Redlands Liberal Democrats

Supporting community development: tackling poverty in Reading

This evening at CCEA Scrutiny Panel we discussed the Council's anti-poverty strategy and the Thriving Neighbourhood Programme  - a really important attempt by the Council to improve the quality of life for residents in some of Reading's most deprived communities.

12 years of a Labour government and even longer of a Labour council here in Reading has failed to tackle poverty.

Need evidence?

• 15% of employed people in Reading earn less than £7 per hour
• 10,960 people (11% working age adults) are currently claiming unemployment benefit
• 18.2% of children live in these families (an issue I have been pursuing through the children's health scrutiny review)

And there's more. For anyone who thinks Reading is a wealthy place throughout...some facts we heard tonight:

• Reading has 11,871 live housing benefit claims
• There are currently 4,600 unemployed people in Reading
• 10.6% of working age adults have no qualifications
• 9.6% of young people (16-18) are NEETs and youth unemployment is a big problem

I spent a lot of time this year calling for local action to tackle these problems.

My LIb Dem colleagues and I have actively supported this programme from the word go as it has community development at it's heart: it's not just about spending money but helping the community get the skills they need to prosper and helping them access to good quality public services locally.

This programme is working well but faces big challenges: funding for the frontline community development workers who are helping deliver this programme on the ground is under threat and the recession is making problems of worklessness worse not better.

These community development workers employed by regeneration company Groundwork have done an amazing job in the areas of North Whitley that I know, including Hexham Road.

We cannot afford to lose them.

The other problem we face is a repeated failure by local health partners - notably the Primary Care Trust to invest energy and resources into improving health outcomes in the most deprived areas of Town.

As I said in the meeting - tackling the problems associated with poverty is not a council responsibility it should be the responsibility of all public bodies - including the PCT and the Police.

I thought it was important to offer more than just warm words to officers who are engaged in this work so I tabled the following recommendations which got unanimous support from all parties.

The Panel:

- Notes the positive contribution made by frontline community development workers to the delivery of the Thriving Neighbourhoods Programme;
 
- Notes however that as set out in the report (at paragraph 5.1) continued funding of these workers will continue to be challenging for the authority and recommends Cabinet to give due consideration to this as part of the budget planning process;

- Notes that gaps in support for the Programme have been identified in the area of health and, in this respect:

- Refers the matter to the Housing, Health and Community Care Scrutiny Panel for further investigation

in 2009 we must not accept inequality but challenge it wherever we find it in Reading. We know that unequal societies are less happy places. And we should care about the quality of life of all residents in the town.

Labour may have broken their promises on poverty and let down some of the poorest and most vulnerable people here in Reading.

But we in the Lib Dems still think fairness matters - as Nick Clegg and Vince Cablet explained - outlining Lib Dem tax policies earlier this week.

And this means supporting communities and supporting those hard-working, committed people who's job is to support them.

Don't stop moving!*

So much going on both inside and outside the ward at the moment, it's hard to know where to start! I thought it was worth doing a quick recap.

It was great to be out in the ward this weekend after a week in which I spent four out of five nights in the Council Offices.

I took an afternoon off work on Tuesday to attend the Credit Crunch Summit on supporting young people and as well as two formal Council meetings (full Council and the Children's Health Scrutiny Review) I also managed to squeeze in a visit to Reading Job Centre Plus, the 47th Reading (St Paul's) Scout Group Open Day, Basingstoke Road (see pic), our regular ward surgery, and a debate on higher education funding organised by the ever-energetic Reading University Lib Dems.

The debate was of a very high standard and it was chaired by RUSU VP Education Tom Gilchrist who did a good impression of David Dimbleby - "is there a question in there somewhere?!"

There were local representatives on the Panel from Labour, the Lib Dems, NUS and Reading Youth Cabinet.

But for some reason no sign of either Rob (White or Wilson) at the meeting to put forward Conservative or Green viewpoints.

Wendy from Reading's Youth Cabinet spoke very confidentally - at 16 she was the only Panel member who hadn't yet gone to university but she certainly gave the more experienced politicians a run for their money!

No doubt that tuition fees and graduate debt are going to be hotly debated between now and the next General Election - great to see local students engaged and campaigning.

