Showing posts with label cabinet. Show all posts
Showing posts with label cabinet. Show all posts

Tuesday 6 February 2024

Brent budget for 2024/25 agreed: Council Tax +4.99%, council rents +7.7%, communal heating +90% and £8m in savings

 The Brent Cabinet yesterday approved the Council budget for 2024-25 with Deputy Leader Cllr Shama Tatler saying it was the worse situation they had encountered yet: 'We didn't come into politics to make these sorts of decisions.'  Cllr Butt stressed that they had to be honest with residents about they decisions they had been forced to make.

The budget includes a council tax rise of 4.99% (2% ring-fenced for Adult Social Care), 7.7% increase in council rents and £8m in 'savings'.

Cllr Anton Georgiou addressing the Cabinet said that the Liberal Democrats would come forward with a 10 point alternative budget. 

Council Tax Bands including GLA Precept

Council rent rises will be at the maximum (CPI+1%=7.7%)
 
Council Service charges including 90% rise for  communal heating and hot water
 
Council garage rents will also rise by 7.7%


 





Friday 15 December 2023

Brent is NOT ditching the blue bags

There was a flurry of activity and some pretty pithy comments on Next Door earlier today when a resident posted a copy of a letter that seemed to suggest that the blue bag for the collection of cardboard and paper was to be ditched by Brent Council and mixed recycling re-introduced.

Cllr Georgiou checked it out and Brent Council confirmed it just referred to one specific street because of particular practical collection difficulties.

The 3,400 blue bag petition is due to be presented at Brent Cabinet on January 16th 2024.

Thursday 15 September 2022

Brent Cabinet members put on the spot by residents' questions. Detailed Q & A's here.

 Asking written questions of Brent Cabinet meetings is a chance for residents to air issues that directly concern them. Next week's Council Meeting has eight written questions and answers. The people who asked the questions have the opportunity to attend in person and ask a supplementary question, following up the answers received. The Cabinet member has two minutes to respond. You may like to suggest supplementary questions (one minute remember!) in the comments.

Next week's question cover:

1. The Council's upkeep of their estates

2. Collection of food waste & parking on North End Road, Wembley.

3. Lack of progress on Low Traffic Neighbourhoods.

4. Problematic Event Day traffic management.

5. Network Homes increasing service charges beyond what had been agreed with the Council.

6. Brent Council's actions on the requurements of the Building Safety Act.

7. Residents' opposition to Newland Court infill proposals.

 8. Brent Council action on Wealdstone Brook sewage & the finding of the polio virus in Brent's waterways.

 

The questions and answers can be found in the document below. Click bottom right corner for full page view.



Wednesday 24 August 2022

Transparency and Accountability: Ask a Brent Council Cabinet Member a Question - email by 5pm on Tuesday 30th August

 

 

From Brent Council

Do you have a question for a Brent Cabinet Member?

Did you know that you could submit a question to Brent’s Full Council to be answered by a Cabinet Member?

If you would like to ask a question at our next Full Council meeting on 21 September 2022, please send this over by email by 5pm on Tuesday 30 August 2022. You’ll receive a written response and will also have the opportunity to ask a follow-up question at the meeting itself.

Meetings are now being held in-person but you still have the option of tuning in virtually via the live stream if you'd prefer.



Tuesday 16 August 2022

August 22nd Brent Cabinet meeting cancelled

The Cabinet Meeting scheduled on the Brent calendar for Monday August 22nd has been cancelled. Brent Council said this was on the basis  was  that the next Cabinet meeting is scheduled for the start of September (Monday 12th).
 

The agenda for the September cabinet meeting is due to be published on 2 September.

Tuesday 31 May 2022

Brent Cabinet approves 2 year 'Purchase in Advance' energy deal

 

The first meeting of the new Brent Cabinet this morning approved a new Purchase in Advance energy supply contract for energy and gas across the Brent Council estate  including some schools. The contract is for a two year period 2022-24 rather than 4 years and for 22-23 represents a doubling in price compared with 21-22, reflecting the current energy crisis.

 

Cllr Paul Lorber addressed the Cabinet and this is the official record of the decision:

 

Cabinet noted the comments made by Councillor Lorber who had requested to speak at the meeting in respect of the item.  In addressing Cabinet, Councillor Lorber referred to section 3.2 of the report and sought further details on the basis of the decision taken in 2020 to provide for a two rather than four year energy supply period under the procurement framework along with an outline of any associated financial implications given the current and unprecedented increase in wholesale energy costs.

