Screening of “The Age of Stupid” at Odeon Covent Garden this Tuesday

 

Hello from the Age of Stupid’s offices in Camden. 

Along with the rest of our team of staff and voluteers I am busy working on what we hope will be the world’s biggest global film premiere next Monday/Tuesday.  On Monday night New York will be hosting the US premiere of The Age of Stupid, with a green carpet made of recycled bottles and celebrities arriving by bicycle, solar powered car and sailing boat!  After the film there will be a Q&A including former UN General Secretary Kofi Annan, former Irish President Mary Robinson, Actress Gillian Anderson, climate minister Edward Milliband, Star Pete Postlethwaite and the film’s director Franny Armstrong.  There will also be music from Moby and Thom Yorke of Radiohead.

On the evening of September 22nd the rest of the world will then join in, with over 60 countries showing the film.  Whilst the film has already premiered here in the UK, the Odeon Leicester Square will be holding a special screening where we will be able to watch the green carpet arrivals, and images sent in from around the world of special green carpet events being hosted by them.

To book tickets go to: http://www.odeon.co.uk/fanatic/film_info/s81/Covent_Garden/m11958/The_Age_Of_Stupid_

Hope to see you there!

Victoria

 

Support Camden’s Greens calling for Camden to sign up to 10:10 campaign

Camden’s Greens are calling for Camden council to seek a commitment to reduce Camden Council’s carbon emissions by 10% by 2010, in the 10:10 campaign that was launched on 1 September by Climate Campaigner, Franny Armstrong, who lives and works in this Borough.  Kentish Town Green Party member Victoria Green, who works at Franny’s offices in Camden, will be meeting up with supporters at Camden Town Hall on Judd Street at 6.30 this Monday (14 September) with T-shirts and banners from the 10:10 campaign.  Please come along and show your support!

Camden’s Green Party councillors say that it is absolutely essential that people the world over seek to cut their emissions to keep our temperature within 2 degrees of pre-industrial temperatures.

To achieve the necessary reduction in emissions whilst ensuring that poor countries are able to improve their living standards, means that the West must cut its emissions by about 90% by 2050. And we need to begin to do so now as it’s the emissions between now and 2050 that will make all the difference.

With this in mind, Camden’s Councillors have brought a motion to ask Camden Council to support the 10:10 campaign.  Kentish Town member Victoria Green is currently working with Franny’s team in Camden on co-ordinating the global launch of Franny Armstrong’s film “The Age of Stupid”, which is due to take place with simultaneous screenings in over 440 cinemas in the United States, and over 50 nations around the world the following day.  Victoria says “It is incredibly exciting to be part of a movement trying to push our political leaders towards signing a deal in Copenhagen that will give us a chance of avoiding the effects of run-way climate change.  As a resident of Camden it is embarassing that our Borough is behind others in London in signing up to this achievable 10:10 committement.  Let’s put that right this Monday evening!”

If you can spare an hour, come along to the Town Hall at 6.30 on Monday evening and show your support!

Consultation meeting in Kentish Town tomorrow on NHS future

The local primary care trust ‘NHS Camden’ is seeking to make drastic changes to the provision of primary and urgent care in Camden. Make sure you make your views known through the consultation that closes on 9th Ocober.

You can also attend a meeting, organised by NHS Camden in Kentish Town on 8th September – see below.

Greens are part of the Keep Our NHS Public coalition in Camden, which is opposing many aspects of the new strategy. A recent meeting of the group passed a motion of no confidence in the trust, and feels that the consultation asks unfair and confusing questions that obscure the real effects of the plans.

A key part of the plans is to centralise GPs into larger ‘polyclinics’ contracted out to be run by private companies. Greens and KONP do not believe that core NHS principles of care can be upheld if general practices are handed over to profit-making companies and amalgamated into polyclinics.

Polyclinics centralise treatment, which can lead to impersonal care, lower levels of out of hours service and lead to longer journeys for patients to see a GP. They also go against the key principle of keeping public services in public hands.

