Hackney 143rd Best Council In Country*

The Audit Commission’s annual report on council performances has again rated Hackney as one of the country’s worst – classed as “poor” – and most damningly awards it the lowest possible ratings for its core services and ability to improve. To those of us who’ve suffered at the hands of the council over the years, this comes as no surprise, but what is galling is Mayor Jules Pipe’s attempts to spin his way out of trouble. You can almost hear him whistling New Labour’s anthem “Things Can Only Get Better”.

According to the Evening Standard, Pipe “disputed that the council was the worst in the country. He said the fact that the ratings had only been partially updated since last year had made it impossible for them to convey major advances. “I realise there is a mountain to climb but I’m pleased we are going in the right direction,” he said. ”

While Hackney Council is identified as one of the 10 most improving councils by the Audit Commission, this isn’t really that hard to do. After all, improving on totally incompetent to massively incompetent isn’t that much of a leap. Apparent improvements in education have come at the expense of school closures – directly against the wishes of parents, pupils and staff – and amount to little more than an airbrushing out of the picture of some of the poorest areas of the borough. Meanwhile, leisure services are rightly slated at a time when the massively overbudget Clissold leisure centre is shut for repairs and the much-loved Haggerston Pool is still gathering dust.

Jules Pipe may believe the only way is up – and that may be true – but the slash and burn strategy of this Labour administration is likely to cause more damage to Hackney’s working class majority in the process.

(* out of 150!)

Hackney Council is Worst in Country for Benefits Claims

A report from the Government’s Department of Work and Pensions (as reported in the Hackney Gazette 29th May) shows that Hackney Council is the worst in the country for processing housing benefit claims. The report showed that on average it took the council 142 days to process such a claim.

This comes two years after the council finally sacked the private company ITNet which had caused such misery for so many people. The IWCA was heavily involved in the campaign to get rid of ITNet and ran numerous advice surgeries to help those affected by the delays. We are still getting requests for help from people whose benefits have been delayed and while the situation is better than it was under the benefit bunglers of ITNet, Hackney Council has a duty to improve its service. In a mealy-mouthed response to the Gazette’s report, Cllr Samantha Lloyd claims that things are looking up. Why then is it that neighbouring boroughs with a similar social make-up can expect to get their claims processed so much quicker? And why after sacking ITNet 2 years ago is the Council’s own provision in such a mess?

Councillors Award Themselves Huge Pay Rises As More Services Slashed

Hackney councillors have awarded themselves huge pay rises – in many cases between £20,000 and 35,000 – while more local services have faced cutbacks. A spokesperson for the council stated that the increases were agreed back in November but have been paid since January of this year.

Barrie Hibberd, a member of Hackney Tenants and Residents Convention voiced concern over the huge increases in the Hackney Gazette and we’re sure that many others would agree that it’s scandalous to give more money to councillors who have been decimating our services. Recently there have been cutbacks to council gardeners, Laburnum School and Kingsland School face closure and that’s on top of the massive round of cuts from last year which saw funding to a range of community services reduced and in some cases stopped completely.

Clearly these councillors are more interested in getting their noses in the trough than in helping their constituents.