 

In responding to the comments raised, Councillor Mili Patel (as Deputy Leader and Cabinet Member for Finance, Resources & Reform) drew attention to the independent assessment of the Council’s energy procurement policy which had confirmed the proposed re-procurement arrangements remained fit for purpose and achieved prices better than market average as well as offering a range of additional services of value to the Council.  The proposed re-procurement and purchasing approach had also been designed to mitigate against overall market risk whilst also seeking to support the Council’s environmental objectives in considering how best to move towards procuring greener and zero carbon energy.

 

In terms of the overall financial impact (as detailed within section 8 of the report), members were advised of the difficulty in securing fixed term wholesale energy supply costs with the arrangements and approach outlined within the report designed to secure an optimal price for required energy usage and associated services whilst also seeking to mitigate against the risk and minimise significant exposure to further wholesale energy market volatility in the short to medium term.  Members noted the approach outlined also included the potential to avoid significant additional costs on energy contract prices in 2022-23 (on the basis detailed within the exempt appendix to the report).

 

Having considered the comments made and recognised the difficulties in predicting future market volatility at the time the decision was made to agree a two rather than four year energy supply period Cabinet RESOLVED:

 

(1)      To approve the award of a contract for the supply of electricity to NPower Limited for two years from 1st October 2022 via a call-off from LASER Framework Y18003, and

 

(2)      To approve the award of a contract for the supply of gas to Total Gas and Power for two years from 1st October 2022 via a call-off from the LASER Framework Y18002, and 

 

(3)      that alternatively to (1) and (2) above, to approve the award of contracts for gas and electricity to the next ranked Suppliers on Lot 1 of each of the Frameworks referred to in section 5 of the report, if NPower Limited or Total Gas and Power cannot, or do not accept the offer of a Council contract. Such award shall be in accordance with the offer and award process described in Section 7 of the report.

 

(4)      To approve the Council’s entry into an amended Access Agreement with Kent County Council referred to in sections 7.11 and 7.12 in the report, to enable its participation and purchase of gas  ...  view the full decision text for item 7.

 

The full Cabinet paper can be found HERE

Monday 16 May 2022

Brent's new Cabinet

 Cllr Tariq Dar tweeted details of the new Brent Council Cabinet earlier this morning. (Note the Tweet appears to have been deleted later this morning so perhaps it was premature, inaccurate  or unauthorised so please take this into account when reading below) 

The Cabinet has been expanded to 10 members 8 of whom are appointed by Council Leader Muhammed Butt.  Leader and Deputy Leader are elected positions although only the deputy position was contested this year. Muhammed Butt could be leader until 2026.

There are some role swaps in the new Cabinet as well as newcomers including Dr Gwen Grahi who replaces Cllr Thomas Stephens at Children, Young People and Schools following  his defeat at the local election. All members of the outgoing Cabinet who retained seats at the local election continue, albeit soemtimes in different roles. 

Some of the portfolios have been expanded. Shama Tatler, holds on to Regeneration and Planning, a role in which she has been criticised as far too 'pro-developer.' Krupa Sheth retains Environment with the addition of Infrastructure. It remains to be seen how that works alongside Regeneration and Planning. Promise Knight's new role at housing will be challenging given controversies over the amount of truly affordable housing being built as well as the quality of housing and threats to green space from 'fill-in' plans on estates.

It is noteworthy that the gender split is now 7 women to 3 men.

The proposals are ratified at the Council AGM.

1. Leader, Muhammed Butt

2. Deputy Leader, Mili Patel

3. Regeneration and Planning, Shama Tatler

4. Safetr Communities and Protection, Harbi Farah

5. Jobs, Economy and Citizen experience, Ellie Southwood

6. Public Health and Adult Social Care, Neil Nerva

7. Environment, Infrastructure and Climate Action, Krupa Sheth

8. Housing, Homelessness and Renters Security, Promise Knight

9. Children, Young People and Schools, Dr Gwen Grahl

10. Community Engagement, Equalities and Culture, Fleur Donnelly-Jackson

I presume Mili Patel will take on Safeguarding, Early Help and Social Care. From Dar's tweet it is unclear who will be responsible for Finance/Corporate.

Previous Cabinet




Monday 7 March 2022

Democracy in Brent – are Cabinet Meetings a Charade?



