DOORS WIDE OPEN

It appears to the tenants and leaseholders of Grenfell Tower that the TMO and their building contractor, Rydon, have chosen to treat the health and safety of residents with total contempt by repeatedly failing to respond to requests to repair the locking system to the front entrance of our building. For many months now, in spite of repeated requests by individual residents to the TMO to rectify the problem, the front door of Grenfell Tower has remained unlocked thereby granting access to our property to all and sundry.

Grenfell Tower’s internal stairwell is now a magnet for local youth and drug and alcohol misuser’s and the total lack of security on our property to stop these anti-social gatherings is an utter disgrace that should bring great shame on the TMO who have a duty of care to protect the wellbeing of all residents in this tower block. It seems that Siobhan Rumble (LW Estate Manager) and the TMO could not care less about protecting our security despite having a duty to respond to safety critical matters of this nature within 24 hours.

It is a matter of record that an intruder managed to enter Grenfell Tower over the 2014 Carnival Bank Holiday weekend despite the supposed security organised around Lancaster West. It was only due to the streetwise actions of a local resident that this intruder did not gain access to individual properties. Despite this incident, and the complaints that followed, the TMO have done nothing to repair the security lock on the front door of Grenfell Tower that has been defective since Rydon moved the entrance from the ground floor level to the walkway some three months ago.

Despite receiving many assurances from Ms Rumble and Kiran Singh (TMO Area Manager) that the problem would be fixed as a matter of priority nothing has been done. Mr Singh had previously promised that Rydon would fix the broken lock within ten days of 24th Ocober 2014 but these words have proved meaningless.

It is a shame that the TMO have chosen, yet again, to show their contempt for residents by allowing our homes to become a target for anti-social gatherings and by ignoring residents repeated requests to repair the broken front door security system.

It seems that the TMO are effective in matters that serve their own interests, (eg rent collection) but totally incompetent when it comes to providing even the most basic of services to local residents.

The International Housing Crisis

In today’s post we return to the issues underpinning our recent coverage of the MIPIM protests at Olympia. This will be short on words and is intended to remind our readers that the housing issues we face at Lancaster West, throughout Kensington & Chelsea, and across London and the rest of the UK, are not ours alone. We share our plight, and the many dangers and threats we face, with a great many others across the world.

The picture illustrating today’s blog shows a camp of homeless people at Nickelsville, Seattle, USA. This is typical of the many ramshackle encampments and tent cities that have sprung up across the USA as the last resort of many of the victims of the financial crash of recent years. Many of the inhabitants of these encampments had the great misfortune to lose their jobs, and then inevitably had their mortgages foreclosed. All of this in the “Land of the Free” where the poor lack even basic social and medical care. In the USA it seems that to be homeless and poor is to suffer a special form of stigma, accompanied by extreme econonic and social exclusion.

All animals, as Orwell famously said, are equal, but some are more equal than others.

Below we present  a couple of Utube clips to illustrate the worldwide nature of the threat to social housing, or as the Thought Police now prefer to call it “affordable housing”, and the growing international resistance to the injustice and cruelty which is meted out to those of us who can’t afford to buy the luxury housing which is fast becoming the only remaining choice. The first clip is from Spain, and the second from the Irish Republic.

We must leave it to our readers to form their own opinions about what, if anything, can be done to curb the apparently limitless power of the banks and the class of oligarchs in whose interests the so-called democratic governments of the so-called free world perpetrate, with such impunity, such crimes against the powerless populations on whose behalf they are allegedly elected to govern.

 

Blakeman and Coleridge – The War Drags On

Further to the Grenfell Action Group’s blogs on the lies and deceit that we believe have been perpetrated on our community by Councillors Blakeman and Coleridge we wrote to the Royal Borough of Kensington and Chelsea using Freedom of Information legislation.

When we had previously questioned the Council on the removal of our right-of-way along Station Walk, on the fact that our community had been promised that this much loved pathway would reopen once the construction of the academy was no longer an obstacle, and would then remain open “in perpetuity”, we were told by Amanda Johnson (Head of Housing Commissioning at RBKC) that the Council was aware of the promises it had made and was working with Transport for London to resolve the problem.

