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notes from JK

Is past performance a guide to the future? The Brighton & Hove Green council’s end of term report

I happened to hear a bit of BBC Radio 4’s World at One yesterday. Presenter Martha Kearney was trying to explore the issue of manifesto promises: Does legislating on them help (as per the Conservative’s announcement on taxation yesterday), how often are they broken and do people actually trust the promises made. In service of this topic she interviewed Labour’s Rachel Reeves and the Conservative’s Michael Gove, both senior national parliamentarians for their respective parties. Rachel Reeves spent most of her interview mentioning reams of the promises Labour are making in their 2015 manifesto, while avoiding the questions on her party’s past performance. Meanwhile Michael Gove kept wanting to rehearse in detail his party’s past achievements while avoiding Kearney’s exhortations to expand on the promises they were making for the future.

It seemed a rather odd and unsatisfying set of encounters for a rather key point central to electioneering: the manifesto pledge. Apparently we are seeing huge pledge inflation, more pledges are being made and manifestos are getting fatter than ever. But what value are pledges when future circumstances are likely to change? And can we make any judgements for their future governing based on parties’ past performance? Mr Gove justified his desire to rehearse his party’s record in government on this very basis, that because (in his view) they had delivered on previous promises their future ones could be trusted. Then why legislate your tax pledge was Ms Kearney’s rebuttal.

I don’t think manifesto pledges can be the only part of electioneering, one should also be considering for example the personal values and judgement of future representatives. But past performance, where available, is also a useful metric if not a guarantee of future progress.

So in the spirit of openness I published the Green minority administration’s record last week. On election four years ago we almost immediately began tracking the 195 pledges we’d made in our 2011 manifesto. By our own judgement we are on course to deliver over 85% of those pledges. I think that’s pretty a good result for a minority administration running a council for the first time in our party’s history during a period of unprecedented austerity cuts to our budgets. But I might be biased!

What’s interesting is how few administrations locally or nationally produce such end of term reports, nor do independent bodies provide such analysis either. If we are seeing ever more pledges being made, then that does give ever more opportunity for such progress reporting to be done. Perhaps something for FactCheck, IFS and others to consider for 2020?

You can download the full PDF Brighton & Hove end of term report here.

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My farewell speech to Full Council

Here are my remarks this evening to my last meeting of Brighton & Hove City Council after having been presented the LGiU Judges’ Special Award for Contribution to Local Government by the Mayor.

Dear colleagues

It has been a huge privilege and honour to serve on this council for the past eight years and as your leader for these past three years. I believe I leave the city and our council are in a better condition than it was four years ago.

We don’t always agree, nor should we, it is in debating our differences that we have represented our city as the tough decisions have been made.

But I am in no doubt that you are all here because you want to make a difference. I very much hope that continues with whoever the next 54 councillors of this city will be in May. I also hope that the good grace and humour with which we usually treat each other can continue – our common passion for the city, in putting city before politics is what should unite us.

The next council faces an incredible prospect, bittersweet in many ways. Budget cuts continuing beyond what any modern councillor has experienced. No councillor would have wished to deal with such significant and unrelenting budget pressures. Yet at the same time few could have dreamed that finally devolution could be moving so quickly after such a long wait. Juggling those two changes will I’m sure be challenging, exciting and hugely important for our future.

As your leader I have had the privilege to attend a number of events and conferences in the UK and Europe which have always left me with a clear impression: Brighton is a global city, one which has a fantastically good and strong reputation around the world. Every mayor I have met knows Brighton and most have visited. Treasure this, few cities our size have anything like the reputation or recognition we do.

Also we are all fortunate to have an incredible cadre of officers working for us. True public servants who work so hard with such passion, integrity, creativity and talent. Let’s keep nurturing them and showing our appreciation.

I’m extraordinarily grateful for the privilege you have bestowed on me in being your leader these past few years. I have done my best to serve this city and the council in all that I have done. Any achievements and progress I have made for our collective endeavour has only been possible due to one person who very fortunately is here with us today: My wife Ania who through her endless love, advice and support has made me able to do what I have done. Thank you.

Colleagues, I wish you all the best, thank you once again. Good luck for the future. In me you will have a lifelong champion for the great city of Brighton & Hove.

Thank you.

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notes from JK

Some thoughts on 2014

Much has happened in 2014 to put Brighton & Hove on the map. After working with our neighbouring areas – including councils, universities and businesses – we won ‘City Deal’ status from government, bringing millions of pound of investment to our Greater Brighton region. This includes government funds to upgrade the facilities for technology and digital businesses at New England House.

 

Signing the Greater Brighton City Deal at Wired Sussex's FuseBox in New England House
Signing the Greater Brighton City Deal at Wired Sussex’s FuseBox in New England House

 

We’ve worked very closely with the Coast 2 Capital Local Enterprise Partnership and Wired Sussex to win a number of big investments from government and Europe. Particularly close to my heart was winning a Digital Catapult Centre for Brighton.

