January 2020 Councillor Report

Dear Noel Park Members
Happy new year! In this report, I have summed all the different types of work that I have been doing recently as your Councillor. I am happy to meet or speak on the phone if you would like more details on specific aspects of my work. Below are all the different bodies of which I am a member in my capacity as a Councillor:
(i) Chair of Housing and Regeneration Scrutiny Panel
(ii) Co-chair of Turnpike Lane Strategy Group
(iii) Member of Alexandra Park and Palace Advisory Committee
(iv) Member of Free School Meals Working Group
(v) Trustee of Wood Green Urban District Charity
During the general election campaign, I canvassed in many marginal seats outside London such as Milton Keynes North and South, Harlow, Stevenage and Hastings and Rye as well as locally for Catherine West. I also published a number of articles on LabourList and Labour Hub which reached thousands of readers across the country. You will find my articles on my blog (www.khaledmoyeed.blog).
i. Turnpike Lane Joint Strategy Working Group
Cllr Sarah James (Harringay) and I co-chair the Turnpike Lane Joint Strategy Working Group (TPLJSWG), made up of Harringay and Noel Park Ward Councillors, traders, residents, the Police, Council Officers and local interest groups, which was set up to tackle some of the issues facing the area and agree on a plan to improve Turnpike Lane.
TPLJSWG has been meeting regularly for the past 18 months and I am pleased to inform you that we are in a position to start agreeing on projects and schemes that local traders, residents and visitors to the area have been asking for.

I would like to invite you to attend the next TPLJSG meeting to be held on Monday 13 January, 6.00pm – 7:30pm, at Shine Café, 89-91 Turnpike Lane, N8 0DY. For further information please contact Maureen Juliana-Harvey at: Maureen.JulianaHarvey@haringey.gov.uk

Below is a progress report of the various steps that we are taking on Turnpike Lane.

1. Festive lights: Festive lights have been installed and were switched on on Friday 6th December. It has been received well with traders, residents and visitors.

2. Bespoke business support: Thirty five businesses have participated in the scheme and been surveyed. Our aim was to identify 15 struggling businesses to offer intensive in-house and bespoke support. Those needing support tend to be managed by staff rather than owners. The staff have been reluctant to fully engage. We were hoping to collate detailed information about the businesses including types of tenure to ascertain whether they will be willing to participate in shop frontage improvement. We were also hoping to encourage them to invest, albeit a small amount, in their businesses and in developing an online presence and improve their marketing. We have not given up and will try to contact owners.

3. Redundant Estate Agents Boards: Officers from the Council’s Enforcement Team have agreed to launch an operation to take down expired and old estate agents boards. An operation has been set for 8th January 2020.

4. HMOs on TPL: The Housing Improvement Team and the WG Regeneration Team have applied to Ministry of Housing, Communities and Local Government – MHCLG, to deliver a project named ‘TPL -Accommodation Above the Shops’. The project is aimed at HMOs and will seek to work with tenants to ensure the properties comply with Council’s regulations and are safe and suitable for habitation. Elements of this projects includes: Establishing relationships with tenants and property owner; tackling waste management and ASB and establishing a line of communication for future engagements.
The project will be offering translations services and support. The scheme will also benefit from having two housing advisors funded through Migration Impact Funding as part of the Council’s wider connected community’s project. These officers will work alongside Housing Improvement Officers to ensure tenants have access to support mechanism, signposting to other services within the Connected Communities programme and to advise tenants of their rights. We have applied for £93,000.

5. Waste Consolidation Scheme: The Council’s Waste Improvement Team’, supported by Wood Green BID, have submitted a funding bid to London Waste Recycling Board to introduce a waste consolidation scheme in the area. Currently eleven different waste collection companies operate in the area. This project aims to reduce this number and use a local storage (compactor) to store the waste and remove them at a later stage.
An electric vehicle will be used for collection to reduce air pollution. When implemented the scheme will result in lower waste disposal costs for businesses. This is a two-stage bidding process. Our bid was successful at the first stage. The outcome of the second stage will be announced late January 2020.

6. Neighbourhood CIL Funding: Our application for Neighbour CIL money has been recommended for approval by the S106 / CIL team and a report will be going to February Cabinet meeting. The report has been signed off by Cllr Hearne and Dan Hawthorn. We have applied for £600,000.

