This, by Lib Dem Elaine Bagshaw, is the next in the series of guest posts by candidates for the Tower Hamlets mayoral elections on June 11. John Biggs and Rabina Khan have also promised articles although they have yet to materialise.
I’m running for Mayor because we need to build a better Tower Hamlets that works for everyone.
Forty-nine per cent of our children live in poverty. We live in the shadows of the City yet have second highest unemployment rate in London.
Why is it that if you are born in Tower Hamlets you are expected to live five fewer years than someone born in the City of London?
I’ve been proud to call this borough my home five years now, and I want to deliver for people in this borough so that everyone gets the same opportunities I had. I was the first person in my family to go to University, and through a shared ownership scheme in the borough I’ve had the chance to own my own home. I currently live in Poplar, near Westferry station. I ran for the Parliamentary seat of Poplar & Limehouse in the General Election, and the Blackwall & Cubitt Town by-election in 2014.
The last five years have been difficult for the borough. Yes, there have been some improvements such as the results at our local schools, the introduction of the London Living Wage payment for staff, and the cleanness of certain areas, but they don’t go far enough, and they’ve divided our community. We’ve collectively lost faith in the office of the Mayor, the Council and its arms-length organisations such as Tower Hamlets Homes at exactly the time when they are needed most.
The previous administrations of both Labour and Tower Hamlets First have left us this legacy, and it is simply unacceptable. This can’t be allowed to continue. It is time for a change with local people leading the way. The borough needs new leadership and new ideas so that we can move on from the feuds of the past and together build a united community that delivers local solutions.
If elected mayor I will:
- Make sure that there are affordable homes for working families
- Ensure that a minimum of 50 per cent of a social housing development has to remain as social housing once it has been redeveloped
- Protect our social housing provision by making sure that like-for-like replacements of the lost social housing are built in the borough
- Housing developments are built alongside infrastructure such as schools; doctors surgeries and transport links so that they are additions to our community
- Identify all empty homes in the borough and make them fit for use as social housing
- Ensure no social housing tenant in the borough is living in a home that is unsuitable for human habitation
- Investigate the treatment of leaseholders, putting an end to charging for unnecessary work and systemic overcharging of residents
- Deliver new local facilities such as more GPs and better local transportation needed to support our community.
- Save £1.5m by scrapping the council newspaper and use this money to create apprenticeships for young people in Tower Hamlets that pay the London Living Wage
- Have zero tolerance on corruption
I’ve spent just over six years working as a regulator in the borough on Canary Wharf. As a regulator I have held banks to account, and supported those who fell victim to the scandals of payday lenders. I’ve also worked as a youth worker helping get young people back into education and into work.
I know what needs to be done and how hard it can be. But I also know that I can deliver for our community.
A vote for Elaine Bagshaw is a vote for a better Tower Hamlets.
Trial by Jeory 
Sounds much better than I had expected.
However, too much focus on housing, not that it is not an important issue – except the council does not have the space or the money. Unless the commercial builders agree to give up a larger share of their developments to go to social housing.
And, if Elaine have worked as a regulator for Canary Wharf, would she not much earlier have been able to help weed out the alleged corruption within Tower Hamlets? “Zero tolerance” is nice, but it doesn’t explain how it will be investigated and enforced. By all appearances, even the Police are finding it difficult.
I would also have liked to see a bit more on anti social behavior and the use of open space for consumption of drugs and alcohol by minors.
Only saying this, because I have now been tempted to vote Lib Dem.
Hi madsvid,
The focus on housing comes partly from my own experience in the borough and because it’s the top issue on the doorsteps when I’ve been canvassing.
A number of developers are getting around the requirement to provide social housing in their developments by claiming they wouldn’t viable. As Mayor I would do more to challenge this, including looking at getting developers to provide two viability statements rather than only one, and them having to come from independent organisations.
In terms of tackling the corruption it would be a case of going through every process; looking at all of our governance and also talking to staff and people involved in decisions made over the past few years to work out what has been going wrong and what can change in the short and long term. This may well involve changing some of the leaders in the Council and it’s arms length bodies such as Tower Hamlets Homes.
I haven’t put everything in this article as there’s so much to tackle in Tower Hamlets there isn’t room! I’ll be adding more things to my website http://www.elainebagshawformayor.com between now and polling day.
If the financially poor property speculators (also known as developers because their primary focus is developing their fortunes) can not include a significant chunk of good quality social housing in all new developments then the Planning Authority should refuse permission.
Simple. No capitulation required. Local government truly serving the local public and not the financial well-being of property speculators wanting to get richer !
Curious Cat
Resist the temptation! Vote Biggs with a clothes peg on your nose or you get Lutfur Rahman.
excellent advertisement for foul smelling Tower Hamlets politics
How long do the clothes pegs last in the stench ?