In the summer we were also named the third best city in the country for small and medium sized businesses to grow, and we had record visitor numbers of 10m people coming to the city. We hope to keep growing that number having started work on building the iconic i360 observation tower and begun the process of building a new world-class conference centre as part of the ‘Brighton Waterfront’ project.

Digging the first sod for the i360. Once we got out of the way they opened up a vast hole below for moving a sewer tunnel and laying foundations.
Digging the first sod for the i360. Once we got out of the way they opened up a vast hole below for moving a sewer tunnel and laying foundations.

 

We won the City of the Year Award in Europe, for our work on sustainable travel. Figures this year showed that the number of people killed and injured on our city streets had fallen – meaning our work to improve travel safety is paying off.

This year we also opened two new libraries at Woodingdean and Mile Oak, creating new community hubs for residents to access books and the Internet at a time when most other councils are closing them. We also pioneered, with Sussex Police and Rise, drop-in domestic violence surgeries in council customer service centres.

 

Selfie outside one of our new libraries.

 

I started chairing the Health & Wellbeing Board this year, which was significantly reformed to bring together health and council colleagues together on an equal footing for the first time.

2014 has not been without its challenges, but 2015 brings opportunities to address them. Council officers are working on redesigning the refuse and recycling department to give residents an improved service. Work is also due to begin on a permanent travellers’ site, which will help reduce the unauthorised encampments that have disrupted residents and businesses for many years.

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The council is consulting on what is going to be its toughest budget yet, now that our government funding has been cut by some 40%. The debate comes to a head in February when councillors will be agreeing the budget and deciding how best to fund and provide services for residents for the year ahead. After years of dwindling funds for local services, this time mounting government cuts are going to hurt. Combined with the general and local elections in May, it’s certain that 2015 will be an extraordinary year for our city. My best wishes to you all for the New Year.

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notes from JK

Starting the 2015/16 budget process

The Coalition Government’s relentless cuts to councils, led by Secretary of State Eric Pickles, has created an extraordinary situation: Councillors of all parties across the country are united in their disgust at the way in which councils are being treated.

In recent days alone we’ve heard the Conservative Chair of the Local Government Association, Sir Merrick Cockell, warn once again of the devastating effects of the continued austerity measures imposed on councils. Sir Merrick’s successor as LGA Chair, Labour’s David Sparks, has also this week spoken out against the unsustainable funding situation facing council services. Meanwhile similar warning’s are being issued by the Association of Directors of Adult Social Services (ADASS), the Rowntree trusts and many more.

There is a great deal of unity in expressing our deep concern about these national policies. We know we are only halfway through the government’s austerity programme, one which is set to continue regardless of who forms the next government after the general election.

But when it comes to the local decisions of how to best cope with these cuts, the differences start to emerge. Even experienced opposition councillors, who know options are few, can’t help themselves but blame the situation on whoever the incumbent party is. Local voters are too busy leading their lives to notice that across the country council administrations of every political hue are being forced to cut back.

All councils face the same crunch: Huge year on year reductions in government funding whilst service demand grows as the population increases, ages and health needs grow more complex.

In Brighton & Hove we face a £25 million hole in our budget for the next financial year, £18 million of that as a direct result of government cuts and the remainder due to increased pressure for our services.

As a Green minority administration we are committed to protecting the essential public services that our citizens depend on. So we will continue with a ‘value for money’ efficiency programme which has saved tens of millions so far. But that won’t be enough so we are also proposing a 5.9% council tax increase for next year. This is equivalent to £1.48 more per week for the usual comparator of a band D household, though the majority of homes in Brighton & Hove are in bands A to C.

This increase won’t plug the hole completely, but it will give us enough breathing room to retain public services, particularly social services for adults and children. We know that by making such bold proposals there is much greater engagement by residents in the realities of the huge challenges facing council finances. As the debates developed we’ve seen many agree that a greater contribution through council tax is needed to protect the services they value.

Opposition parties will continue to utter empty platitudes about the need to be more efficient and cut down on management, but citizens deserve better than such comments which could never plug our budget gap. We’ve saved tens of millions in efficiencies already, and reduced management spend to its lowest ever. Rather than having a go at each other, residents need their councillors to work together on the huge challenges ahead.

As a Green I’m committed to protecting public services, reducing inequality and improving my city’s wellbeing. These are particularly tough challenges at a time when budgets are being squeezed so hard. Yet I do believe that by backing a 5.9% tax increase we can keep supporting those in need while keeping Brighton & Hove great.

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The crisis in local government funding: Why now is the time for a referendum (Part 2)

This is the second and concluding part on why now is the time for the citizens of Brighton & Hove to be asked whether they will support a 4.75% tax increase to protect council social care services. Part One is here.

