Is Getting Rid Of The Dear Leader Really Enough?

Over lunch at Saturday’s Counter Olympic Conference, I was once again pulled into a discussion with campaigners about Newham’s terrible directly-elected Mayor and how much better the borough would be without him. The plea I made in December not to hear another grumbled but inconclusive conversation about how vital it is that we are rid of Sir Robin Wales clearly hasn’t worked.

As I explained back then and again on Saturday, the means are now available under the Localism Act to change the way Newham is governed. However, even if there are enough people willing to put in the hard work to collect signatures and trigger a referendum, any local 'Bring Back Democracy' campaign would also need to be brilliantly organised, better than anything the borough has seen previously. It would need the confidence to guarantee that enough people actually turn out to vote for change: in January 2002, the referendum that created the Mayor and Cabinet system had only a 26% turn-out. That would mean ward-by-ward voter mobilisation, lots of willing volunteers and money: enough to pay for publicity to cover over 91,000 households.

Thinking more about this over the weekend, the organisational obstacles are only the start. If, by some Herculean effort, the position of directly-elected Mayor was eventually abolished, what would happen then? In an area where integrity mattered, it would be nice to think that the current incumbent would resign, but it’s just as likely that Wales would simply step back into the position of council leader, one he held from 1995 until 2002. Even if his position was untenable within the local Labour Party, look at the calibre of politicians in Newham and imagine who would take over – probably one of the long line of staggering mediocrities who have loyally served the Dear Leader over the last decade.

Nor would we ignore one of the principal reasons for the deference displayed by most councillors on key issues over the last ten years. Many are now dependent on a salary for representing their constituents that is far higher than the average local wage. Disobedience carries the risk of demotion, political exile and even the dole. No wonder they toe whatever line is given by whoever holds the power of patronage.

It will be tough to encourage a large number of local people to vote for a change in the governance of Newham when all that is on offer is a return to the way things were in 2001. Yes, seeing Sir Robin Wales humiliated might be satisfying, but perhaps it’s worth thinking a little more ambitiously?

Personally, I think a 'Bring Back Democracy' campaign needs to argue not only for a referendum on the Mayor and Cabinet system but for:

• an end to full-time councillor positions and to automatic allowances, with elected representatives paid only for time off work (possibly as compensation to their employer, if they are working, to encourage companies to support the principle of local public service).
  
  
• a right of local residents to demand an annual recall vote of their elected representatives if they believe their councillor is useless and can gather enough signatures in support.
  
  
• far greater openness and transparency, including a presumption of automatic publication of everything unless the council can show that disclosure would cause genuine harm.
  
  
• the establishment of Neighbourhood Forums in Newham that are created by local people themselves (perhaps with a minimum requirement for the numbers of streets) but formally recognised by the council and
  
  
• the use of further local referenda to validate any large scale redevelopment plans (such as the proposals for Forest Gate, Canning Town or for Queens Market in Upton Park).

The system that has operated in this borough since 2002 has created a fiefdom in which, as I argued in 2009, “timidity crushes initiative, fear ingrains institutional inertia, culminating in a mixture of incompetence and officiousness”. Pulling it down requires a political earthquake in Newham, not just a change of personality at the top.

Report on Yesterday's Counter Olympic Conference

Yesterday's 'Countering the Olympics' conference at Toynbee Hall certainly didn't lack ambition: nothing less than constructing an alternative narrative to the constant, almost cult-like cheerleading in support of this summer's Games.

It brought together many of the local campaigns that have tried to resist the anti-democratic imposition of the Olympics on London, one that has pressed ahead with little regard for Londoners as anything other than passive spectators and with even less interest in the notion that 'consultation' means listening and acting upon the concerns of local people. There were valuable contributions from campaigners concerned with the issues that have dogged previous Games: the International Olympics Committee's obsession with satisfying the money-making needs of its corporate sponsors, the use of sweatshop labour in manufacturing athletes' kit and the dubious claims that the Games will be 'ethical and green'. Colin Toogood gave an interesting account of the campaign by the Bhopal Medical Appeal against the involvement of Dow as the 'official chemical company of the Olympics' and Anna Minton, author of 'Ground Control', was excellent in highlighting how London 2012 represents just as much of a government 'bailout' as the one gifted to RBS. Despite promises that £738 million would come from the private sector for core Olympic costs, companies have contributed only 2% of the overall figure.

