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The new government’s spending cuts have yet to truly bite, but already their effects are being sorely felt in our corner of North London. The severe cut to Legal Aid targets the lifeline of support to vulnerable families and asylum seekers. The cuts to local government funding will inevitably overwhelm social services in a borough where they are already so strained. The abolition of the Affordable Homes programme will undermine efforts to relieve the housing crisis that grips our borough. A crisis that will inevitably become worse a result of the outward migration of families who cannot afford to live in central London due to the callous reforms to the Housing Benefit.
We have seen the Educational Maintenance Allowance – the source of money that low-income families can claim to support their children to go to 6th Form or FE college – cut, and we are seeing tuition fees treble. All that has been achieved in raising young people’s aspirations in Tottenham over the last 10 years – post-16 participation increasing by 50%, University participation double – will be squandered.
Political office carries with it important decisions, and for all the crowing about the fiscal crisis, these cuts were their choice: it was their choice to cuts so deep and so fast, it was their choice to let Vodafone off their £6 billion tax bill whilst cutting welfare spending by the same amount and it was their choice to balance this budget on the backs of the poor, young and vulnerable.
But Christmas and the end of the year should not be a time to reflect on the grief that has gone before, but to be hopeful for the future.
Despite the savaging of public finances by this government, Tottenham, and Haringey, remain one of the few places in London that can boast so much diversity and vibrancy in our community.
Tottenham Hotspur is having one of its greatest seasons for a generation, and if Daniel Levy and the club board decide to, the area can look forward to a brand new stadium and a regenerated Northumberland Park area over the coming years.
We have a rich mosaic of community and voluntary organisations that sustain areas of our community, be it the local trade unions, the hard-working groups based at the Selby Centre just off White Hart Lane, Haringey Shed or the countless community groups and projects dotted around the constituency. There are few places that have as vibrant a civic society as Tottenham and Haringey, and for that we can all be proud.
2010 has been a difficult year for all, and I want to thank every one that has supported my work and that of my office over the past year.
In the New Year, I will be hitting the ground running and taking the fight to the coalition’s plans for our community, and I will need your support more than ever.
Whether it is emailing in photos of betting shops clustered together on one corner of the High Street, sending over data you have uncovered about the elitism of our most selective universities or tweeting to me why Spurs should stay in N17 – it all counts and it all helps and I look forward to more of it in 2011.
Have a Merry Christmas and a Happy New Year.
David