Here in Brighton & Hove we have tried to absorb as much of the budget pressures as possible through being more efficient, more flexible and by reducing our footprint – in other words fitting our staff into fewer, more sustainable and efficient offices. This has yielded significant savings, but it won’t be enough for the very significant drops in funding the government plans over the next two years. In July 2013, based on government statements, council officers made their best predictions on how our core funding will drop in the coming years. Here’s their graph:

Main BHCC grant reductions

So in the face of this we do need to find more efficient ways of working – we have no choice. But we also need to raise money. We are looking at new ways of generating income, but those will take some time to pay dividends. More immediately we could increase fees and charges, but this isn’t always desirable, could only go so far and couldn’t possibly raise enough.

So the last option we are left with is council tax. It is an option that Eric Pickles has done his best to undermine and control local decisions with gimmicks like a ‘tax freeze grant’ and by adding an ‘excessive tax threshold’ over which councils are forced to seek permission for the increase through a referendum which can only be held after tax bills have gone out.

However for all its many imperfections, those with the biggest homes do pay more council tax and the poorest do get help paying it through our discount scheme known as ‘Council Tax Reduction’.

First though we need to understand the recent history of council tax in the city. In the last year of the Conservative administration they originally proposed a -1% council tax reduction, but this was amended to a freeze. Labour had originally agreed with us to still refuse the overall budget and revisit some of the other options. Sadly in the end Labour reneged, and supported the freeze. The next year Labour passed an amendment, backed by the Tories, to our first budget reducing a 3.5% council tax rise down to a freeze. It was only the year after that Labour, at the last moment, decided to support a 1.96% council tax rise.

Even setting aside the scale of government cuts in relation to our budget, what do these successive freezes do for the council’s financial position when compared with the pressures of inflation. This graph shows the situation since Greens took administration in 2011:

Total Green Inflation + Council Tax

As you can see, in real terms one of the only sources of income the council has influence over, is hugely behind inflation. It’s so far behind that it barely scrapes the surface of growing demand and government cuts. The imposition of a freeze by Labour and Tories in 2012 alone means that we have £3.7m less in the 2014/15 budget. Indeed we have cumulatively had £8.5m less since 2012 when compared with what our 3.5% proposal would have done. This additional income would have quite probably meant that we could have kept to a 2% rise for 2014/15. Many warned that freezes back then would lead to higher tax increases later, and this is proving to be case. Smaller, regular increases as we proposed was responsible, long-term thinking. Sadly, as Eric Pickles knew, too many were unable to resist the temptations of the short-termist freeze approach.

Let’s put all this history and our 4.75% proposal into perspective. Firstly let’s look at the average inflation and tax rises during our term in office and Labour’s terms:

Average CT + Inflation Labour vs Greens

Clearly Labour’s tax rises were far above inflation, while ours have been significantly below, even if the 4.75% proposal was to be agreed. And this was during the time of plenty. So in real terms council tax bills have been declining in value under Greens.

Now let’s look at the whole picture of tax increases and inflation since the city council was formed:

By party Council Tax + Inflation graph
Click for full sized graph

It’s important to note that the first budget of each administration is actually set by the previous administration just before the elections. So the 2011/12 budget, which we had to implement, was set by Tories in February 2011 just before we became the largest party in May 2011.

Clearly no party represented on the council today was averse to tax increases at one point or another when they were in charge. That continues to be the case: Right now we see Conservative-led councils like Kent advocating 2% increases and Sussex’s Conservative Police & Crime Commissioner just approving a 3.6% increase to her precept. Labour councils are seeking tax increases too and we see Labour council leaders backing our referendum proposal including from Preston and Brent.

What would our proposal cost? Setting aside Police and Fire precepts, which we don’t control, for our 4.75% proposals the majority of households would pay an additional £4.53 or less a month. It would raise £2.75m more than in our draft budget from December 2013 when we planned for a 2% rise. The extra money raised would go exclusively to protecting Home Care, Community Care, the supported employment service ‘Able & Willing’, and third sector grants. The nature of the budget and referendum processes mean it will be cast iron that the additional money raised would have to go to those services.

***

So there we have it. Our population is ageing, adding significant additional pressures on council budgets as we strive to deliver the care our most vulnerable deserve. We have an unprecedented scale of government funding cuts – which councils and political parties across the country agree is setting us up for a huge funding gap. And lastly, we have in recent years locally seen council tax fall well behind inflation meaning that it is not really contributing to relieving our intense funding pressures.

Social care is the council’s biggest area of spending, and is responsible for the most vulnerable in our society. The picture I’ve painted above shows that carrying on, even with the most clever efficiency savings we can possibly deliver, will mean a severe reduction in what care we can offer. I hope that isn’t what we want for our society. But now is the time to have the debate. The referendum process defined by government is imperfect, but it’s all we’ve got right now.

