Examination of Witnesses (Questions 300-314)
17 SEPTEMBER 2003
CLLR DAVID
JONES, CLLR
HOWARD SYKES,
ANDREW KILBURN
AND ANDREW
FLETCHER
Q300 Mr Clelland: In terms of the
cohesion agenda is it clear in your mind what the division of
responsibilities is between the Office of the Deputy Prime Minister
and the Home Office, for instance?
Mr Kilburn: It is becoming increasingly
clear. In the aftermath of 2001 there was inevitably a great wish
on behalf of the Government to be seen to be active, in the same
way that there was in many local authority areas.
Q301 Chairman: Then define it for
me quickly in a couple of sentences.
Mr Kilburn: Define what?
Q302 Chairman: The difference between
the two partners in terms of what they are providing.
Mr Kilburn: I think the ODPM through
the Neighbourhood Renewal Unit and others are focusing on the
longer term issues around regeneration and how we build an economic
base and how they support us through that process and the wider
community issues. I think the Home Office is still seeing very
much the issues around racial tensions and that aspect of the
community cohesion agenda. It seems to me that that is the distinction
between the two.
Q303 Chairman: And do you think they
are getting further apart or closer together?
Mr Kilburn: I think there is evidence
that they are increasingly coming together.
Q304 Chris Mole: The Home Office
have told us that they have identified the measurement of cohesion
as a priority. Can you tell us what you are doing by way of measuring
what you do and evidencing the success you believe you have?
Mr Kilburn: What we could do is
provide you with a copy of our improvement plan which has some
measures, and I cannot remember the number now, under the headings,
of which community cohesion is one. There are a number of detailed
actions with officers identified, target outcomes and dates. We
are monitoring and managing that process very closely and we know
the consequences if we do not.
Q305 Dr Pugh: How does the council
work with the police to tackle racist incidents?
Mr Kilburn: Very closely. When
we put together the new crime and disorder strategy racist incidents
were very clearly the first priority. We recognised that the events
of 2001 had many causes but a greater and closer working relationship
between the police and ourselves in terms of a number of trigger
incidents may have gone some way to preventing some of the worst
excesses during that period. Now there is a regular dialogue between
myself and the Chief Superintendent at strategic level and at
an operational level on racial incidents there is a regular Wednesday
morning meeting of practitioners who review the racial incidents
that have been reported and follow those through.
Q306 Dr Pugh: But apart from dialogue
what do you do?
Mr Kilburn: We try to identify
the nature of the problem, what the incident was and then follow
that through. Some of them take some time to resolve, but there
is a clear commitment to follow it through whether it be in a
school, in a housing office or wherever it might be.
Q307 Dr Pugh: Do you think that contact
and communication between young people, the police and the council
is better than it was?
Mr Kilburn: There are three elements
to that. I have absolutely no doubt that contact and communication
between the police and ourselves is better. I have every reason
to believe by personal observation and reports that I have read
that the work of the police with young people is improving. I
think the way in which the police have moved to township policing
and the way in which they are getting a much closer link through
area committees, with members and with community groups is facilitating
that, but I would not want to pretend that there is not a significant
way to go.
Q308 Chairman: The council was pretty
courageous when it set up the VI Form College which clearly solved
part of the problem of under-achieving youngsters in the town.
It is quite clear that there now are some significant problems
at secondary school about the way in which the schools have become
mono-ethnic. Would it not be reasonable for the council now to
have a strategy for secondary schools?
Cllr Jones: Yes, I think the council
has to develop a strategy for that. Part of it is working with
partners to make sure that you have clear progression routes so
that people fully understand that form the age of three when you
start with Sure Start you know what path you are going to follow
right through to higher education and further education. It is
that, alongside the development of centres of excellence within
our secondary schools, that will allow us to break some of this
down. There is some evidence that there are parents who, because
of white flight, were taking their children out of certain of
our secondary schools, and because of the development of those
schools as centres of excellence and with the additional funding
that the Government is making available they are beginning now
to have confidence in the schools and we are beginning to see
parents wanting to return children to those schools. There are
a number of things that we can do but it will have to be a slow
process because at the end of the day we are bound by parental
preference.
Q309 Chairman: A lot of those schools
are in a fairly worn-out condition, are they not, physically?
Cllr Jones: Yes. We have one PFI
bid at the moment which has been approved for £60 million.
We have been invited to bid for an extra £170 million next
year and that would allow us to replace all the non-denominational
secondary schools within the borough. We are also looking at a
PFI scheme between the two dioceses for work to be done on refurbishing
and replacing the diocesan schools. Hopefully, within the next
seven to eight years we should see virtually every single one
of our secondary schools either totally regenerated or rebuilt.
Q310 Chairman: And you would hope
that in replacing those schools you would improve social cohesion?
Cllr Jones: It is a contributory
factor. There will still be the element of parental choice and
that is very difficult. What we have to do is to work to make
sure that people see that all the schools within the borough are
a bit more aware and make sure that their children get the best
quality education wherever they are.
Q311 Chairman: We saw quite a lot
of very impressive things yesterday, and a lot appear to come
from quarters other than the council. The school links looked
good. It would be nice if there were much more mixed groups within
schools but if you cannot get that then the school links programme
seems quite good. Certainly the evaluation suggests that it is
good, but you are not funding that, are you? It is being funded
by the Ethnic Children's Fund. Is that going to be mainstreamed
when their funding runs out?
Cllr Jones: We already spend above
FSS on education in Oldham, considerably above FSS. What it does
mean, with the constraints that we have upon us as a local authority,
and we are looking perhaps next year at having to make at least
six million pounds worth of cuts, is that either we have to reduce
the amount of money going directly into the schools through the
delegated budget in order to fund some of these schemes or we
are going to have to rob Peter to pay Paul. It is a case of having
to look for external funding in order to keep schemes like this
going.
Q312 Chairman: When we went to the
Millennium Centre, and we went to the Marlborough Centre down
there, they were bending our ears pretty powerfully that again
council funding was not that generous.
Cllr Jones: If you look at council
funding in terms of the voluntary sector in Oldham, it is about
50 per cent higher than the average authority in Greater Manchester.
We are a far more generous authority than any other Greater Manchester
authority.
Mr Kilburn: Apart from the city.
Q313 Chairman: And, of course, when
we went up to Derker they were very worried about their very small
community centre within a converted house when their funding runs
out. There is an implication, is there not, that either you value
these things and you want to be able to mainstream and fund them
or you have to be looking at some way of getting these continual
pockets of money put forward, but they are fairly divisive, are
they not, first, because one bit of the community gets it and
another does not, and, two, that you get it for two to three years
and the project workers on them are always looking for the next
project to have to move on to?
Cllr Jones: Yes, and we are looking
at the funding machine for the voluntary sector now so that we
can try and build in some security funding over a number of years.
The Chief Executive has put his finger on the problem that we
face in that it is short term funding. Housing market renewal
shows the way forward in terms of government funding for local
authorities and for particular projects and for dealing with particular
indicators. That is to have it as long term funding where you
can talk to the community, where you can communicate with the
community, where you can gain views and attitudes and then determine
the programme and put the programme forward instead of having
to bid for this scheme, that scheme and the other scheme. Yes,
it is divisive when you have to bid for it scheme by scheme.
Q314 Chairman: Are there any final
comments you want to make to the Committee?
Mr Kilburn: I think most of the
points we wanted to make we have had an opportunity to make, thank
you.
Chairman: Thank you very much indeed.
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