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| London the most diverse city on the face of the planet. |
I attended Lambeth Town
Hall a few days ago for a "consultation " on the Draft London Safety
Plan that outlined huge cuts to London Fire Service planned by
Mayor of London Boris Johnson.
The event took place in
the main hall and was full illustrating the extreme anxiety felt by Lambeth
residents at the prospect of seeing Clapham Fire Station and other inner London
stations close, in addition to the planned removal of fire engines and cuts to
firefighter numbers.
Lambeth's Unite Community
Branch had mobilised to support the Fire Brigades Union in their efforts to stop
cuts and closures.
The event itself was the
usual GLA fare when it comes to these things, a sort
of "consultative abuse" where
all the major decisions have already been made and the public is expected simply
to turn up and rubber stamp the Mayors proposals.
I refer to this as an abusive process because such sham
consultations actually degrades community and public confidence in democracy.
Communities are routinely asked their opinion by statutory agencies and in the
majority of cases duly ignored.
The whole process of
statutory consultation is a deeply alienating process that reaffirms the
powerlessness of communities to effect change.
The meeting itself began
bizarrely, with a statement read out by the Fire Commissioner Ron Dobson from
London's Fire Emergency Planning Authority opposing the Mayors plans.
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| London Fire Commissioner Ron Dobson. |
Then confusingly, he then
went on to wax lyrical about the Mayors plans subjecting us to a powerpoint PR
exercise, that was intended to convince us, that despite his own Authority’s
objections, we had nothing to worry about.
Dobsons general thrust was
that the incidence or fire is falling and as result of ' better
organisation" Lambeth residents and Londoners will see no loss of service
or increased loss of life as a consequence of the cuts.
We were assaulted with a
blizzard of London average statistics relating to the incidence of fire,
response times and how many times they get called to deal with people stuck in
lifts.
The presentations were
designed to placate and sooth anxieties however they achieved neither.
The Commissioner was
joined on stage by Assembly members Tory Cllr James Cleverly and Lib Dem Cllr
Stephen Knight and Labour Fiona Twycross.
Cleverly’s contribution was
the usual diet of waffle and verbiage delivered in that impenetrable bureaucratise policy
twonk speak that was polite, condescending and irrelevant.
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| James Cleverly Tory AM |
Lib Demmer, Mr Knight
despite him being a member of the Coalition Government articulated his complete
opposition to the cuts, slightly undermined by the savage cuts imposed on
London by his Government.
I was impressed by Labours
stance adopting outright opposition to the cuts taking exactly the right
position in defence of vulnerable communities. Ms Twycross was both effective
and articulate in her presentation. She was supported by the Leader of
Lambeth Council Cllr Lib Peck who pointed out from the floor, the potential
devastating effects of these cuts on Lambeth residents.
Labour is right to oppose
the Mayors plans and this approach should be extended to opposing all such Government
cuts that unfairly target the poor and the vulnerable.
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| Susan Matthew's Lambeth TUC. |
From the floor Susan Matthews
Chair of Lambeth Trades Council slammed the proposals as failing to take
account of Lambeth's unique diversity for which she received warm applause.
Fire fighters lined the back of the room and made several interventions that
exposed the reality of the Mayors cuts, slower response time and fewer fire
fighters would cost lives and all to save all paltry 7p per week.
Jon
Rogers Unison Branch Secretary
and Lambeth SOS pressed the Commissioner about whether the London Fire
Authority and The Mayor had completed an Equality Impact Assessment
(EQIA) as legally required by the Equality Act 2010. This requires the Mayor to duly assess any major proposed
policy changes with regards to its effects on a range of protected groups.
The Commissioner waffled
and tentatively offered to arrange a meeting with those responsible for his EQIA.
He clearly had no clue what was in this assessment.
A poignant contribution
came from the floor summed up the mood of the meeting, "I'd prefer to have
more firefighters sitting idly by in fire stations than more Londoner's in coffins". The top table endured a relentless barrage of criticism for the
audience. The meeting seethed with anger and throughout the course of a
three-hour meeting not one person spoke in favour of the Mayors proposals.
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| August 2011 London burning. |
The notion that there had
been big reduction in the incidence of fires in London was challenged more than
once. I began to wonder if the August 2011 disturbances had inflated the
figures being quoted.
My own small intervention
came toward the end of a meeting where the Chair refused to take a vote from
the floor, this being Lambeth the vote went ahead anyway and was unanimous in
rejecting the cuts to the fire service budgets.
I had followed up Susan
and Jon’s interventions with a statement and a question. You can see the whole
meeting here. My own contribution (part two at around
01:08:21) was that surely everyone knows that the incidence of fire increases
during a period of recession, that deprived neighbourhoods suffer more than most
and that quite unbelievably, the Commissioner had come to one of the most
diverse boroughs in London and not bought any copies of his Equality Impact
Assessment. I also pointed out that Lambeth’s Council’s estates bore many similarities
to the Southwark’s Lakanal
House. The failure to target resources
towards at risk groups, the majority of whom had been black and living in
Council property had resulted in tragedy
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| Larknal House Southwark |
I asked a direct question
of the Commissioner:
"Are there a disproportionate number of fire death in London Black
and ethnic minority community?"
He responded by saying
" I can’t answer. It’s more
complicated than that"
When pressed again and
again, as can be seen on the video, the Commissioner finally responded to the
challenge of failing to bring copies of his EQIA to Lambeth.
Firstly, he said it was a
matter of cost, as if race equalities in London was some sort of bolt on extra and
not part of mainstream provision. Then when asked why he failed to include and
equalities information ion his presentation he went on to blame the London Fire
Authority, saying they had agreed his presentation and had not specifically asked
him to included equalities.
