Lucky to have Mike in charge

I was rather disturbed to see that our neighbours in Harrow Council are bringing in an ID scheme for council tenants. Surely we have enough big brother style schemes already. We are lucky that Barnet has Mike Freer in charge. He would never agree to such a crackpot initiative.

Mike on Conservative home

Mike has penned a superb article for Conservative home. His friends are also pleased to hear that he's recovered from a nasty bout of swine flu and is fighting fit again.

Sorry for the recent lack of posts. I've been too busy on the campaign trail and then a well needed holiday ! I think we can all take heart from the fantastic result in Norwich.

Mike gets a ringing endorsement

The votes have been cast, unlike the Euro elections where turnout was as low as 10%, the byelections for Barnet resulted in a huge swing to the Conservatives and a massive turnout, well over 40%. This can only mean one thing - a huge endorsement for the Leadership of Mike Freer. Whatever the bloggers of Barnet may say, the public love him and recognise all of his hard work.

Another award for Mike Freer's Council

Barnet Council has been recognised for its innovative work with Muslim communities by the Government Office for London. The award, for Best Overall London Project, presented on 17th February at the Prevent 2009 One London Conference, is in recognition of the Council’s groundbreaking approach to engaging with members of Barnet’s Muslim community through the borough’s schools, community organisations, university and mosques.
Using research findings from one of its partners, Middlesex University, the Council designed its projects specifically to reflect the diversity of the borough’s Muslim community.
Among the projects undertaken by the council and carried out by the Barnet Muslim Engagement Partnership was the 2008 award-winning Madrassa Citizenship Programme which was adapted to fit mainstream, multi-faith schools. The programme aimed to improve inter-faith understanding among school pupils through a series of workshops taken by different faith leaders. Other programmes included empowering local Muslim women to become public influencers and increasing the self-esteem of south Asian, Somali and Afghani young people through performing arts, sports and national youth accreditations.
The project also succeeded in challenging myths in the community through its critically acclaimed exhibition ‘Muslims in Barnet’ portraying the positive contribution of Muslims engaged in daily life.

Commenting on the award Mike said “This award recognises and reflects the breadth of projects undertaken by the council across the whole of the Muslim community in Barnet over the last year, and our overall efforts to work with all faith communities.”
“Not only has our innovative approach in understanding the complexities of our local Muslim community helped increase self-esteem among residents, it has also been recognised by other government bodies who are looking to Barnet to see how to successfully deliver projects like this.”
“We are fortunate that our communities do live peaceably together and projects such as this continue our history of working with all faith communities across the borough.”

Barnet Leads the Way

Barnet Council is leading the way in London. Under the Leadership of Mike it has developed the most innovating and exciting website in London. I've put a few links to this so you can go straight there yourself. Check out the interesting and informative YouTube videos and the Fantastic pictures on the Flickr Site. See why people such as Boris are flocking to Barnet to see how a modern Council in the 21st Century does things. It makes me proud to live in Barnet.

Mike Cuts the Mustard !!!!

Some very interesting questions and answers at the last Council meetings.
Strangely these haven't been reported by the usual suspects in their blogs :-


Question 26
Councillor Brian Gordon
For how many successive years has our Council managed to keep Council Tax increases below inflation and how has this been achieved?


Answer by Councillor Mike Freer, Leader of the Council
Unlike the previous Labour / LibDem coalition who increased Council Tax above inflation every year they ran the Council, this will be the 5th year in succession we have delivered a below RPI increase in Council Tax. We are one of only a handful of London Councils to have achieved this.
This has been done by tight budget setting and control. We have consistently reduced the base budget by £10m every year, largely through efficiency measures that protect priority services. We have ensured spending is within budget through rigorous budget monitoring and proactive budget management. All this has been during a period of below inflation grant settlements i.e. real term grant cuts.


Question 30
Councillor Brian Gordon
Can the Leader please comment on the latest Government Formula Grant Settlement for the Borough?


Answer by Councillor Mike Freer, Leader of the Council
Barnet’s grant increase is 2.2% below the national settlement of 2.8%
The percentages cannot hide the poor settlement for London in particular where grant increases will not be enough to meet inflationary pressures let alone new service demands. In fact, it is likely that the NLWA levy increase alone will exceed the grant increase. The current minister has made it quite clear his intention to help his northern supporters by continuing to drain grant away from the economic capital of the UK to the less successful regions. As evidence I need only refer to the flawed changes made in the last couple of years to grant allocations for adult social services that have deprived London of much needed resources to support the vulnerable.

Mike Stands up to the bullies

Why will Mike Freer make a great MP? Because he's prepared to stand up to the bully boys and take action. In his latest blog he details the tough action he's taken to stand up to the cowardly thugs who threaten hard working family businesses in Barnet. If you have any doubts about the way in which the conflict in Gaza has been exploited by various supporters of terror, left wing radicals and other bandwagon jumpers for their own ends read this article in the London Daily News. Have any of the other Golders Green and Finchley Candidates gone public with support for Israel?

Barnet Council Tax rise below inflation again

This week Barnet Council's cabinet met to discuss the budget for the coming year. They are proposing a rise of 2.81%, well below the rate of inflation. Congratulations to Mike on keeping taxes rises down when the grants from government have been cut.

How have Labour and the Lib Dems reacted? As ever they are looking both ways at the same time. They berate Mike for having to raise tax at all, whilst complaining that services are being streamlined. They've also taken to criticising Mike for using the reserves to ease the burden on families. Given the raids on reserves when we had a Lib/Lab administration, this is rather rich. Doesn't it occur to them that the reserves are funds earmarked for a rainy day. Given the economic situation, surely that rainy day has arrived and families in Barnet deserve a break.