Some in the media want to skip straight to whether people will vote for or against the referendum question. That’s premature, right now we need to debate the reasoning for the referendum as I have set out here. We must discuss the principle of letting the city decide at this critical juncture for the future our public services, otherwise we risk this precious opportunity being rejected out of hand by a few councillors.

I believe it is right and just to ask the citizens of Brighton & Hove, before it is too late, “What future do you want for our elderly, disabled and vulnerable?”

Debate continues on Twitter under #bhbudget #brightondecides and #LetThePeopleDecide – join in!

The Brighton & Hove Independent are hosting a free public debate on the social care referendum on Monday 10th February at 7pm. Free tickets can be booked here.

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The crisis in local government funding: Why now is the time for a referendum (Part 1)

There has been much political analysis in recent days over the ‘real’ reasons why I announced the Green administration’s plans for a social care referendum on a 4.75% council tax increase.

Opposition parties have tried to throw as much sand in the eyes of the public with a colourful array of false and misleading claims. I won’t dignify them further other than to say how unedifying it has been to see political leaders doing everything they can to avoid debating the genuine issues at hand: the huge financial pressures councils are under and the growing uncertainty over how social care can be provided into the future.

Let’s be clear, the reason I’ve proposed a referendum on a 4.75% tax rise for social care is because I think it’s the right thing to do. Let me now explain why in more detail.

In 2011 we made a commitment to publishing early drafts of council budgets to facilitate the consultation and engagement process. Every year so far the final budgets have changed for the better as a result of this process. It’s the right way to do things when we have to decide on the future of important services for our city. We did the same again this year and the feedback from the public, service users, advocacy groups and unions was clear. They were very concerned about the impact of budget cuts on the third sector and social care in particular. They’re not alone – the majority responding to the council’s budget questionnaire wanted funding to be maintained or increased for local services. Yet because of government cuts and growing demand for our services , we will have to spend £23m less for the coming 2014/15 financial year.

Why is social care under particular pressure? Well the number of people who need social care is growing. This includes those with physical and learning disabilities as well as the elderly. It’s no secret that as we are all living longer, the cost of social care is growing. Here’s a snapshot – looking at centenarians as just one of many examples – of how the ageing population is expected to grow in the coming years:

Growth of centenarians in the UK

 

Let’s bring that into the local context. Here are the ONS’ predictions for our city until 2021 along side the change in council funding from Government in a similar period:

 

Future population & council funding changes
Future population & council funding changes

 

Yes, the graph really does show over 85s increasing in number by 20%  and at the same time our government funding declining by 61%. This is why the cross-party Local Government Association has been doing increasingly detailed work on making clear the huge pressures councils face as austerity continues and pressures on services grows. This graph shows their predictions for unitary councils like Brighton & Hove:

 

LGA unitary funding forecast
LGA unitary council funding forecast

 

The gap between funding available and funding needed for existing services is incredibly stark: This is not for new or extra services – but just to keep things going. In local government circles this has been debated, with increasing angst, for some time. But it’s sadly the case that too little of this reality  has entered public debate.

Some have claimed that this is special pleading by the Greens but that’s simply not true. The Local Government Association has a cross-party consensus on the issue and their chairman, the Conservative Sir Merrick Cockell, has led the charge. Sir Merrick, also the former leader of Kensington & Chelsea Council has said:

“We are being pushed into a position where either things will fail or the system has to change … we can’t cope unless someone takes that big step … to change the way we operate … Vital services are being damaged because councils do not have a seat at the table to negotiate a fair deal for their communities.”

Similarly the Labour leader of Birmingham City Council, Sir Albert Bore has said:

“Birmingham faces a severe financial crisis. Politicians in Westminster are systematically dismantling services that maintain the very fabric of culture and community here.”

“These cuts will mean the end of local government as we know it … but that does not mean the end of local government. We now need to build the new local government that will replace it. We call on the government to make radical changes to the way local services are funded and provided.”

The Independent Mayor of Bristol, George Ferguson, has said:

“…every city in the UK is facing a massive budget challenge… It will not be without pain… No number of negative headlines will change the fundamentals: we [the city council] must balance our books…”

The Conservative leader of Devon County Council has said to local government ministers:

“The impact of [the] spending review has not been accurately portrayed… We cannot make these extra savings without reducing substantially the services we offer to the people of Devon.”

And the Labour Mayor of Liverpool Joe Anderson has said:

“I believe community cohesion is being seriously threatened by the lack of funding to our city and others. I believe that the so-called ‘summer-of-discontent’ will happen again if we do not address this issue.”

So the problems of funding cuts are real, are being expressed loudly by all parties and are already hurting local services across the land.

In part two I will look in more detail at the particular situation we find ourselves in Brighton & Hove and why I believe our proposal is the right way to proceed. UPDATE: Part two has now been published.