 

Guest Blog (by Philip Grant in a personal capacity)

 

I watched the Live Stream recording of Brent’s Cabinet Meeting on 7 February 2022, as I have an interest in housing matters, and wanted to see how the petition from residents about the Council’s “infill” plans at Kilburn Square was dealt with. Martin published a “blog” about this, and underneath it you can see in the comments that I sent a follow-up email to the Leader of the Council.

 

My email to Cllr. Muhammed Butt linked his attitude at that meeting, and claims that building new Council homes was his top priority, to Brent’s plans to only provide 37 affordable rented homes in the 250-home development on land that it owns at Cecil Avenue in Wembley. Cllr. Butt replied, and his full response was included in my “guest blog” on 9 February.

 

At the end of his email to me, Cllr. Butt wrote: ‘I look forward to hearing that you will be watching the next Cabinet meeting; it is a fantastic thing to see more people actively involved with local democracy.’ But how much “local democracy” do we really receive through these Cabinet meetings?

 

Margaret, on behalf of the Kilburn Village Residents’ Association, was allowed to speak to the Cabinet. This was one of the democratic “improvements” which Cllr. Butt introduced after his Labour landslide win in the May 2014 local elections. He told our local newspaper soon afterwards: ‘New proposals allow the public to speak in council meetings for the first time ever is aimed at bettering how the community engages with the council and allows residents to hold us to account.’

 

But how much difference did what she said to them make? How much difference could it have made? I’m afraid that evidence I’ve recently received, under a Freedom of Information Act request, suggests that the decisions supposedly made at public meetings of Brent’s Cabinet, which people can watch and even participate in, have already been made beforehand, at meetings between Cabinet members and Senior Officers behind closed doors.

 


 

Regular readers will know that I have been trying to understand the justification for Cabinet’s decision on 16 August 2021 to allow a private developer to profit from the sale of 152 of the 250 homes on Brent’s Cecil Avenue housing scheme. This is the main site in the Council’s Wembley Housing Zone (“WHZ”). It was difficult to discover the reasoning, partly because most of the supporting documents were “exempt” (= secret), and partly because Cabinet members (and their Officers) were reluctant to provide explanations.

 


Extract from the WHZ report to Cabinet on 16 August 2021.

The statement that ‘Cabinet Members were consulted in July 2020’ was the subject of my latest FoI request, because there was nothing about that in the minutes of the Cabinet Meeting held on 20 July 2020! 

 

I asked for details and supporting evidence about that “consultation”, and the results were a surprise (to me at least). These showed that, as well as the formal public meetings of Cabinet, for which we can see the agenda and reports and watch a broadcast, there are at least two other types of regular meetings of Cabinet Members and Senior Council Officers, to which we are not invited.

 


Heading from the WHZ Report to the internal Policy Co-ordination Group meeting in July 2020.

 

The “consultation” which the 16 August 2021 Cabinet Report referred to actually happened four days before the 20 July 2020 Cabinet Meeting, at a meeting of the Policy Co-ordination Group (“PCG”), a body that I had never heard of before. In many ways, it appears to be very like a Cabinet Meeting, except that the public are not made aware of it, and are not invited! This is the “preferred delivery option” paragraph from the WHZ Report to that meeting:-

 


 

From this, it appears that the “preferred option”, to involve a private developer who would sell half the WHZ scheme homes for profit, had been on the cards since at least December 2019! It is not only the Report that looks very like one prepared for a Cabinet Meeting. The written record of this meeting, though described as ‘PCG Meeting Action Points’, looks very like the minutes of a Cabinet Meeting. I received this document in response to my FoI request, although Council Officers treated it as an Environmental Information Request, which allowed them to redact one paragraph in it.

 

 

Extract from “minutes” of the Policy Co-ordination Group meeting on 16 July 2020.

 

I understand, and accept, that there does need to be some co-ordination of policies across the different service areas of Brent Council, but does this really need a quasi-Cabinet Meeting to achieve that result?

 

My FoI request had asked for details and evidence of any other discussions of the “preferred delivery option” between July 2020 and the official decision on this at the Cabinet Meeting on 16 August 2021. The response to that produced evidence of another type of internal “Cabinet Meeting”, referred to as a Leader’s Briefing, held on 26 July 2021. This “briefing” appears to be effectively a trial run-through for the Cabinet Meeting, but held three weeks before the public meeting!