I organised a visit to Reading Job Centre Plus not because I lost my job (although no-one is immune and I don't want to tempt fate!) but because I was keen to understand better what it is like looking for work in Reading at the moment both from the point of view of job-seekers and staff.

The visit followed the Credit Crunch Summit and my recent meeting about theproblem of NEETs so helped give me a much clearer picture of problems many people in Reading are facing.

I'm really grateful to the staff of the Job Centre Plus who met me and talked about their work and the challenges local people are facing in the recession.

I was particularly impressed by staff who's job it is to support lone parents and young people navigate the complicated world of benefits, New Deal etc.

They reckon about 1,000 people are coming through the doors of the JCP each day. The Centre has been forced to take on more staff to cope with demand over the past year and more expansion is planned.

I was supposed to sit in on a group session for 18 year-olds but it was cancelled as no-one had turned up - an indicator of some young people's morale at the moment.

On a more positive note they are seeing a reasonable number of vacancies in the Reading-area which compares more favourably with other parts of the country.

Still, the number of people who are unemployed in the Reading area is a concern and it is a a particular concern that the number of 'low skill' jobs in Reading is predicted to fall by 25,000 by 2025 (something that was revealed at the Credit Crunch Summit).

Back to the ward, these are a few of the things that we've been working on on our constituents' behalf this week:

• Picked up complaints about poor streetlighting on Cintra Avenue and dog fouling in Cintra Park - we're calling for a lighting update and extra enforcement + dog waste bins
• Got extra litter picks on Hexham Road and Addington Road following complaints from residents
• Advised residents about a new planning application which has gone in for 10 flats on Redlands Road - we're meeting residents next week to discuss in more details
• Chased overdue repairs to a couple of Council properties around Hexham Road

I could do with next week being a little less hectic, having also picked up a cold!

* Reference to the fact I was forced to do Karaoke by some of my Reading Uni friends earlier this week. I would have preferred something by Girls Aloud but I was given no choice but to sing along to S-Club 7...Well, my ward is 50% student I suppose!

Reading's jobless figures continue to rise

This morning, on my way to work I bumped into a couple of my constituents on the bus.

I asked how they were doing -  they looked downcast and said they were on their way to the Job Centre Plus in town.

I have known this family for a couple of years having supported them on a couple of local issues in their street. 

They are both young professionals who live in central Reading with a young daughter.

Mr x had just been made redundant from his job in the IT sector, Mrs x had recently graduated from Reading University.

Both are highly-skilled, highly-educated individuals who are keen to work, and expected to be in work.

Neither of them expected to be claiming Job Seekers Allowance or other state benefits.

Their plans to sell their house and buy a bigger property for their young family have effectively had to be put on hold.

Mr x told me that the Reading Job Centre was full of other middle-class professionals who had never experienced being unemployed before.

It must be a stressful, difficult time for them and for all local people who find themselves in this position.

Mr x told me that jobs paying a decent salary/the national average (around £25k) are very thin on the ground at Job Centre Plus in Reading.

While they look for work this family will continue to sign on and you could see the demoralising effect being in limbo like this is having on them and their lives.

I've been campaigning to raise the profile the problem of rising unemployment in Reading for the past few months, and one which I raised at our party conference.

I've also got the Labour-run Council to focus heavily on supporting home-owners and tenants who are struggling in the recession.

Last week I blogged about the problems facing school-leavers in particular. I've also been campaigning on the problems facing local graduates.

Bumping into Mr and Mrs x today got me thinking : how many other individuals and families living in Reading are in the same situation?

I emailed officers at RBC and got the following stats:

• As of the end of August 2009 there were 4,463 people claiming Job Seekers' Allowance in Reading
• That's up from 1,949 people in August 2008.

That's a whopping 129% increase. 

Within these figures, which groups have been most affectd?

A. Women. There has been an increase of 138% of women claming JSA.

B. Young people. January 2009 – February 2009 saw the largest increases in most age groups claiming with 20-24 year olds seeing the largest overall increase at 34%. 

The recession is very definetly not over in Reading. And as this recent article shows the picture across the country is no better.

Labour ministers have been forced to admit that financial support pledged so far is inadequate (as I indicated a couple of months ago) and had to announce more cash today to support people who find themselves out of work.

