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Some good advice: Don’t cut funding
• THE proposed cut in funding of advice agencies will have a devastating effect on the Camden Tribunal Unit (‘Crime to axe legal lifeline’, November 16).
It would reduce our income by 30 per cent, and risk the loss of the income we receive from the government in legal aid. We would then be forced to close.
We provide representation in welfare benefits and employment tribunals to Camden residents. Our clients are referred from a wide range of other agencies, including the Citizens’ Advice Bureau and community groups.
A large proportion of our benefits appeals concern Disability Living Allowance and Attendance Allowance. Each claimant in receipt of these benefits produces a payment from central government to Camden of £1,000.
We believe we provide value for money, both to Camden residents and to the Camden Council.
We would ask the council to reconsider the proposed cut.
MIKE HARAN
Manager
Camden Tribunal Unit
Grafton Yard, NW5
• MUCH of what has been written about the Camden Law Centre seems fuelled by misinformation and dishonesty. No changes in funding have yet been decided on. Perhaps Camden Labour councillors have created this smokescreen in order to obscure the crippling cuts to legal aid being pushed through by the Labour government.
The Law Society estimate that a quarter of all current providers of legal aid advice may abandon their legal aid work as a result of these changes.
I note that the Lib Dems oppose these cuts. Their President Simon Hughes has been at the forefront of the campaign to ensure that advice centres receive the support they need. He has pointed out that inner London areas like Kentish Town, where legal costs are higher and cases often more complex, will be the first to suffer under Tony Blair’s reforms.
It is hypocritical for Camden Labour to pretend that they’ve no record of cutting back on services.
During Labour’s last term, they cut seven Citizens’ Advice Bureaux (CABs) down to three. In 2003, Labour’s plans to close a neighbourhood advice centre caused such dissent that a full council meeting was halted for the first time since the poll tax. A few months later, Labour plans to reduce funding for people with physical disabilities and mental health problems prompted more protests, stopping another council meeting.
All councils have to make tough choices. For the elector, the choice is between the fresh and honest approach of the Lib Dems, or the bitter, begrudging approach of New Labour.
MATTHEW SANDERS
St Leonard’s Square, NW5
• IT seems like Lib Dem council leader Councillor Keith Moffitt has made up his mind to cut funding to Camden Law Centre and the CABs in order to fund a Credit Union.
While I have no doubt that people without a bank account could benefit from a Credit Union – isn’t this just a case of robbing Peter to pay Paul?
Advice services tackle poverty by helping people negotiate the benefits system, raising their take-home pay. Why therefore are they under attack?
Instead of paying £500,000 to a fat cat city consultancy, the council should pay for the Credit Union and carry on funding the advice services.
SHIRLEY JENKINS
Albert Street, NW1
• I AM extremely concerned about the 43 per cent cut to the voluntary service that the Lib Dem/Tory coalition is now threatening us with.
Now that they have won Camden council, the Tories and Lib Dems obviously don’t care about serving those in the community who most need their support and who are least likely or able to vote.
Camden has had a fine tradition of supporting the voluntary service, it is one of the things that has made me proud of my local council. But now the law centre on Prince of Wales Road and the CABs on Kentish Town Road are threatened with closure and the freeze in budget means that many more voluntary organisations will find it difficult to continue.
Years and years of hard work to build up essential services for those most often left behind could all be lost in a matter of months.
ANNA BECKETT
Oakford Road, NW5
• THERE is clearly a general concern underlying the anxieties being expressed about the freezing of funding to the voluntary sector, the proposed cuts to the Camden Community Law Centre and CABs, or the lack of ready access to schooling in the south of the borough. The concern is that there is little sign of an adequate vision or moral direction from the new ruling coalition in the council. It would seem that the Lib Dems, who have been accustomed to the opportunist mini-politics of opposition, have immediately fallen in with the dominant Tory mindset.
Camden is one of the most successful examples of a culturally diverse community in the world. But this success cannot be taken for granted. It has to be sustained by policies that respond to the fact that this is also a socially polarised borough, which has not only some of the wealthiest but some of the most deprived people in the country.
It is on the treatment of the vulnerable and the needy that the cohesion of this wonderfully diverse community depends.
CECIL JENKINS
Wedderburn Road, NW3
• PLANS to cut funding to the Camden Law Centre and CABs risk undermining the important work on which many of Camden’s residents rely.
However, I have to ask if these ‘proposals’ are in reality proposals at all. The Lib Dem leader of the council, Cllr Keith Moffitt, recently stated that no decisions had been made but that the review was part of a drive to put environmental sustainability at the heart of council funding decisions. It sounds like the decisions have already been taken.