 

As well as all members of the Cabinet, the FoI response gave details of the Senior Officers attending:

 

16 Council Officers were invited to attend the briefing, positions below :

 

 

Chief Executive; Head of Executive & Member Services; Strategic Director Children & Young People; Personal Assistant to the Leader of the Council; Director of Finance; Head of Communications, Conference & Events; Strategic Director Community Wellbeing; Strategic Director Customer & Digital Services; Director Legal, HR, Audit & Investigation; Assistant Chief Executive; Governance Manager; Strategic Director Regeneration & Environment; Scrutiny Officer; Head of the Chief Executive Officer; Senior Administrator; Operational Director Regeneration, Growth & Employment; Head of Regeneration.’

 

 

It is interesting that the Head of Communications attends these Leader’s Briefing meetings. Could that be so that he can prepare the publicity for the Cabinet decisions, in advance of them officially being made? 

 

 

The “minutes” of the Leader’s Briefing meeting on 26 July 2021 are in the form of an email from a Governance Officer, and I will ask Martin to attach a copy of that document at the end of this article, should you wish to read them. You will note that there may, or may not, be amendments to the Reports which Cabinet members have received for the briefing, before they appear along with the agenda for the official Cabinet Meeting on 16 August. There was also mention of another PCG meeting, scheduled for September 2021.

 

 

The reports that went to the Leader’s Briefing meeting were marked “Restricted”. This may be because they might be changed, or because they should not be “leaked”, which would reveal that Cabinet members had already considered them before the official meeting. There was actually a slight change in the wording of the “preferred delivery option” paragraph 3.5.1 between the two dates. 

 

 

In the 26 July report (below), members had ‘endorsed’ Delivery Option 2 a year before. In the 16 August report (see third image above), they had ‘indicated a preference’ for it. This may only seem a small difference, but it gives the suggestion, in the first publicly available document, that no final decision had been reached before Cabinet officially considered the matter in August 2021.

 


Extract from the draft WHZ Report to the Leader’s Briefing on 26 July 2021.

 

What happened when Cabinet did consider the WHZ publicly on 16 August 2021 (having previously considered it in private several times since December 2019)? There were problems with the Live Streaming of that meeting, and the recording is only available towards the end of the WHZ item. 

 

 

We hear Cllr. McLennan speaking about the ‘really, really good news’ that WHZ includes a number of larger homes for families in housing need, and that ‘many of them will be affordable’. Cllr. Butt then starts by saying ‘this is actually great news’, and goes on for over a minute, commending how well the Council is doing with its housing programme, and delivering homes for people who need them on its waiting list.

 

 

The Council Leader speaking about WHZ at the 16 August 2021 Cabinet Meeting.


 

The Leader of the Council was actually talking about a Brent housing scheme, on Council-owned land at Cecil Avenue, where 152 of the 250 homes would be sold for profit by a private developer, 61 of the so-called “affordable” homes would be for shared ownership or Intermediate Rent, and only 37 would be available for rent to local people in housing need at London Affordable Rent level! On the other WHZ site, across the High Road, although the 54 flats would be for London Affordable Rent, only 8 of them would be family-sized.

 

 

To me, that performance was just misleading “grandstanding” – playing to the public gallery over a decision that had been made in advance of the formal Cabinet Meeting, and which he hoped no member of the public had actually read the detail of the Report (and could not read any of the details in the “exempt” Appendices to it).

 

 

I asked in the title ‘are Cabinet Meetings a charade?’ You may know “Charades” as a game involving guessing words from acted clues. I think that Brent’s Cabinet are playing a game with the borough’s residents. They are acting at their meetings as if they have considered and decided the Reports attached to their agenda, after hearing what any members of the public or backbench councillors have to say at the Cabinet Meeting.

 

 

A charade (singular) is defined by the Oxford English Dictionary as ‘an absurd pretence’. If the items on the Cabinet’s agenda have been considered and decided in advance, at a Policy Co-ordination Group meeting or Leader’s Briefing, then Cabinet Meetings are a charade.

 

 

Philip Grant.

 

Saturday 24 April 2021

Increased powers for Brent Cabinet and Officers

The Brent Council AGM was moved from May 19th to April 29th without any explanation. This moved the largely ceremonial meeting into the pre-election period (purdah) when contentious policy decisions or initiatives that could be of advantage to a political party are banned.   Councillors will be reminded of this requirement before the meeting

However, today's Labour Group AGM, might want to discuss an item that is on the Council AGM Agenda. This is one that involves increased delegated powers for Cabinet members and the CEO following advice from Luke Hall MP, Minister of State for Regional Growth and Local Government that once the Covid regulations expire that they use existing power to delegate decision making to reduce the number of meetings required.  