However, as the FoI response from Robin Yu at RBKC clearly shows the Rotten Borough appears to have made no effort to engage with TfL over the issue of our right-of-way along Station Walk. We believe that Ms Johnson’s statement clearly shows that she intended to mislead our community by intimating that the Council were working towards resolving this situation when the facts paint a very different picture:

In his response Mr Yu said:

“There are no minutes or forms of written correspondence regarding discussions that have taken place between the Council and TfL and the proposals for Station Walk”.

True to our word that the Grenfell Action Group would not let this matter rest we wrote subsequently to the RBKC Town Clerk Nicholas Holgate who referred the matter for investigation to Leverne Parker, RBKC’s Chief Solicitor and Monitoring Officer. We have now decided to publish in full our subsequent correspondence with Ms Parker:

Dear Ms Parker,

Thank you for your email and confirmation that you will investigate the deception carried out by Councillors Blakeman and Coleridge on an elderly resident of Whitstable House who was persuaded to drop his objection to the Secretary of State regarding the RBKC Council’s plans to extinguish our “right of way” along Station Walk.

I shall be forwarding this matter to the Secretary of State so that he is also made aware of the underhand tactics that were used to trick our community out of our legitimate right to oppose the extinguishment of a much loved and used “right of way”.

This particular resident in Whitstable House, and the wider community, were promised that our “right of way” would only be closed for a short period of time and would be then be reopened “in perpetuity”.

The reality is that Station Walk has never re-opened and the evidence shows that these Councillors and the wider Council have made absolutely no effort to honour their promises and return us our “right of way”.

The Grenfell Action Group will be publishing additional blogs on this subject to further highlight the fact that we feel our community has been lied to by these two Councillors and that it is not acceptable for those we elect to treat our rights with such disdain.

I was informed in a letter from Amanda Johnson dated 4/08/14 that the RBKC Council has been involved in “continuing the discussion”  with Tfl about securing the re-opening of Station Walk sometime in the undefined future. She said:

“Currently we do not have a timescale for the re-opening of Station Walk….This has been delayed due to not progressing the matter as far as we would have liked with TFL. We will be continuing the discussion with them as we recognise the commitments we made.”

A subsequent Freedom of Information request has shown that there has actually been no recorded discussion on the feasibility of using Tfl land to resurrect our right of way along Station Walk either now or in the past.

So, please can you explain to me why an employee of the RBKC Council (Ms Johnson) has informed me that the Council are involved in discussion with Tfl about our “right of Way” along Station Walk when the evidence from my FoI request clearly shows this is not the case?

Or maybe, it’s just simply more lies that the Council feel they can tell with impunity???

I look forward to you investigating this abuse of Councillor power and answering my query regarding the behaviour of Ms Johnson.

Regards,

Grenfell Action Group.

The outcome of Ms Parker’s so-called investigation was provided in a letter of reply from her, dated 1st October, which can be read in full via the following link:

https://grenfellactiongroup.wordpress.com/leverne-parkers-reply/

When Blakeman and Coleridge signed their names to the letter that promised  the reopening of Station Walk there can be little doubt that they knew that any reprovision of our right-of-way would depend entirely on the surrender by TfL of land beneath the railway arches which was already leased by them to a number of businesses, mostly auto repair shops. This was always going to be problematic and probably undeliverable, and both of these Councillors knew it full well. Being a Tory RBKC Cabinet Member, Coleridge could not be trusted on this, and he proved himself true to type.

But Blakeman, as a local ward councillor and Leader (at that time) of the Opposition Labour Group, should never have signed such a promise on behalf of a Tory Council which she knew to be deceitful, untrustworthy, machiavelian and utterly contemptuous of the Rotten Borough’s working class communities. Because of this she deserves the special ire and venom of the local community, which it was her duty to serve and protect. This was a fundamental betrayal, on her part, of her duty of care to this community, and of the principles upon which the Labour Party had originally been founded, and which we all now know it has completely abandoned. The offending letter is reproduced in full via the following link:

https://grenfellactiongroup.wordpress.com/2014/08/31/station-walk-did-senior-rbkc-councillors-lie/station-walk-notice/

Needless to say the Lancaster West community has absolutely no faith that the Council can be trusted to properly investigate any such matters, but we can promise our readers that we will not let this matter drop until we have done our utmost to ensure that Councillors Blakeman and Coleridge are held to account for their actions and we are informed why Amanda Johnson felt free to misinform us, with impunity, that the Council were in discussion with TfL when the evidence clearly shows otherwise.

