More from the Group Meeting
You may have thought that Cllr Mushtaq Mughal had been suspended by the Labour Party. Possibly so, but not by the Newham Labour Group because he was there again for the meeting of the Labour Group on the evening of 22nd February. And he was chairing it!
We are told that the Chief Whip reported to the Group that some 35 individuals are currently under some form of investigation. That’s right, 35. There are only 60 members of the Group. That’s almost 60% of the Group under investigation! We don’t know if there were observers from the CLP at the meeting, but surely this should be something that would concern them. It doesn’t seem to have been shared with the CLPs. Is this true? Further information or confirmation would be appreciated.
Councillor Clark apparently questioned the Mayor on the progress of her promise to build 1000 new homes in her first term.
Here is the promise:
With a bit more, just to be clear.
It is good to hear a politician being so clear and explicit in what she is going to do.
We do not know if she got 100 new homes built in Y1. Clearly some were built because these were underway during the Wales regime. She has been strangely reticent about her ‘success’ in this area.
We are also unclear on how many new social homes are being developed by private developers, whom she requires to build at 50/50, private/social. What we hear is that developers are mothballing their Newham schemes because they can’t make them pay using the Fiaz formula.
What we do know, and this was in her response to Cllr Clark, is that the firm commitment to build (at least) 1000 new council homes has now changed to an aspiration to start 1000 new homes before she leaves office.
This begins to look like a contender for a Pinocchio Award
Can anyone remember what the opposite of under-promise and over-perform is?
It was a hard meeting by all accounts. ‘Tax and Cut’ Terry told the comrades about what first seemed to be his inability to control overspends and later appeared to be his unwillingness to do so. When questioned about the collapsing general reserve by Cllr McAlmont, Tel slapped him down. There is no decrease in the reserves, apparently.
If you read the budget report it might appear that there is only £4m left. Just because it says that doesn’t mean that that is the case!
The Group spent some time, not a lot, but some time discussing the swinging cuts to services. Cutting £2m from the fund to support those without access to public funds. There is a real argument about why it is local government, that is left to pick up the pieces for a national problem. But cutting funds will leave large numbers, thousands we are told, in Newham without support. The Labour Group will support the reduction to services for this group by £2m.
It appears that there will be a 66% increase in the cost of emissions-based charges for vehicles, just prior to the local election in 2022. Good timing.
Shortly after, the Group went on to discuss the reduction in costs of refreshments to councillors by £40,000. Small compared to the £2m that they had just agreed, but significant and it would let the citizens of Newham know that councillors were willing to take a hit, not in their allowances (obviously) but in their refreshments.
It was at this point that the discussion in the Group became somewhat more animated, we are told. The Chair struggled to keep the members to time. Given the extreme importance of this matter, eventually Mayor Fiaz agreed to take the matter back for further consideration and withdrew the proposal.
Nice to know that they have got their priorities right and our councillors are fighting on behalf of the people.