Meanwhile debate continues on Twitter under #bhbudget #brightondecides and #LetThePeopleDecide plus comment pieces have been published by Local Government Chronicle editor Emma Maier, The Guardian’s Simon Jenkins and others as well as lots of excellent blog posts.

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Why we want to let the people decide on social care referendum

A version of this article was first published in the Brighton & Hove Independent.

Readers will know that public services have for the last few years seen significant government cuts. Here in Brighton & Hove we have so far been successful in protecting essential services by saving tens of millions of pounds through genuine efficiencies. But darker storm clouds are on the horizon.

Councils are facing what many are calling ‘a cliff edge’ in funding, and as a result huge chunks of services could disappear. Simply put, we can no longer absorb all of the government’s cuts whilst also meeting the increasing demand for our services from a growing yet ageing population.

Nationally councils have seen a 38% reduction in funding compared to Government only 8% trimming of Whitehall departments. And sadly, per head of population, Brighton & Hove has been one of the worst hit councils in the country.

We want to offer you, the residents of our city, a choice: accept the full weight of austerity cuts imposed on Brighton & Hove by Eric Pickles or else cast a vote for a fairer and more compassionate society. Let the coalition cuts take their toll, or agree to pay a little bit extra each month to fund care for older and disabled people in our community and protect funding for the city’s charities.

The increase in council tax we’re asking of residents will not only save services this year, but will improve their security for years to come. If agreed, the money will specifically go towards supporting home care, residential community care, day services, support for those with learning disabilities looking for work – as well as protecting grants to the city’s third sector.

The elderly have worked hard all their lives and deserve our continued support in their old age. And the city’s charities, social enterprises and not-for-profit organisations also provide essential services across all our city’s communities. We know that investment in our third sector benefits the city and residents many times over. Without additional funding, the Coalition’s cuts will seriously impact upon some of the most vulnerable people in our city.

We think it’s right that we trust the residents of Brighton and Hove to decide what they want from local services – particularly given the financial situation is so different to that when they voted in 2011. So we want to hold a citywide referendum in May 2014 on whether we should raise council tax by 4.75% for the coming financial year.

We ask the people of the city to vote in favour; to reject austerity in Brighton and Hove and help us to preserve a more compassionate society, one which cares for older and disabled people, supports social enterprises and protects the not-for-profit sector that is so vital to so many in our community.

The full announcement of the referendum can be viewed here.

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2013 in review

A version of this article was first published in The Argus on Saturday 28th December:

The past year has been a challenging, but good, year for our city. We continue to outpace the national economic recovery with rising employment figures, low levels of shop vacancies and visitor numbers continuing to do well. Our schools, colleges and universities are all growing and outcomes are improving, indeed this year saw record GCSE results against a nationwide downward trend.

2013 saw Brighton & Hove Albion and the city council, win the right to host 2015 Rugby World Cup matches in the Amex stadium. The city’s wonderful Festival and the Fringe both had record years, and our museums have been doing very well. Public art and photography have continued popping up across the city thanks to a diversity of projects. Pride was better than ever this summer, and has plans afoot to do even more next year. The Brighton Marathon also had a bumper year and announced exciting plans for 2014. And we saw a Royal visit to open The Keep, our new public archives in Falmer.

Nevertheless our wonderful retail sector faces challenges as shopping habits change to online and household disposable incomes continue to feel the squeeze. Sadly many have less in their pockets each week, not just in inflation-adjusted ‘real’ terms as economists say, but because of sustained government cuts to welfare. Whilst most agree the welfare system needs reform and simplification, little of that promised change has happened. So far we’ve just seen measures that by 2015 will have taken £15 billion out of support for the poorest. In many cases councils are picking up the pieces. For example the benefit cap costs the council £1m a year to keep families in their homes and prevent homelessness. The government is celebrating the reduced benefits bills, whilst we, the local taxpayers pay the price.

These years were always going to be challenging for local councils. With an ageing population and a baby boom, we have more demand than ever before. We are helping thousands more people each year through our 800 council services. This increase alone is a pressure of £10-15m a year. Yet, we have a government not just failing to recognise and help us with that growing demand – but cutting our funding, making the situation worse. By 2015 councils will have seen a 40% cut in funding just as their services are in greater need than ever.

Unfortunately the austerity consensus between Tories and Labour in Westminster means that this situation will only continue. We have to do the best for the city in the circumstances – so what has been happening?

Many readers will have noticed the major transport improvements completed this year, thanks to external funding from the Department for Transport and others. The Lewes Road and Seven Dials have been transformed, improving safety for all. Brighton & Hove remains one of the ten worst areas in the UK for road safety, so more work is needed. We’ve also been successful in rolling out 20mph limits where residents support it. Thanks to these transport measures we’re seeing walking, cycling and bus use all growing significantly – crucial when we have more and more people living, working and visiting the city.