We are not prepared to sit back and simply accept such lies and deceit from the councillors and officers of a local authority that has long since lost it’s moral compass along with any pretence of the integrity that should underpin the activities of such an authority.

Kensington Academy – The Lights Are Still On

In mid September we posted an item questioning the negligence and profligacy of leaving the entire Kensington Aldridge Academy fully lit all night, and every night, thus wasting electrical power and causing light pollution and great inconvenience to  neighbours in Grenfell Tower and elsewhere (notably the senior citizens in the sheltered housing complex on Silchester Road).

https://grenfellactiongroup.wordpress.com/2014/09/19/kaa-the-lights-are-on-but-no-one-is-in/

The picture illustrating today’s post is a ‘still’ borrowed at 2.50 am on Saturday 8th November from the Council’s live 24 hour live camera feed intended to advertise the merits of the new academy, locally referred to in jest as ‘The Westfield Academy’ because of its cloned design and garish cladding which makes it so closely resemble a Westfield Supermarket.

The picture clearly shows the obscene and unnecessary light levels still emitted overnight, and almost every night, from this building complex. Readers should note that the appearance of fully lit lower floors in Grenfell Tower is actually caused by the reflected glare from the overlighting of the south side of the academy. It is noteworthy also that the lighting on the north side of the academy (left of picture) overlooks the neighbouring sheltered housing complex for senior citizens on the other side of Silchester Road. No respect or consideration for the old of our community either!

This tends to remind one of the nasty sleep deprivation techniques used by police and military the world over to soften up prisoners for interrogation and/or torture. We suspect the comparison may not be entirely inappropriate.

Does nobody in authority listen, or pay the slightest attention, to the feedback they receive on this and other issues? It would seem not!

David Benson, the headteacher of the academy, appears to be a fairly reasonable man who has previously earned our respect by responding positively to correspondence from us. Please Mr Benson, can’t you use your powers to intervene now and find a remedy for this outrageous intrusion?

On a separate, but related note, we sent the email below to Melanie Rieder at the Aldridge Foundation challenging their breach of promises made earlier to engage meaningfully with the Lancaster West community on such (and other) issues:

Dear Melanie,

I hope that you are well.

The Lancaster West community was informed that the Kensington Aldridge Academy intended to engage with us and that residents of our Estate would be given the opportunity to meet the new Headmaster, Mr Benson, and tour the Academy campus.

We were told at the time, however, that Mr Benson was very busy and that we would have to wait until September 2014 before this “community engagement” would begin.
It is now nearly November 2014 and it appears that no effort seems to have been made by the Academy to reach out and engage with residents on Lancaster West as promised.

We would, therefore, like to invite Mr Benson to come on a short tour of our Estate so that he can see the slum like conditions we are forced to live in.

Before visiting us, Mr Benson might like to reflect on why £65+ million has been spent on the shiny new KALC project but despite the Council having £260 million in reserves his nearest neighbours are treated like less than human and forced to live downtrodden and defeated in Hell.

Thank you for your assistance with this matter.

Regards,

Grenfell Action Group

WE EAGERLY AWAIT A RESPONSE FROM MS RIEDER, OR PREFERABLY FROM MR BENSON HIMSELF. REGRETABLY THERE IS LITTLE MORE THAT WE CAN DO. ONE HAS TO WONDER ALSO WHERE OUR LOCAL WARD COUNCILLORS ARE, AND WHY THEY APPEAR TO CARE NOT A JOT ABOUT SUCH ISSUES.

SOME AWKWARD QUESTIONS FOR RBKC

Several years ago, we first discovered that the Rotten Borough planned to destroy Lancaster Green and replace it with the Kensington Aldridge Academy. We realised this would also mean the destruction of the much used five-a-side football pitches on the site and the displacement of the users of that facility to the nearby Westway Sports Centre. We immediately began to question the suitability of that Centre as a sporting venue for local children, and its safety in terms of air quality, specifically air pollution from the overhead Westway flyover and its’ various access ramps.

