Coming soon to Bromley!

Bromley Cuts Concern supporter and organiser Paul Rooney posts news here of two free-to-attend meetings at Bromley's HG Wells Centre -  

Thursday 31st May at 6.30pm. Venue- HG Wells Centre

Bromley Cuts Concern meeting.

Guest Speaker: Glenn Kelly (Staff Side Secretary,Bromley Council).

Glenn is at the forefront  of fighting the Tory cuts to essential local Council services.

    Bromley's latest proposal is to withdraw from National Pay & Conditions. This will mean even lower pay & worse pensions locally, leading to poorer services as well as preparation for privatisation of even more Departments.

    Glenn will also tell us about his ongoing battle with Unison regarding his suspension from the union. He won his High Court case recently, but unfortunately Unison have appealed. 

    Glenn is a great & uplifting speaker .

Open meeting

ALL WELCOME

Free Entry.

Wednesday 6th June at 5pm.Venue-HG Wells Centre

Transport and Salaried Staffs' Association (TSSA union) have invited Dave Smith (UCATT and a former engineer) to speak at their next meeting.

Dave has been in the news over several years because he was blacklisted for raising concerns as a  UCATT trade union safety rep about unsafe working practices in the construction industry.

    This is a very relevant today as both nationally & locally the Tories are determined to  attack hard won worker protection and employment rights. Disturbingly and falsely, the Tories view workers rights & health & safety protection as holding back economic growth.

   Only last year the absurd Leader of Bromley Council tried to set an immature & dangerous example by refusing to wear a hard hat on a visit to  local construction site.

    If Mr Carr wants to hurt and injure himself then that's up to him although I doubt his wife & children will be too impressed if they have to care for him as result of sustaining a serious head injury.

   Also, he put others (including any Emergency Service workers) in jeopardy who would have had to risk harm to themselves in order to atend to his injuries caused as a result of not protecting himself. 

   Dave is an excellent speaker. Do come and hear his story and learn about lessons for today.

ALL WELCOME

Free Entry

People's Assembles Network

YouTube movie 'Beyond Resistance' appears on People's Assemblies Network website.


Following January's post here relating to 'Occupy London', the movement has now established an international presence and internet profile. They write -

The People’s Assemblies Network is an informative and resource platform to support the ongoing democracy protests and open, democratic assemblies in the UK, Europe and throughout the world.
We are open to collaboration and welcome your news about People’s Assemblies wherever you live, please get in touch at:
info@peoplesassemblies.org
For further infomation you can read about various other ideas about Assemblies here and contribute to the further development of the politics and economics of PAs at our forum or wiki page. Also, take a look at the Wikipedia entry on Popular Assemblies, everyone who believes in a society much more democratic than the current model is encouraged to contribute!

How much longer will the public put up with this...

Letters by Paul Summers, Rod Reed and John Getgood, on topic of more spending for the better off through more slashing of services for the vulnerable and less well off, are published in the Bromley Times this week.

 Bromley Times Letters, 22/3/12

The national campaign against the Health & Social Care act Keep our NHS public (KONP) is building coordinated local action. Lewisham meets Thursday March 22, 7pm Waldron Health Centre, New Cross.

Is this The Big Society at work...

Two posts from Bromley Cuts Concern supporters --

On Bromley's community services -

Bromley Council seem to be celebrating the 200th anniversary of Charles Dickens birthday by imposing new hard times on the people of our borough. 

£13.5 million of cuts voted through by our councillors will hit the elderly, special educational needs, disabled, citizens advice bureau, school improvement, street cleaning and more.  

The council should be caring for the whole community not casting the needy and vulnerable adrift.

Is this The Big Society at work. 

Paul Summers

On Bromley's railway services -

Last week the Government announced their backing of the McNulty Report which represents the biggest threat to the railway since Beeching.

If the McNulty report is implemented passengers will experience further cuts to their safety and services at the same time paying even further increases to their fares.

Many stations, such as Bromley North, Knockholt, Ravensbourne and New Beckenham will be totally de-staffed and many others, Shortlands, Chislehurst, Chelsfield, Bickley and Hayes staffing will be severely reduced, this is to name just a few.

There will be many further staff reductions such as no guards on trains.

Since privatisation the cost to the tax payer has increased four fold and due to the fragmentation and big profits being made by often foreign owned companies, nearly £1 billion a year is taken out of the railway, money which could and should be reinvested.

Even though McNulty admits that the franchise system has failed its answer is to actually increase this failure and give in to the profit driven companies by having longer gold plated franchise terms.

We ask passengers and the public to please contact their MPs and Councillors to reject this report and to ask for a not for profits run railway.