Brent Council Leader Muhammed Butt has agreed to such action.  This raises the issue for me that a mainly one party council with power already concentrated by the Cabinet model, will have even less scrutiny from backbench councillors and the public.

The extent of these delegated powers can be seen in the document below (click bottom right for full page view):

 

 

 


Wednesday 10 February 2021

Bobby Moore Bridge tile murals – a “dodgy deal” behind the scenes?

 Guest blog, by Philip Grant in a personal capacity:


A year ago, I wrote a guest blog which urged readers to go and see three tile mural scenes at Olympic Way in Wembley Park while they still had the opportunity. This also highlighted the possibility, mentioned in an email I had received from Quintain, that the “footballers” mural scene in the subway might still be covered up on occasions.

 

The “footballers” mural last week (on my way to get 

 first Covid-19 jab!)

 

I raised that question in an email to Brent’s Chief Executive and Council Leader on 16 February 2020, saying:

 

This "footballers" mural was meant to have been put back on permanent public display last autumn. The prospect of it being covered over with adverts again, particularly when England are playing at Wembley Stadium during the UEFA 2020 tournament, should be unthinkable!

 

I hope that Brent Council will do all within its power to ensure that the "footballers" mural, which includes the plaque unveiled by Bobby Moore's widow in September 1993, remains uncovered, particularly during England's UEFA 2020 matches at the Stadium this summer.’

 

 

A letter from Carolyn Downs on 2 March told me that 'the lease does provide Wembley Park with the scope to cover the footballers mural with advertisement dressing at certain points during the year, should a commercial opportunity arise.' I responded by telling her that although the lease might say that, the 2019 advertising consent did not allow the footballers mural to be covered. 

 

Ms Downs passed my reply to the Council’s Operational Director (Regeneration, Growth and Employment) to deal with. I explained in detail to this officer why the various planning and advertisement consent decisions did not allow adverts over the footballers mural. Her response was curt:

 

‘We have already set out our position on this. We disagree. I do not therefore intend to continue this dialogue.’

 

By that stage (23 March 2020) the country had just gone into its first Covid-19 pandemic “lockdown”. I decided not to raise a formal complaint, as Brent’s Chief Executive had more important things to deal with. I put this issue “on hold”, saying: 

 

'I will not pursue the point in this correspondence now, but may return to it once we are through the current emergency.'

 

One of the reasons why I have been campaigning, with fellow Wembley History Society members and others, to get all of the Bobby Moore Bridge tile murals put back on permanent public display is this. They are a colourful celebration of Wembley’s sporting and entertainment heritage, specially installed in 1993 as a work of public art welcoming visitors to Wembley Park. 

 

2023 will mark the centenary of Wembley Stadium, and the 75th anniversary of the 1948 London Olympic Games, for which Olympic Way was constructed. What better way to mark those milestones than to let residents and visitors enjoy those murals again? After all, the Council had (finally!) recognised the importance of ‘the heritage tiles at Wembley Park’s Bobby Moore Bridge’ at the start of Brent’s year as London Borough of Culture 2020, saying:

 

‘The tiles, which show scenes from famous sports and entertainment events at Wembley Stadium and the SSE Arena, Wembley, are part of Brent’s rich heritage and date back to September 1993 when they were originally dedicated to the legendary footballer.’ 

 

Cllr. Butt, the Mayor and other guests at the LBOC 2020 tile murals reveal, 18 January 2020.
[Photo by Francis Waddington]

 

I was hoping to persuade Brent’s Cabinet, when the Bobby Moore Bridge advertising lease came up for renewal later this year, to consider the option of only allowing advertising on the large display panels on the bridge parapets. This would give the opportunity to remove the light boxes currently covering most of the mural scenes in the subway, possibly using some of the CIL funds which the Council is sitting on to fund that work.

 

I wrote to Brent’s Chief Executive on 4 January, setting out my suggestions for how the Council could go about this, so that Cabinet members could be given a choice of options when the lease came up for renewal in 2021. You can imagine my surprise, and disappointment, when I received the this reply from Ms Downs the following day:

 

The lease for Bobby Moore Bridge was recommended for a three year extension from 30 August 2021 and expires on 30 August 2024.  This was completed in November 2019 after market appraisal was carried out by an independent advertising consultant who recommended the lease extension on the basis of market conditions at the time and the leaseholder’s ambitions to refurbish the area and upgrade the panels to digital screens.’