Despite our repeated attempts to engage constructively on that issue with RBKC, and our local Labour councillors, we made no progress whatsoever, and were stonewalled at every turn. Following the publication, at last, of the results of the “Mapping for Change” Citizen Science Project sponsored by University College London, our air pollution concerns have been completely vindicated.

According to the results of the study the nitrogen dioxide average for July alone at the Westway Sports Centre was 52.46µg/m3, whereas the annual legal limit for  nitrogen dioxide levels is 40µg/m3. This clearly shows that the total NO2 pollution measured at this site in a single month exceeded the safe limit allowed for a full year under European law. This is in itself entirely unacceptable, and it also follows that the annual NO2 pollution levels are sure to far exceed the maximum annual safe limit allowed under European law. We have therefore compiled the following questions which demand to be answered by those in power at Hornton Street:

QUESTION: Why would those in authority at RBKC, including the leadership of the Westway Development Trust, a creature agency of the Council, think it appropriate to build a largely outdoor sports complex, used by many of the children of North Kensington, under a complex motorway intersection where there were always likely to be air pollution issues?

QUESTION: Having decided to proceed with the development in question, why did neither the Westway Development Trust (ie the Westway Sports Centre) nor the Environmental Department of the Royal Borough consider it advisable, either at the planning stage or subsequently, to install air quality monitoring equipment on the site, despite sustained pressure to do so over recent years?

QUESTION: Why did RBKC repeatedly insist, even though they had no scientific basis on which to do so, that there was no air pollution problem at the Westway Sports Centre?

QUESTION: Specifically, why did RBKC falsely claim, when challenged on the lack of air quality monitoring at the Westway Centre, that “by a quirk of atmospheric pressure” the area directly underneath the Westway did not have air quality problems, “as the pollution drifts further afield”?

QUESTION: What, if anything, does RBKC now propose to do to remedy this appalling situation? Clearly the many outdoor facilities at the Westway Sports Centre are unfit for purpose and unsafe for use by the many local children, including school parties, who routinely use them. Will the Council urgently provide alternative facilities which are not so badly polluted that they pose a clear and serious risk to the health of anyone, especially children, who exercise and play sport at this venue for personal lifestyle reasons, or as part of their school curriculum?

WE SUSPECT THAT CLEAR AND HONEST ANSWERS TO THESE QUESTIONS WILL NOT BE FORTHCOMING FROM THE COUNCIL, BUT IT IS OUR CONSIDERED OPINION THAT RBKC COUNCILLORS AND OFFICERS HAVE DELIBERATELY AND CYNICALLY BEHAVED IN A MANNER LIKELY TO DAMAGE THE HEALTH AND WELL BEING OF THE USERS OF THE WESTWAY SPORTS CENTRE, MANY OF WHOM ARE CHILDREN BUSSED IN FROM LOCAL SCHOOLS. WE CONSIDER THIS TO BE A VERY SERIOUS MATTER.

LASTLY: In a Freedom of Information request dated 6 July 2014 the Grenfell Action Group asked to see any correspondence, emails, minutes of meetings, etc held by the Council concerning RBKC Labour Councillors and the issue of air pollution around the Westway Sports Centre that may have taken place since 11th December 2012. The response from the FoI officer at RBKC stated that when the records were searched no information was found in relation to this request.

On more than one occasion recently when we have used Freedom of information legislation to check claims by councillors and council officers to have engaged in discussions or negotiations with third parties on various issues of local importance, we have discovered that there is no documentary record of any such meetings or discussions – no emails on record, no meeting notes or minutes etc. We do not believe that this is remotely credible. Institutions of government simply don’t operate on such bases. Records are always kept for future reference, and if the records don’t exist, then it strongly suggests that the meetings or discussions never took place.

Kensington Labour councillors claim to have lobbied the Council intensively on the Westway air pollution issue – and yet there is no record of meetings with council officers, formal or informal, no emails, no minutes, no meeting notes. We are left with no alternative but to assume that they too have been disingenuous about how much lobbying they have engaged in, and how much pressure they have brought to bear on the Council – precious little it seems.