Stephen Leggett  

'Green' Economy or Greed Economy? - an Open Teach-in

Open Teach-in on the 2012 Rio + 20 Earth Summit:
'Green' Economy or Greed Economy?

Saturday March 24th, 11am to 5pm

London Feminist Library
5 Westminster Bridge Rd
London SE1 7XW
http://feministlibrary.co.uk/visit-us

Speakers: climate science update; the UN Earth
Summit in Rio (20 years later); the international
treaty process and economic justice; technology
assessment: hope or hype; and what to expect in
the future. Plus open Discussion.

In June this year, twenty years after the
original 1992 Earth Summit, the United Nations
will once again bring together a conference to
discuss the environment and the global economy.
The conference hopes to discuss what they call
the 'green economy', a follow-on concept from
'sustainable development'. The 'green economy'
consists of (i) giving nature and 'ecosystem
services' a financial value which can be used to
facilitate trading, as has already taken place
for carbon emissions, and (ii) using new 'green'
technologies such synthetic biology/biomass and
'geo-engineering' to combat environmental problems.

Hope or hype? Will new technologies build a real
green economy or perpetuate the current greed economy?

Whose interests are served by such technocratic 'green solutions'?

What are the risks of synthetic biology and geoengineering?

What's wrong with putting financial values on nature?

Can we build a real green economy based upon economic justice?

Come join the debate, learn the latest details.

For more information https://network23.org/invite

Speakers and/or support from: Luddites200, ETC
group, the Land Magazine, Scientists for Global Responsibility and others

The event is free (bring lunch to share) but
participants are encouraged to donate £2-10 to
support the London Feminist Library. http://feministlibrary.co.uk

This teach-in will be an alternative forum to the
Royal Society's "Planet Under Pressure"
conference, a large international technology
conference preparing for the Rio Earth Summit.

Bring lunch to share.

'Scandalous...', '...callous and unimaginative...'

 

 Bromley Times (23/2/12)

...and here is a personal account posted by an observer at Bromley's full Council meeting on Monday, February 20th 2012 

The budget was passed with an overwhelming majority.  In fact one Conservative Councillor stood up smirked, and said it is about time that we ALL lived within our means.  They did say that consultations with the elderly day services are on going, but the cuts are happening.  No one got a chance to say anything.  They spent most of the time talking about grammar schools and how crap secondary education is.  So the cuts to the young, vulnerable and disabled are going ahead.  Something they are looking at under the environment department, is thinking of bringing in a charge to use the refuse collection dump sites, and the cardboard/paper recycling boxes to go bi weekly as well, although that looks as though it will be in the future.

These cuts are done behind closed doors with a small group of people who have never met people who use the services under threat or the people that care for them.  £800,000 off the supported housing budget to help people live independently is a joke.  The Gateway club is having to move to a Monday because Crofton Halls said they are not paying enough money for Friday Nights which is a prime night to rent out.  Councillor Arthur once said at a meeting i went to over a year ago before the local elections happened that he would be quite happy to get rid of the people who are disabled from the PCT and not using services at all.  With these cuts it is happening.

On one case of Benefit Fraud the council spent £218,000 fighting the case which most Councillors conceded was crazy, the person ended up with 40 hours of unpaid work.  They rubber stamped the budget last night.  I have to go back to community options and tell them that mental health day services provision will be cut by £75k year on year and support services as well, and cab will be losing £32,000 with £75k the year after.  Scandalous.  Not much else to say than that.

Worrying new round of cuts planned by Bromley Council

In her capacity as founder/supporter of Bromley Cuts Concern; Ann Garrett is posting this letter for the attention of local media and all borough residents -

Dear Editor

It is worrying to see that a new round of cuts of £13.5m is planned by Bromley Council. This will include support for children with educational needs, disabled people, the elderly, and street cleaning and will mean further loss of jobs. Funding for the Citizens Advise Bureau - a valuable service for many people, especially those who are disadvantaged will be cut by £32,000.

Once again the council will no doubt refuse to use their high reserves, and with public morale at a low ebb after so many job and service cuts last year, this will further impact on the most vulnerable, and those generally trying to make ends meet.

Many people have stated during last year's consultation meetings with Bromley Council  that they would rather see the council tax raised in order to save and re-instate essential public services and create new jobs. With banker's bonuses and tax evasion still prominent in the news, the public has little sympathy for cuts.

Be at the Bromley Civic Centre  by 7.00pm on Monday February 20th when the cuts which have been outlined in the draft budget will go before the full council for approval.

Ann Garrett

Bromley Cuts Concern

Letter as published in Bromley Times, 16/2/2012