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The Haslemere Community Land Trust to Meet Haslemere TC

This evening, the Haslemere CLT will be addressing a special meeting of the Haslemere town councillors, on their plans.  Their website proclaims that

The Haslemere Community Land Trust is new
It is “not-for-profit”
It works to create affordable housing
It is run BY the community
It is run FOR the community
It works IN the community

I have been interested in the trust since I first read about it. In Haslemere, we are fortunate to live in an extremely desirable location, rich in history and natural beauty, but also in comfortable commuting distance to London – but that very desirability means that property prices are high, and so not always affordable for young people who have grown up here.

Our local Liberal Democrat team are committed to the importance of securing affordable housing – but that means genuinely affordable, particularly social rented housing, rather the legal governent definition, which simply meas a little less expensive than others in the neighbourhood. so not necessarily affordable at all, for those on average or low incomes. Formal housing studies agree: the “West Surrey Strategic Housing Assessment” study states the primary need is in the affordable/social market sector, especially for smaller homes suitable for young couples starting out, and for older people wanting to downsize. These are not the housing types that private developers are likely to prioritise: they are generally more likely to be more interested in larger, more expensive family homes.

My concerns are in general alignment with the aims of the Haslemere Community Land Trust.  The challenge will be to find ways to realise these aims. I look forward to this evening’s discussion, and will report back later.

 

Read more, from the Haslemere Community Land Trust:

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Our LibDem Councillors: Promises Kept!

It is now not much more than two months since our team of newly elected Liberal Democrat town councillors were inducted, but already we are making a difference – and are keeping promises we made on the campaign trail.

As candidates for the local elections, we promised (among others) to :

● Communicate regularly with residents: We will continue distributing Focus all year round.

We have already distributed one issue of Focus since the election, and are currently preparing the next. We plan to produce one every quarter.

● Listen to your concerns:  We will hold regular Councillors’ surgeries to hear your concerns and assist where we can.

We have held our first surgery at the Haslewey Community Centre. The next two are scheduled for August 3rd (10-12 am, again at Haslewey) and August 10th (3:30 – 5pm, Royal British Legion, Hindhead) .

● Attend Council meetings This should be a basic but the record of several Conservative Councillors leaves much to be desired. We pledge to do better.

It’s early days, but our LD councillors thus far have a strong attendance record, not only for the main council and sub-committee meetings, but also for other civic functions and meetings with community groups.

● Consider the interests of ALL residents. We promise to consider all our residents, reflecting our community’s full diversity.

At the Finance and Governance committee, we proposed amaending the existing equal opportunities policy for staff, to cover the full town, in everything that we do.  The full council has now approved an amended policy that does just that.

● Be ACTIVE campaigners We will be fully involved in campaigns to protect and improve our community, starting with our efforts to be ready, if necessary, to defend the library from cuts.

We will shortly be announcing the next steps in the library campaign. In addition, we worked closely with our Green and Independent partners in the “progressive alliance” that now leads the council, to prepare a motion for the council to declare a climate emergency. While that did not pass in the original wording, council did adopt a revised motion, again prepared by Independent and LibDem councillors, to accept the principle, and set up a working party to produce a revised motion that will be accepted at our next meeting. 

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Haslemere – an “Inclusive Town”

At the meeting of the town council “Finance & Governance” committee last month, one of the documents before us for perusal was our existing “equal opportunities policy”. On inspecting this, I noted that the words contained referred to “staff” – but no more. Our LibDem mayor, Cllr John Robini, suggested that this policy should also apply to councillors, and I responded that it should go even further: it needs to apply to all our residents, in everything that we do.

During the local election campaign, I noted publicly that although Haslemere is widely thought of as a comfortable, middle-class English town, and that is undeniably accurate in general, it certainly does not apply to all our residents. I am well aware from my work delivering medicines for our local pharmacy, that we have many elderly people in our community, some of whom have mobility problems, are lonely, or on limited incomes. We have others too, not only the elderly, who have problems with mobility or have other disabilities. We have young people who have grown up here, but cannot afford the high housing costs. We have a small but visible community of black and minority ethnic groups.  On Hindhead Road there is a significant community at an Islamic study centre, and my own immediate neighbours are a Syrian refugee family.  While campaigning for the local and EU elections, I also noticed a surprising number of Eastern European names on the electoral register. Inevitably, there is also a significant proportion of LGBGT people – just as there are, everywhere.

I do not suppose that any of our existing policies or practices deliberately discriminate against any of these groups, but in practice, it is all too easy to take decisions that benefit people “like us”, and inadvertently do not include others or take account of their unique needs. We need consciously to consider all members of our community in our deliberations. I was therefore pleased when my proposal was eagerly accepted by the Finance and Governance committee. The revised policy, submitted to the full town council for its meeting this week, now includes the statement:

It is the aim of the Council to ensure that no one with whom the Council interacts receives less favourable facilities or treatment (either directly or indirectly) on grounds of age, disability, gender / gender reassignment, marriage / civil partnership, pregnancy / maternity, race, religion or belief, sex, or sexual orientation (the protected characteristics).

This was accepted unanimously, without need for discussion. Haslemere is now stated its clear intention to be a fully inclusive town.

As an openly gay man, it is LGBT inclusion that most directly affects me personally, but it was not this in particular that motivated my proposal. Nevertheless, it is worth noting that after Guildford raised the rainbow flag in June,  I made a passing suggestion on Twitter about possibly doing the same next year. Cllr Odell immediately replied that we are the “proud owners” of such a flag, and our town clerk soon after approached me to discuss this. We now have agreement that Haslemere will hoist the rainbow flag for Surrey Pride day this year, August 10th. No doubt, we will make further arrangements for 2020 and future years.

Rainbow flag, Guildford (image: Eagle News)

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Facing the Climate & Environmental Crisis.

This past week, Haslemere, Godalming and Woking councils followed counterparts across the country, and dealt with motions to declare a climate emergency.  Godalming and Woking passed theirs. Haslemere did not, but accepted the principle, and left the detail to a working group, to be dealt with at our September meeting. Was this obviously disappointing – is there a possible silver lining?

 

Continue reading “Facing the Climate & Environmental Crisis.”