UK LOCAL GOVERNMENT CONTINUES TO OPPRESS COMMUNITY ACTIVISTS!
Mike Lane | 25.07.2002 09:59
Local government councillors and senior council officers on Merseyside and throughout the UK continue to oppress voicefull community activists who speak out against social injustice within their own communities, and still no one from central government’s Social exclusion Unit intervenes against this blatant attack on poor people’s civil rights
The New Deal for Communities project
Over the next ten years over £200m will be spent in an area in Liverpool called Kensington. This area encapsulates 4,200 houses, shops and small businesses. The area is run down and many of the people who live here suffer from the adverse effects of poverty, social exclusion and various forms of depravation. I view this as an ideal opportunity for me to, using the above authors and others opposition ideology to try and bring about social change.
Much is being said by central government about NDC initiatives being community led and the importance of community participation and empowerment, but in reality the regeneration administrators, who have set themselves up in the community, have set into motion a set of dynamics that is geared up to oppress and subjugate the community. They have employed people who are called community outreach workers to go out into the community and practice a form of community participation methodology that has evolved in such a way that it does not empower the community or community activist but domesticates them. As a result of this participation and empowerment methodology hardly any of the community, except for people with a vested interest, such as homeowners and the most easily manipulated, have bothered to get involved. Such is the level of apathy that out of the 14,000 people who live in the community there are only about 60 or 70 people involved, and these people have been divided into many small groups. Of course this situation suits the regeneration administrators hidden agenda, an agenda that included massive demolition of the community and the building of many new houses for sale. These demolitions will result in the expulsion of many poor families from the area, mostly families that live in rented accommodation. Many community activists, who like me, are clued up as to what is happening feel that this is a form of social cleansing. Many of these poor families will be in effect re-ghettoised in other poor run down communities in Liverpool. One of the main reasons for this injustice is: The Liverpool city centre is at this moment in history having £5 billion spent on it to regenerate it, money that was meant to go into 37 poor run down areas in Merseyside, but was hijacked by city centre elitists and property developers. The community that I live in is adjacent to the city centre and the main motorway the M62 (also known as the gateway into Liverpool) runs through the middle of the NDC community. So it is no coincidence that the Kensington area was selected for regeneration. The regeneration administrators have systematically lied to the community in as much as they have tried to make the community believe that the money was given to them because of depravation problems when in reality the community was picked because of it’s strategic position close to the city centre.
The death of the Public forum meeting
There used to be a monthly public forum meeting, which was well attended with over 300 turning up, but the £57,000 per year chief executive and his staff decided to stop it. I believe they did this because the people who attended the meeting where asking too many questions and the administrators did not want the community to unite as one body of people.
Governments Office in Merseyside
The central government body that is supposed to be monitoring the NDC initiative is called Government Office and the civil servant responsible for this task is quite aware of the fact that the regeneration administrators and the new social landlord are blatantly ignoring democratic procedure. Even though central government ministers have instructed civil servants to get involved in the 39 NDC initiatives throughout the UK these same civil servants will do nothing to rectify this blatant abuse of democracy.
The “Housing Proposal” document is disregarded
To get the regeneration funding from central government the regeneration administrators had to consult with the community and put together a document called the “Housing Proposal” document. Even though this document was only proposals it served as a master plan for the regeneration of the community. Outlined within this comprehensive 176-page document were proposals that were put together from a totally inappropriate skewed in favour of homeowner’s community consultation methodology? A methodology that involved the use of a questionnaire that was sent to all 4,200 houses and businesses, although a question mark hangs over the fact as to whether this many houses actually received it. Based on this skewed in favour of home owners questionnaire the Kensington Regeneration administrators put together a document that on careful scrutiny was totally unacceptable and was an antithesis of fair democratic procedure and not in any way a true representation of the wider communities aspirations or expectations.
Undemocratic self-serving element within the NDC community
From the onset of this inititive there was certain undemocratic self-serving forces at work within the Kensington NDC community. When it was realised by the regeneration administrators that the contents outlined within the “Housing Proposal” document were being viewed by the community as a sort of master plan the conniving administrators had to act quickly to change this about, so they decided to cease promoting this document and now act as though it never existed, claiming that the document was only a proposed view that was put together to get the NDC funding from central government. Nothing is ever mentioned about the fact that the material that is contained in this document was the main reason for central government awarding the funding to the community in the first place. Many critical community activists believe that the regeneration administrators have sidelined this document so that the community cannot use it as a master plan that can be criticised and changed.