WE BELIEVE,THEREFORE, THAT OUR LOCAL LABOUR COUNCILLORS ALSO HAVE SOME SERIOUS QUESTIONS TO ANSWER REGARDING THE APPALLING AIR POLLUTION LEVELS AT WESTWAY SPORTS CENTRE. NEEDLESS TO SAY WE DON’T REALLY  EXPECT SUCH ANSWERS TO BE FORTCOMING FROM THE LABOUR GROUP, ANY MORE THAN FROM THE RULING TORIES.

THIS, UNFORTUNATELY, IS THE SHAM DEMOCRACY WHICH WE  IN THE SO-CALLED ‘FREE WORLD’ HAVE INHERITED.

STUDY REVEALS HIGH POLLUTION LEVELS AT WESTWAY SPORTS CENTRE

For some time now the RBKC Labour Party have waged a vicious campaign aimed at marginalising and discrediting the Grenfell Action Group and it’s membership. This has manifested itself in local Labour Councillors refusing to assist the Grenfell Action Group in holding Public Meetings and, in doing so, seeking to stamp on our democratic right to free speech.

We have also recorded instances of RBKC Labour working with the neo-Cons in Hornton Street to deny residents in Grenfell Tower collective representation (power surge issue, Grenfell Tower Improvement works, etc) much to the detriment of our local community.

The local Labour Group seem to think that no-one except themselves are entitled to voice opinions about the state of our community, and they appear to hold in contempt the notion that we supposedly live in a country of free speech .

We believe that the RBKC Labour Group should be deeply ashamed of the way that they have responded to and interacted with the Grenfell Action Group and how they have constantly attempted to stamp on us and oppress our heart-felt and carefully considered views. An example of this was when Councillor Blakeman was seen tearing down legitimate literature posted around our Estate by the Grenfell Action Group and then claiming she did so because of threats of violence from our members.

The latest example of the Labour group’s marginalisation and ill-treatment of the Grenfell Action Group relates to the Westway Sports Centre and the ongoing issue of air pollution on that site. We believe that they have historically done very little to stand up for residents on this issue and we believe that a recent blog by the Grenfell Action Group, using details obtained by Freedom of Information legislation, demonstrates their inaction very well :

https://grenfellactiongroup.wordpress.com/2014/08/19/dent-coad-parachutes-into-notting-dale-air-quality-debate-2/

We were, therefore, very surprised to see that they have recently published, on the Kensington Labour website, http://kensingtonlabour.com/ the results of a pollution study undertaken with the assistance of Grenfell Action Group members (in partnership with another community activist) before we had a chance to respond to the study or publish our own interpretation of the results on our own blog. Please note the key finding of the study:

The European legal standard for annual nitrogen dioxide levels is 40µg/m3
The average for July alone at the Westway Sports Centre was 52.46µg/m3. This is an extremely high reading. It is truly shocking and completely unacceptable.

Our readers should note that RBKC have consistently refused to provide air quality monitoring at the Westway Sports Centre and have simultaneously insisted that there is no air pollution problem at this site. One has to question the integrity of the local council based on such irresponsible and obstructive behaviour, and to strongly suspect ulterior motives at play. Don’t take our word on this.  Check it out via one of our earlier blogs on this issue:

https://grenfellactiongroup.wordpress.com/2012/12/12/bad-air-days-at-shepherds-bush-roundabout/

To continue, despite RBKC Labour Leader Emma Dent Coad being made aware of the Grenfell Action Group’s involvement with the “Mapping for Change” Citizen Science Project at University College London, they did not have the courtesy to share these findings with us, but instead used the data as though it were their own, shamelessly “piggy backing” on our work while completely failing to acknowledge the role of the Grenfell Action Group in collecting the data for the study.

We are utterly sickened by Labour’s pretence that they have been actively involved with the issue of pollution at the Westway and find this most recent action towards the Grenfell Action Group parasitic and self-serving in nature. No doubt the hollow words posted on the RBKC Labour website will be met with equally hollow actions from a group of elected Labour Councillors who should be deeply ashamed of the way they routinely hijack the legitimate work of others and the contemptible way they treat members of the community who have the temerity to disagree with them.

Residents of Lancaster West gave up any hope that the Labour Party have the will to achieve anything for our community a long, long time ago and know that if we are to achieve change it will be through our own actions as tenants and leaseholders and not through the actions of our pathetic elected Labour Councillors.

THEY SHOULD HANG THEIR HEADS IN SHAME!