Catch up on the latest political news from across Kent with Rob Bailey, joined by Cllr Dr Lauren Sullivan, Labour's leader at Kent County Council and Cllr Patrik Garten, from Maidstone Borough Council.
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00:00 Welcome to the Kent Politics Show live on KMTV. I'm Rob Bailey. And this week, one Kent
00:28 Council says it's having trouble with space invaders. Gravesham Council has told the Mayor
00:33 of Lewisham to stop sending London families who need temporary homes over the border into
00:38 Kent. They say it's pushing up prices and taking up space that could be used by desperate
00:43 families who live in the borough. Well, joining me tonight is Dr Lauren Sullivan, Labour's
00:47 leader at Kent County Council, an opposition leader there, and a Gravesham Councillor.
00:52 Alongside her is Conservative Patrick Garton from Maidstone. Thank you both for joining
00:57 us. Lauren, this is obviously happening in your backyard. Do you know anything about
01:01 the scale of how many families are being moved in and how this is affecting Gravesham? So,
01:07 the honest answer is we don't know how many families have been moved in from Lewisham.
01:12 But we do know, we do know, I have a flavour of the impact. So, the impacts are on our
01:17 schools, on our hospitals, on GPs. We just don't know how many residents that may need
01:23 additional help or additional needs. But what the impact is on our homeless, growing number
01:30 of families that are finding themselves homeless in Gravesham is that we can't place them or
01:37 work with landlords in our area. So, that means that they then have to move. And so,
01:42 that's not right and that's not fair. At some, this is being talked about as one of the biggest
01:47 financial pressures on district councils, borough councils, a growing cost. For Gravesham,
01:52 the cost has grown 348% over the last five years. £1.8 million overspend of allocated
02:00 budget. So, the government give us £350,000 for this. But clearly, the need is so great
02:06 and of course, we have a duty to help those that are needing housing. Having some of that
02:12 space, some of that capacity taken up by London Borough, probably a richer borough is able
02:17 to pay higher costs, is that pushing up prices for you? Well, indeed, and that's part of
02:21 the problem. So, they have been paying over and above what market rate is. So, they're
02:26 almost stealing away landlords that would ordinarily in a market-based system be open
02:33 to either GBC Lettings, which is our own kind of flagship where we are looking to help landlords
02:39 get – give that confidence to landlords so that they can rent with us. We would take
02:43 their property. We would house people there. They would pay affordable rent, but we would
02:48 guarantee you that rent for two years. So, a really nice initiative to help people in
02:53 the area and then we're getting gazumped by people that are able to pay way in above the
02:58 market premium. So, it's not fair on anybody. Patrick, obviously, this is an issue that's
03:03 specifically risen up in Gravesend, Gravesham this week, but it's everywhere, isn't it?
03:08 It's not a specific issue at all. It's a Kent issue. It's a South of England issue. And
03:14 Gravesend is probably moving their needy residents further out into Medway.
03:21 Are you aware in Maidstone of this issue of other authorities moving families in?
03:26 Absolutely. Absolutely. In Maidstone and because we then are also pushed to seek places affordable
03:34 for our people to go. It's a…
03:36 It's a ripple effect.
03:37 Yeah, ripple effect. It's a sprawling effect.
03:41 You mentioned that it's private landlords which you have to work with, which means that
03:45 there's no control over the price of accommodation, is there? And that must leave you in a very
03:50 difficult position as local authority.
03:52 Very much so. I mean, what we do, what our property team does and what we as a ruling
03:58 party have as a plan is to build 1,000 new affordable homes in Maidstone, 1,000 new homes.
04:04 So, we are looking at the property market at all times to see where are opportunities
04:11 in Maidstone. It is actually important for us to grab the places before Lewisham or Croydon
04:17 or whoever grabs them before us. So, I think that's where the local authority needs to
04:23 be proactive to protect its own…
04:26 And it's not just Lewisham. Bromley, the likes of Bexley. There is a widespread of
04:33 this kind moving out. And yeah, absolutely, we need to build houses and it's almost cheaper
04:37 now to invest in the capital to buy houses and then for a temporary accommodation.
