Wednesday 17 November - 10am-1pm: FBU rally against cuts to the fire service, Methodist Central Hall, Westminster. Afternoon: lobbying MPs.
I am going to go along and ask to see Matthew Offord MP. As his constituent I want to know what he thinks about the planned cuts to the fire service, and ask whether he thinks Brian Coleman is playing a constructive role in the dispute with the FBU. I also want to know whether he agrees with me that it is dangerous taking 27 fire engines (16% of London's total) out of service with no assessment of the risks involved, as Brian Coleman has done.
Thursday 18 November - 4-6pm: Barnet sixth formers protest against tuition fees, assembling at the Arts Depot, North Finchley, marching to Finchley and Golders Green Conservative office to hand in a petition.
I am going to go along and show my support for the students. Can you imagine how you would feel if you had been slogging through your exams and coursework and were looking forward to going to university only to discover now that in order to do so you would need to take on £20-30,000 of debt before you're out of your early 20s? Gutted. No wonder they are angry. Forget all anxieties about young people rioting: they need to know we are on their side against the government's plans to raise tuition fees.
Tuesday 14 December - 6-7pm: union and community demonstration against Barnet's cuts budget, Hendon Town Hall. Later in the evening there will be a fundraising social event.
I am going to go along because I don't accept that the case has been made for massive cuts to public services. Barnet Tories plan to cut services by 25% over the next three years, and make 430 redundancies in the next year alone. The impact on vulnerable people will be enormous, and we will all pay the price in years to come. The cuts to the youth service are particularly alarming.
Sunday 30 January - all afternoon: Barnet march against cuts and privatisation - no to easyCouncil! Assembly point is yet to be decided but the march will wind up at the Arts Depot for an indoor rally with refreshments provided. Come and make a day of it!
I am going to go along to all these events, and I invite you, dear readers, to come as well. Please tell friends, relatives, colleagues and neighbours about them. Most of the cuts planned would be unnecessary, if only the goverment had different priorities; the overwhelming majority of them are dangerous and will leave us a more divided society!
More information on all of these events from info@barnettuc.org.uk
Subscribe to:
Post Comments (Atom)
Posts
9 comments:
March, march, march
Demo, demo, demo
Petitions galore....
...any sign of ways to provide modern, efficient services that most residents in Barnet get to experience in the rest of lives in the public sector?
Does the left in Barnet think that the way things are and 1970s working practices are really that good?
Good luck with Matthew Offord: wonder what time he gets back from lunch?
There will be one Angry person at the sixth form demo anyway: ie my son, whose school, I am pleased to see is where the organiser goes too. I have been forbidden to be within a two mile radius, for fear of embarrassing consequnces, sadly.
Daniel, if we don't like things we have to do something. I don't take the model of democracy that you put a take it or leave it tick in the box every five years and that's it.
You have been known to do the odd thing outside of that as well. Marches, demos, petitions... why the increase in tempo? Why the running around like a blue arsed fly-ness of it all?
You know why! The government is doing something new, something big and something horrible. They are going to cut public services by at least 25%. Do you think that won't make a different to people's lives?
Do you think that people are just going to meekly put up with it?
When cuts like that mean people lose their jobs, can't pay their mortgages and rent, when hikes in tuition fees mean their children have to think twice about going to university, etc., etc., then people are going to respond.
I don't think everything's hunky dory as it is, far from it, and, believe it or not, I'm not mad keen on the class struggle myself. I'd rather develop some hobbies. But we are not free to do that.
Someone is paying in this society right now, and it is not those who can afford to take a hit, the people at the top with the money, it is the people at the bottom and half way up, who have the most to lose.
Please elaborate, Mr Hope, on the 1970s working practices you think are in place in Barnet's public sector? Don't be fooled by the kipper ties and wide collared shirts favoured by some senior officers: apparently they are right on trend for this season ...
Oh Danny Boy,
There you go again, there you go again - like one of life's accident's in the LSD laboratory of the late 1960's. Where were you in the 1970's? The Left were hardly in Barnet when the AcidHeads created you, then indoctrinated you. They failed to plant a brain cell.