He seemed utterly
oblivious to the fact that London is a city where majority white ethnic Britons
are in the minority
according to the 2011 census. It mattered not a jot to him that Lambeth is one
of the most hyper diverse boroughs in London. This constitutes a serious
and fundamental profession error and further I believe fails to reach the
minimum threshold of meaningful "consultation" required by
legislation.
To consult with the
inhabitants of the most diverse city on the face of the planet and fail to
include detailed information about the how the proposed Draft London Safety Plan
is likely to effect protected groups is a monumental and on this occasion, a
potentially catastrophic failure.
Of course under Boris
Johnson's administration, such breaches are a part of the dominant Tory political
culture that sometimes condescends, pays lip service too, but largely sneers,
undermines and attacks the principles of equality and multiculturalism.
If I were a millionaire I would launch a series of legal challenges in
the courts on this and many other of Mayoral policies that have, in my view
failed miserably to undertake professional EQIA’s.
The woeful degradation on
the edifice of world-class equalities standards established under the
Livingstone Mayoral regime has spread across the GLA like a virus. The best
example of the resurgent level of institutional racism in the GLA is the
Metropolitan Police Service You can more read about that here, here and here, here and here
Back to the lamentable
performance the Fire Commissioner, after I pressed him again for an answer re
disproportionality he eventually denied that there was any
overrepresentation in fire deaths of Black and ethnic minority communities
in London.
I knew this to be untrue
and since the meeting I have trawled the LFEPA web site looking for evidence
that that an adequate EQIA had been done and any information that pointed to
the incidence of fire in deprived and Black communities.
Firstly, I found a report
of the Governance, Performance &
Audit Committee 10th September 2012 and under the section Q1 monitoring of performance indicators in
the London Safety Plan 2012/13 (Prevention, Protection & Response), point
15 I found the following;
"Reaching
London’s diverse communities is a key aspect of the Brigade’s community safety
activity, which is helping to drive down the number of fires and the casualties
that result from fires. Our community safety strategy targets risk
by addressing people’s lifestyle. This approach gives a broader
understanding of the risks different groups face rather than focusing on a
single factor such as a person’s age or ethnicity. However, within
the lifestyle groups which are the target for our home fire safety visits, both
age and ethnicity are factors that are over-represented in these at risk
groups. "
So Commissioner Ron
Dobson not only failed to meet the general equality test, but he mislead the
meeting by denying the disproportionate impact of fire
deaths on Black and
ethnic minority communities in London.
That’s a serious
charge and one that the recording of the meeting bears out. His level of
complacency in addressing a multicultural audience was appalling. His
professional negligence on the issue of equalities was worse.
Having now studied the
EQIA (Appendix 16) I can say it is derisory. There is no serious or effective assessment
of the anticipated impact of these plans on equality groups.
In the report under Operational efficiencies section 3 point
19 the Authority reaches this unbelievable and incredulous conclusion;
“Reducing
the numbers of stations would mean that physical access to the closed stations
is removed. However, each borough is served by a Borough Commander, and local
community and partnership initiatives, particularly those that target people
most at risk will remain in place, either delivered centrally or by area teams.
Removing the station will not affect this important work, and there will be no anticipated impact on
people with protected characteristics. Indeed our prevention and protection
work is focussed on those who are most at risk, many of whom will share
protected characteristics, and this will continue to be our priority.”
This is followed (section 4, point 16) by a classic
piece of Orwellian double speak;
Whilst it
is true that certain lifestyles identified as being at higher risk will also
contain people who share protected characteristics, belonging to a protected
characteristic group in the first place does not place individuals at risk.
Once you have waded through the interminable waffle
about “lifestyle” it is absolutely
clear that the Mayors proposals will negatively and disproportionately effect
Black and ethnic minorities and inner London boroughs.
There is no specific account taken of the fact that
Lambeth has six large Council estates with many high-rise blocks. There is no
account taken of the Lambeth deprivation or any fire risk assessment related to
a long period of recession, no account take of homelessness, overcrowding and
increased incidence of squatting or the increasing use of Calor gas and
Paraffin heaters.
The Authority has abandoned ethnic monitoring ( see
Targeting people at risk) and used instead a complex lifestyle matrix that
targets lifestyles instead of ethnicity or gender, poverty or unemployment.
I defy anybody to understand the matrix or how
priorities are arrived at. The use of this psychobabble management speak is
impenetrable. This leaves ethnic groups in London at a higher risk of fire as a
result of the failure to target resources where the problem is greatest or
target particular communities who suffer disproportionate risk.
The EQIA also asks with whom did you consult for the
most part this is answered by the following statement repeated ad nauseam.
“To be
completed following consultation”.
It can’t be answered by Lambeth’s consultation because the Commissioner failed to
include specific equalities information in our consultation.
There are no general equalities events listed as part
of the consultation programme; there is no specific consultation with London’s
with black communities or any other equalities groups. Where when and with whom
are they intending to consult? Your guess is a good as mine and no doubt a
hastily arranged event will now be organised. Too little too late.
As such I think both the Commissioner and the London
Fire Authority have serious questions to answer. This consultation failed to
meet the test of a modern multicultural city. The proposals cut resources of
Labour inner city authorities where the majority of black and ethnic minority
people live and provides extra resources to Conservative outer London boroughs.
Of course when civil disturbance come round again, as
is almost inevitable, given the economic situation and the resurgent racism of
the Metropolitan Police Service, the effect on inner London will be both
dramatic and tragic.
In August 2011, we saw the Police leaving poor areas
to burn, whilst they were deployed to protect wealthy areas. These fire
proposals consolidate that strategy, moving fire services to protect high value
properties and retail areas. We
are being left to burn.
It’s a scandal.