7. GLA’s Good Growth Fund: The Council’s application to GLA’s Good Growth Fund has been successful at stage one and we will be preparing detailed application for the final stage. We have requested £600,000 to match fund the Neighbourhood CIL money to invest on TPL.

8. Place making and design service for TPL: All the documents and paperwork have been cleared by LBH Strategic Procurement and ready to go out to tender for a team of place making consultants to develop detailed and workable vision and design to implement the TPL improvement plan. On the advice of our Strategic Procurement team we will wait until 6th January to go live.

ii. Update on Alexandra Road drug den

There was an address in Alexandra Road which was used as a crack house. This property was closed by the police by means of a Closure Order. The police recently made a further application for a three-month extension meaning no persons will enter the property for a period of six months. The council has also served legal papers in regards to the property. There has been no further nuisance from the property which has been secured by the council.

Officers from the council have monitored Alexandra Road, The Avenue, Malvern Road and The Mews in Turnpike Lane since the Closure Order was obtained, but no persons have been witnessed misusing drugs or loitering with the intention to deal drugs. If residents have information to the contrary they should contact the police advising the date, time, a brief description of the offender. This will enable the police to deploy resources at appropriate times and give the police powers to Stop and Search if individuals match the description given by residents. Residents should report this issue to the police either on 101 or on the Met Police website at https://www.met.police.uk/

iii. Alexandra House conversion

Many residents got in touch with me regarding the proposed conversion of Alex House on Station Road into shoebox size residential units by a billionaire property developer. Alex House is in Woodside ward. This story was featured in the Guardian with the title, “The billionaire and the 219 tiny flats: a new low for rabbit-hutch Britain?” (https://www.theguardian.com/money/2019/nov/23/the-billionaire-and-the-219-tiny-flats-a-new-low-for-rabbit-hutch-britain)

The good news is that Haringey Council has refused planning permission for Alexandra House to be converted into shoe-box size residential units. I will continue to oppose this proposed conversion if the developer appeals the decision.

iv. Free school meals in Haringey’s primary schools

This was one of the key pledges of our manifesto. We had set aside £50,000 in our 2019/20 budget to carry out a pilot project. I spoke of my delight that we were making progress on this manifesto pledge during the full council meeting to set the budget in 2019.
I have now joined a free school meals working group led by Cllr Zena Brabazon, cabinet member for children and families. The first meeting is on Monday 6 January at 6pm. I will report back to you after the meeting.

v. High Road West Scrutiny Review

As part of my work as the chair of Housing and Regeneration Scrutiny Panel, I will be chairing a review of the regeneration scheme known as ‘High Road West’ with Lendlease as the developer. The scheme affects the Love Lane estate which has 297 apartments (majority are temporary accommodation tenants) and the Peacock Industrial Estate. The estimated value of the overall scheme is around £1billion. Please let me know if you are interested in the scrutiny review. I will keep you updated of progress especially if you want to attend any of the public evidence gathering sessions. Otherwise, I will not be reporting on this piece of work going forward as it does not concern Noel Park per se.

vi. Thoughts on Labour’s election defeat and election of new leader and deputy

Since I became a member in 2010, we have lost four general elections in a row. Last month’s electoral defeat was the most difficult for me, because the country needed a radical Labour government more than ever before to reverse austerity and invest in our economy. Labour needs to be united under its new leadership, because divided parties do not win elections. We will need to focus on winning the electorate rather than have endless internal factional struggles. Our manifesto for the next general election will need to be credible. Voters did not believe that our manifesto this time was deliverable which is why they rejected it.

I will wait to see who the candidates are for leader and deputy leader before declaring who I will support. I want the new leader to keep Labour left and retain many of our policies such as renationalisation, abolishing tuition fees, building council houses and the green industrial revolution. Moving to the centre or centre-right like ‘New Labour’ pursuing Thatcherite policies is not going to be the answer. I would like the leader and deputy to work as a team and avoid the dynamics that we saw between Corbyn and Watson.

vii. My Surgery Details

Residents can see me at the following times:
(1) Second Saturday of each month at Wood Green Library from 10.30 to 11.30: no need for appointment
(2) Fourth Saturday of each month: roving surgery from 10.30 to 11.30 by prior appointment.