what the Liberal Democrats will warn in a debate in Westminster Hall this morning.

Without urgent reform of the housing benefit element of Universal Credit, disaster will occur in what is an already dysfunctional housing market.

If those urgent changes are not made to the Government’s new benefit, Universal Credit, homelessness will skyrocket and the private rental sector will prove even more resistant to tenants on benefits.

The government has the opportunity to improve the chronic housing shortage across the country by making Universal Credit payments to landlords the default option.

Despite the chaos created by the shambolic rollout of Universal Credit, opportunities for positive action remain if the government actually listens to those trying to make the system work.

Your views sought on Policing Priorities

Greater Manchester’s Labour Mayor, Andy Burnham, is running a consultation on his plan for policing and the Lib Dem team are urging people take the survey.

The proposed policing priorities are:

Keeping people safe
Protecting and caring for people who live, work, socialise and travel in Greater Manchester. Protecting those who are vulnerable and those who are victims of crime or at risk of being victimised. Building resilience, feelings of safety and confidence in policing and community safety.

Reducing harm and offending
Preventing anti-social and criminal behaviour including the most serious offending and terrorism by solving problems, intervening early and rehabilitating offenders to build confidence in criminal justice.

Strengthening communities and places
Helping to build resilient and resourceful communities including online communities and protecting the places where people live, work, socialise or travel. Supporting the delivery of the IT systems, buildings, roads, street lighting and other public assets needed to solve problems in a 21st century society.

It is probably difficult to disagree with any of these, but worrying that, in the 33 pages of this document, the policing plan does not once mention burglary, theft from motor vehicles or enforcement of traffic offences, despite these being issues that are raised most often as with us.  There is also no mention of Police visible present “on the beat” in our communities.”

You can read the draft plan and take the survey here. The survey closes at midnight on Sunday 14th January 2018.

11,000 homes empty for more than 10 years across UK

Over 11,000 homes across the country have been sitting empty for ten years or more, research by the Liberal Democrats has revealed.

Vince Cable has said it is a “national scandal” that so many homes are being left empty when the country is in the midst of a worsening homelessness crisis.

The figures, uncovered through Freedom of Information responses from 276 local councils, show that there are over 216,000 homes across the country that have been empty for six months or more. Of these, 60,000 had been empty for two years or more, 23,000 for five years or more, and over 11,000 have stood empty for at least ten years.

Across Greater Manchester almost 11,000 homes are empty – and that does’t include Manchester City itself who presumably didn’t respond to the FOI request. Bury has the highest level of those that responded with 1655 empty homes.

Full figures by local council can be found here

The research also shows that just one in thirteen councils are making use of Empty Dwelling Management Orders (EDMO), powers used by local authorities to take over properties that have been empty for at least six months. Only 19 of the 247 councils in England and Wales that responded (the powers do not apply in Scotland) had used an EDMO in the past five years. Of these only six had used one in the past year.

In total, councils returned around 23,000 empty homes back into use, including through direct action and the work of empty home teams. The Liberal Democrats are calling for reform of EDMOs and stronger powers for local councils to bring long-term empty homes back into use.

Liberal Democrat Leader Vince Cable commented:
“At a time when the homelessness crisis is worsening and more and more people are sleeping out in the cold on our streets, it is a national scandal that thousands of homes across the country are sitting empty. These homes could be turned into affordable places to live for some of the most vulnerable people in our society.

“The Government needs to urgently review the current system which is clearly not working. Councils need to be given the powers and resources to bring empty homes back into use . This must form part of a wider package to tackle the housing crisis, including building more homes on unused publicly owned land land and clamping down on land-banking.”