Minutes

Cllr Griffith welcomed everyone to the meeting of the Area Assembly on the subject of business and enterprise in the West Green and Bruce Grove area.

Swine flu

The Chair referred attendees attention to a briefing circulated on swine flu, providing the most up to date information and guidance.

Future agenda items

The Chair asked for any requests for agenda items for future Assembly meetings be notified to Neighbourhood Management staff. The residents soapbox slot was also to be reintroduced at future meetings to allow attendees to address the meeting on issues considered to be important.

Feedback was provided to the Assembly from the last meeting on young people:

Homes for Haringey work shadow placements: following the attendance of the Director of Asset Management at the last meeting, offering two work experience placements for young people, Neighbourhood Management had selected two successful candidates from the applications received. One of the young people had already completed their two week placement with great success, with the other scheduled to take their placement in August. Following the success, Homes for Haringey would be introducing a programme of work experience placements to offer the opportunity four times a year for young people to gain experience in different areas of the business.

Intergenerational projects: confirmation was provided that a number of proposed Making a Difference projects had an intergenerational focus, including the Back to Earth food project on Broadwater Farm, a possible day trip to Hastings and plans by the Friends of Downhill Park to create a pond.

A meeting would also be held in September between Neighbourhood Management and young people to discuss intergenerational projects and ways to involve young people with Area Assemblies in the future. 

The meeting was reminded that the second stage of the consultation process for the new council leadership model was underway. Following consideration of the results from the first stage of the consultation at a Full Council meeting, the elected leader model had been proposed as going forward for further consultation. In response to concerns regarding reaching people without access to computers, it was advised that written replies were accepted and in relation to the potential for manipulation associated with responses submitted via the website that  

The meeting received a short talk from Thelma from Thelma’s Flowers shop on Philip Lane. The shop was a family business and the community had been an important source of support during the recession when business had been effected. The roads and parking remained a concern for the business, as well as the number of homeless people in the area. Thelma was currently offering a couple of homeless young people board, meals and odd jobs for payment within the shop, as she felt it was important for the community to help homeless people where possible.

The Assembly received an update with progress by the West Green Philip Lane Business Strategy Group, made up of small businesses and local councillors with the aim of raising the profile of the area as a town centre and encouraging better services to support businesses.

A recent walkabout of the area had been arranged with the Leader of the Council and senior managers to allow local businesses to raise issues of concern. In addition, an open day would be held in September to enable local businesses to meet with key council services including Economic Regeneration, Highways etc.

The Group is also working projects to promote West Green as a trade area, including seeking funding via the North London Strategic Alliance to undertake an audit of the area and involvement with the Federation of Small Businesses’ ‘keep trade local’ initiative.

A presentation was received from Concept Training, an education and training organisation that began in Haringey five years ago. The organisation runs a variety of events and programmes to meet the needs of the local community including the ‘in transit’ programme supporting the transit of young people to secondary school and the ‘Girls Can’ project, funded from the Youth Opportunity Fund and offering girls only activities. Training is also run including emergency lifesaving, citizenship and peer mentoring sessions.

One of the most popular schemes run is the ‘Money Makers’ programme, offering entrepreneurial skill training for 13-19 year olds living in Haringey, including support and workshop sessions on business plans, presentation skills etc, and residential and weekend events. Recent pupils, Mary and Martha attended the Assembly to talk about their experience of the ‘Money Makers’ course, which they found to be very positive and valuable in terms of building self confidence and providing an opportunity to meet other young people. Learnt useful skills in relation to business ideas around fashion design and performing arts businesses.

In response to a query regarding how the scheme was promoted, confirmation was provided that Concept training were working with the Youth Service, and that taster sessions would be run over the summer period.

The Assembly received a presentation from officers from the Economic Regeneration department, covering physical regeneration, employment and skills and business and enterprise issues.

Businesses

General concerns expressed by businesses in the area included parking, refuse and business rates. Confirmation was provided that a Parking Strategy was being developed for the borough to address issues and that any consultation on CPZs in the West Green/Bruce Grove area would be taken into consideration.

The recession was impacting on local businesses, for example, increases in insolvency and liquidation and decreases in planning applications. Council initiatives include the payment of invoices within 10 days, distributing a guide to local Council services and a leaflet on support available to local businesses. Work has also been done to encourage local companies to bid for Olympic contracts, holding quarterly meetings with banks and business representatives and networking events.

Employment

Details were provided on the key schemes put in place by the council to manage the impact of the recession in Haringey including the flagship Haringey Guarantee programme supporting the longterm unemployed and maintaining employment.  Discussions were also ongoing to extend the LDA funded North London Pledge employment and skills programme tackling worklessness across the Upper Lee Valley.

A three year pilot Families into Work project is currently assisting 59 families in Northumberland Park by supporting people back to work by offering career advice, access to training etc. In response to a query regarding whether the project would be extended to cover the West Green/Bruce Grove area, consideration would be given to extension depending on the success of the pilot.

Additional work includes the ‘Claim It’ and ‘reaping the benefits’ campaigns and setting up a multi-organisation group looking at apprenticeships. The council had pledged in the next finanical year to offer at least 70 apprenticeships.

The Assembly was informed of an outreach project underway between Neighbourhood Management and Haringey Citizens Advice Bureau. Advice sessions were being run in Northumberland Park, Bruce Grove and Noel Park and on a weekly basis at the West Green Learning Centre on Mondays.  

West Green priorities:

• Rubbish dumping and fly tipping – in Ivatt Way CCTV cameras have been installed and plain clothes patrols in place.
• Young people anti-social behavior – recent night duties have been carried out at Milton Road following the end of a dispersal order for the area in order to assess the situation and gain evidence to put the order back in place and move groups of young people on.
• Roads related anti-social behaviour – improvements to signage on Westbury Avenue.

Bruce Grove priorities:

• Young people anti-social behavior – especially on Philip Lane and Napier Road. Work is being undertaken by the Police in partnership with the Youth Service to work with young people in the Napier Road area.
• Alcohol/drugs – CCTV installed on Northfield Road, and also subject to a dispersal zone.
• Prostitution on Philip Lane – a recent Police operation resulted in 25 arrests.

In response to concerns regarding anti-social behaviour problems in Millicent Fawcett house, confirmation was provided that although the installation of cameras had resulted in some improvement, the situtation was monitored regularly, with Police attending twice a day.  

The Chair invited attendees to ask questions of Cllr B. Harris, Cabinet Member for Resources and Cllr Dogus, Cabinet Member for Adult Social Care and Wellbeing at the end of the meeting due to time constraints.

The next meeting of the Assembly would be on 24 November 2009.