My own contribution was on the security implications of the Games, both on local people and on the right to legitimately protest. There are genuine reasons to fear that east London will resemble a militarised zone in July and August (more so now that soldiers drafted in to support G4S private security will wear their own uniforms) and concern about the excessive use of police powers to stop and question anyone, especially the young. It was good to focus on some positive plans already in place to deal with this: the lead by the Network for Police Monitoring on legal observation of protest and plans by Newham Monitoring Project to offer an Olympics civil liberties helpline, trained Community Legal Observers near to event venues, a basic rights information card and workshops for youth and community groups.

What I couldn't shake, however, was the feeling that 100 people in a hall in Whitechapel, six months before the start of the Games, have an enormous task in providing a critical perspective on the Olympics that will be listened to. It felt as though the yesterday's conference was happening rather late in the day, although it probably would have been impossible until now to both get everyone together and to encourage a disparate group of activists to recognise why the Olympics will have an enormous impact on everything from policing to planning. I also detect a degree of wishful thinking in seeing the experience of previous Olympic cities as a model for how opposition can be mobilised, particularly Vancouver's hosting of the Winter Olympics in 2010. The reality is that there has simply been no history of active anti-Olympic resistance in London since the announcement of the winning bid in 2005 that is anything like the scale that there was in British Columbia.

Nevertheless, there will be media organisations from all over the world in our city this summer and the majority, carrying no official accreditation from the London Organising Committee, will be eager for stories. The strapline that appears at the top of this blog has therefore never been more true: if you don't like what's in the news, then go out and make some of your own. If nothing else, London activists will need their own independent media centre to coordinate and distribute information on the news we create and, considering the Metropolitan police's enthusiasm for clamping down on the squatting of empty buildings, we preferably need one that is secure and cannot easily be raided and closed down.

So does anyone have an empty building or a hall they want to offer over the summer, preferably near Stratford and on a peppercorn rent, for a independent media convergence space?

Anti-Olympics Poster Competition - The Results

Having announced an entirely unofficial and not entirely serious Olympics poster competition back in December, the deadline for publishing submissions has arrived (changed for tomorrow's Countering the Olympics Conference in Whitechapel, which I'm speaking at). I'm pleased to share some of the excellent designs, most provided anonymously, that I've been sent.

As 'lawgraduate' points out in a comment to my original posting, the London Olympic Games (Trading and Advertising) (England) Regulations 2011 do not apply to "advertising activity intended to demonstrate support for or opposition to the views or actions of any person or body of persons" or to "publicise a belief, cause or campaign". These were only published on 1 December 2011, which is why I missed them, but they relate primarily to an attempt to control 'ambush marketing' by companies inside the 'event zone'.

However, several of these designs definitely are "a representation of something so similar to the Olympic symbol" under the Olympic Symbol etc. (Protection) Act 1995 that they could be illegal if someone were to "incorporates it in a flag or banner". It's something of a legal minefield and I'm not a lawyer, but whatever way you look at it, I doubt whether you'll get past G4S security into the Olympic stadium with a t-shirt bearing any of them. Anyway, enjoy:

A comment on the potential overall cost:

From the frankly obscene:

To this more cerebral comment on Olympic brand enclosures:

Thanks to everyone who sent in an entry (if 'teacherdude' wants to send me his original,I'll stick that up here too). I'll have these turned into PDFs shortly.

UPDATE

(Most of) the posters are now ready as PDFs. The set are available here or individually:

Olympigs - A4 | A3
CCTV - A4 | A3
"We Don't Want Your Olympics Here" - A4 | A3
"Go Ahead, Arrest Me!" - A4 | A3
Siege City - A4 | A3
Potential overall cost - A4 | A3
Brand Enclosures - A4 | A3

Newham Seeks To Make Olympic ANPR Surveillance Permanent

There seems to be a fair amount of confusion and rumour about the exact impact of this summer’s Olympics on restrictions of movement, access, parking and surveillance of residents and businesses in Newham.

Due to a lack of clear and accessible information, I’ve therefore tried to gather together whatever detail I can find, although the problem is that the London 2012 “Local access and parking plans” web page is rather sketchy and the council’s “Games time access and parking plans” is little better. However, reports submitted to Newham’s Cabinet meeting in October 2011 and to this Thursday’s meeting shed more light on what we can expect. What they confirm is this:

Across Newham

The existing 18 Residential Parking Zones (RPZs) will be extended into one giant zone to cover the whole of the borough during the Olympics (not just 1.5 miles from venues as originally proposed), with parking restrictions covering every street from 8am to 9pm.

The council will use Automatic Number Plate Recognition (ANPR) surveillance to monitor whether vehicles are owned by residents. It will operate its own enforcement database with information provided by the DVLA on every vehicle registered to addresses in Newham. These vehicles will have an automatic right to park.

