The First Green Councillor In The Country - Pete West
Councillor Pete West, Green cabinet member for environment and sustainability, wrote a letter to the Evening Anus this week in which he demolished the thieving Tory bastards’ attack on the new council policy on travellers. As mentioned here last week, they have launched a scare-mongering campaign upon the created premise that this problem is suddenly getting worse. Pete West’s letter highlights the errors upon which the attack is predicated:
- Traveller numbers are this year consistent with previous years.
- The thieving Tory bastards did nothing about the travellers whilst they controlled the council.
- In Westminster Caroline Lucas, the Green MP for Brighton Pavilion, signed a motion on gypsy and traveller evictions which had cross-party support, including from the thieving Tory bastard Peter Bottomley, the MP for Worthing West.
- After only a month of this first Green administration, considerable efforts are being made to find suitable permanent sites for short term stays.
- “Good Neighbour Compacts” are being developed in partnership with Sussex Police and traveller representative groups to address anti-social behaviour and community cohesion. This is an entirely new approach in the City.
Councillors Bill Randall, Amy Kennedy and Ian Davey spoke at a Chamber of Commerce event and were well-received. Thursday 30th June saw the biggest coordinated strikes for many many years. Councillors Phelim Mac Cafferty, Liz Wakefield and Rob Jarrett demonstrated their unequivocal support for the strikers by visiting picket lines at BHASVIC, City College, University of Brighton (the Grand Parade site) and a Job Centre. They also took part in the protest march from The Level to Hove Town Hall. Rob Jarrett also visited council care homes for children with learning disabilities and found the level of care provided very good indeed.
The Leader of Brighton & Hove City Council, Bill Randall, has been involved in the Local Enterprise Partnership, Strategic Housing Partnership and meeting with police representatives. He addressed council staff members at a number of forums and meetings, attended the event after the regiment parade, spoke at the opening of the city sports Take Part festival. Over the last few weeks, Councillor Pete West has gone out on a number of rounds with bin collectors, recycling collectors and street-sweepers to get to know the issues faced by frontline workers.
Without going through all the detail, the Green councillors have
- supported National Breastfeeding Week
- supported the expansion of the ‘Cumulative Impact Area’, regulating the number of alcohol licensed venues in the city area
- supported road safety at City College and working with the Sussex Safer Roads Partnership
- chaired Housing Area Panels, the tenant participation forum for different parts of the city
- worked to resolve issues of parking on pavements in Elm Grove
- met with a local homeless charity and a social enterprise to discuss ways of working together
- been briefed on Overview & Scrutiny, Community Safety, Intelligent Commissioning and Audit work at the council
- held ward surgeries and met with residents to discuss casework
- opposed the introduction of horse-drawn carriages on the seafront
Our local Green MP, Caroline Lucas, asked the Foreign Secretary to support the Freedom Flotilla of boats sailing to Gaza, breaking the siege with deliveries of mail and humanitarian supplies. She also handed in a petition to Downing Street that called on the Prime Minister to cancel the UK’s unilateral plans to build further nuclear weapons as a follow-on for Trident and to provide constructive leadership internationally to ban nuclear weapons and agree a timetable for their total elimination. She spoke at an event to promote solar power, at the Environment Society’s annual reception and obtained national coverage for her work on drugs policy reform in The Observer on 26th June. Caroline Lucas also supported the public servants strike action on 30th June, tabling a so-called Early Day Motion (a procedural device in parliament to create a debate) in support of fair pensions and strike action. Nearly a hundred local teachers wrote to her to explain why they were striking. She spoke at rallies in Brighton on 30th June. She’s been lobbied about plans to restrict internet use for those suspected of illegally downloading files (she has signed an Early Day Motion about this) and about an amendment to the Finance Bill to end legal loan sharking, which she supports. Her mail bag has also been full again with complaints about travellers in the city. She spoke this week at the Compass annual conference and on the Pyramid Stage at Glastonbury! Don’t recall David Lepper or any of the other local MPs working so hard or getting so much attention.