See the Camden KONP website for advice on how to respond to the consultation. The most important response is to say ‘No’ to question 8 in the consultation.

KONP has also prepared an alternative questionnaire which asks fairer questions about the plans. Download the document here (pdf) and return your answers to NHS Camden along with your response by 9th October.

But don’t just take our word for it. Your own views are important on the care you want to receive from the NHS, and the way the service is to be organised in future. So do attend the meetings to find out more about the plans.

NHS Camden say:

“NHS Camden want to transform the way you receive primary and urgent health care and they have developed a strategy which outlines how they propose to improve healthcare in Camden. The HCAG project has invited them to our next meeting so you can give them your views on how they can make sure that all health services in Camden meet local needs.”

And the key points of the strategy and the consultation questionnaire can be found through this link:

http://www.camden.nhs.uk/primary-and-urgent-care-strategy.htm

NHS Camden’s meetings:

Kentish Town
Date: Tuesday 8 September 2009
Time: 12:45-1:45pm
Venue: Kentish Town Community Centre, 17 Busby Place, London, NW5 2SP

St Pancras & Somers Town
Date: Wednesday 9 September 2009
Time: 12:00-1:00pm
Venue Somers Town Community Centre, 150 Ossulston Street, London, NW1 1EE

Gospel Oak
Date: Wednesday 9 September 2009
Time: 6:30-7:30pm
Venue: Somers Queens Crescent Library, 165 Queens Crescent, London, NW5 4HH

Kilburn
Date: Monday 14 September 009
Time: 4:00-5:00pm
Venue: Abbey Community Centre, 222c Belsize Road, London, NW6 4DJ

Food and refreshments will be provided. Please call to register your interest. If you have any queries, difficulties in getting to the venues or have issues with childcare please contact Natalie Creary by phone on 020 7974 7841, text 07780 985 882 or email Natalie.Creary@Camden.gov.uk.

Greens join campaign against racial profiling of gigs

Local Green campaigner Sian Berry joined civil liberties champions and musicians in a joint letter to the Equality and Human Rights Commission this week, opposing the use of discriminatory questions about music events in a form used by the Met Police – Form 696.

This is an important issue for Camden Town and Kentish Town, which both have a strong culture and history of live music.

The open letter, which was also published in the Guardian, was organised by Sunny Hundal of the Liberal Conspiracy website and objects to questions in Form 696 about the genre of music played at gigs, which can be used to ethnically profile events and discriminate against bands and promoters.

The letter says:

“We write to raise our concerns over the Metropolitan police’s use of form 696 to collect information about, and in some cases restrict, live events across London.

“Form 696 has already been criticised by the music industry as an unnecessary piece of bureaucracy that will make it more difficult to hold small and impromptu live events. We are also deeply concerned that form 696 has the potential to be misused by the police to discriminate against ethnic minorities. The signs are not positive since the police have already indicated an interest in the racial profile of people attending.

“Though this question was removed after an outcry, the form still asks what music style will be performed (focusing on styles disproportionately popular with minorities), as well as its target audience.

“Anecdotal evidence already suggests that the Met is restricting events aimed at ethnic minorities and making it harder for Londoners to enjoy a diverse range of music.

“There is now the danger that police services across the country will adopt this measure and further entrench this illiberal and potentially racist practice. (One London council has already invoked prevention of terrorism in its licensing guidelines for live events.)”

The letter was also signed by Feargal Sharkey, head of musicians’ representatives UK Music, journalist Yasmin Alibhai-Brown, Sian’s fellow former London Mayor candidate Brian Paddick, Green London Assembly Member Darren Johnson and Hornsey & Wood Green LibDem MP Lynne Featherstone.

Read the full letter in the Guardian here

Housing sell-offs: meeting this Wednesday in Kentish Town

Leaflet from the No Sell-Offs campaign

The ‘No Sell-Offs’ campaign against auctioning off council houses and flats, is holding an urgent public meeting this Wednesday in Kentish Town.