What are the Tories saying? Nothing in Reading, but plenty at their Party Conference where they are doing their favourite thing of attacking some of the poorest and most vulnerable in our society - those who are claiming state support because they are too ill to work. 

The Conservatives plan to cut benefits to thousands of sick and disabled people who are not able to work.  In the middle of a deep recession.

So much for caring Conservatism.

I haven't heard anything from local Labour politicians for months about what they will do to help local people.

To take this campaign forward I have written to the head of the Job Centre Plus to arrange to visit to the Centre to get a better idea of what's going on locally - how people are coping, what the pressures are etc

I would also be very keen to hear from anyone who is looking for work in Reading at the moment. My email address is: redlandslibdems@hotmail.co.uk

Don't let anyone tell you that Reading is booming and that unemployment is not a problem.

The recession is still looming large in many local people's lives and my Lib Dem colleagues and I will be doing all we can to keep this issue high on the political agenda.  We will be asking questions to see that Reading Borough Council, local agencies and partners are doing all they can to help local people affected.

With this in mind we will be attending RBC's next "Credit Crunch Summit" which will focus on young people and which is being held on 13 October at 2pm in the Council Offices.

NEETs: the new name for social exclusion

Yesterday evening I took time out to hear what the Council is doing to tackle the problem of the large number of young people who are not in education, employment or training here in Reading.

So-called NEETs. 

This is an awful, dehumanising term for what is essentially not a new phenomenon.

And we're talking about a whole generation of young people who have not benefitted from Blair or Brown.

A few years ago (when Tony Blair took office) it was simply called social exclusion.

This was designated a priority by Blair and  a social exclusion unit was duly set up and then later disbanded.

I raised the difficulties facing young people in this age group at our recent party conference and am pleased to see the Lib Dems nationally campaigning for more to be done to help young people achieve their potential.

To my mind, it is one of the clearest examples of where Labour has failed to deliver in reducing inequality in this country.

And the impact  of this failure is felt by thousands of families and individuals here in Reading.

Reading has a high-number of NEETs - around 8% of the current population of 16-19 year olds. That's well above the national average.

Fewer young people stay in education beyond 16 in Reading compared to other similar areas of the country.

It is is a town of sharp contrasts where some of the top performing grammar and private schools exist alongside schools where improving educational standards and pupils' records of achievement has been a long slow road.

But the high number of our young people effectively 'dropping out' between 16-19  is a symptom of a much wider issue than simply the need to improve access to good quality education and jobs (although both of these things must happen).

The real problems go far deeper, as the latest version of the Council's Children & Young People's Plan (2009-12) sets out:

"Social disadvantage and poverty in Reading are above the national average - in 2007, the borough was ranked 151st out of 354 authorities on the Government’s Index of Multiple Deprivation.However, of the 93 Lower Super Output Areas (census areas) within Reading, 11 of these are in the top 20% most deprived in the country."

Speaking to the RBC officer responsible for co-ordinating  yesterday I was very impressed by what I heard. The Council is taking a lead with other bodies such as Connexions Berkshire in identifying youngsters who have left school and need support. Real effort is made to make sure all young people are accounted for and contact is made with them. 

There are regular interventions to try and encourage young people to go to college or begin an apprenticeship, with mentoring available for youngsters who need intensive support.

The Council has also made creating local apprenticeships a priority and is actively trying to persuade employers to take on young people as apprentices.

However, despite the Council's best efforts (and the fact that reducing NEETs is a top priority of the Local Strategic Partnership and the Children's Trust ), significantly reducing the overall number of NEET in Reading is proving an uphill struggle.

Why is this? 

Well, first of all  while all this effort has been going on locally the wider economic picture has worsened, undoing some of the best efforts of the people working in this area.

As I highlighted in the Summer, the number of young people unemployed claiming Job Seekers Allowance in the Reading area has dramatically increased and the number of jobs vacancies has plummeted.

Young people with low skills who want to work are finding themselves in an increasingly desperate scramble for jobs up against well- qualified graduates. It's not surprising they start to lose heart and give up feeling 'the system' and society is against them.

And as I have pointed out before the government help for councils like the Future Jobs Fund is a drop in the ocean compared to what's actually needed here in Reading.