In effect what the regeneration administrators have done is sidelined the “Housing Proposal” document so as to enable them to impose their “gradualism” agenda onto the community. They wish to impose an environment onto the community that will in reality be an antithesis to the environment that the wider community wants. In other words we are having our environment created and imposed upon us by a hand full of regeneraation administrators and well meaning but blind community activists. I believe that the, now made defunct by the regeneration administrators, “Housing Proposal” document should have been kept as a point of reference. At this present moment the regeneration administrators and the proposed new social landlord are discrediting the “Housing Proposal” document in favour of promoting an agenda which includes and incorporates an ambiguous modusoperandi of gradualism and an evolutionary process that has no concrete master plan for the community to disagree with and change. In other words what they are doing is promoting an ideology of: We don’t know how thing will turn out, everything is only suggestions and proposals, we will have to consult with the Citizens Panels and the Housing Panels as we go along, and so on and so on. But the regeneration administrators and the new social landlord are well aware of what they intend to impose onto the unsuspecting NDC community.
Divide and rule tactics
As has already been mentioned the regeneration administrators with the full support and backing of the new private sector social landlord, (The new private sector social landlord is called Community 7, but they are really under the control of Riverside Housing, and it’s new director was a former member of the Liverpool City Council where he held the position of Group Manager of Regeneration Special Initiatives, further proof that public sector council officers are involved with private sector social landlords) have split the community up into 5 separate entities, each entity having within it’s midst 2 bodies of people called the Citizens Panels and the Housing Panels. Of course these Panels are made of the already mentioned 60 to 70 self serving, extremely moderate and easily manipulated people. This means that in reality only 10 to 20 people turn up at each of these five Panels, (in one of these panels only 6 people attend on a regular basis). It’s a well-known fact that the community participation and empowerment methodology that is and has been consistently used on Merseyside is not conducive with bringing about mass community involvement. The regeneration administrators go to great lengths to cover up this low attendance fact and have devised a rhetoric, which they have passed on to their outreach workers. This rhetoric incorporates within its ideas a form of oppressive indoctrination. A ideology that has evolved to persuade the already oppressed people in poor communities to conform to what is being stealthfully imposed upon them. The most perverse aspect of this situation is that the hand full of Housing Panel resident members are being manipulated into making decisions that support the agenda of the regeneration administrators and the private social landlords and will almost invariably have an adverse effect on the lives and aspiration of the wider community, especially the most vulnerable and socially excluded members, of the NDC community, and these people are in the majority. One can predict with uncanny precision that the people who are attending these Panels, will as time goes by, fall away leaving just a residue of self serving people who have their own selfish agenda. This residue will work hand in glove with the regeneration administrators and the private social landlord, in other words these people will become part of the two latter mentioned bodies. As you can see this undemocratic evolutionary process will, if not challenged emerge in an astonishingly short period of time. This is why the regeneration administrators practice what I have already referred to as deceptive, ambiguous stealth like gradualism. Keeping the community ignorant to what they are doing is tantamount to their agenda.
Ambiguous literature, which always contains the most favourable spin
The regeneration administrators post literature into the community, (they never post this literature at my address, concerned members of the community have to pass it on to me) which contains information that bears hardly any relation to what, is actually going on. Everything that is written in these ambiguous expensive glossy newsletters is full of truths, half-truths and mostly ambiguous dialogue. They print smiling faced pictures of certain well meaning but misinformed members of the community to reinforce this illusion onto the wider community. To try and counteract this behaviour I have put together a newsletter called the “Whistle Blower” and over the last 18 months have posted 22 issues, which amounts to about 80,000 copies. I have designed the newsletter in such a way as to try and enable the community residents to get another view of what is happening, but such is the culture of blind acceptance amongst the people who live in the community it has been an uphill task to try and make them realise that they are being oppressed by the regeneration administrators and a hand full of community residents who, although unaware, are acting as sub-oppressors for the administrators. The level of ambiguous information is truly extraordinary. The regeneration administrators and the private housing association officers have tried by stealth to marginalize me within the community and have to a certain degree succeeded, but I believe and have strong evidence that what I am doing is having a definite effect in as much as I am acting as an internal catalyst for democratic social change, and even though I have been excluded from the initiative by the 60 or 70 people, who the administrators hold up as the community, I have had some influence on the these people and 2 or 3 of the 10 community members who have been undemocratically elected on to the NDC board. Of course my research project is ongoing and I intend to use many democratic methods to see if I can act as an enabler for social change, change that will alter the present oppressive culture that exists within the Kensington NDC community a culture that also exists in other communities throughout the length and breath of the UK.