We’ve taken made major progress on big developments in the city  We’ve moved forward with the University of Brighton on developing Preston Barracks, and announced our plan to sell our seafront headquarters, Kings House. Lots of building has been underway such as the old Co-op on London Road, ‘Block J’ behind Brighton station, Woodingdean’s new library, the Brighton Housing Trust container homes and the Amex stadium expansion. We’ve also completed a major refurbishment of the Withdean Sports Complex and a number of council offices. Part of this involves working more closely with other public sector organisations – for example we now share Hove Town Hall with Sussex Police. Our parks and open spaces have seen lots of work this year too including installing chalky ‘butterfly banks’ and the revamped facilities at The Level .

It’s been a busy year for negotiating with government. After winning money for ultrafast broadband in late 2012, this year has been spent pushing government to let us spend it as they wrangled with suppliers and the EU. This was finally resolved a few weeks ago so 2014 should be an ultrafast year for the city. We’ve also been negotiating with government for a ‘City Deal’ to support the so-called Greater Brighton region. Clearly our residents’ lives don’t stop at municipal borders – so it’s important that we work with our neighbours to make progress together. At the time of writing we are very close to sealing an agreement which will support key developments across the city region to unlock economic development and empower our area.

This year we also completed the long overdue process of ensuring equal pay for all council workers. This should have been done more than a decade ago, but the political and logistical difficulties of doing so meant it was never fully tackled.. I know how difficult and unpleasant the dispute and subsequent strile was for all involved. But the end result is we now have clear and fair pay and allowances for all council workers and we’ve avoided the risk of legal challenges which could have left the council bankrupt.

We’ve also had great success with the living wage campaign. The council was accredited as a living wage employer this year, and a few weeks back the campaign celebrated over 100 local employers providing a living wage or more to all their staff. The campaign is led by the city’s Chamber of Commerce with council support, the only campaign of this type in the UK. Thanks to its work, over a quarter of the living wage employers in the UK are right here in Brighton & Hove – a wonderful milestone.

In April we were recognised as the world’s first One Planet City by sustainability charity BioRegional. This means our plans to reduce our environmental impact have been independently assessed to be credible, but we’ve still go to do the work of implementing them. That work is well underway.

We as a Green Group of councillors published our mid-term report in the Autumn which showed our strong record of delivery since May 2011. Three quarters of our manifesto commitments have been done or are on course to be completed. Straight after that the city hosted the Green Party conference in the city, followed by the Labour Party conference – both great for the local economy.

Looking ahead to 2014, we’ll need to complete the very challenging annual budget process for the 2014/15 financial year and start preparing for the 2015/16 council budget. There are no easy choices left for councils. But I’m committed to doing the best we can for citizens with whatever government leaves us in our spending pot.

In 2014 I hope to be signing the Greater Brighton City Deal with government and seeing developments move quickly after that. Almost immediately we will be working with our Local Enterprise Partnership to negotiate a ‘Growth Deal’ between government and our region. This will be our main source of funding for transport projects in the city in the future, a successful deal is crucial.

Meanwhile we’ll be completing the rollout of communal recycling and pay by phone parking in the city. We also have major work to do on the seafront ,balancing our local economy whilst finding the £100m cost of maintaining the rapidly ageing structures holding up the promenade.

Another absolutely key task is transforming social care and the local health system overall. Almost everyone agrees that council social care and the NHS need to work better together to improve services for our residents and make sure it’s affordable.

Many challenges and opportunities lie ahead in 2014. We will keep supporting those in need, helping local businesses and charities while delivering services. Brighton & Hove moves into 2014 in a strong position, with a creative energy ready to surprise and impress as we continue to attract visitors from far and wide. Merry Christmas and a Happy New Year.

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Speech to Green Party Autumn Conference 2013

I was very fortunate to be given the opportunity to address our party conference in Brighton yesterday. Below is the video and (approximate) text of my speech.

//www.youtube-nocookie.com/embed/Cw_IUhoaObs?rel=0

Thank you. Weren’t Natalie, Caroline and Will’s speeches great yesterday and today? Conference is going fantastically well. It’s an incredible feeling to have it here in my city, in my ward. I’d like to pay tribute to our great party leadership team, all the conference organisers and the local party for all they’ve done in making us feel so welcome. Thank you everybody for all the work you’ve done.

I moved to this city 13 years ago. Single and just out of university I came here to start a digital business, just like so many others have.

I began to learn more about this city that I lived in and worked hard in. I enjoyed the many good things about this unique place but also grew impatient with how many things I knew could be so much better.

I also kept noticing that the strongest, most committed and caring voices on the issues I too cared most deeply about were Green councillors and activists.

And so, inevitably, within a couple of years I had joined the Green party and was knocking on doors each election with the rest of them.

Quite a few things have changed since then. I’m fortunate to have a family now with two beautiful children and my wonderful wife. I’m also far more directly involved in running the city than I was 13 years ago.

