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| One creative alternative to Christmas lights |
I thought hard about adding a question mark to
this entry’s heading. As the festive season gets into full swing, hundreds of
Brent families remain officially homeless, while the sharp increase in possession claims continues throughout the
Borough. The 92 luxury-flat gated community in Willesden Green is
swiftly and mercilessly occupying our public space and skyline (no sign of the
new Library last time I looked), and more -largely unaffordable- high-rise
developments are in the pipeline at the
Queensbury pub site, the Electric House building, and now the old Willesden Green police station. One of
our popular local schools, Gladstone Park Primary is due to be privatised in
April. And on top of that, we don’t even get High Street Christmas lights or
decorations this year or the next. Hardly reasons to be cheerful.
Yet looking ahead into the new year, it turns
out there are some glimmers of hope. People in Willesden Green and neighbouring
wards have been mobilising to reverse the misery and pain designed by the
ConDem coalition and delivered by our Labour-controlled Council. Brent Housing Action has established itself in a
short time as the local campaign
fighting racism, social cleansing and the victimisation of the most vulnerable
residents in both the private and social housing sector of our Borough. The
Save the Queensbury Campaign has finally
–third time lucky – got Brent to recognise our community pub as an Asset of
Community Value (that now makes two in the whole of the Borough). This status
should count as a material consideration in the Council’s decision on planning
permission, and residents’ objections
to Fairview’s proposed scheme are piling up on the Planning application
website.
Separately, a working group issuing from the Willesden Green Town Team has recently been established to prepare a
Neighbourhood Development Plan
which, if supported by widespread participation, could offer residents some
real power in designing our area’s built environment. Even in Gladstone Park Primary there seems
to be some positive movement: six months after the Parent Action Group
suggested ways to keep the school under
local authority control, it seems Brent has finally listened – as of January
the school will share an Executive Head with an outstanding Camden school,
effectively forging a ‘soft’ federation across two local authorities.
None of this, of course, is to say these
various campaigns are on a path to victory. There are all kinds of powerful
obstacles in the way of making Willesden Green more democratic; in keeping our
neighbourhood socially mixed, protecting and extending our public spaces and
services, and defending the area from
colonisation by developers. Some of these obstacles come in the shape of dismal representation from our local
Councillors and the three mainstream parties. But we have an opportunity to
change that at the local Council elections on 22 May 2014. Willesden Green
residents will each get to vote for three candidates next year – with my own
independent grassroots candidacy seeking to give electoral voice to these
various local campaigns there will at least be a real alternative at the ballot
box. However small, and in these times,
that’s hopefully one reason to be cheerful.
If you wish to participate in building this
alternative, there is a Make Willesden Green policy afternoon scheduled for
Saturday 11 January 2014. Email me or sign up to our list for more
details.
