25 July - Compassionate Conservatism
I suspect, based on the lack of feedback, that very few people are interested
in the Motions that the Bexley Labour Group puts forward at every Full Council
meeting. They tend to suffer one of several fates; if they are worthwhile the
Tories will make a minor amendment and claim them as their own or if they are less than enthusiastic will
change them out of all recognition with a bit of self-praise added for good
measure. Sometimes they will simply vote them down.
Last week the subject was temporary accommodation
for which the Conservatives chose their second option. Councillor Mabel Ogundayo
(Labour, Thamesmead East) said the Council “owed it to residents to ensure a decent and
non-demeaning home” and called on Bexley Council to
“raise and enforce basic standards”. Recently we have seen people dumped into
houses with no roofs, no toilets,
no electricity and no furniture
but with the benefit of rodent droppings.
The photos below were taken in a flat in my own road
after a single and mentally damaged lady was unceremoniously dumped along with all
her worldly goods such that it was next to impossible to get through the front
door let alone sit down, cook a meal or sleep.
One of the disadvantages of relying on webcasts for
information is that the inevitable Tory
Amendment is not made public. It fell to Councillor Davey (West
Heath) to derail Mabel’s motion but what it may have said must remain a
mystery apart from his spoken comments on the night.
He said it was an improvement on the Labour Motion because “it highlights the fantastic work of our Council staff”
(the mandatory self-praise) who dealt with 2,915 homeless approaches last year. The Housing
Associations are good and some private landlords are better. “Nearby Labour
Councils” provide “a concrete forest not fit to bring children up in”.
“Households in temporary accommodation in Bexley continues to decrease month on
month. [Are they turning even more applicants away?] Greenwich overspent on temporary accommodation by £2 million, Lewisham
£6·5 million and [sheer desperation] ULEZ will cause more homelessness”.
The Amendment was seconded by Councillor Chris Taylor. “All Bexley properties
meet national standards” while Greenwich provides “substandard, dirty cramped and verminous accommodation”.
Labour Councillor Chris Ball (Erith) objected to the Amendment being about Emergency
Accommodation while the Motion was on Temporary Accommodation but was
over-ruled by the Monitoring Officer who said “neither
the removal of words nor the insertion of words amount to voting against the Motion”.
Councillor Daniel Francis obviously thought that was nonsense as indeed it must
be. Change any number of words you like but it remains a simple Amendment not a new Motion.
Councillor Ogundayo regretted that the debate had become one of semantics and not people’s lives.
Cabinet Member Sue Gower said that Bexley was a “compassionate Conservative
Council” and the Labour Motion was defeated.
The photographs above were made available to Bexley Council which, after being
chased, telephoned me at home to explain that the occupant had not been very helpful to them and was therefore being
“actively punished”. The words are burned into my memory.
It will be noted that the events
portrayed above are 20 years old which puts it firmly within the Labour era. It
is to be hoped that the staff employed then are long since gone.