Just received Mayor’s answers?

Boris Johnson’s response to my recent written question on housing benefit shows the Mayor is simply pretending to have achieved fundamental reforms whilst simultaneously supporting the measures.

• He claims to have gained more time, but this just means delaying the pain.
• He claims to have won more funding, but the amount he got was just a drop in the ocean.
• He claims to have delivered incentives for landlords to reduce their rents, but he told me himself that last year alone private sector rents in London rose 12%. So where’s the evidence?

The Mayor needs to push for a regional variation to the benefit caps.

Housing Benefit
Question No: 1419 / 2012
Nicky Gavron

Boroughs of all political colours in both inner and outer-London – including Croydon, Newham, Waltham Forest and Westminster – have publicly stated that as a result of the welfare reforms they are seeking homes for claimants in other parts of the country. Kit Malthouse AM, your deputy Mayor for Business and Enterprise, claimed on the April 29th Sunday Politics that you do not believe there is a need for boroughs to move residents out of London because of the welfare reforms as you have secured “transitional arrangements”. Why do you think you are right and the councils are wrong?

Written response from the Mayor

The main political parties agreed that welfare reform, in particular housing benefit reform, was overdue and necessary. I have had and will continue to have a constructive and positive dialogue with Government about its programme of welfare reform. These discussions have secured transitional arrangements for London, including more time for existing claimants, more funding for boroughs, and incentives for landlords to reduce their rents.

Event: Revival of the Communal and Cooperative Idea in Israeli

Discussion with Danny Gavron

This Wednesday 30 May I will be pleased to host British-born Israeli author and journalist Danny Gavron at City Hall for a discussion on the revival of the communal and cooperative idea in Israel, which has become part of a powerful protest movement.

The news from Israel regarding the communal scene in the last decade is that the famous Kibbutz Movement is perceived as largely dead. Yet the recent protest movement shows that the idea of the communal is making a comeback.

Out of the public glare, young leftwing children of the kibbutz have joined allies from around Israel to form urban communes and small town kibbutzim. Whereas the traditional kibbutz was a rural village, these new communes are located in the poorest areas of Israeli towns and carry out educational and social work for the weakest sectors of society. They now number more than a hundred communes and counting, with some two thousand members. They are responsible for a new cooperative sector that includes the establishment of a trade union movement which has already unionized workers in low-wage sectors. These new kibbutzim and the movement around them represent an unexpected revival of the communal egalitarian ideal in Israel.

The huge protest movements last summer demanding social justice and protesting Israel’s march to capitalism of recent years were largely led by these communes and by others in touch with them. Yet it remains unclear if these actions will be renewed this year. Additionally, the movement has not yet tackled the Israeli-Palestinian question, which is so vital for both Israelis and Palestinians.

Danny will discuss this movement and what it means for Israeli, the Israel / Palestine question, and what lessons we can bring to the UK.

Danny is a British-born Israeli who has worked for Israel Radio, the Jerusalem Post, and as managing editor of the Palestine-Israel Journal. With two Arab co-authors, he wrote Peace pays: Palestinians, Israelis, and the regional economy, and has published numerous other books on Israel & Jewish history and the Israel / Palestine question. He has also worked with many NGOs.

The event will be free and open to the public but RSVP is essential. The evening will also include a short tour of City Hall and a glass of wine.

Revival of the Communal and Cooperative Idea in Israeli: discussion with Danny Gavron
Date: Wednesday 30th May – 19.00 to 20.30
Venue: Committee Room 3 (ground floor), City Hall, The Queen’s Walk, London, SE1 2AA
RSVP essential. RSVP to Alex Csicsek at alex.csicsek@london.gov.uk

Homes for London?

How’s this for a brazen piece of rebranding?

On 20 April, with his re-election looming, Boris Johnson pledged to deliver on Shelter’s campaign to create a ‘Homes for London’. Post-election, it has become crystal clear that Boris had no idea what measures he had signed up to.