Vehicles not registered to an address in Newham will need permission to park and need to apply for inclusion on the database. This includes businesses and service providers needing vehicular access to the area. Residents will be required to register any visitor’s vehicle online or by phone when the visitor arrives and will be offered up to 40 “games time only” all day visitor vouchers, at a subsidised cost of £1 per day. Applications are likely to be limited to those residents registered on the electoral roll. Non-resident/business visitors and commuters will be prohibited from parking in the borough during the Games.

LOCOG-provided ANPR vehicles will provide “real time” information on cars and vans that are not on the database and Newham has contracted Mouchel Ltd to enforce parking restrictions, including vehicle removal (it’s a timely contact for the company, who in December announced annual losses of £65m). Mouchel will employ a team of 18 mobile Civil Enforcement Officers (on mopeds) and 33 Parking Marshals. Enforcement is likely to be stringent and there are plans for a back-up system if the technology fails.

Newham is lobbying to increase the penalty charge to £200 on the entire borough’s roads, bring it in line with the charge for the Olympic Route Network (see below).

This is the alarming legacy issue: the council papers for Thursday’s Cabinet [PDF] say that LOCOG has indicated that after the Olympics are over, “they would be willing to negotiate with Newham regarding the sale of their ANPR vehicles”. Moreover, whilst the DVLA have said that supplying vehicle registration for the Games is a one-off, “Newham and other London Authorities will continue to lobby to have direct access to the DVLA data base to assist with improved efficiencies in administering parking permits to Newham residents and businesses”. The report adds:

Notwithstanding direct access to the DVLA data base it is the intention of Newham to roll out its own virtual permit system as a way of reducing administration costs and providing a more accessible service to all residents and businesses. ANPR would be used to automatically recognise vehicles parked without a valid permit which in turn will improve parking enforcement and enable Newham to have a much more proactive enforcement regime with regards to identifying persistent evaders.

Olympic surveillance using ANPR is to become a permanent feature, in other words.

The Olympic Route Network

In Newham, the Olympic Route Network (ORN) and Paralympic Route Network (PRN) will primarily affect residents in Stratford, Canning Town and Custom House. The roads affected are:

• Lea Interchange to Bow Roundabout via Stratford. This includes Great Eastern Road, The Grove, Stratford Broadway, Angel Lane and Leyton Road.
• A12 from Leytonstone to Redbridge Roundabout (Eastern Avenue)
• A12 from Leytonstone to Bromley-by-Bow
• Silvertown Way to ExCeL

It will mean changes to traffic signal timings, restricted turns, side road closures to general traffic, bus diversions and the suspension of parking, waiting bays and some pedestrian crossings. In addition, around a third (35 miles of the ORN in London) of the ORN/PRN will include temporary Games Lanes that are only accessible to the 4000 BMW cars for VIPs and a fleet of 1500 coaches for athletes, games officials and the media. Enforcement will operate between 6am and midnight, seven days a week from 25 July to 14 August for the Olympics and from 27 August to 11 September for the Paralympics. The fixed penalty charge will be £200.

Not all the details of local restrictions or the ORN/PRN arrangements have been finalised. I’ll write more when I hear about it – and if anyone has any extra information they’d like to share, please let me know.

In Memory of NMP Supporter Rhona Badham

Sadly, pressure of work mean I was unable to attend the funeral in Brentwood today of Newham Monitoring Project supporter Rhona Badham, nor the wake held at the George pub in Wanstead this evening.

Rhona (on the left in the picture, appropriately) was a local activist and campaigner, one of those sometimes-maligned and always overworked individuals that are essential for helping in some small way to glue their community together. I knew her as a regular volunteer for NMP's Emergency Service in the early 1990s, someone who was always willing to step in if we were short of someone to cover the telephone helpline, as well as someone who I saw on numerous anti-racist and anti-war demonstrations. Rhona was also a trade unionist, a socialist and a peace campaigner who was very active in Labour CND and in Newham's voluntary sector too: running the Citizens Advice Bureau at Lawrence Hall in Plaistow during the 1970s and serving as a director of the Parents' Centre (from which Newham Bookshop was founded).

The history of resistance to racist violence in Newham is a proud one. That resistance was always made possible by the many individuals who never sought acclaim or political influence from their activism, but who worked hard to offer practical support to communities under attack. Rhona was one of those people and, speaking for everyone at Newham Monitoring Project. I know she deserves to be recognised and remembered for the contribution that she made over many, many years.