The leaflet opposite gives details of the meeting - at Kentish Town Community Centre on Busby Place this Wednesday at 6.30 pm – and asks ‘How can we turn up the pressure on councillors who refuse to support our campaign?’

All six local councillors in Kentish Town and Cantelowes (the area covered by the Kentish Town District Housing Office) are named as not backing the campaigners, who want to prevent more properties being sold off into the private sector when tens of thousands of people in need of a new home are stuck on council waiting lists.

The issue was highlighted again this week in the Camden New Journal (Fat Flipping Profits are Incredible), who found recently auctioned properties being advertised for sale immediately after being auctioned off to developers, a practice known as ‘flipping’ which is against the terms of the auction process.

The ‘No Sell-Offs’ campaign, organised by the Camden Federation of Tenants and Residents Associations, Camden Defend Council Housing, local District Management Committees and trade unions, is also opposing cuts to Camden’s caretaking services, which would see resident caretakers removed from council estates and blocks.

Work to resume on Fortess Road?

The new marks that appeared today

Some signs today that safety work on Fortess Road, including pavement widening, new pedestrian crossings and relocated bus-stops, may be getting going again.

After consultation ended in late 2006 (you can still see the Council’s plans and consultation documents here – pdf), the progress of this project has been painfully slow.

Last year, residents  had to endure months with new paving slabs piled up and blocking the pavement, work that was eventually finished off. However, outside number 129, dropped kerbs and electric points have waited in vain for a promised new pedestrian crossing for nearly two years.

During today however, new spray-painted instructions have been added to the half-finished crossing, which suggests the work may be about to resume.

Don’t get too excited though: the actual marks – shown right – appear to indicate that the existing preparation works may simply be replaced, leaving us no further on.

The new(ish) yellow textured paving slabs have been marked with crosses and the word ‘Red’, seeming to show they are being binned in favour of new slabs in a more typical crossing colour, and the iron cover nearby has simply been labelled ‘RE-DO’.

It’ll be interesting to see what happens when the contractors turn up!

What WOULD improve the High Street – let us know!

The old Woolworths shop on Kentish Town Road has now re-opened as a Sainsbury’s ‘Local’ supermarket.

The Green Party in the area has long championed locally owned, independent shops and we’re not sure this is exactly what the High Street needed or the best use of the Woolworths site.

With a Tesco, Iceland, Somerfield, Co-op and three  independent general grocers on this single road already, wouldn’t Kentish Town be better served with a wider range of shops, rather than more big supermarkets?

On Fortess Road nearby, the opening of a Sainsbury’s Local has provided one benefit -  a much-needed cashpoint machine -  but it hasn’t helped the existing local shops. Costcutter has already cut back on its range of stock, most notably in the bakery department, and is likely to close when its lease runs out, raising the prospect of yet another empty shop on the street.

Highgate Greens’ annual shopping survey has shown vacancy rates rising in our neighbouring ward this year, and the trend for boarded-up premises  seems set to continue in Kentish Town.

As local Green campaigners said more than three years ago when landlords used the opening of Sainsbury’s as an excuse to try to raise rents for the other shopkeepers on Fortess Road by as much as 88%: ‘We can’t live on Sainsbury’s alone!’

So, rather than yet more supermarkets, what new shops would YOU like to see in Kentish Town?

Tell us your views using the poll on the right.

Hello from the Greens in Kentish Town

Welcome to the new Green Kentish Town blog – you can also find us on Twitter as @KTGreens

We’re a group of Green campaigners in and around Kentish Town, and we keep a pretty close eye on what’s happening in our area.

So this blog aims to share some of what we find out with the wider world.

Through these pages we’ll keep you up to date with local news, transport, campaigns, planning and social events, and we hope you’ll find our writings useful.

Visit early, visit often, and please get in touch if you have a problem or  issue you want us to investigate.

Sian, Victoria and the rest of the team