Hackney IWCA Launch INDEPENDENT KIDS' CINEMA

Posted: August 22, 2003 | Filed under: Community Facilities, Events | Comments Off on Hackney IWCA Launch INDEPENDENT KIDS' CINEMA

WHO
Hackney Independent Working Class Association (www.hackneyiwca.fsnet.co.uk) this week launch their Independent Kids’ Cinema with 4 showings of the Disney film ATLANTIS

WHAT
The Independent Kids’ Cinema is a series of film shows put on for local kids in community centres, with the help and support of Tenants Associations. We ran a successful pilot in the summer half term and are now launching it with 4 showings on 4 different Hackney estates.

WHY
The IWCA has always made a point of getting involved in the local community. We argue that young people need more facilities and more investment in their future, and that working class areas have suffered most with council cutbacks. This is a chance to put our money where our mouth is.

WHERE & WHEN
Goldsmith’s Community Centre – Thursday 28th August 10am
Fellows Court Community Centre – Thursday 28th August 3.30pm
Haggerston Community Centre – Friday 29th August 11am
Arden Estate Community Hall – Friday 29th August 4pm

Working class rule in working class areas!

IWCA Launched as National Organisation

Posted: August 10, 2003 | Filed under: Uncategorized | Comments Off on IWCA Launched as National Organisation

10th August 2003

On Monday 28 July 2003 the Independent Working Class Association launched itself as a national organisation with its first manifesto, entitled ‘Working class rule in working class areas’.
‘The IWCA has chosen the Aylesbury estate for this event today because it is, in our opinion, symbolic of the failure of the New Labour project to improve the lives of those once considered the party’s core constituency – the millions of working class people who live on neglected estates such as this.’

See the national website for the full story and more details of how to join the IWCA and support our GLA campaign next year.

IWCA Attacks Councillors' Pay Hikes As Youth Cuts Bite

Posted: August 10, 2003 | Filed under: Community Facilities, Hackney Council, Schools | Comments Off on IWCA Attacks Councillors' Pay Hikes As Youth Cuts Bite

In a typically tasteless display of Hackney Council’s real priorities, councillors have awarded themselves a sizeable pay rise while at the same time overseeing the cuts to summer playscheme places. In a letter to the Hackney Gazette, which reported both stories last week, Carl Taylor responds:

I have to congratulate the gazette, once again, for juxtaposing two stories in last week’s edition, which demonstrate the misplaced priorities of Hackney Council: “Councillors give themselves pay rise” and “No place to go”, about the reduction in summer playscheme places for 5 -13 year olds from 36 schemes to just six.

This will, of course, as Hackney Play Association say, “have a direct impact on youth offending and anti-social behaviour”.

The ‘confusion’ of responsibility between the Council and the Learning Trust is not a new phenomenon. The recent closure of Laburnum School was, according to the council, the responsibility of the Learning Trust, while the LT (quoted in a national newspaper) maintain that “… they [Hackney Council] retain ultimate authority for education in the borough”. As with other Hackney Council privatisations, for example the late but unlamented ITNet debacle in the Housing Benefit service, it is easy to see how this abdication of responsibility is very convenient for those who are supposed to be accountable to their electors.

Now we have the sickening spectacle of large pay rises for councilors, recommended by an “independent” panel. Luke Akehurst asks us to believe that this will safeguard them against “allegations of having our noses in the trough”. I – and no doubt other Gazette readers – would be very interested to know exactly who made up this independent panel. Are they as independent as they unconvincingly claim Learning Trust to be? And how does this unjustifiably pay hike square with the cuts being made to youth provision in the borough?

You might be able to fool some of us some of the time, but you ain’t fooling all of us all of the time!