Westminster Tories bring in a bylaw making it an offence to “give out food for free”!

From Daily Mirror
Westminster Tories have ­revealed their true colours by  banning charities from running soup kitchens for the ­homeless.Conservative Westminster council in Central London also wants to make it an  offence to sleep rough – while slashing £5million of funding to hostels. Astonishingly, town hall chiefs claimed soup kitchens only “encourage” people  to sleep on the streets.

Westminster council, one of the richest in the land, wants to bring in a  bylaw making it an offence to “give out food for free”, punishable by fines. The  twisted move blows apart David Cameron’s Big Society boast that an army of ­volunteers will flock to help those worse off.

And it sparked a storm of ­criticism. Reverend Alison Tomlin of the  Methodist church in ­Westminster said: “The proposals are nothing short of  disgusting. This bylaw punishes people solely for their misfortune and belongs  in a ­Victorian statute book, not the 21st century.”

Labour’s London mayoral ­candidate Ken Livingstone added: “Only the  Conservatives would try to make it illegal to give food to the homeless. “With Tory mayor Boris Johnson cutting affordable housing to a trickle, the  number of people sleeping on the streets is rising and cuts to housing benefit  threaten ­thousands more with eviction and homelessness.”

Councillor Paul Dimoldenberg, leader of the Labour Group, said: “Nothing  illustrates the cold-hearted and callous approach of the Conservatives than this  attempt to criminalise those offering help to ­homeless people. “I thought this was what the Big Society was supposed to be all about,  generous-hearted people giving their time to those less fortunate, at no cost to  the public purse. This is a nasty, mean move from a nasty, mean party.”

A consultation paper says rough sleeping and soup runs would be banned in the  Westminster Cathedral Piazza and surrounding area. Labour said the cruel move  comes as the council ­withdraws funding for three hostels in the borough and  housing trust.

Westminster’s Daniel Astaire provoked fury by declaring  free food “keeps people on the street longer”. He added: “Soup runs have no  place in the 21st century. It is undignified that people are being fed on the  streets. They actually encourage people to sleep rough with all the dangers that  entails. Our priority is to get people off the streets altogether. We have a  range of services that can help do that.”

Save Our Schools – Academies Are Asset Stripping Our Schools

Mumsnet.com, May, 2013
Before the election councils in England held the title deeds to schools and land valued at over £2.5bn. But most people don’t know the very fine print of the academies bill and what it means. 

1. The title deeds of the school and the land are transferred to a private company when the school becomes an academy.

2. Michael Gove borrows £25,000 to pay the legal fees for the private companies to ensure the title deeds are transferred from the council (us taxpayers who paid to build the schools) – to these private companies).

So far £1billion of title deeds for schools has been transferred from taxpayers – with Michael Gove increasing the deficit by £481,750,000 – just for legal fees to transfer ownership of the schools from councils to private companies.

So who has the title deeds now:
Tory party member Philip Harris has his hands on £millions worth of title deeds. Philip Harris made donations to David Cameron as leader of the Conservative Party. He is considered to be one of his personal friends.

Stanley Fink, another friend of Cameron has donated £2.62m to the Conservative Party. David Cameron made Fink a Lord as soon as he came to power, and has since made him Tory Party Treasurer and handed his company £millions title deeds for schools.

And today David Cameron has told us, as well as changing the law to transfer state assets to Tory Party members (and I thought only China did that) – now he is changing the laws to allow them to start selling the Land.

Just so you know – Stanley Fink – his company states in their accounts – any extra money – his company has a policy to transfer the funds to the Cayman Islands – via stockbrokers that Stanley Fink just happens to be on the board of.

Now if I remember correctly the directors of southern cross did the same thing with care homes – selling them off – the money disappears offshore, the company goes bust and pensioners are left high and dry (with taxpayers expected to step in).

Well Cameron has just announced Tory Party members who have their hands on the title deeds for our schools and school land can start doing the same thing. And just to be clear – Stanley Fink’s company accounts for the schools also state – if Stanley Fink’s company controlling the schools, the school budgets and the title deeds goes bust – Stanley Fink (Tory Party treasurer on the Times rich list) only has to pay £10.

Academies are not about education, they are about asset stripping, and parents and children will find (just like the pensioners who were left without facilities due to the directors of Southern Cross) private companies selling off the assets and disappearing in to the sunset.

Do Michael Gove and David Cameron shout from the rooftops that they are spending £25,000 per school to cover legal fees to transfer the title deeds to Tory Party members – no I wonder why not. – Could it be they don’t want parents to know the real intentions of the academies bill? It’s not about education, it’s about asset stripping by Tory Party members – thanks to David Cameron, Michael Gove, every Tory MP and every Liberal MP.

