HAPS+-+Minutes+-+22nd+Sept+2010

[|www.hapsnews.net]
 * Haringey Alliance for Public Services **

**Watch the film of the inspiring 14th Sept anti-cuts rally at the Haringey Civic Centre:** []

**Next Haringey Alliance general meeting - Wednesday 12th October, 7.15pm:** @ the North London Community House, Moorefield Road, N17 (behind Bruce Grove station). All Haringey residents and workers urged to get involved. Come along to help promote and co-ordinate effective opposition to cuts, and the defence of our vital public services.

**'Stop the Cuts - Defend Haringey's Public Services' Eve-of-Budget demonstration - Monday 18th October:** **5.30pm:** Assemble for March from Wood Green Library / High Road to the Civic Centre, N22 **6.30pm:** Rally outside the Full Council Meeting



// 7pm at the North London Community House //
 * __ Draft Minutes of HAPS General Meeting on Wednesday 22nd September 2010 __**


 * 1. Introductions and apologies ** [Including membership of relevant organisations]

**Present:** Kenan Ulusan, Deniz and colleague (North London Community House + Day-Mer); Ely Mukhwana (AJAMU); Joan Curtis (Haringey Friends of Parks Forum); Dave Morris (Haringey Federation of Residents Associations + Haringey Solidarity Group); Emma Lewis, Tongogara and Ismael (Free Mumia Abu-Jamal Defence Campaign)**;** Keith Flett (Haringey TUC); Richard Willmsen (Local resident + Socialist Resistance); John Dolan (Haringey Unison + Socialist Party); Jenny Sutton (CoHenel UCU); Presley Antoine (Communications Workers Union + HTUC); Stephanie Grant (Local resident + Socialist Resistance); Jeremy Cox (Haringey worker) **Apologies:** Janet Shapiro (Defend Haringey's Health Services Coalition); Jane Laporte (HSG), Zaher Aarif (HSG), Barabra Blake (Local resident + PCS + GMB), Anne Gray (Haringey Green Party), Oktay Sambaz (NLCH, Day-Mer), Michelle Lawson (HSG), Helen Steel (Haringey Unison + HSG), Jim Horton (Unite + SP), Sean Fox (Haringey Unison Local Govt); Seb Klier (Unite + HSG); Chris Holmes (SP); Simon Hester (Haringey Right To Work Campaign);

//Minutes JC; Chair DM.//

**2. Minutes of last meeting** Agreed as correct, apart from some errors over a couple of quoted dates.

**3. Brief local cuts/opposition updates from the last month**

- __Council cabinet members__ have been saying publicly that they are being pressurised by Central Government to make catastrophic 25-40% cuts throughout all services, with a provisional budget in place by November. 18m has already been slashed in Haringey over the last 100 days. We are hearing of internal high-level 'reviews' looking into further sell-offs of public assets, outsourcing and privatisation options - and even merger of certain depts with those in other boroughs.... All this contradicts promises made by all the main parties during the local elections. - __Haringey Friends of Parks Forum__ reported a second meeting with the Assistant Director of Recreation Services in which he admitted to them that a wide range of budget streams for green spaces are under serious threat, including funding for playgrounds and certain front-line support staff. Leisure services may also be badly hit. He had also admitted that 'alternative forms of management' were being investigated - eg for cemeteries and leisure centres. The Friends Forum pledged to continue to work in partnership with the Council, whilst opposing cuts. To this end, they are linking up with other such groups and Forums around London and the UK. - __UNISON__ have called a lobby of the Council's General Procurement Committee on 23rd Sept, 6.30pm to oppose threats to agreed redeployment policies, which could result in compulsory redundancies. This is seen as the start of a fightback against threats to hard-fought for rights and conditions. A major members' meeting is planned after the budget. - __CoHENEL University & College Union, Haringey TUC and Right To Work Campaign__ held a 40-strong anti-cuts public meeting on 21st Sept. The meeting agreed to promote unity between community groups and trades unionists, and to call for a general strike against cuts as has happened recently in Greece and other European countries [See below]. The UCU is currently balloting on national strike action. - 30 people attended a __street protest organised by the 'Find Your Voice' campaign__ against the threat to turn the long-established and much-revered black music shop 'Body Music' by Seven Sisters tube into a betting shop. Find Your Voice has agreed to support HAPS, and attended the HAPS rally on Sept 14th. - __RMT union__ held strikes to prevent reduced hours and closure of many tube ticket offices. More strikes are planned on October 3rd (the day of the Conservative Party conference), and all are welcome to join the local picket lines. - __Voluntary and Community Sector organisations__ are angry about looming cuts which could threaten the viability of many groups and projects - __Whittington Hospital__ campaigners organised a recent public meeting to keep up the opposition to any cuts there or at North London hospitals - __Local firefighters from the Fire Brigades Union__ in Haringey were due to begin a ban on overtime in a row over new shifts patterns, which was seen as a precursor to cuts in staffing levels. - __European news__ The meeting heard that Anne Gray was currently visiting Spain where she had reported there are preparations for a general strike over austerity measures. Simon, who had also sent his apologies to the meeting, had sent a text to the meeting from Romania. He later reported: " //I had to go to Romania last week for my work. I arrived on Wednesday to find that Bucharest was gridlocked due to strikes across the public sector and a massive demonstration in the city centre. The government have already imposed a 25% pay cut for all public sector workers and the state pension has been cut by 10%. To head off the workers revolt the minister of labour was sacked after two weeks but the movement is getting bigger. Interestingly, Romanian TV News also covered mass demos in Greece (workers appeared to be storming a council or government building) and a huge demo against cuts in Prague."//