Photo: Labour CND

Stratford - A Scrap Metal Paradise

Remember the 'titanium trees' that I mentioned back in June 2010? They're designed to hide the old Stratford shopping centre from the delicate gaze of Olympic visitors and were originally rejected by Newham council’s own design review panel. But now they are nearing completion and unless the 'canopies' that come next can somehow transform them, they really are quite spectacularly ugly:

Another far from stunning steel construction, the 115-metre high ArcelorMittal Orbit observation tower in the Olympic Park, has also come a long way since I last dropped by at the end of July 2011. More photos from a brief visit today can be found here.

Left: July 2011 Right: January 2012

Exhibition Remembers 25th Anniversary Of Wapping Dispute

Yesterday afternoon I stopped by at the Bishopsgate Institute near Spitalfields to visit the exhibition marking the 25th anniversary of the Wapping Dispute, made all the more interesting for having a long chat there with John Bailey, a former print worker and and NGA chapel father at The Sun.

John very kindly suggested that I couldn't possibly be old enough to remember the strike, but it began on 24 January 1986, the year before I started a degree at City of London Polytechnic in Aldgate. Indeed, I still have old copies of flyers and "Don't Buy The Sun" stickers buried in a trunk in my flat, many of which are included in an exhibition that quite deliberately sets out to provide a workers' perspective on the strike. I also remember the staggering police violence against print workers and protesters, which having probably had more impact on me as an 18-year-old than the Miners' Strike a couple of years earlier. Equally, having pitched up in Tower Hamlets in 1987, the legacy of the dispute, its effect on local communities in Wapping and the defeat of the print unions was a prominent part of the political background of my first year at college.

The other legacies of the strike have become clear: removing trade unions from Wapping gave Rupert Murdoch the absolute power to ensure that his journalists did whatever was necessary in the pursuit of greater profit - even when, as we've seen with the phone hacking scandal, the methods used were illegal. It also cemented a cosy and corrupting relationship between News International, the government and the Metropolitan Police that has continued for 25 years, one that only now is the Leveson Inquiry beginning to pick apart.

The exhibition continues at the Bishopsgate Institute until 29th February. It is open Monday to Thursday and Saturday from 10am to 5.30pm and on Friday from 10am to 2pm. This video gives a flavour of what is on display:

London Mayor Rejects Forest Gate Redevelopment Plans

In a letter sent on Wednesday to Newham council, Mayor of London Boris Johnson has rejected the planning application for major regeneration in Forest Gate centred around Earlham Grove, which would have involved 800 new homes and a highly controversial 27 storey tower block.

The letter from the Senior Planning Manager at the Greater London Authority says:

"The Mayor considers that the application does not comply with the London Plan... Having consider the report the Mayor takes a different view on the acceptability of the tall building in this location. He does not consider that this location is suitable for a tall building on this scale."

The decision to reject the application also sets out (in paragraph 141) a number of other concerns, including insufficient information on housing quality, the impact on equalities, community facilities and heritage considerations.

In a statement e-mailed from the Save Forest Gate Campaign, local resident Paul Holloway said:

"This is fantastic news for the community in Forest Gate, which has been overwhelmingly opposed to this development since it first became public knowledge in the summer.

The GLA also criticised the planning application regarding the Retail Strategy, loss of community facilities, the impact on ethnic minorities, lack of affordable, family housing – and the GLA also makes it clear that the housing density is excessive – and that it had been under-stated in the planning application".

Dr Opara-Mottoh, Member of the Methodist Church Council added:

“We are very glad that Boris Johnson has seen sense in rejecting the planning application and we hope that Newham Council will also see sense when they consider the application in February”.

The rejection of the plans does not necessarily mean that the project is dead: the GLA report sets out (in paragraph 142) a number of remedies that property developers Obsidian can consider "that would possibly lead to the application becoming complaint with the London Plan." However, the decision by Boris Johnson's administration to reject another planning application in Newham, one that also centred around a huge tower block, completely killed off efforts by developers St Modwen to redevelop Queens Market in Upton Park.

Obsidian will have a massive task - and potentially an hugely expensive one - if they intend to rescue their deeply flawed proposals. As Dr Opara-Mottoh says, it will be interesting to see what Newham council decides to do next.

New Monitoring Role For Wanstead Flats Campaign

Rather like the very first public meeting on plans to place an Olympics police operations base on Wanstead Flats, back in July 2010, I had no idea how many people would turn up at Durning Hall in Forest Gate last night to discuss what residents wanted to do next. After the disappointment of December's court decision, would people vote with their feet or was there still a popular commitment to defend the Flats?

