News from Westminster Labour

Labour sets out its priorities for Church Street Ward

Church Street Labour Councillors Barbara Grahame and Aziz Toki, together with local campaigner Ahmed Hamid, have outlined their priorities for Church Street Ward over the coming years.

Housing
Housing problems predominate in Church Street. With 12,000 adults crammed into this tiny patch, many in social housing, including many elderly and very young, from all over the world, different cultures, different life-styles and different bed times, community cohesion is a real challenge where people feel themselves competing for housing.

Our priorities are:

* An end to overcrowding. A family with 2 or 3 young children in a small flat is a nightmare for everyone

* We need to build more 2 and 3-bedroom affordable housing, as Church Street has enough one-bedroom flats

* Reliable lifts – 8 storey blocks, many built for the elderly, continually suffer breakdowns leaving residents marooned in their homes

* Regular maintenance of the sewage systems – the appalling experience continues for ground floor residents who suffer from backflows of sewage because there is no regular maintenance contract

* To pursue landlords of private housing which does not meet Environmental Health or Health and Safety standards. The worst housing in Church Street is privately owned.

* No neglect of the housing due for demolition in the regeneration plans

* The Council should buy the long-vacant West End Green site on Edgware Road and build more affordable housing, as residents have petitioned.

Regeneration Proposals
Councillor Barbara Grahame said;

“Church Streets residents must not only be kept fully informed about the plans, but the Council should be clear that it will residents’ voices that will be driving the regeneration plans. The process may be painful and disrupt residents’ lives for years, so they will need to be convinced that their and their children’s lives will change dramatically for the better.

We need a promise from the Council to tenants that they will be relocated fairly and return to homes of the right size, at fair rents and secure tenancies, and a promise to leaseholders that they will receive a fair price for their properties if they are forced to move.”

Community Safety
The Safer Neighbourhood Teams has done wonders for making people feel safer but more could be done:

* Put the Safer Neighbourhoods Team on the streets when and where people most want them, when its dark, around entrance lobbies

* Security doors alone do not prevent intruders: the Council should reconsider concierges where groups of blocks are interlinked

* CCTV should be relocated where it is most needed and used more effectively

* Ensure estate lighting is repaired immediately

* Close shops that sell alcohol to drunks or children

* Make Lisson Green’s canal-side walkway a safe and clean route to the park, the mosque and schools – we’ve achieved new lighting and irregular cleaning, now we need new paving, benches, and drainage under the railway bridges

* A pedestrian crossing over Rossmore Road – residents’ petitioned for this and feel they are being ignored

* A 20 mph speed limit not just on Lisson Green but the whole of Church Street Ward, except Lisson Grove. Church Street is for people to live in, not a rat-run to somewhere else

* Road safety measures around King Solomon Academy and Broadley Gardens

Gardens and Open Space
* Reopen Broadley Gardens by the summer – it has already been closed one summer

* The Council should fund and manage Lisson Gardens as it does Broadley Gardens

* Playgrounds to be refreshed

* Create an open air exercise ground similar to those in Camden

Priorities for children and young people
* Church Street residents are pleased with their excellent choice of schools, such as Gateway, which take children from often difficult backgrounds and instil a delight in education that brings high achievement. Most stay on into the 6th Form and most go on to University if they wish

* Education must not bear the brunt of council cuts. A council that cuts children’s services will fail our children.

* Church Street has some good sports facilities, sports pitches and tenants’ halls but needs funds to allow people to make good use of them

Health
Councillor Aziz Toki said;

“Church Street residents benefit from two first class Doctors’ Surgeries, the proximity of St Mary’s Hospital and numerous outreach and projects. However, despite a dramatic improvement in health generally, life expectancy still lags 8 years behind the rest of the Borough., so there is much still to do.”