Secondly,there are some deep-seated reasons why the number of NEETs in Reading is so high, linked to pockets of significant deprivation which exist in the town. Where for examples families where for generations children have not gone to college or university and families where at least one parent has never been in full-time employment.

An example was given of a young woman the first in three generations to go to college.

What you might expect in a developing country. But this is not the third world. This is Reading.

And this is about poverty and the impact living in poverty is having on generations of young people.

And however Labour politicians nationally or locally care to dress it up deprivation has become more rather than less ingrained in many parts of Reading after 12 years of a Labour government and even longer of local Labour in power in Reading.

If you need further convincing that NEET statistics are an indicator of poverty, please see below. 

The following wards in Reading  currently have the highest number of NEETs (RBC stats, as of Dec 08)

Church: 15.2% (52)

Whitley: 13.% (41)

Kentwood: 10.3% (37)

Minster: 8.7% (32)

Compare this with the wards with the lowest percentage of NEET young people: Mapledurham (0.3), Thames (2.3) and Peppard (2.3).

The message behind these statistics is clear: where you are born in Reading has a serious impact on your life chances and if you live in South or West Reading the odds are likely to be stacked against you.

And let's face it no amount of strategies or action plans from RBC will put right this inequality - action at national level is needed and it could take years to put things right.

One Lib Dem policy that will help in this regard is our policy to take the lowest paid out of paying tax altogether. 

Vince Cable has also said we would raise the income tax personal allowance to £10,000, cutting income tax bills by £700 a year for anyone earning over £10,000, and taking four million people out of income tax altogether.

The other is the 'pupil premium' - allowing us to invest in the education of the most disadvantaged children.

Nick Clegg is the only party leader who has said categorically that improving social mobility must be the top priority for any incoming government.

He set up the Social Mobility Commission the day after he was elected as party leader.

And I don't mean attacking 'chaotic families' as Gordon Brown did this week, for the state of Britain today. This sounded a lot like the Tories blaming family breakdown for 'broken Britain'.

Tweedledum and Tweedle Dee politics is not what's needed here.

Locally, I can't recall the Tories saying or doing anything about what they would do to tackle the shocking inequality that exists under their very noses.

The Labour and Conservative councillors who represent wards where youth unemployment is highest should be demanding action. The silence from them locally on these issues is deafening.

Local people in these wards should reject these two parties at the next election in favour of electing hard-working Lib Dems who will work hard for their communities and give them a voice.

We will continue to speak up for these young people, and all people abandoned and let down by this Labour government and the local Labour-run Council.

Two examples: I will be co-chairing a scrutiny review into children's health (and health inequality) later this month and attending the Council's forthcoming summit on supporting young people through the credit crunch.

I was instrumental in getting both these events into the Council's diary and on to the political agenda in Reading.

Because I think the situation facing many 16-19 year olds in Reading is seriously bad and warrants urgent action.

Young people and the recession: 'Future Jobs Fund' fails to impress

Today the Labour government launched the 'Future Jobs Fund' : £1bn of public money which is set to 'create' 150,000 jobs.

"We are determined not to lose a generation of talent because of the recession," said work and pensions secretary, Yvette Cooper MP, announcing the scheme.

Sounds great, doesn't it. Except that it isn't - particularly if you are a young person looking for work in Reading.

This cash will be a drop in the ocean when as figures released in June showed there were 900,000 people aged 18-24 out of work, a rate of 16.6%. This is the highest youth unemployment has been for 15 years.

The number of job vacancies has also fallen to 420,000: it's lowest level since 2001.

Go beyond the spin and you find that as with most carrot Labour government dangles in front of councils - like money for play areas - local authorities are expected to compete against each other (and other bodies), sorry, 'bid' for a share of the cash.

Some facts about FJF:

• In the first round 182 bids were received by the government of which 117 have been successful.
• This will apparently create up to 47,000 jobs (well short of the number needed).

• Of these 117 bids, 62 are local authority led. The others are from a mixture of public bodies, third sector organisations, social enterprises and private companie

According to the LGA, jobs that get created should ''last at least six months, should benefit local communities, and be able to get underway quickly. Funding of up to £6,500 per job is available, and all successful local partnerships will have to develop a work and skills plan by April 2010.'