The other day I got on the bus and someone said “you’re Kitcat aren’t you?”  “Yes….” I replied. He cheerfully shook my hand, and said “Great to see the council leader taking the bus!”

The difference is not that I’m just recognised on the bus, the key difference is that finally we Greens are in administration. No longer do we have just words to dedicate to the pursuit of our long-held values. Now we can put them into practice.

Yesterday, with my colleagues on the Green administration, and we launched our report on our achievements of our first two years in office. Yes of course, we’re a minority administration and at any time the opposition can and do gang up to outvote us. Yet in spite of that we’ve have delivered huge amounts of our manifesto promises for our city. Three quarters of our promises are done or well on course to be completed.

It’s quite novel that, isn’t it? You stand for election on the basis of a manifesto and then you deliver on the promises. It could catch on, what do you think?!

A few of the highlights for me:

A Living Wage for our lowest paid council workers. We’ve also reduced the gap between top and bottom earners to almost 10 to 1, another manifesto promise.

We’ve protected our local economy from the worst of the recession, it’s outperformed the national average. In July alone we had 1m people visit the city, which shows that we are committed to protecting all the makes Brighton special so that people have their weddings, conferences and more here which is essential to our local economy. And guess what? The majority of those visitors come to the city by public transport.

Yes, we are experiencing biting government cuts — we’re the second worst cut of any unitary in the country — we’ve protected council services and funding for the third sector.

Thanks to the work of colleagues Ian Davey and Pete West huge progress has been made in putting sustainable transport first in this city. The significant benefits for public health, and improved air quality are clear. We have been named the least car-dependent place outside of London.

We have become the world’s first One Planet City, independently accredited by environment charity BioRegional. We are delivering on our promises, we in believe in environmental justice and social justice.

When we came into office we discovered that despite having the most highly educated parents in the region, we had very poor secondary school results. Led by Sue Shanks, Chair of the Children’s Committee, we have brought a new focus to school improvement. This year we have seen record GCSE results whilst the national average has been going down.

And if you have a spare 15 minutes do visit The Level where a £3m investment has transformed a key city centre park into a fantastic green lung and high quality public space for all. There are 30,000 households within 15 minutes walk of this park, go and have a look. It’s truly incredible what we’ve been able to do there, and we’re so proud.

I could go on all afternoon, seeing as there’s about one hundred manifesto achievements we’ve already delivered, but I won’t. Do have a look at the report which is available online and in the hall next door.

I’m so proud of what we’ve achieved together as an administration. All the councillors — every councillor in the Green Group on this council — are delivering on our manifesto their working hard every day, to make our values reality in this city.

We are of course also fortunate in this city to have someone who is, without any doubt, the UK’s most impressive and principled MP – Caroline Lucas. I’d like to personally acknowledge the incredible job she does representing the people of Brighton Pavilion and the Green Party in Westminster. Thank you Caroline.

I also can’t wait to see what Jenny Jones is going to do in the House of Lords, I think it’s going to be incredible as well. Congratulations Jenny.

As Caroline said in her speech yesterday, this year in Brighton & Hove has been tough. It’s not an easy time to be in local government. It seems to me that Councils are the coalition government’s whipping boy. Despite being found at the start of this Parliament to be the most efficient part of government, by far, councils are bearing the brunt of the cuts. One average local government, local councils that affect all of your areas, have seen the budgets reduced by 28%. What have Whitehall done? They’ve only trimmed theirs by 8%.

Those cuts harm our local communities. We have to fight against them. We must keep making the case they aren’t necessary, and that austerity does not work.

But we also must keep campaigning for devolution to independent local government. If we don’t fight for local power for local councils for our local people, then our communities will always be at the whim governments. We have to keep making the case for what we believe in, which is true localism and true decentralisation for our councils.

But until then, until that time when we control all levels of government at the same time (!), we do have a duty to do the best for our areas. It is so much easier to criticise from the sidelines than to govern. But in spite of the bad times, we cannot abandon those who put their faith in us to fight for what we believe to be right. We need to make the most of whatever resources we have to protect those in the greatest need. And we will.

Of course this year we have had another challenge which I feel we really must talk about.

When we took administration we found that successive Labour and Tory administrations had let unequal allowances for council workers fester for 15 years. They had repeatedly tried to push their dirty secret under the carpet for the next administration to trip up on.

We couldn’t let this go on. So we set upon the huge task of finally resolving the mass of historical arrangements which were leaving men and women unequally compensated for similar types of work.

Everyone knew this had to happen but only us, the Greens, had the moral fibre and courage to follow through on delivering fairer allowances for all council workers.

Yes it was rough on the way, as it inevitably would be. But I’m delighted to say that come this 1st October we will have introduced a new simple and fair set of allowances for all our staff which meets our moral and legal obligations. As a result of this many workers, especially women, will be seeing increased take-home pay as a result of this. That’s the Green values.