These are your schools – they do not belong to the Tory Party (well they do now). Ask Michael Gove if your council gets the money when they sell off school land. Ask Stanley Fink (ARK SCHOOLS) – will this Tory Party treasurer be selling playing fields and as his accounts state, the money be transferred to the Cayman Islands (with his stockbrokers taking a cut along the way). Serious questions – £1bn worth of assets stripped – £half billion in legal fees to pay for it (which we the taxpayers must pay back as Gove had to borrow the money).

A study of ARK accounts for the 8 schools they controlled in 2010 showed Stanley Fink and the other directors of Ark Schools under spent the education budget by 7%. The money that Stanley Fink was given to educate children which he chose not to spend, went to the Cayman Islands via his stockbrokers – to the Ark Cayman Island Fund. In its 2010 accounts Ark reported an operational surplus of £1.8 million, and in 2009 it was £3.6 million.

We paid for our schools and paid for the land. Stanley Fink did not pay 1 penny for any of the schools he holds the title deeds for. Stanley Fink did not pay 1 penny for the playing fields he is now selling. Just because Cameron and Gove changed the law does not make it legal or right. If Parents don’t stand up now and demand these schools are transferred back to councils, like Southern Cross, there will have no schools and no land.

And who is Stanley Fink selling the land to and how much for? Where does the money go? Schools are not assets for stripping – schools are there to educate. But David Cameron, Philip Harris and Stanley Fink all believe it’s not education – its assets for selling.

Save our schools – save our school land – demand the title deeds back into the safe hands of councils – after all they ran schools for years without selling the land, and the title deeds were kept in trust for you. And councils have never transferred education funds to the Cayman Islands via Stockbrokers they own, which is exactly why only democratically elected; accountable councillors can be trusted with the title deeds for our schools.

August Riots: The Voice Of Anti-Capitalism in Guildford (The VOAG) Salutes the youth!

August Riots: The VOAG Salutes the youth!

For five nights running,working class youth have been on the streets fighting the police in running battles. The uprising spread from Tottenham to Hackney, then Lewisham, Peckham, Croydon, Clapham and on to Birmingham, Manchester, Liverpool, Nottingham and Bristol – as well as many other towns and cities throughout the country.

The Voice Of Anti-Capitalism in Guildford stands foursquare with the heroic youth and workers who have taken to the streets.

The uprisings are an expression of rage at racist police killings, daily police harassment, and underlying it the surge in youth unemployment (25% across London, rising to 80% for black youths in Brixton) and savage cuts in benefits and local services, including cuts in youth services of up to 75% in many places.

The shooting of Mark Duggan and the contempt the Tottenham police showed for his family and the peaceful protest on Saturday were just the spark that lit the fuse. On the 30th anniversary of the Brixton Riots of 1981 it was not forgotten by people on the streets and across Tottenham that this most deprived borough was also the scene of the most intensive uprising against the police in the ’80s – the Broadwater Farm uprising of 1985.

Entirely absent from the speeches of David Cameron and other political leaders has been any mention of the facts that Mark Duggan was gunned down without having drawn a firearm, that police used dum-dum bullets, designed to cause maximum damage to internal organs, and that police issued lies about the incident to the press in the aftermath to cover their tracks.

Riots And Political Sentencing: Magistrates advised to ‘disregard normal sentencing’. The Voice Of Anti Capitalism In Guildford investigates

The Chair of Camberwell Green Magistrates Court, Novello Noades, claims that her court has been given a government “directive” that anyone involved in the rioting be given a custodial sentence. This follows David Cameron’s speach to The Commonons in which he said: “anyone involved in the riots should expect to go to prison”. However: Sentencing is a matter for the ‘independent’ judiciary under British Law.  

Magistrates are being advised by the courts service to disregard normal sentencing guidelines when dealing with those convicted of offences committed in the context of last week’s riots.

The advice, has resulted in cases that would usually be disposed of in magistrates courts being referred to the crown court for more severe punishment and sentences for offences that would otherwise have attracted a far shorter term.

In Manchester a mother of two, Ursula Nevin, was jailed for five months for receiving a pair of shorts given to her after they had been looted from a city centre store. In Brixton, south London, a 23-year-old student was jailed for six months for stealing £3.50 worth of water bottles from a supermarket.

The Crown Prosecution Service also issued guidance to prosecutors on Monday, effectively calling for juveniles found guilty of riot-related crimes to be named and shamed. Those dealt with in youth courts are normally not identified. The youngest suspects bought before the courts last week in connection with the riots were an 11-year-old girl and a 12-year-old boy.

The sentencing advice from Her Majesty’s Courts and Tribunals Service came to light after the chair of Camberwell Green Magistrates Court, Novello Noades, claimed that the court had been given a government “directive” that anyone involved in the rioting be given a custodial sentence.

