[Campaignforrealdemocracy] campaign real democracy - actually starting to campaign!

Mon Oct 12 19:00:32 BST 2009

Hi James

I live in Brockley SE4; I have avoided my local assembly to date, only because I have had extensive interaction with the council at the local strategic partnership level and neighbourhood management level - however I know many of the lead officers from my days when I was a community development worker working across Lewisham for a community led network (i.e. not working for the council).  I agree to an extent that they can be influenced, but there's a lot of paranoia about rival mainstream political parties - tories, lib dems etc doing just that so the idea that community activists can get in there probably needs to be tempered.  I like the transition town thing because it is more genuinely local people led - from my perspective anything that is council led is going to end in disappointment at some point so the ideal is to bypass them where possible and make demands from a position of strength and equality.  Real democracy can never (ever) be council mediated, managed democracy.  I have many contacts in both Lewisham and Southwark so happy to link up if there is any stuff needs doing

Matt

Matthew Scott

CSC Director

020 7336 9461

Work mobile: 07827 258411

Website: www.communitysectorcoalition.org.uk

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From: martyn2345 at googlemail.com [mailto:martyn2345 at googlemail.com] On Behalf Of James Holland
Sent: 12 October 2009 13:30
To: Matthew Scott
Cc: campaignforrealdemocracy at lists.aktivix.org; project2012 at googlegroups.com; Mark Barrett
Subject: Re: [Campaignforrealdemocracy] campaign real democracy - actually starting to campaign!

yes, thanks for that
the forums are different in different places  - in lewisham they're called called local assemblies, and they have one for each ward, however they have no powers at all, they can vote on things inc how to spend a budget, but it's the council that have to approve the decision. In southwark its less clear but where i live is covered by the nunhead community forum, from what i can tell its now independent of the council (although most of it's money comes from the council) it's also very involved in a campaign against council plans for the community centre. the lewisham assemblies whilst having no actual intrinsic powers have the advantage of being quite really amorphous and in need of definition and perhaps can be easily 'taken over' by a small switched-on group who can start to use them as a real stepping stone to democracy. the alternative is that we get the assemblies to force the council to veto plans, and then end make fuss / set up a rival assembly etc - there's loads of possibilities.

matthew, whereabouts do you live, are you involved in your local assembley?

On Sun, Oct 11, 2009 at 10:25 PM, Alison Banville <alisonbanville at yahoo.co.uk<mailto:alisonbanville at yahoo.co.uk>> wrote:
At the talk I went to recently by Brixton Transition Town's Duncan Law (he who grows CORN in his front garden there!) I got a copy of the Transition Handbook which is brill. I'm still poring over it but it's very cheap on Amazon, here's the page:
http://www.amazon.co.uk/s/ref=nb_ss?url=search-alias%3Dstripbooks&field-keywords=transition+handbook
and here's BTT's phone number, they should be able to find you someone to help: 07958 635181

Alison

--- On Sun, 11/10/09, Mark Barrett <marknbarrett at googlemail.com<mailto:marknbarrett at googlemail.com>> wrote:

> From: Mark Barrett <marknbarrett at googlemail.com<mailto:marknbarrett at googlemail.com>>
> Subject: Re: [Campaignforrealdemocracy] campaign real democracy - actually starting to campaign!
> To: campaignforrealdemocracy at lists.aktivix.org<mailto:campaignforrealdemocracy at lists.aktivix.org>, project2012 at googlegroups.com<mailto:project2012 at googlegroups.com>
> Date: Sunday, 11 October, 2009, 9:07 PM
> Hi James
>
> Thanks for the update!
>
> From my side of things:
>
> Here in Southgate I am continuing to work on
> developing a long term partnership between residents,
> traders, educational establishments, human rights and
> humanist/faith groups, encouraging them to come
> together for the accessible idea of a democratically run,
> and community owned street market on a small but suitable
> patch of pavement. From there, for me it is a short skip
> towards real local sovereignty - which I always mention in
> the same context - because the right to run a street market
> and receive the rental income from it (rather than it going
> to the Council) is a form of sovereignty in itself. A
> community owned asset..
>
>
> And so I agree 100% it's about working with people
> you wouldn't normally consider as allies.  So far
> I've got some support for the idea but I need to
> develop it further. Luckily I've been offered some
> collaboration with Southgate College, who are stationed
> right next to the site in question, so fingers crossed that
> will be a plus to the campaign's potential.
>
>
> Local Area Forums, which you mention are definitely in
> need of democratisation and if they are like the ones up
> here they cover three wards. So far I've found
> LAFs relatively good for info gathering (altho by no means
> perfect) and quite frustrating in other ways. There maybe
> room for common cause around the issue of over
> centralisation - half the time it seems that both Cllrs AND
> residents are equally frustrated by Westminster's huge
> powers over and so it's hard to feel anything other than
> it all being a big talk shop; an  exercise in Council being
> seen to be doing the right thing but actually not that
> effective because no real powers. As with consultations
> it's al quite top down. If you have some allies and can
> present yourselves as a decent sized coalition defintely
> consider pushing them to sit in the democratic fashion in a
> circle and all - can't wait to hear how you get
> on!
>
>
> Also there is now the possibility in London to create
> your own parish council althought I think that's quite a
> procedural obstacle course. Might be worth looking into
> though as PC's can raise there own revenue via taxation
> (ie in our case, democratically agree ie non compulsory
> subscription).
>
>
> Other stuff moving forward:
>
> (1) Theatre Project with Teresa Hoskyns and a number
> of pro-theatre people aimed at getting
> schools involved in the great issues via the old Greek
> democratic idea of Agon Theatre.. we are applying to do a
> show at the GLA Scoop Space and have some schools on board
> already
>
>
> (2) Local version of 21st Century Network in Enfield
> to bolster the other work that's going on. Francis and I
> are developing 'Make Politics Matter' initiative
> with local schools to get them interested in political
> issues and community action / sovereignty and tap into their
> creativity and we're getting interest from schools
> across the Borough. Email me for more info on
> this!
>
>
> (3) Dec 2 Real Democracy and Right to the City
> meeting with 21CN; speaking Matt Scott of CRD and Community
> Sector Coalition, Teresa Hoskyns of Queens Market defence
> group, Project 2012 and me. We hope to make this a launch
> for a Civil Society union event in 2010 around the idea of
> Local Sovereignty. Glad to have yr support  - register at
> http://www.meetup.com/21stCenturyNetwork/
>
>
> (4) I would like to link the local work I am doing
> with the Transition Towns initiative - be grateful of
> someone could put me in touch with anyone suitable in North
> London to talk me through what's involved. Also, did you
> see the flier for 21st Nov I put round earlier. See
> attached. I think it would be good to have a CRD presence
> there and I'm talking to Matt about this in the context
> of our planned event for next year and maybe making a short
> presentation there.
>
>
> (5) Great to hear about the Climate Camp plans!
>
> Mark
>
>
>
> 2009/10/11 James Holland <james at dogmanet.org<mailto:james at dogmanet.org>>
>
>
> Hello CRD people. I've been really quiet on this
> list recently because I've been actually starting to do
> some campaigning groundwork for building some examples of
> real democracy.
>
> As the climate camp was in SE london, I have some
> connections in the area and there are loads of inspiring
> grassroots campaigns going on; I have moved into the area
> and have spent the last few weeks meeting with transition
> towns, anti gentrification campaigns, labour struggles, anti
> school closure groups, residents associations, community
> forums etc etc.
>
>
> I've learned loads already including that you have
> to be more pragmatic about who you work with and how, and to
> look beyond people''s labels and affiliations.
> There's good people everywhere!
>  I'm focusing my efforts generally on lewisham and
> southwark, but also on particular areas within those
> boroughs. both of these boroughs have council-created forums
> that cover a small area (1 ward or slightly larger) that  i
> think are good targets to try and increase their democracy
> (open agendas, using consensus, encouraging more people to
> be involved) but also gradually taking more power. the first
> steps are to talk to people already involved in these
> structures and find out what's already happening, then
> probably to get them to use some of their budgets to
> increase participation, a
>
>
> I'm planning to build on the definition I sent out
> before which was something like - real democracy is when all
> the people of a community take complete and equal control
> for doing everything their community needs, (and no one has
> any power to say what other communities should do.)
>
> I can also report that there is an idea within climate
> camp to arrange something for the lead up to the election to
> expose the charade of democracy.
>
> james holland
> _______________________________________________
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>
>
>
>
> --
> "We hear men speaking for us of new laws strong and
> sweet /Yet is there no man speaketh as we speak in the
> street."
>
>
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James Holland

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