During Wednesday’s Mayor’s Question Time he told me that the Homes for London he has created is simply the new name for The London Housing Board. He’s taken the name but none of the initiatives or policies.

He even told me he would have to “look at the detail of what is entailed by that pledge”.

This makes it hard to consider his pre-election support as anything other than cynical electioneering. Boris Johnson got good publicity off the back of his pledge and at the time of writing the Homes for London website still proudly proclaims:

“At the end of April we had a major win: Boris Johnson pledged to create Homes for London.”

Not that he noticed. On Wednesday he told me:

“I may have had a lot of publicity but not enough to come to my attention.”

But the biggest shame is not that Boris Johnson seems to have notched up the first broken promise of his second term, but that he is going to continue to fail millions of Londoners living in the private rented sector.

Rents rose 12 percent last year alone, complaints about rogue landlords and rip-off letting agents are increasing and the government’s welfare reforms will compound the pain.

Shelter’s Homes for London provided some solution to these. A mayoral London-wide Letting Agency with fairer rents and securer longer-term tenancies that work for families coupled with a drive to prosecute rogue landlords – these are not just good ideas, they are an essential minimum.

Boris Johnson should pay attention. To date, his record on the private rented sector is worse than poor.

His main ‘achievements’ being a voluntary landlord accreditation scheme with no qualifying criteria, a London Rents Map that tells Londoners where they cannot afford to live and a Housing Strategy with no policies to tackle rogue landlords and extortionate rent increases. His manifesto was equally threadbare, promising just more of the same.

A third of London households now live in this sector. Their living standards are being squeezed, people can’t get deposits together, poor environmental standards effect their health and children’s wellbeing and education is damaged by the constant churn.

The Mayor has the position, influence and power to tackle these problems. So far he has chosen not to. Let’s hope, once he studies the details, he will change his mind.

My Letter in today’s Daily Telegraph – London lacks housing

Today the Daily Telegraph published my letter responding to an article by Andrew Gilligan on the Government’s cuts to housing benefit.

Below is the unedited version that was cut down to meet word limits. You can read the published version here.

——————————

Andrew Gilligan says the “evidence of a mass exodus” as a result of the welfare reforms “is thin” (The ‘final solution’? Don’t believe the hype about the housing benefit cap).

He is right, but only because he is not factoring in the delayed and phased-in implementation of the measures. As Gilligan acknowledges, 70% of existing claimants are still to have their housing benefit cut. Furthermore, 2013 will see the introduction of the total benefit cap and the pegging of local housing allowance to the Consumer Price Index.

While CPI is currently 3.4%, London rents rose 12% last year. As homes become more expensive to rent, the benefit – which is claimed mostly by people who are in work, disabled or pensioners – will cover less and less.

And where will these homes, at low rents, be found?

The Government believes the caps will bring rents down. But, a lack of social rented homes at one end combined with declining new home ownership at the other will continue to fuel year-on-year rent increases way above inflation in London.

For all these reasons, a report for Shelter showed that only 20% of inner-London neighbourhoods would be affordable by 2016, compared to 70% in 2011, while less than half of outer-London remains affordable. Affordability does not necessarily mean availability.

This is not a matter of party politics, it’s a matter of mathematics. That is why councils of all political colours in inner and outer-London are scrambling to find homes that are affordable for their residents and are increasingly being forced to find homes well beyond the south east.

The term “social cleansing” was introduced into the debate by Boris Johnson. He said it wouldn’t happen ‘on my watch’. But because Johnson “absolutely” supports these reforms, he has only lobbied Government for delay.

Why isn’t he lobbying for a regional variation to the caps? This is widely supported, including in a report published this week by IPPR. In addition, we need a comprehensive impact assessment of the totality of the reforms on levels of social segregation in London and other parts of the country.