Divisions within the Lib Dem/Tory coalition are also apparent. Tory Deputy-Leader, Cllr Marshall, wants to make “room in the budget” without stating why or what this room would be used for.
Would it be unreasonable to think that when he says “room” he really means less long-term investment in important services for vulnerable people? The Tory/Lib Dem leadership seem to be in direct opposition on this issue, one wanting more spending on environmental sustainability and the other wanting less spending full stop.
JAMES MACGREGOR
Highgate Labour Party
• I WAS interested to read that the house prices in parts of Camden are approaching the levels found in Notting Hill and what the papers call ‘super affluent neighbourhoods’. As a former resident of Notting Hill I watched the area change and lose a lot of what made it special in the first place – it was in danger of becoming a new, sterile and affluent Chelsea.
While it is positive that Camden is in high demand, this imposes serious duties on the council if it is to preserve the social and economic diversity that makes our area such a good place to live. Over the years Camden has had a proud progressive tradition in providing services which benefit rich and poor alike, including support for a flourishing voluntary sector.
It is therefore worrying that the Lib Dem/Tory coalition is harming the interests of people in the borough who need help by, for instance, making cuts to the Prince of Wales Law Centre.
LEWIS BASTON
Arlington Road, NW1
• I WAS shocked to read Lib Dem council leader Keith Moffitt quoted in the New Journal as saying: “There are a lot of voluntary organisations who put the environment at the heart of what they do and it is a central issue and we want to look at providing funding to this area.” No true environmentalist would want to be responsible for axing the justice services, which the CABs and Law Centre provide.
If Keith Moffitt wants to make protecting the environment a fluffy and inconsequential issue, then by all means proceed with these proposals.
Sure, it’s easy to deal with ‘environmental issues’ if you forget about the many people in Camden who need advice, but who are either poor, not very well off, or who need a few questions answered before deciding on a next crucial step.
Pricing out the not-so-well-heeled is one way of assuring a ‘sustainable environment’. But sustainable for whom?
Not only have I used those services myself, but I cannot begin to count the number of times I have recommended them to others. It is unfortunate that Cllr Keith Moffitt has chosen to pit ‘environmental protection’ against the free advice agencies. Concern for the former does not obviate the need for the latter.
VIRGINIA MACFADYEN
Parliament HIll, NW3
• I WOULD like to add the Green Party’s voice to those who are protesting against cuts to law centre funding, and my own as a lawyer and a member of the management committee of one of Camden’s law centres.
The proposed 40 per cent cut in Camden’s funding to the not-for-profit legal sector could not come at a worse time. On the one hand the Association of London Government (now dominated by the Conservative Party) recently proposed cuts to voluntary sector funding to inner London boroughs – these were luckily overturned by the full committee but this still causes uncertainty as to future funding.
On the other hand, anticipated reforms following the Carter Report on Legal Aid raise the spectre of greater financial difficulties for law centres.
Also, at least one of the options proposed by the Lib Dem/Conservative administration in the current consultation involves selected voluntary sector providers arranging for services to be provided by others.
This could mean that the costs of administering these funds will shift from the council to the voluntary sector - implying a further reduction in funding for frontline services.
The Lib Dem/Conservative administration in their lists of priorities for the voluntary sector puts ‘rights’ high up. Affordable good quality legal services are essential to secure our rights and I’d like to see the actions of the new administration reflect these words.
CLLR MAYA DE SOUZA
Town Hall
Judd Street, WC1
• AS a Job Retention Advisor for Jobs in Mind working in the voluntary sector in Camden, I believe potential closure would have a direct impact on the work that I do with people with mental health problems.
Jobs in Mind have an excellent working relationship with the Law Centre, whereby I am able to refer employment cases when employers are breaching legislation and employment rights. My clients are extremely vulnerable, socially excluded and often feeling suicidal due to the draconian treatment of some employers who believe they are exempt from the law.
The law centre provides a vital lifeline to my clients who otherwise would have nowhere else to go.
The results of this working relationship to date have been excellent. Every client that has been referred to the centre has either remained in employment or come away with a good severance package and more importantly also a good reference, which means that they are then able to move on from their very traumatising experience with some hope for the future that they will again be employable in the future.
Taking into account the fact that the national policy focus is geared towards getting people with mental health problems into work, the law centre plays a vital role in helping to keep them there through their excellent negotiations with employers.
I sincerely hope that the decision makers think very carefully before making their decision, since it is almost inevitable that if the proposed cuts go ahead, many already socially excluded and vulnerable people will be left with no where else to go.
LORRAINE LOOKER
Job Retention Support Advisor
Jobs in Mind
Baynes Place, NW1
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