CC.
This peg needs to he very very big to block out that smell
On the same morning as Nick Clegg (rich boy with more opportunities than the vast majority of people could dream about) made his awful and deplorable statement about the tragic death of Charles Kennedy – Nicola Sturgeon’s speech was genuinely kind and vastly superior) up pops a Lib-Dem with an impressive and readable posting.
However is this “spin doctor” polished statement really genuine ? Does Elaine Bagshaw truly care about Tower Hamlets ?
This item attracted my attention:
Ensure no social housing tenant in the borough is living in a home that is unsuitable for human habitation
Having inspected a wide variety of sub-standard residentially accommodation for so-called “private sector tenants” that I would hate to live-in, I wondered:-
(1) What does Mrs Bagshaw mean by “social housing tenant” ? Is it someone housed by a local authority or by a “private provider of social housing” (‘PPSH’)(previously known as Housing Associations and RSLs).
(2) What about the rest of humanity housed in often disgusting conditions operated by private landlords who charge rents far greater than councils and the PPSH ?
(3) How can anyone who wants to improve the community be so unaware of the scandal of expensive, neglected, dilapidated and often asthma causing accommodation ?
If I were running for the Mayor-ship, I would want the local authority to seize (the power is in the law) sub-standard accommodation, make it fit for human beings, and then fill it with social tenants.
But I don’t have a spin doctor. I write from my heart whilst fully aware of the daily realities.
Curious Cat
Hi Curious Cat,
I sent this to Ted yesterday and he kindly posted it this morning – so there’s nothing except a coincidence in terms of the timing.
I don’t have a spin doctor, I wrote this myself so I guess nearly 7 years as a regulator means I’ve ended up with a particular style that can be a little bit clunky.
In answer to your questions:
(1) What does Mrs Bagshaw mean by “social housing tenant” ? Is it someone housed by a local authority or by a “private provider of social housing” (‘PPSH’)(previously known as Housing Associations and RSLs).
I’d include both groups in the definition. As an aside, I prefer to go by Ms Bagshaw
(2) What about the rest of humanity housed in often disgusting conditions operated by private landlords who charge rents far greater than councils and the PPSH ?
Having lived in such a property in Tower Hamlets I’d bring in a licensing scheme for private landlords operating in Tower Hamlets, so that have to meet minimum standards for their housing to operate in the borough. We did this in Birmingham for student accommodation and it helped lift standards.
(3) How can anyone who wants to improve the community be so unaware of the scandal of expensive, neglected, dilapidated and often asthma causing accommodation ?
I’m very aware, both from having lived in such accommodation and from talking to thousands of local residents over the past couple of weeks that this is a significant problem. I’ve also spoken at hustings about the health problems our poor housing stock is causing. As this is a guest post I haven’t included everything I’d work on – more posts will be added to http://www.elainebagshawformayor.com over the coming days.
Hi Ms Bagshaw,
Thanks for your response.
I was extremely disappointed by Nick Clegg’s comments about Charles Kennedy, a true Son of Scotland. Hopefully the next Lib Dem leader will be more like Lt. Gerald from Northern Ireland (a.k.a. Paddy).
I favour the licensing of private sector landlords but Eric Pickles was intending to reduce local authorities ability to license on the premise it was bad for the private sector renting “business”. Since licensing depends on the whim of central government how to you propose to force basic standards on the scum landlords who get rich at the tax payers expense, by offering bad housing at high rents to those dependant on tax payers funded Housing Benefit ?
affordable homes
(1) A banker on £1.25 million per annum can afford a home that a road sweeper on £18,000 p.a. can not afford. Since ‘affordable homes’ is an abstract concept utterly meaningless without additional clarification, would you like to describe how a normal person would identify ‘affordable homes’ and which normal people are unlikely to benefit from the inevitably expensive (to them) ‘affordable homes’ ?
Have zero tolerance on corruption
(2) As a campaigner against local government corruption – of which Tower Hamlets seems to excel – how would you actually instigate a ‘zero tolerance’ of local authority corruption when the police privately admit its endemic.
Would you introduce:
(a) a 24 hours a day hot-line for people to report suspicions ?
(b) an external watchdog panel to scrutinise all council spending especially the awarding of contracts ?
(c) put all senior council staff on continuous 1 year contracts to persuade them to behave ?
(d) offer rewards for information leading to the uncovering of irregularities ?
(3) How would you tackle the problem of developers and/or their agents having private conversations with councillors on the planning committee and the developer or agent subsequently making a “donation” in cash to the councillor’s political party or election expenses – no receipt required ?
(4) How would you end the private hospitality and/or gifts and/or favours given to council staff and councillors by third parties wanting commercial advantage ?