Mike Lane (Campaigner for social justice)
Over the next ten years over £200m will be spent in an area in Liverpool called Kensington. This area encapsulates 4,200 houses, shops and small businesses. The area is run down and many of the people who live here suffer from the adverse effects of poverty, social exclusion and various forms of depravation. I view this as an ideal opportunity for me to, using the above authors and others opposition ideology to try and bring about social change.
Much is being said by central government about NDC initiatives being community led and the importance of community participation and empowerment, but in reality the regeneration administrators, who have set themselves up in the community, have set into motion a set of dynamics that is geared up to oppress and subjugate the community. They have employed people who are called community outreach workers to go out into the community and practice a form of community participation methodology that has evolved in such a way that it does not empower the community or community activist but domesticates them. As a result of this participation and empowerment methodology hardly any of the community, except for people with a vested interest, such as homeowners and the most easily manipulated, have bothered to get involved. Such is the level of apathy that out of the 14,000 people who live in the community there are only about 60 or 70 people involved, and these people have been divided into many small groups. Of course this situation suits the regeneration administrators hidden agenda, an agenda that included massive demolition of the community and the building of many new houses for sale. These demolitions will result in the expulsion of many poor families from the area, mostly families that live in rented accommodation. Many community activists, who like me, are clued up as to what is happening feel that this is a form of social cleansing. Many of these poor families will be in effect re-ghettoised in other poor run down communities in Liverpool. One of the main reasons for this injustice is: The Liverpool city centre is at this moment in history having £5 billion spent on it to regenerate it, money that was meant to go into 37 poor run down areas in Merseyside, but was hijacked by city centre elitists and property developers. The community that I live in is adjacent to the city centre and the main motorway the M62 (also known as the gateway into Liverpool) runs through the middle of the NDC community. So it is no coincidence that the Kensington area was selected for regeneration. The regeneration administrators have systematically lied to the community in as much as they have tried to make the community believe that the money was given to them because of depravation problems when in reality the community was picked because of it’s strategic position close to the city centre.
The death of the Public forum meeting
There used to be a monthly public forum meeting, which was well attended with over 300 turning up, but the £57,000 per year chief executive and his staff decided to stop it. I believe they did this because the people who attended the meeting where asking too many questions and the administrators did not want the community to unite as one body of people.
Governments Office in Merseyside
The central government body that is supposed to be monitoring the NDC initiative is called Government Office and the civil servant responsible for this task is quite aware of the fact that the regeneration administrators and the new social landlord are blatantly ignoring democratic procedure. Even though central government ministers have instructed civil servants to get involved in the 39 NDC initiatives throughout the UK these same civil servants will do nothing to rectify this blatant abuse of democracy.
The “Housing Proposal” document is disregarded
To get the regeneration funding from central government the regeneration administrators had to consult with the community and put together a document called the “Housing Proposal” document. Even though this document was only proposals it served as a master plan for the regeneration of the community. Outlined within this comprehensive 176-page document were proposals that were put together from a totally inappropriate skewed in favour of homeowner’s community consultation methodology? A methodology that involved the use of a questionnaire that was sent to all 4,200 houses and businesses, although a question mark hangs over the fact as to whether this many houses actually received it. Based on this skewed in favour of home owners questionnaire the Kensington Regeneration administrators put together a document that on careful scrutiny was totally unacceptable and was an antithesis of fair democratic procedure and not in any way a true representation of the wider communities aspirations or expectations.
Undemocratic self-serving element within the NDC community
From the onset of this inititive there was certain undemocratic self-serving forces at work within the Kensington NDC community. When it was realised by the regeneration administrators that the contents outlined within the “Housing Proposal” document were being viewed by the community as a sort of master plan the conniving administrators had to act quickly to change this about, so they decided to cease promoting this document and now act as though it never existed, claiming that the document was only a proposed view that was put together to get the NDC funding from central government. Nothing is ever mentioned about the fact that the material that is contained in this document was the main reason for central government awarding the funding to the community in the first place. Many critical community activists believe that the regeneration administrators have sidelined this document so that the community cannot use it as a master plan that can be criticised and changed.