Were you not one in the Public Sector of the Noughties that got himself sacked trying to be inventive - as you are now
WHAT ARE BARNET'S TORIES DOING ABOUT PROVIDING MODERN EFFICIENT SERVICES ?
LINING THEIR OWN POCKETS FROM TAXES - LOSING £42 million of our money cause you don't pay taxes or do you - Pear Shaping the Future - CON-NAUGHT/NOWT - Abandoning the elderly - Paying Barnet's Public servants more than the (Left)Prime Minister, followed by paying them off with amounts to make redundant bankers happy - Anymoreyou care not to a?d
I can think of one. Put brain in gear before breaking wind from rear. Your problem as a 1970's kid is, you rolled over, while another continues to strive for a "Society" that a particular Tory and her troupe of simians set out to destroy, maybe we forgot all the the rioting going on, followed in 1997 by another re-defined political group and today, yet another. I'm glad the VickiMs of your years, are still about, I'm optimistic about Britain, when I see our college and university kids challenge our pretentious and hypocrtical Parliamentarians.
Go read the history of the past 28 years again and again and again and then begin with " What did the Tories do with the Oil revenue to make Britain Great again? You might get what Mrs Angry's comment on Kipper ties.
All, the way things are done in the Town Hall are, in my experience, sluggish, innovative and Yes Minister like. Far too many people procrastinate and pass things from pillar to post and then get things wrong.
But my main point was that too much of what the Council provides is geared to suit the Officers and not residents / customers. I mean, for example, who benefits most from my local Library only opening past 5pm one day a week? Users or those Officers who get to work 9-5 rather than some evenings....
Why are the Council switchboards not open in the evening?
Why is NLBP a ghost town after 5pm?
It's all symptomatic of the 1970s style of unchallenged 'producer led' service provision.
I would wager that many residents are as angry at the p*ss poor quality of services than the worry that they be scaled back.
And that's without me talking about the pathetic gritting service that we are about to experience again this year....
that was 'uninnovative' !
I wonder if it's ex Councillor Daniel Hope leaving nasty messages about himself to give the impression that people actually care about what he has to say. That way he can leave his usual witty comebacks.
"the 1970s style of unchallenged 'producer led' service provision." Some MBA speaking.
Dan, tell us the "Polytechnic" you graduated fropm in contrast to the University that many of your age group attended.
Reality In the 1970s, Libraries were open till 8 PM and 6 PM Saturdays. Mill Hill Library used to close once midweek. My GP worked Saturday mornings and out of hours visits. Banks also opened on Saturdays until 12, switchboards were manned 24/7. Producers produced the 3 day week and entry to the EEC/EU in 1972.
Young lad of 18 upwards, me, not wanting any asssociation with the family or their retail business, was educating our lower paid incoming BRITISH subjects of Indian origin, from Kenya Uganda and Tanzania, the Producer was paying me more than their rates. for the same work and, there was trades union membership, for that equal pay Act of 1970. By the late 70s I was in Germany producing for them, earnt twice as much learnt a language and a whole load more. No speakee language, geschirr spülen/wash dishes, also did that.
Apart from the well worn phrase Financial sector -- 66 degrees North. What is it that Barnet Council produces to service because in 1970s the "Local Government Civil Servant" served the public until that point in time where they did not want to be servants but graduated to become "Officer."
Notwithstanding certain types of employment, Why should not the working mummy and daddy with children like you, not work 9-5 like the rest of taxpayers whom wish to spend quality time with "little Danny" because, neither earn enough so that the other can raise Danny boy, rather than be, dragged up like myself, left to the streets (no after school clubs) to be uncouth and insulting, shooting and stabbing and the parental worries of a Big Society, Produced by numbnuts from Oxbridge with a Cabinet of 20 millionaires who thought a riot in Toxteth was a 'snort' and alcopop party.
Read Read and Read again, refer you back to Mrs Angry only this time "Please elaborate, Mr Hope, on the 1970s working practices you think are in place in Barnet's public sector?
"Why is NLBP a ghost town after 5pm?" I Give Up! Is it IBM - Microshop - India the 1970's have returned.Is there anything "left in Barnet.
My apologies hijacking your blog.
Post a Comment