I am aware that Reading Borough Council submitted a bid but it appears that it was unsucessful this time with the closest benificiary being Hampshire County Council. If you are looking for work that you move to Hampshire however - it could take months for this money to filter through and jobs to be created! You can read the full list of which councils were successful here

Dig a little deeper and you find that the South East 'pot' of money to be shared around 6 local authorities is anyway only expected to create a paltry 3,300 jobs.

Simply doling out scraps of cash from the centre to a lucky few of local authorities and being highly prescriptive about how that money should spent seems to me to be wrongheaded.

How does Whitehall know best about how jobs can be created? Local councils are far better place to judge what works in their area.

If, as Lib Dems believe, local councils were given more control over their finances they themselves could decide to create jobs or support small businesses create jobs locally. That's because Lib Dems trust councils and councillors to know what's best in their area, and they are directly accountable to local people. Simple really.

Neither Labour or the Tories have bitten the bullet and reformed local government finance, however, and both spent years centralising and taking powers away from directly-elected councils and councillors.

As Vince Cable observed in an article published back in February 'it is far better to borrow to invest in capital projects creating jobs today and assets for the future rather than to borrow to keep people out of work'.

What Gordon Brown's government is offering to people out of work today is a far cry from Roosevelt's groundbreaking New Deal in the 1930s which was built around the three Rs: Relief, Reform and Recovery.

One bit of good news, following my recent campaign to highlight problems faced by the many young people looking for work in Reading I am told that the date for the next credit crunch summit - with a particular focus on young people affected by the recession will be 13 October.

The meeting will be held at 2-30pm at the Civic Offices.

If you are a young person or you work in an organisation working with young people I would strongly encourage you to attend and make your voice heard on this issue. Or, why not drop me a line with your views on what we can do to help young people find work.

The economic hardship facing many young people in this country is severe and the government response to that should be both compassionate and effective.

What we are seeing from Gordon Brown's government is neither at the moment.

 I'll leave you with some words from Roosevelt's famous 1932 address on the New Deal which I think encapsulates very well the sort of vision we need (and which contrasts with what we are getting from GB):

"My program, of which I can only touch on these points, is based upon this simple moral principle: the welfare and the soundness of a Nation depend first upon what the great mass of the people wish and need; and second, whether or not they are getting it. "

A small victory for openness and transparency

It appears I rattled a few cages amongst the ruling Labour Group earlier this week when I proposed a motion on how grant aid is allocated by Reading Borough Council (which was discussed on Tuesday evening).

In case you were not aware, the amount of money handed over by Reading Borough Council to voluntary sector and community groups this year currently stands at over £2.5m.

And yet, If you asked me to come up with two words to describe the current process the Council goes through to allocate this substantial some of money the words 'open' and 'transparent' would not spring to mind.

Don't get me wrong, my Lib Dem colleagues and I firmly believe in the value of the voluntary sector in Reading and the need for the Council to continue to support it. This ongoing commitment was clearly spelt out in my motion to Council.

However, where tax payer's money is concerned, in our view it is vital for public confidence that any decisions are made openly and subject to regular scrutiny.

As a backbencher, sorry, 'frontline' councillor, I was only dimly aware of the process by which Council funding for voluntary and community groups is agreed each year so I decided to make a few enquiries.

The current system is as follows according to officer briefings I received...

• Applications forms for grants arrive at RBC in October, and officers check them to ensure that we have all the documentation before sending them out to Grant Liaison Officers [GLOs].
• The GLOs look at the content of the application and make a recommendation to the Lead Councillor.
• Briefings for Lead Councillors are held in November.

• Officers also write to the applicants  with the officer recommendation followings these briefings, giving them a chance to ask for a review of the application in case there is any new information we should be aware of; a change in circumstances; or if they feel that they have not been fairly treated.

• Lead Councillors then decide whether or not the application should be supported at Cabinet and it is Cabinet that makes the decision about whether or not to support an individual grant.

Under the current regime, the involvement of members from other political parties is limited to group briefings. These briefings are offered fairly late in the process (in December), shortly before the matter goes to Cabinet.

The aim of these briefings apparently is to give other political groups ‘the chance to air any concerns.'

The Review Panel' referred to above consists of the Lead Councillor for Communities and Regeneration (currently Cllr Tickner) and a senior policy officer at RBC.