HMCTS explained that they had advised magistrates to consider disregarding normal sentencing guidelines. It said: “Magistrates in London are being advised by their legal advisers to consider whether their powers of punishment are sufficient in dealing with some cases arising from the recent disorder- and that thos cases should be referred to Crown Courts.

The HMTCS continued: “Courts can therefore consider the riots as an aggravating factor in any offence, making stealing from looted shops more serious than conventional shoplifting”.

Last week David Cameron told the recalled House of Commons that anyone involved in violent disorder should expect to go to prison. The Ministry of Justice denied that it had asked the HMCTS to issue their advice.

The Judicial Communications Office, which issues statements on behalf of judges, also dismissed suggestions it had been involved. “The senior judiciary has given no directive in relation to sentencing for offences committed during the recent widespread public disorder,” it said.

Magistrates can only sentence offenders to up to six months in prison for a single offence. The chairman of the Magistrates’ Association, John Thornhill, has been pressing the government to raise the maximum sentencing power of magistrates to 12 months. “Many of these cases would have been dealt with more expeditiously and cheaper if we had the 12-month sentencing powers,” Thornhill said. “They would not have needed to be sent to the crown courts.”

In its advice on identifying youths, the CPS said: “We have issued guidance to prosecutors that states they should ask the court to lift the anonymity of a youth defendant when they believe it is required in the public interest that the youth be identified. Legislation permits the court to do so after conviction. These representations will be made on a case-by-case basis.”

Among those appearing before City of Westminster magistrates court on Monday was Wilson Unses Garcia, 42, of Walworth, south London. He was jailed for six months for receiving stolen property: two tennis racquets worth £340 looted from a sports shop in south London. When police searched his property they found the racquets still in wrapping and with price labels on them.

Garcia said he had had the racquets for some time. Police said he later told them: “I knew it was not right the minute they put them into my hand.”

His solicitor told the court that Garcia, who pleaded guilty, had not participated in looting, did not agree with the rioting and had accepted the racquets from a man he knew only from his first name as payment of a £20 debt.

Alicia Wilkinson, 22, was discovered with a vast amount of stolen guitars, televisions and hair braiding equipment when police raided her home in Outram Road, Croydon, at the weekend.

The ConDems pave way for privatisation of public services!

In an article for the Daily Telegraph, David Cameron said that ‘complete change’ was needed in the public sector
 
Almost all public services could be opened up to private companies under plans being put forward by Cameron. Cameron claimed: “complete change” was needed in the public sector to improve standards for users.

The Tories’ plan calls for private companies, voluntary groups and charities to be allowed to bid to provide services as part of the “Big Society project”. It would allow the Government to transform public services without having to legislate repeatedly to allow different providers to get involved.

The changes, contained in a White Paper to be released any day now, could allow non-public providers to run schools, hospitals and council services such as maintaining parks, adult care, special schools and roads maintenance.

Cameron wrote: “We will create a new presumption – that public services should be open to a range of providers. Of course, there are some areas – like the national security services or the judiciary – where this wouldn’t make sense. But everywhere else should be open to real diversity.”

With providers competing with each other, there will be an imperative to drive down price. The savings will come at the cost of workers’ pay and conditions. The drive to reduce costs will inevitably affect the quality of the services, and will precipitate a race to the bottom among competing service providers.

Writing in the Telegraph, Cameron said: “Opening up public services to private sector providers was an important part of the “Big Society” agenda”. “I would argue that our plans to devolve power from Whitehall, and to modernise public services, are more significant aspects of our Big Society agenda than the work we’re doing to boost social action.”

Cameron’s version of “devolving power from Whitehall” is to give the power to the bankers and capitalists, those who caused the economic crisis. And where he writes “modernise” read privatise for the profits of a few. Speaking of the White Paper Cameron said: “It will put in place principles that will signal the decisive end of the current model of public services”.

“And it is a vital part of our mission to dismantle Big Government and build the Big Society in its place.” He said. “The grip of state control will be released and power will be placed in people’s hands. Professionals will see their discretion restored. There will be more freedom, more choice and more local control.”

But Cameron’s plan is to take public services out of the hands of the people, and put them in the hands of private global businesses, which are unaccountable. For the vast majority of people there will be less choice – and often no service at all, as the profitable services are cherry picked by big business, leaving less profitable contracts to fall by the way-side. 

Demonstrate to save public services and the NHS
Join the TUC demonstration on March on 26th. Coaches, subsidised by Unison are leaving Guildford, Woking, Staines and Redhill. Only £2.00 Rtn.
Buy a ticket at www.saveourservic.es using a secure paypal -OR-  Email:guildfordagainstfeesandcuts@yahoo.co.uk