 

It didn’t appear that the Cabinet had approved this, so how did it come about, who authorised the lease extension, and what authority did they have to do so? I submitted a Freedom of Information Act request, and while I have yet to receive all the items I asked for, I have received redacted copies of three documents. 

 

One document is a “Delegated Authority Report”, prepared by Brent’s Property Services team. Addressed to the Operational Director (Property and Assets), it includes the claim:

 

‘The Borough Solicitor has confirmed that pursuant to the Council’s New Constitution Part 4, paragraph 4.3 you have the delegated authority to approve of this letting.’

 

[The Borough Solicitor? – Were they using a very old template?] I have yet to receive the supporting evidence for that claim, so cannot comment yet on whether the approval of the lease extension was valid. I would mention, however, that the section of Brent’s Constitution included in the Report to justify that authority begins with the words: ‘Only the Strategic Director Resources may acquire or dispose of an interest in land or buildings’!

 

The Deed of Variation itself raised the biggest concern, particularly one new clause which it added to the terms of the original lease. I apologise for the poor quality of this copy of it, but this is the best I could prepare from the document supplied to me:

 

The new clause 10.3 in the Bobby Moore Bridge advertising lease.

 

The “Tile Mural” that this clause applies to is ‘the 9.4 metre tile football mural on the east side of the walls under the Bridge’. In other words, the “footballers” mural that was supposed to be put back on permanent public display in 2019! Yet here in an agreement entered into by Brent Council they are saying that ‘the Tenant’ (Quintain’s Wembley Park Ltd subsidiary) is entitled to cover it up, on many “event days” during the year, up until August 2024.

 

I have written to Carolyn Downs, and Brent’s Chief Legal Officer, to tell them that this clause in the lease is unlawful.

 

‘It purports to entitle the Tenant to cover 'the Tile Mural' on a substantial number of days of each year. 

 


However, on 28 November 2019, when the Deed was signed, it was already the case that the Tenant's advertising consent did not include consent to cover that "Footballers" mural scene with advertisements. That clause is therefore invalid or void, because it purports to give an entitlement which at the time was, and still is, unlawful. 

 

 

Alternatively, if that clause is considered valid, it is inoperable, because the Tenant does not have the Necessary Consent, required by the lease, to cover that mural with advertisements.

 

 

This is a legal matter which needs to be resolved now, before the resumption of events at Wembley Stadium which may lead Quintain / Wembley Park Ltd to unlawfully arrange for advertising which covers that mural, in the false belief that the lease entitles them to do so.’

 


I will ask Martin to include my “legal argument” document at the end of this article, if possible, so that it is in the public domain and anyone can read, and refer to it, if they wish to do so. If you are studying law, you might like to use it as a practical exercise, to see what you think of the merits of Brent’s case and my answer to it. If you do that, please feel free to give your “legal opinion” as a comment below!

 

I have issued my challenge to Brent over this issue (politely and respectfully, of course):

 

I would ask you, please, to ensure that the position I have set out in the attached document is examined promptly by the Council's legal officers; and that if I am wrong, they explain to me why that is so. 

 

If I am correct, as I strongly believe that I am, then they should acknowledge this, and take action to ensure that Quintain / Wembley Park Ltd is informed that they are NOT entitled to display advertisements covering the "Footballers" mural on the east wall of the Bobby Moore Bridge subway.’

 


One positive variation of the lease, introduced by the November 2019 Deed, was clause 10.4. This dealt with the “Tiling on East Wall” of Olympic Way, the three mural scenes showing American Football, Rugby League and Ice Hockey which were “revealed” for a few weeks in January and February 2020. It gave ‘the Landlord’ (Brent Council) the right to request that these be revealed (that is, put back on public display) for up to 21 days each calendar year.

 

The East Wall tile murals at Olympic Way, February 2020. [Photo by Mark Price]

 

I have written to ask whether Brent has made a request for these mural scenes to be “revealed” for three weeks during 2021, and if so, between which dates. You can be sure that if I get news of them being on public display, I will let you know!

 

For the moment, though, I want to make sure that the one mural scene our efforts over the past three years have managed to get put back on permanent public display, is not unlawfully covered up. And unlawfully covered up by a deal that was concealed from public scrutiny.


Philip Grant.

 

The Legal Argument (Click bottom right for full page version)