04:42 Not almost. It is that cheaper. It's just simply cheaper. And we have a few schemes
04:50 in the pipeline at the moment and the figures are actually so good with all the grants we
04:56 are getting and the long-term interest rates that we are not only going for the affordable,
05:02 but for the social rent on some of the developments we are building now.
05:07 Can affordable housing be built fast enough? Because this is a critical issue now, isn't
05:12 it? And housing is something which appears sometime later. Is there a solution that can
05:19 meet the demand now?
05:20 I don't think so, because people are living longer. We've got people coming to this country,
05:26 people having children and we've been sitting asleep on the wheel for about 50 years in
05:31 this country. I think we have a lot of catch-up to do before and that's why everybody has
05:39 such a backlog and we can't build as fast as we need to.
05:42 Lauren, I mean, people in Gravesham will be thinking about this. There's always a need
05:45 for affordable homes. There's also dismay every time someone suggests another bit of
05:49 land is going to be used for lots more houses and where will the services come from for
05:52 that. It's a tricky one, isn't it?
05:53 It is, but I think it's about the tenure. So, it's about social housing, it's about
05:57 council housing. I think if people know that that house could be for them or their family
06:03 or their community, they're not going to be priced out of it. I mean, there's a new housing
06:07 estate that's near us. There's no way we could have afforded to live there because it's so
06:12 much more expensive. Well, that's not fair. But if you know that there is a house, basically
06:16 we need to expand the council housing build programme because then you know that it's
06:23 people that have lived in the borough for over three years that can apply and that's
06:27 what we kind of need. So, at least you know that it's going to be local people that can
06:31 live in an area that's close to their home.
06:33 Brilliant. Well, we'll move on from there. Next tonight, vulnerable people in Kent could
06:38 be asked to pay up to £30 a week more for care in their homes. Kent County Council is
06:43 considering the increase as it continues to struggle with rising costs and falling funding.
06:48 But a disabled campaigner from Maidstone says it could wreak havoc on the lives of service
06:52 users. Our local democracy reporter, Gabrielle Morris, met her.
06:56 I've been attacked enough in some ways and that we don't choose to be like this. We don't
07:02 choose to, we want to be out there living our lives and contributing. Yeah, so I think
07:11 it's a frightening tactic to disabled people sometimes when they know the charge is going
07:17 up and you know, I know friends that have said, well, why, why am I alive?
07:27 Lauren, Kent County Council's Conservative administration says it has no choice but to
07:31 look at measures like this because it has a huge funding gap and the budget is under
07:36 too much pressure. As a Labour leader, what would you do differently?
07:42 So, we're in this predicament because the government have not fully funded or properly
07:48 funded adult social services. So, we need to grasp that nettle and deal with that. So,
07:55 Labour National would be looking at a national care service and that's really about making
08:00 it funding fairer. In terms of Labour and if Labour were running Kent County Council,
08:06 well, we'd be looking at different ways to fill that, that, those short cut, those savings.
08:11 So, we would be looking at the commission market, the commissioned area and actually
08:15 look at, we could be doing services in-house, we could be doing services with non-profit
08:21 organisations, we could do services that work with, there are other councils across the
08:25 country that have a balanced adult social services budget. What are they doing differently?
08:30 That's what, that's what we would be looking at and doing differently so that we're not
08:34 passing on the cost to, again, vulnerable adults, vulnerable people that are already,
08:40 I think in that piece there they said how they don't have the ability to go out and
08:44 earn more money. They are literally living hand to mouth based on what the state can
08:48 provide and we're taking more from that. That's just not right, that's not fair.
08:53 Patrick, obviously this is, it's not a district council issue but this is someone who lives
08:57 in the Maidstone borough. Indeed, I would just say to Lauren, good luck with your plans.
09:03 In my view KCC is simply too big and too overblown to be a local authority. The long-term answer
09:12 would be unitaries in Kent and breaking up KCC. I think that's the only way how we can
09:19 run an effective local authority. Maidstone currently as a district council, we've done
09:24 so many good things over the last two years. We've got a balanced budget, local plan which
09:30 will come to council next week, hopefully we get it through. So it can be done properly,
09:38 a local authority can be run with the right people properly but KCC, your party or my
09:44 party I think nobody can run KCC. It's just too big for local authority.