Nicky Gavron
Labour Group spokesperson for housing and planning on the London Assembly

Boris Johnson and the missing £5.3m of rough sleeping funding

On 16 April I wrote to Boris Johnson after it became apparent that £5.3 million had been removed from the GLA’s budget for rough sleeping. The Mayor has consistently said that the full £33.8 million devolved to him from central government specifically for rough sleeping services (although not ring-fenced) would be spent on services.

The text is below.

April 16
Dear Mayor Johnson

Rough Sleeping Budget

I write in relation to the rough sleeping element of the Mayor’s 2012/13 Budget.

Homelessness charities have written to your office expressing concern that you appear to have diverted £5.3 million of the £33.8 million given to you by the government to spend on rough sleeping provision.

Their letter highlights:

“The £33.8 million was specifically transferred from central government to be spent on commissioning services that cannot or would not be provided at a London borough level…. Cutting those resources can only imply that in future years such services will in turn be ended or their funding cut back.”

Having revisited your Budget, a number of questions have arisen.

1. Your ‘Group Budget Proposals and Precepts 2012-13 Consultation Document’, published in December 2011, states that spending on rough sleeping provision would be at the full amount of £8.5 million per annum until 2015 (rounded up from £33.8 million over the four-year period). This was consistent with previous announcements by your office regarding the devolution and value of this fund.However, your finalised Budget of February 2012 shows an allocation of £28.5 million.This suggests that a decision was made to reduce the amount of money you would be allocating to such provision. Is this the case?
2. Although you have allocated only £28.5 million in spending on rough sleeping services in your Budget, your spokesperson told the Evening Standard (10 April 2012) that you “will spend £33.8million over this comprehensive spending review period”. Can you provide information as to where the remaining £5.3 million will be found in your Budget?
3. The Mayor’s ‘Rough Sleeping Commissioning Framework 2011-2015’ consultation closed on 12 August 2011. Yet eight months later no results have been announced. According to pages 15 and 16 of your Framework document, seven commissions providing vital services to London’s rough sleepers were due to have ended on 31 March 2012. This would suggest that it was vital that the publication of the final commissioning decision was made before that date.Therefore, could you tell me if those services are still being provided and, if so, how and on what basis are they being provided? Can you also tell me why you delayed publication of the final document beyond 31 March 2012 and if it will be published before the election?

I look forward to your response.

Yours sincerely

Nicky Gavron AM
Labour London-wide Assembly Member

Ken v Boris

After months of campaigning, it’s time for Londoners to make up their minds about which Mayor will run our city in the next four crucial years.

This is the time to look back on the records of both men: what each inherited, and their legacies.

For Labour you have an effective and uniquely experienced “executive” Mayor, with an encyclopaedic knowledge of London – Ken Livingstone

For the Tories a convivial part-time “ceremonial” Mayor, good at opening things, one-liners and endless waffle – Boris Johnson.

Compare their records.

When Ken was elected in 2000 London was a world city at risk after fourteen years with no citywide government.

The transport system was creaking at the seams: internationally, London was renowned for being easy to get to but difficult to get around, with congested streets and ramshackle public transport. There was an acute housing crisis, growing inequalities and a huge backlog of investment in social infrastructure and the environment.

As London’s first elected Mayor, Ken set up the GLA from scratch, defining its modus operandi and establishing its vision and goals. As his Deputy Mayor I was part of that process, and honestly cannot imagine anyone who could have got the authority up and running more efficiently or more quickly than Ken. While being happy to debate and discuss issues with staff, stakeholders and the public, Ken had a complete grasp of the options and admirable decisiveness.

He was acutely aware that the new authority had to tackle lots of things at once.

He began a revolution in how we police our city. He increased the number of police on the streets, bringing them out of their cars and into our communities, introducing the Safer Neighbourhoods community policing teams in every ward in London.

He tackled the then woefully inadequate transport system. In the short term, he massively improved the bus system, adding a third to the fleet and draconian enforcement of bus lanes. At the same time he began a rail renaissance – Tube modernisation; creating the Overground network, including the East London Line extension; and getting Crossrail agreed and funded after decades of procrastination by central governments. Ken also prepared a programme of future transport projects post 2018 and, of course, introduced the Oyster Card, congestion charge and the London Low Emission Zone. These and other policies resulted in the fastest shift out of the private car and onto bikes, buses, and feet in any major city in the world.

