Campaigning against the cuts

Yesterday Hackney Labour was out in force across the borough speaking to residents about the effect of the Government's cuts to the Council's budget and their impact upon the us, our families and our neighbours.

Across the borough local members and councillors set up stall to make clear the cuts' impact on Hackney. On Broadway Market they were joined by Hackney South MP Meg Hillier, whilst on Stoke Newington Church Street Diane Abbott MP and Jennette Arnold AM spoke to many concerned local residents. Stalls were also held on Ridley Road Market, Upper Clapton and the Narrow Way in Hackney Central. We also looked to building awareness of the TUC's 'March for the Alternative' protest on 26th March in Central London.

Hackney Council’s funding will be cut by £44m in 2011/12 alone, with a further cuts to come in future years. In the past, areas like Hackney have received extra funding from the government for good reason— to help the Council tackle the high level of social need in the Borough. The structures that provided that support have been removed by the current Local Government Minister, Eric Pickles.

The reach of the cuts go beyond Hackney Council. On Wednesday students from BSix College and Hackney Community College came to Hackney Town Hall to tell us about about the campaign to save the Educational Maintenance Allowance which gives poorer students the means to stay on in education beyond 16. A packed council chamber also heard from Hackney Keep Our NHS Public about the impact that that GP commissioning and 'any willing provider' will have on healthcare in the borough.

The Cuts and Hackney - the full picture

Hackney Council has now received details of its central grant funding for 2011/12 and 2012/13.

In 2011/12 our core central government grant will be cut by £33 million and – removing the one-off transition grant which covers no more than the costs of making the cuts we face, and the money ‘given’ to the Council from the NHS budget and taking into account the end of a number of social care grants – we are facing a reduction in central funding of £44m for the next financial year. This represents a cut of 14.9% in the Council’s grant funding.

This cut is significantly higher than the headline figure of 8.9% announced in December by Eric Pickles, the Local Government Secretary, and the 7.25% announced by George Osborne in the Comprehensive Spending Review. It is also significantly higher than the cuts faced by other more affluent areas – across the country the local government settlement has favoured rich areas at the expense of poorer ones.

The mayor, cabinet and Labour councillors have already agreed a package of spending reductions amounting to £23m. Whilst having a serious effect, these cuts will largely not directly impact on the Council’s front line services. For example, as part of these reductions the Council will lose approximately a third of its director and senior manager posts.

Due to £4m of additional unavoidable cost pressures, this leaves the Council needing to cut another £25m from next year’s spending. The majority of this – and the biggest impact - will be made up of the ending of specific grants totalling £17m. These grants are for third-sector and voluntary projects and are funded through partnership arrangements. The funding for these projects will therefore come to an end. The mayor has said that he would like some of these projects to be picked up by the Council but clearly the scope for doing so will be extremely limited.

The remaining deficit, after some technical savings, is about £5m. Later this month Labour Group will consider how this can be bridged. Legally, the Council has to set its 2011/12 budget by March 11^th. If it does not do this, the Coalition Government will set its budget for it.

While we may be able to avoid further direct cuts for 2011/12, for 2012/13 we face a budget gap of about £25m. It’s difficult to see where this will come from except through direct cuts to services.

There will be further cuts to our funding in 2013/14 and 2014/15 but these are yet to be announced and the government is currently undertaking a review of the overall structure of how money is distributed to local authorities.

If you want more details, you can find them here on the council’s website.

As always please do get in contact if you have an questions or comments.

Hackney Community Law Centre

For many years the Hackney Community Law Centre has provided access to justice for vulnerable people from across Hackney and beyond.

The Centre was recently successful in securing new contracts from the Legal Services Commission which means it will be able to continue to support our community. Its legal advice service covers social welfare – which includes housing, debt, welfare benefits, employment, discrimination and community care - as well as immigration & asylum issues.

In addition to the Legal Services Commission funding which is now secure, the Centre also receives funding from Hackney Council and London Councils. It is a member of the Law Centres Federation, and is part of the campaign to defend access to justice in the face of the unprecedented cuts to legal aid that are being proposed by the current government.

If you need to contact the Centre for any reason to you can reach them in the following ways:

• General Advice Line: 020 8985 8364 – 10.00am to 1.00pm Monday to Thursday
• Immigration & Asylum Advice Line: 020 8985 8364 – 11.00am to 1.00pm Friday
• Visit their offices at 8 Lower Clapton Road, London E5 0PD – they are open between 10 am and 5 pm, Monday to Friday.

Flagship Hackney Youth Centre gets green light

The go ahead has been given to a new flagship youth centre to be built in Forest Road, just to the east of De Beauvoir. The new £2.5 million facility – to be built on a site just across Kingsland Road - will be at the heart of a new network of five youth centres based across Hackney. This network will also include the long-established Hoxton Hall found on Hoxton Street to the south of De Beauvoir’s Hobbs Place estate.

The new Forest Road Youth Centre will be at the centre of this network and will offer activities such as sport, music, art, fashion, and photography. The new building, which has been designed in consultation with young people who live locally, will include main hall, an IT suite, a group room for smaller group activities, a ‘chill-out' space, interview rooms for one-on-one sessions and external break-out spaces. Fifteen staff from Hackney Youth Services will also be based in the building. In addition, the centre will provide a base for the Youth Parliament and Youth Volunteering programmes. The new building will replace an existing youth club on the site, which is currently run from a single-storey portacabin-type facility.

The centre forms part of a £5m investment in youth service in Hackney. Beyond the investment at Forest Road, funds will also be allocated to four other locations. These include Hoxton Hall in Hoxton Street which will be refurbished. The others are centres in King’s Park and Milton Gardens, and a new centre in Woodbury Down.

The investment is funded by MyPlace, a youth-focused grant scheme set up by the previous Labour Government. The scheme was set up in 2009 to improve youth facilities across the UK and Hackney was awarded funding in March of that year. The scheme has now been discontinued.

Improvements to the junction of Whitmore Road and Hoxton Street

Many of you – particularly those who live in the south of the ward and the cyclists among you – will by now have seen the new road layout at the junction by the Britannia Leisure Centre.

The new set up removes the roundabout that previously sat where Whitmore Road, Hoxton Street, Hyde Road, and Pitfield Street meet and creates a layout that is far more friendly to cyclists and pedestrians.

As you can see in the plan below, once the works on the pavements are also complete it will also create additional open space by the side of the road where 16 new trees will be planted improving the area for those that live and work nearby.

The main funding for the works has been provided by the Department for Communities and Local Government and they are designed to improve the flow of traffic which travels along Whitmore Road onto Pitfield Street and into Shoreditch. The road is a key cycle commuter route (as anyone who has travelled along it at 8.30 in the morning will confirm!) and these improvements will make the journey far easier for those cyclists who travel down this route into the City and beyond, as well as for the cars and pedestrians that use this route.

Some residents have contacted us with concerns about the consultation that occurred prior to this work starting. We have raised these concerns with the council who have promised to use this feedback to improve future consultations.

We can also assure those of you that have been in touch with us about ‘the family’ sculptures that were in the centre of the previous roundabout that once the works are finished they will be put back into the new layout in a new location in front of Hobbs Place estate, just south east of where they were previously found.