**4. HAPS anti-cuts rally at Civic Centre, September 14th**

This was considered a great success. At least 120 people attended despite atrocious wet weather. Our presence and speeches had sent out a strong message to the Council and made an impact. 15,000 informative and agitational leaflets had been distributed (including some in turkish) beforehand at street stalls, door-to-door and at events. We had achieved much publicity in the press, before and after. We have ensured that our Alliance is now well and truly 'on the map' and that the people who live or work in the borough are being encouraged to resist cuts and can expect support if they do. We had also worked well together as an alliance of organisations, individuals and working groups. There were some improvements proposed, including: more hand-written placards, more banners (and make sure the HAPS banner is at the front in any photo), more diverse speakers (including more women), work harder to encourage a wider range of community groups to attend, ensure more 'sign-ups' to get HAPS updates... //ACTION: Add our own photos and video of the rally to the HAPS website. Add a link with details of all Haringey Councillors so that people can contact/lobby them further.//

**5. Brief reports from HAPS working groups**

//Events & Publicity// **- Oktay, Jane and Dave Met on Sept 1st. Focused on co-ordinating the publicity/leafleting for the rally. Agreed to act as press liaison for HAPS [which was agreed by the general meeting]. Felt that a HAPS conference would be more realistic in the spring 2011. Next meeting 28th Sept.**

//**Community and community groups networking**// - had not held a second meeting yet.

//Trades unions and workplaces// - **Held a productive second meeting in which future London and national union lobbies and protests were discussed in order to be publicised locally - See HAPS Events Diary, below at end. Tickets are available for coaches to some of the events. Planning to do a special leaflet to distribute in local workplaces.**

//**Info/Research**// - hoping to schedule a second meeting in the coming week. Please send to the internal list any specific news about local cuts/privatisation and, most importantly, opposition to it! //ACTION: Richard//

**6. HAPS anti-cuts march and rally, October 18th October**

We agreed it was important to build on the success of our first public rally, and call for all local groups, residents and workers to come together to lobby the full Haringey Council meeting on Oct 18th. This was just 2 days before the highly controversial National Budget which is likely to signal the biggest attack on public services since the second world war. It was proposed and decided to hold a public march from Wood Green Library up to the Civic Centre, where we would call on all Councillors to demand adequate funding from the Government for our public services, to refuse to vote for or to implement cuts or privatisation, or to resign. There was some discussion about the details of the march and its publicity. As a result we decided to call a special planning meeting for this on 28th Sept. We'll only have 3 weeks to publicise and mobilise for the demonstration so the hope is that affiliated groups will pull all the stops out! //ACTION: All//

**7. Other relevant coming events**

//Local UNISON lobby// **As reported in Item 3, above, on Sept 23rd Haringey UNISON was planning a lobby of the Council over redeployment conditions. //UPDATE: Around 40 people, mainly UNISON members, attended.//**


 * **//UCU anti-cuts protest//** On Sept 29th the University and College Union at CoHENEL is holding a lunchtime rally outside the college on Tottenham High Rd, 12.30-1pm. All welcome. //ACTION: Can someone take the HAPS banner?//

//**London and national events**// We reaffirmed our policy of publicising relevant London and national anti-cuts events, lobbies and protests etc. Jenny agreed to produce a regular Events Diary - see below, at end. Tickets may be availble for coach travel to some of the events, eg 3rd Oct lobby of the Tory party conference in Birmingham (contact Keith, Haringey TUC). It was also reported that Anne Gray had, as agreed by HAPS, attended the planning meeting for the national 'Coalition of Resistance' anti-cuts conference being organised for 27th November.
 * //HAPS lobby of local MP(s)?// **There was a proposal to hold a HAPS lobby of Government Minister for 'Equalities', Lynne Featherstone MP. After some discussion, including proposals to extend the lobby to cover former Government Minister for Training & Skills, David Lammy MP, this was dropped.**

**8. HAPS admin issues**

//Website// **New [|www.hapsnews.net] website is now up and running. Michelle is co-ordinating it, and would welcome help! //ACTION: Contact: michellejlawson@gmail.com//**

//HAPS Newsletter// **Joan Curtis had offered to lay this out, but had not yet received any interesting pieces to put in. All encouraged to contribute informative local news of cuts/opposition. //ACTION: All encouraged to email: joancurtis@blueyonder.co.uk//**
 * **//HAPS Conference//** On hold until after the new year due to so much going on in the next couple of months.


 * //Finance// **Donations sought from groups on a regular basis to help HAPS activities to continue, ie costs of printing leaflets and posters and holding meetings. One group has already committed 10 per month. A fundraising event was proposed - to be discussed next meeting. Donations collected at end of this meeting from attendees. [20 collected]. //ACTION: All to seek donations//**

9. AOB **Members of the international Free Mumia Abu-Jamal campaign attended the meeting in solidarity with anti-cuts campaigns, and to warn of the dangers of institutional racism (currently focused in Europe against migrant and refugee populations). They reported that Mumia, a celebrated radical journalist and former member of the Black Panther Party, has spent nearly 30 years on death row in the USA, having been framed for the death of a police officer. More information: [|www.mumialegal.org]**

10. Next HAPS general meeting** October 12th, 7.15pm, at the North London Community House.