In effect what the regeneration administrators have done is sidelined the “Housing Proposal” document so as to enable them to impose their “gradualism” agenda onto the community. They wish to impose an environment onto the community that will in reality be an antithesis to the environment that the wider community wants. In other words we are having our environment created and imposed upon us by a hand full of regeneraation administrators and well meaning but blind community activists. I believe that the, now made defunct by the regeneration administrators, “Housing Proposal” document should have been kept as a point of reference. At this present moment the regeneration administrators and the proposed new social landlord are discrediting the “Housing Proposal” document in favour of promoting an agenda which includes and incorporates an ambiguous modusoperandi of gradualism and an evolutionary process that has no concrete master plan for the community to disagree with and change. In other words what they are doing is promoting an ideology of: We don’t know how thing will turn out, everything is only suggestions and proposals, we will have to consult with the Citizens Panels and the Housing Panels as we go along, and so on and so on. But the regeneration administrators and the new social landlord are well aware of what they intend to impose onto the unsuspecting NDC community.
Divide and rule tactics
As has already been mentioned the regeneration administrators with the full support and backing of the new private sector social landlord, (The new private sector social landlord is called Community 7, but they are really under the control of Riverside Housing, and it’s new director was a former member of the Liverpool City Council where he held the position of Group Manager of Regeneration Special Initiatives, further proof that public sector council officers are involved with private sector social landlords) have split the community up into 5 separate entities, each entity having within it’s midst 2 bodies of people called the Citizens Panels and the Housing Panels. Of course these Panels are made of the already mentioned 60 to 70 self serving, extremely moderate and easily manipulated people. This means that in reality only 10 to 20 people turn up at each of these five Panels, (in one of these panels only 6 people attend on a regular basis). It’s a well-known fact that the community participation and empowerment methodology that is and has been consistently used on Merseyside is not conducive with bringing about mass community involvement. The regeneration administrators go to great lengths to cover up this low attendance fact and have devised a rhetoric, which they have passed on to their outreach workers. This rhetoric incorporates within its ideas a form of oppressive indoctrination. A ideology that has evolved to persuade the already oppressed people in poor communities to conform to what is being stealthfully imposed upon them. The most perverse aspect of this situation is that the hand full of Housing Panel resident members are being manipulated into making decisions that support the agenda of the regeneration administrators and the private social landlords and will almost invariably have an adverse effect on the lives and aspiration of the wider community, especially the most vulnerable and socially excluded members, of the NDC community, and these people are in the majority. One can predict with uncanny precision that the people who are attending these Panels, will as time goes by, fall away leaving just a residue of self serving people who have their own selfish agenda. This residue will work hand in glove with the regeneration administrators and the private social landlord, in other words these people will become part of the two latter mentioned bodies. As you can see this undemocratic evolutionary process will, if not challenged emerge in an astonishingly short period of time. This is why the regeneration administrators practice what I have already referred to as deceptive, ambiguous stealth like gradualism. Keeping the community ignorant to what they are doing is tantamount to their agenda.
Ambiguous literature, which always contains the most favourable spin
The regeneration administrators post literature into the community, (they never post this literature at my address, concerned members of the community have to pass it on to me) which contains information that bears hardly any relation to what, is actually going on. Everything that is written in these ambiguous expensive glossy newsletters is full of truths, half-truths and mostly ambiguous dialogue. They print smiling faced pictures of certain well meaning but misinformed members of the community to reinforce this illusion onto the wider community. To try and counteract this behaviour I have put together a newsletter called the “Whistle Blower” and over the last 18 months have posted 22 issues, which amounts to about 80,000 copies. I have designed the newsletter in such a way as to try and enable the community residents to get another view of what is happening, but such is the culture of blind acceptance amongst the people who live in the community it has been an uphill task to try and make them realise that they are being oppressed by the regeneration administrators and a hand full of community residents who, although unaware, are acting as sub-oppressors for the administrators. The level of ambiguous information is truly extraordinary. The regeneration administrators and the private housing association officers have tried by stealth to marginalize me within the community and have to a certain degree succeeded, but I believe and have strong evidence that what I am doing is having a definite effect in as much as I am acting as an internal catalyst for democratic social change, and even though I have been excluded from the initiative by the 60 or 70 people, who the administrators hold up as the community, I have had some influence on the these people and 2 or 3 of the 10 community members who have been undemocratically elected on to the NDC board. Of course my research project is ongoing and I intend to use many democratic methods to see if I can act as an enabler for social change, change that will alter the present oppressive culture that exists within the Kensington NDC community a culture that also exists in other communities throughout the length and breath of the UK.
Mike Lane (Campaigner for social justice)
Mike Lane
e-mail:
mickjlane@btinternet.com
Homepage:
www.whistleblower.nstemp.com