This officer is not involved in the grants process up until this point. Cllr Tickner has the overall responsibility for grants, while officers provide advice and background information.

The Panel does not meet in public and minutes (if they exist at all) are not available to councillors or the public.

The report which goes to Cabinet in January each year summarises the application and the outcome of the Panel's discussions, so I was told. This report acts as the record of the (Review Panel) meeting.

You can read the most recent report here which was rubber stamped on 19 January. It contains an appendix detailing all the groups which benefited from Council cash and details of unsuccessful applications.

What my Group and I are not comfortable with is the lack of scrutiny and involvement of non-executive councillors in the grant aid application process.

Surely the decision to allocate grant aid funding should be above narrow Party interest and  besomething that all members should be involved in as a Council?  

The way the current system is set up the fact that one councillor both recommends and reviews grant application applications  mitigates against a transparent approach and leaves it potentially open to politicians supporting pet projects or favouring/ignoring particular groups.

As I said in my speech on Tuesday evening, the process of allocating substantial amounts of public money, should it in an away appear to lack openness, has the potential to damage politics and politicians. As guardians of the public purse in Reading we must all do our best to avoid such impressions.

When I discussed this issue with Conservative members ahead of Tuesday's meeting I detected similar concern about the lack of transparency in the current process, and support for reform which we had proposed. 

Unsurprisingly,the response from Labour councillors during the meeting to the motion being tabled was both defensive and arrogant: they queued up to pour scorn on my efforts. How dare a non-Labour councillor wish to investigate something so clearly within the domain of the ruling group for so many years, was the infererence I took from their shrill response. 

Without calling me in advance to discuss her concerns, Cllr Tickner put forward a poorly drafted amendment the aim of which was to attempt to limit the scope of any future CCEA Scrutiny Panel review of the grant aid process to exclude past funding decisions.

We couldn't accept this change so we abstained and the Conservatives along with Labour backed the amended motion.

As my colleague Cllr Bayes pointed out during the debate, how can future decision-making be improved if previous decisions are not looked into? We were not asking for previous decisions to be changed, but simply to be reviewed in general terms as part of a review of the process.

Anyway, to cut a long story short despite the ruling Labour Group's attempts to stop us from throwing more light on the process by which grant aid decisions are made in Reading, I am pleased to say the matter will be the subject of a future CCEA Scrutiny Panel review.

In my view this is not before time.

A broken system

Reflecting a little more on the continuing 10pct tax rate debacle (the Independent has a great piece this morning), I would say the plans to scrap it owe as much to our broken electoral system as to the tax and benefits system.

Under the current system, general elections are decided by a small number of "swing" voters - people who switch between parties - situated in a small number of marginal constituencies.  The interests of these voters, who are typically middle to high earners, often living in suburban areas or market towns, weigh very heavily in the minds of Governments.

So, as the Independent describes, we saw Gordon Brown trying to create headlines for these swing voters by reducing the "basic rate" by a couple of pennies. This was in advance of a possible general election, you recall. The Labour benches cheered! The only problem was, he did it at the expense of those who could least afford it. This was obvious from the start.

Fair taxes are important. The poorest people in our society rely heavily on public services. If the tax demanded from people is higher on the poor than on the rich, it means that trying to help the poor with better services simply means they get taxed more heavily. This is precisely the dilemma many local councils face with Council Tax: the last thing you want to do with an unfair tax is impose more of it, yet without income, local services face a bleak future.

It's time for a real change in the tax system.

On unfair taxes

This month, the doubling of the tax rate for earners under £18,500 p.a. from 10p to 20p came into effect.

Lib Dems highlighted this issue more than a year ago (for example, the post on this very blog from Mar 27, 2008), and moved a series of proposals in parliament to try and stop this idea in its tracks.

We have a very unfair tax system. Taking all taxes together, figures last year showed the poorest 20% paid 36.4% of their income in tax, compared to just 35.6% for the richest 20% (ONS data). 
It's hard to imagine these recent changes will improve the situation. In fact, the Independent estimates that 5m people nationally will be adversely affected.

The Government really is out of touch with how hard life is for the majority of people. They are moving in the wrong direction. Our taxes need to be fairer, simpler and greener. Find out more about what Lib Dems would do to reform our tax system here.