Attendance by around forty people yesterday, almost half of them teenagers, was therefore very welcome. The 90-minute debate ranged from concerns about the scale of Olympic security (an issue I'll return to in more detail in a future article) to how decisions were made by the City of London Corporation and Redbridge council. Encouragingly, a number of important decisions were made - most notably that the Save Wanstead Flats campaign will continue. Its new role will focus on monitoring the impact of the Metropolitan Police's base on the local neighbourhood and on people who use Wanstead Flats, as well as the extent of damage to the site after the Olympics are over. The campaign is looking for written assurances from the police that there will be no restrictions on access to the Flats beyond the boundaries of the fenced enclosure and on our ability to enjoy the remainder of the land for its intended recreation and leisure purposes.

The Save Wanstead Flats campaign website will soon include a reporting form so that local people can feed back and report any concerns or complaints. The intention is both to highlight immediate problems and draw together lessons that illustrate why any future attempt to use the Flats for security purposes would be completely inappropriate. Some residents also want to take up issues such as challenging the undemocratic nature of the Legislative and Regulatory Reform Act 2006 and changing the way planning permission on the Flats is solely the responsibility of Redbridge council, in situations that mainly affect people from other boroughs. But the main decision, overwhelmingly supported last night, was to mark the beginning and end of the police occupation of Wanstead Flats with a reminder that the land remains public and belongs to us.

On Sunday 10th June, the campaign is inviting everyone to 'Come Dine With Us On Wanstead Flats' with a community picnic on the planned site of the operations base, similar to the event organised in September 2010. A further gathering, to welcome the Flats back to full open access for all, will be held once the site is restored in late September. More details on this and a further campaign meeting will follow soon - but for the time being, keep 10th June in your diary free.

Is Police Database Abuse Becoming Endemic?

On Twitter, I regularly share (from @copwatcher) news stories about policing in Britain that interest me. An item today on the Daily Mail website, about eight Essex police officers losing their jobs after illegally accessing confidential police databases, made me realise that lately I’ve been seeing similar stories appear again and again.

Looking back over my Twitter timeline, I have noticed that from November 2011, there have been six reports in only three months that involve abuse of personal data by serving officers. As well as today’s story, these include:

• A Merseyside Police officer who was dismissed this month for making 170 unauthorised checks on women over a three-year period.
  
  
• A Bedfordshire Police officer jailed for 15 months after gave information obtained from a police computer to her boyfriend, who passed it on to a friend facing arrest.
  
  
• A Derbyshire Police officer prosecuted for misusing information from a police database to target vulnerable women for sex.
  
  
• Two Lincolnshire Police community support officers forced to resign for unspecified misuse of police computers.
  
  
• Another Merseyside Police officer, a Detective Chief Inspector, charged with six counts of the unauthorised accessing of personal data.

In addition, a news report in November on breaches of the Data Protection Act in Norfolk and Suffolk since 2008 identified 22 incidents within Norfolk Police, a number that involved the dismissal of police officers or community support officers.

Today’s report about Essex Police reveals that it took a whistle-blower, rather than strict rules and policies usually defended by police press officers, to highlight ‘routine abuses’ of IT systems. Although browsing back through my Twitter timeline involves a far from vigorous methodology, the number of stories from around the country does point to the possibility that this kind of routine police misuse of personal data may be far greater than reported, perhaps even commonplace.

If this is the case and if even a small proportion of these abuses of power are for financial gain (the Mail on Sunday alleges Essex officers had routinely attempted to access the private details of celebrities), then this would represent a significant level of police corruption and the kind of unhealthy relationships with the media that go way beyond the ‘drinking and flirting’ focused on by the recent report by Elizabeth Filkin. Perhaps the Levenson Inquiry, currently considering the culture, practices and ethics of the press, should consider asking for details of data protection breaches from all 43 constabularies, along with information on the number of incidents where there were suspicions that personal information was passed on to journalists?

The failure of the surveillance society to maintain control of the data it routinely hoovers up is one of the reasons why its defenders’ claim, that "if you have nothing to hide you have nothing to fear," has always been a myth. Data gathering is a huge operation, the depth and breadth of information held is unprecedented and it can be incredibly difficult to have personal data removed from police databases – and as two teenagers in Bishop Auckland found out in December, after helping a five-year-old girl asleep in the back of a stolen car, far easier to wrongly end up on one.

That’s what makes the prospect of endemic misuse of IT by police officers across the country so alarming.

UPDATES

17 January 2012: A civilian worker at Lancashire Police who was sacked for accessing personal data has told an employment tribunal that police officers and staff regularly checked files for their own benefit.

9 December 2011: the Leicestershire police inspector Tobias Day, who murdered his wife and daughter, had just been sacked for misusing his force's computer systems.