He inherited a housing crisis and a rapidly rising population. He doubled the number of homes built in London each year from 17,000 to 32,000 and worked towards 50% affordable homes in every housing development. He secured from the Labour government and handed to Johnson the largest housing investment budget ever in London – £5bn over to provide 50,000 homes in 3 years.

He tackled London’s huge carbon footprint with a raft of measures including the first comprehensive Climate Change Action Plan and set up the C40 group of large cities worldwide to collaborate to address climate change at the metropolitan scale.

He took on the challenge of regenerating the Thames Gateway, the largest concentration of multiple deprived communities in Western Europe. It was Ken who spearheaded the campaign to secure the Olympic and Paralympic Games for London to give momentum to the regeneration of East London and the Thames Gateway.

In short, Ken gave us a powerful vision for the future – “to develop London as an exemplary sustainable world city” – and provided the means to deliver it.

Boris Johnson inherited that catalogue of solid achievements when he entered City Hall in 2008 and has spent the past four years enjoying the fruits of Ken’s labour. From Crossrail to the Olympics, Johnson has merely cut the ribbons on Ken’s projects.

Johnson has done very little, but he’s undone a great deal.

His first act was to cancel nearly all of Ken’s long-term transport projects, starting with the Thames Gateway Bridge.

He weakened the London Plan, especially in respect of housing, abandoning Ken’s ambitious target that 50 percent of all new homes should be affordable.

He squandered the record £5 billion housing budget, failing to deliver the 50,000 affordable homes by 2011.

He got rid of the accessible bendy buses and replaced them with eight “Boris Buses” at about £1.25 m each… probably the most expensive bus in the world!

Despite his claims to the contrary, he managed to reduce by almost 2,000 the number of police officers in advance of the Olympics and Paralympics.

And when his leadership was tested last summer, during the August Riots, he utterly failed even the basic test of being in London. What a contrast to Ken’s response to 7/7.

Perhaps most serious of all, while Ken is campaigning against the Tory government’s welfare reforms, Boris Johnson “absolutely” supports them. By 2016 only 20% of inner-London and less than half of outer-London neighbourhoods will be affordable to people receiving housing benefit – most of who are either in work or pensioners.

As we are starting to see, this will change the social fabric of London. It will create social segregation on an unprecedented scale and undo the mixed communities that have driven London’s social and economic success.

As a Tory Mayor, Boris has been obsessed with the Tory agenda. This is the man who in September 2010 said:

“You know we in the government in London have been making very substantial cuts for the last two years. I don’t think there’s any part of government across Whitehall that’s moved so far and so fast to make cuts.”

The fact is that even before the recession Boris’s main activity as a part-time Mayor has been cutting investment in London.

That is why there is virtually nothing for him to call his own and nothing in the locker for the next term. As a cabbie put it to me:

“we got a bunch of bikes for city blokes, when we could have had a bridge over the Thames for East Enders.”

In contrast, Ken’s record shows he will fight to make London a fairer and more equal city. He will deliver more homes that Londoners can afford, safer streets, more jobs and training and better transport with cheaper tube and bus fares.

He has new ideas about delivering more affordable homes in partnership with the pension funds and a serious commitment to cutting London’s carbon emissions.

Ken has the record to show that he’ll deliver for all Londoners and that he speaks for all Londoners in a crisis.

In the end, the sensible choice is Ken.

The only arguments against him have been a relentless stream of negative campaigning. That worked in 2008. Don’t let Boris get away with it again.

An open letter from Ken Livingstone to all Londoners

Monday 30 April 2012

Dear Londoner,

In three days time, you and 5 million other Londoners will have the chance to vote for the next Mayor of London. Things could not be more important. We are living through hard times. People are struggling and Britain is back in recession.