Changing this country to the clean, green, fair future we all so urgently want to see will not be easy. That was just one microcosm of the challenges we face ahead.

The enemies of change, the opponents of fairness, the self-interested, the oil barons, the oligarchs, they will all fight us every step of the way. I say to you, as a party we must steel ourselves to this challenge. We know time is short and the stakes are incredibly high.

And yes, being tested in government is tough. But this is only the start of what we need to do to bring our vision to reality.

We need to find the courage to retain our unique Green traditions of co-operating and collaborating whilst being stronger and more united in the face of the powerful opposition our values inevitably arouse.

As a smaller, newer party the odds often seem stacked against us. But we keep breaking through — in Europe, in councils across the country and in Westminster. And I know that together we can do it again in Europe next year, and beyond.

Never has our message of a sustainable, balanced and fair future been more urgent and important than now. We must really keep working together to win arguments, win elections, to win power and deliver real change.

The better Brighton & Hove we’re building here today is just the beginning.

Together we can do it.

Thank you.

Categories
notes from JK

Modernising the council and responding to Tory opportunism

During our term of office the Green administration has been working hard to keep lowering the council’s costs and reducing our carbon footprint. A major part of this work has been focussed on the buildings we use.

Brighton & Hove City Council was formed from the merger of a number of different councils which themselves had amalgamated others bits of councils further back in history. So it’s no surprise that there was quite a spread of properties, of varying quality and value, in us. As the government continues to cut council funding our staff numbers are declining through voluntary severance and recruitment freeze. This and technology allow us to dramatically reduce the number of buildings we need to provide council services.

This programme of rationalising buildings is called ‘workstyles’ and began under the previous Conservative administration. Greens have accelerated this work, linked in more IT and service modernisation plus greater ambitions for sustainability.

The final phase, number three, is the biggest and most important. It covers a very significant number of staff and some of our largest, most high profile, offices in a programme that will take 3-4 years to complete. As we are a no overall control council and this work will extend into the next 4 year term, all party leaders have been briefed on the plans. This started in earnest just over a year ago leading to a decision at Policy & Resources Committee in October 2012 which set the principles for this phase. The key principle being that the entirety of our Kings House offices would be sold to fund either moving entirely into Hove Town Hall or into part of Hove Town Hall plus another unidentified building. Either way the decision was clear that savings (in cash and carbon emissions) could only be made with the investment of the capital that selling Kings House would provide. This was agreed with the support of the Conservative councillors on that committee.

The very significant work that decision required has now been done. The clear recommendation from all the analysis is to move remaining staff entirely into Hove Town Hall. As this programme is key to saving the council money, enabling major service redesigns and essential IT investment, we didn’t want to delay. So with cross-party agreement I called a special meeting of the Policy & Resources Committee for this month specifically so that we could crack on with the Workstyles phase 3 programme (otherwise there wouldn’t have been a scheduled meeting until mid-October).

Last Monday the party leaders met for our monthly Leaders’ Group meeting and we discussed Workstyles. There was no suggestion of any concern about the report, just some questions about some of the planning that would need to happen whilst building works were underway and what the refurbished Hove council chamber might be like.

So it was with considerable disappointment that on Wednesday I learnt of a Conservative amendment to the plans through Brighton and Hove News — the next day the Tory leader Geoffrey Theobald sent me the full text of the amendment which aims to tear up the workstyles programme by putting a school on the rear half of the Kings House site.

It somewhat renders the year of briefings and discussions pointless if a party is going to then opportunistically seek to amend at the last moment via press release. Even more so when the Conservatives voted for the principle of selling all of Kings House off less than a year ago!

Workstyles is essential to the council’s financial future as well as its ability to meet the challenges of changing demand. You’d think Tories, who started it, might understand that! Instead they want to offer up the most valuable part of Kings House to a free school who I understand they have already lined up a sponsor for. If their plan went ahead it would totally shatter the financial savings and it would eliminate the opportunity for a significant amount of much needed affordable housing to be built on the site. Furthermore, because of the nature of the Workstyles programme’s need for works to happen elsewhere first, the site couldn’t open as a school before 2017 at the earliest.

Having had discussions at the end of last week I’m pleased that the Labour group leader Warren Morgan has confirmed that he, like the Greens, will oppose the Conservative approach thus allowing this important project to move forward unimpeded.

Yes there is currently pressure on school places in the West of our city. But lots of work is underway with school expansions and already approved Free Schools getting going. A last-minute Tory attempt to make an essential and very long-term programme about schools is deeply opportunistic. It also undermines the whole point of repeated cross-party briefing to find consensus in our times as a no overall control council.

As Council Leader I will keep working hard to find open and consensual ways of working cross-party so that we can put the needs of our city first, and politics second.