(5) Since you, and no one else either, will ever reduce local government corruption to zero %, what percentage of corruption would you consider to be a reduction success and how would you measure this amount ?
(6) What would be your annual anti-corruption budget ?
Thank you.
Curious Cat.
It will may well read well to the uninformed but I think it’s naieve.
In exactly the same way that a number of Rabina Khan’s pronouncements on housing are also naieve and/or misleading.
One could find either candidates’ promises more persuasive if they said
1) HOW they were going to deliver on their promises
2) and/or eliminated those which are just plain fanciful given the current legal and funding regimes for social housing.
Let’s face it the only thing the Council does, other than control some limited aspects of the planning function related to housing (which are always open to Appeal), is act as a money filter from central government to those organisations providing social housing.
The Council itself does NOT provide any social housing. It has no control over the amount of cash allocated for social housing development and precious little over housing rents.
I assume she’s aware that housing finance is wholly separate and effectively ring-fenced – and not very open to tweaking as to the sums available.
Does she not think that both residents and councillors who have been contributing and/or reviewing planning applications for housing developments in Tower Hamlets have not made a number of similar points on a number of occasions over the last few years?
Does she not know what happened to those points when made?
Does she not know what would happen at Planning Appeal to any decisions which look good on paper but would fail to deliver?
Maybe she could comment on the reasons why those points, when made, have typically been ignored by the Council’s Strategic Development Committee? http://moderngov.towerhamlets.gov.uk/mgCommitteeDetails.aspx?ID=360
Besides which, odd as it may sound to some, not everybody in this borough lives in social housing!
IMO limiting virtually all her election agenda to this topic is effectively ignoring a lot of the other voters in the borough – and a lot of other issues which make a difference to the lives of people living in this borough.
I predict that the person who will win this Mayoral Election will be a candidate who can appeal to a number of different constituencies across the borough – and who will NOT be partial in favouring one set of people over another.
I think we’ve had quite enough of that sort of politics.
At least the Returning Officer is trying to be seen to be doing his bit in terms of improving election performance this time around
see https://twitter.com/TowerHamletsNow
Yes more polished spin from a semi parachuted candidate
No real substance and lack of any comprehension of delivery of these aims. Especially her lack of understanding of planning policy and national guidelines and financial rules and spending powers as pointed out by YCMIU.
We all remember the last liberal administrations wasteful to a level suggesting corruption, spiteful to the point of outright racism in many instances and policies, sounds similar to Lutfurs in some regards.
Any controls to the ARHO i.e. THH and the like are possible but only by the council members on these boards having some level of understanding and intelligence, which we all see is severely lacking in all respects. The reconfirming of these organisations constitutions and rules is the councils priority in changing them for the benefit of the tenant’s, leaseholders and boroughs residents, after all the council holds the largest stake of control at 50%.
Still not seen a single leaflet or canvasing in Wapping from any of them.
I feel given the level of trying to win our votes by getting their clear message on deliverable and sensible policy and implementation over to the voters none of the candidates deserve to be elected to represent us.
Absolute cobblers from a wannanbe poltician. All, she will do is split the vote as her party did along with the Greens and Tories in several by elections and the last Mayoral election. Go away, stop fanatasing and let’s get rid of Lutfir’s lot.
A good article from Elaine….No nonsense…short and to the point. I don’t think he can win and i won’t be voting for her but she sounds like a voice that it would be good to hear more of in our council.
She would have no powers to carry out any of the things she has mentioned. Pure spin.
I’m actually more concerned about the brickwork behind her. It’s really rough and I don’t know if it’s supposed to Flemish Bond or Flemish Garden Wall Bond. Could shoe let us know where it is? I haven’t seen anything that bad for years!
Second-hand bricks, mate. There is a good trade in them. Prices do vary.
Variable bond is its best description, a bit like the candidates promises of things they will deliver for us!!!!!
I was talking about the bond. They are a quid each in Lazdan in Bow Common lane. I’ve laid hundreds of millions of them over the last forty years.
It’s a bit rich for someone who came fith in the P&L seat at the last general election to lay the blame for all Tower Hamlets ills at the largest parties in the chamber – i.e. the ones the public voted for (albeit in THF’s case perhaps not quite as many as the declared results). After all it was her party that propped up the Tories for the last 5 years and oversaw the most swingeing cuts to local authority funding since the early eighties.
The Lib Dems only achievement in Government was to force a futile referendum on AV. But at last nights hustings Elaine made it clear she wasn’t going to use her second preference.
Pathetic
Just seen the booklet from TH returning officer through the letter box. It gives the candidates written pitches to us. Some show a level of literacy and grammar that is laughable. My 12 year daughter was correcting this and the very poor English.
So many undeliverable promises. God help us with the election of one of this lot.