I am very proud to have been quietly serving you here in Belsize as your Prospective councillor and candidate since 2006, yes thats an amazing 12 years! I can hardly believe it myself.
As a Belsize resident I become actively involved in my local landlord meetings. I attended my first meeting back in 2006 where I was horrified at how the council and contractors actually allowed a virtual fight to take place amongst the residents to lose valuable consultation rights!
I quickly changed all that as I was within months elected the leaseholder representative for the Chalcots estate. A position that I still hold today 12 years later as a co-opted member of Burnham TRA as position that I have help for 8 years. Since the problems of the evacuations. I was voted in by more than 55 residents in the largest vote that a block has ever had. Such is the strength of support for me and my colleagues.
Together with my other representatives we have saved countless shoddy unsafe GAS pipe installations and expensive GAS meters installations that would have cost everyone £700 each. I got that cost waved. I also obtained more value from the developers for each resident that has been greatly appreciated by all and I still receive thanks from people who remember my input which took months of free volunteer time.
I was elected by Camden councillors in 2010 to be a co-opted member of the Camden Housing and Adult Social Care Scrutiny Committee and re-elected in 2011 again where I specialised in leaseholder matters on the special Leaseholder Scrutiny panel. Again all volunteer positions. I was also School Governor from 2009 to 2013 at the Outstanding rated Primrose Hill School, where I become elected to be on the recruitment panel to select a new head when the situation arose. A task that I was very honoured to do which again I gave up all my free time to discharge my duties.
Yes I take civic duty very seriously, what I say I will do I do and more. I have a track record since 2006 of doing precisely this. Some weeks I have clocked up around 20 hours of voluntary time to our community. It amazes me that in the party political machine some candidates can sweep to election as a local councillor without either living in the ward nor actually doing anything apart from canvassing and simply being with the right party at the right time! Very often it is the true warriors who give the most who simply do not get elected. This is unfortunate and with this in mind I believe that standing as an Independent allows more scope to be equally accessible to all residents without party associations standing in the way.
I have been asked by many of you if I am or was already a councillor well it seems like it to me and I am sure that if you elect me tomorrow to be the first INDEPENDENT councillor here in Belsize it will feel more of a natural development from the positions I currently hold to be an actually elected councillor.
I am sure that together with the other two councillors that you elect that we will form a very effective team. Having me as an Independent will provide a useful balance and check on any party politics that councillors from the political groups will face due to their requirements to often toe the party lines and support their National party policies, which as the Mayor Boris Johnson has demonstrated is not always in the best interest of either Camden and especially Belsize with closure to the Hampstead Police Station, the Belsize Fire Station, loss of 4 community police from a team of 6 and worst of all that remaining small team of 2 being co-joined with Haverstock Hill where they often spend a lot of their time due to policing needs there. Which leaves Belsize more exposed to becoming a future trouble spot if not carefully patrolled as before by the local police with local knowledge.
One thing is clear that I have really enjoyed meeting as many of you as was humanly possible these past six weeks. I have covered virtually the whole of Belsize, walked thousands of steps and walked hundreds of collective miles, completely warn out a new pair of trainers and was invited into many of your homes for a rest and a cup of tea more than at any other time that I have stood as a candidate.
So a special thank you to all that offered such warm hospitality and support. Win or lose I will remember that support for a very long time. Actually it is not just about wining because finding making associations, friends and discovering new thoughts and ideas is just as vital.
I am planning to do a another new film production probably a documentary on the Chalcots here in Belsize later in the year so I expect that I will being seeing many of you whilst out filming.