We cannot let the Tories get away with what they are doing.

My entire aim will be to put money back into Londoners’ pockets to ease the squeeze and boost the economy. I will work hard to win the jobs and opportunities people need. With less than a week to go I want to give you a clear picture of what I will do on the first full day of a Labour administration, if I am elected on May 3rd.

I will immediately appoint Val Shawcross as my Deputy Mayor so we can begin work on forming our fresh team.

There will be many things to do on day one given the problems the Conservative party has caused. But among the many actions of my new team, on day one I guarantee we will:

• Tear up the Tory plan to increase fares above inflation every year.

The Tories’ business plan that sees fares rise every year above inflation will be history. I will meet with the Transport Commissioner on my first day and instruct him to swiftly bring proposals on delivering my commitment to cut bus, Tube, Overground, DLR and Tram fares by 7%, and cut the single Oyster bus fare by 11%. I will instruct Transport for London to deliver the fares cut no later than 7 October 2012, so that within four months of the election, Londoners get the first instalment on the £1,000 that they will save over the next four years under a Labour led administration.

• Reverse the Tory Mayor’s cuts to police officers

Under the Tory Mayor we have had three Police Commissioners in four years. Instability has been the watchword. I will get my relationship off to a firm footing with the Commissioner and ensure we work together to keep Londoners safe. On our first working day together we will begin planning how quickly we can get police numbers back up to full-strength, and prepare a draft plan to make the revenue-raising and efficiency measures identified in my manifesto to pay for this.

• Undo the Tory attack on young Londoners

I will instruct GLA officers to make contact with London colleges, local authorities and universities to plan working together to create a London-wide Education Maintenance Allowance. City Hall will no longer be a bastion of a Tory party that has damaged young Londoners’ lives through hiking student fees, cutting EMA and overseeing soaring youth unemployment. We will be a champion for the next generation and London will set an example for the rest of the country.

• Start to ease the energy squeeze

City Hall officers will be asked to call representatives of the major energy utilities to City Hall to immediately discuss how London can gain its’ fair share of home insulation funding, so that we can help at least 400,000 families in the capital keep their homes warm more cheaply.

• Get co-operative

On day one I will commission a review of the Greater London Authority Group’s current energy supply contracts and tasking the Mayor’s Energy team with preparing to establish the first ever London Energy Co-operative. This bold and radical step will be the kind of innovation that will delineate the progressive, forward-looking politics of a Labour mayoralty.

• Make London more family-friendly

One of Boris Johnson’s first acts was to abolish the Childcare Affordability project which was cutting the cost of childcare for thousands of families. One of my first acts if I am elected will be to commissioned City Hall staff, including the GLA Children’s Unit to set up a new programme to provide grants and loans for childcare as I pledged in my manifesto.

• Make tenants part of the picture

For four long years millions of Londoners in the private rented sector have been wilfully ignored. That will come to an end. Senior GLA officials will meet with the GLA housing team to discuss establishing the first ever London Lettings Agency to cut rents and improve standards.

But beyond these key pledges the first day of a Labour Mayoralty will start to rectify some of the most shameful mistakes of the last few years under the Tories.

After appointing the Greens’ Jenny Jones to lead my cycling and walking policy, we will set up an inquiry with cyclists groups and Transport for London into what has gone wrong with safety on the Cycle Superhighways. I will instruct GLA and TfL officials to make available all the documents, emails and reports relating to the decision to take Cycle Superhighway 2 through Bow Roundabout, including all communication from the Mayor’s Office on this issue.

I will also ask TfL for a report on the capital under-spend during the Tories’ leadership of City Hall, and how it is proposed to get investment back up to budget to improve Londoners’ transport services over the next four years.

After four years of an administration that has prioritised the interests of the Conservative Party and the wealthiest one percent, my over-riding priority will be to put Londoners first – making the 99% better off.

Best wishes,

Ken Livingstone