09:49 I want to keep the focus on the people who are being affected by this because there's
09:53 an interesting change happening here. This is, the amount of money people receive in
09:57 attendance allowance, in personal independent payment, in disability living allowance is
10:01 essentially going to be used to means test the increase in cost. So if people are getting
10:05 more in benefits, the amount they have to spend goes up. Those people are receiving
10:10 more in benefits because they need more care but actually they were going to see an inflationary
10:16 pressure on that which means that they might not be able to afford more, they'll just pay
10:18 more for the stuff they get. That's how I've read it, do you see it that way?
10:24 So it's, you pay more and get less service, in a nutshell.
10:29 In a nutshell, that seems to be, if you're getting more in in benefits from the government
10:33 then you might be charged more for the care that you receive.
10:37 So then where does that leave the local economy, where does that leave spending power, where
10:41 does that leave, it just seems incredibly complicated and I think there's a consultation
10:45 going on at the moment with Kent County Council for this and those particular charges. But
10:50 all those savings are already baked into the budget, those savings have to be taken. So
10:54 in terms of going out to consultation and listening and describing all those things
10:58 that you've just said there, well it's incredibly complicated for anybody to understand and
11:03 quite frankly they're going to have to do it anyway so it's a bit of a sham consultation.
11:07 We've got a small amount of time, Patrick do you want to come back on that?
11:11 Yeah I mean it's just gone to consultation, it's, you've got to streamline government
11:16 in general and local government in particular and the slimmer the process, the slimmer the
11:22 application is for the individual, the more easier it is to administer things. Otherwise,
11:30 I mean nurses need to get affordable housing from the local authority because they're
11:35 not earning enough money so there's something wrong with the system right from the top.
11:39 We'll have to take a short break there, when we come back can you guess which Kent
11:43 village has employed its own community warden in defiance of cuts by Kent County Council?
11:47 You'll find out after this.
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15:07 Welcome back to the Kent Politics Show live on KMTV.
15:12 Next tonight, Headcorn has become the first Kent community to employ its own community warden.
15:18 Stuart Ellesmere used to be employed to patrol the streets and help villages by Kent County Council.
15:23 But when they cut funding for the role, the parish council decided to step in.
15:28 Local democracy reporter Gabriel Morris reports.
15:31 New boots on the ground, but the wearer, no stranger to Headcorn.
15:38 Till last week, he was a Kent County Council community warden.
15:42 Stuart's employer now Headcorn Parish Council.
15:46 KCC is cutting back on their community warden service, saving them one million pounds.
15:52 The county council says a new model will be introduced with room to be scaled up.
15:58 There is a reduction in money coming into councils and to agencies and everybody else.
16:05 So if an area wants to be more resilient and look after its own people, then I think it's a fantastic thing.
16:13 A parish council employing a community warden is thought to be the first in Kent.
16:18 And Headcorn Parish Council claim the cost to the taxpayer will be less than a first class stamp per year.
16:25 There's been an incident in the village. OK, I'll get a community liaison officer to go and have a look at it.
16:30 Thank you very much. Bye.
16:32 We felt that if that position was lost, a lot of people in the village, the most vulnerable people in the village, would very quickly know about it.
16:41 Their problems would increase. It would make it so that we were then responsible for these people.
16:46 But without all the links and knowledge that Stuart has, they're able to help them.
16:52 He'll be helping vulnerable people in the community. But Headcorn also has a shoplifting problem.
16:58 I hope it would encourage shopkeepers to come and talk to me if that is the case.
17:03 And then we can then pass those concerns on to Kent Police and Maystone Borough.
17:08 The parish council believes at least two shops have been lost on a high street due to ongoing theft in the past few years.
17:14 They say a community liaison officer can only go so far in encouraging owners to report crimes if the police aren't seen regularly.
17:22 The truth is there's nothing we can do about the police. We can't employ a policeman.
17:28 I know we have police. You can see them all the time driving through the village. They're not stopping.
17:35 Now I know that we do have two resident police people and that's marvellous news.
17:42 But they need to be more visible.
17:44 Kent Police has promised to increase its presence in the future.
17:48 And that will be welcome news as communities see a reduction in wardens.
17:53 But it's thought other parishes might follow suit in hiring their own community liaison officer.
18:00 Gavin Morris in Headcorn.
18:03 Still here with me is Maystone Conservative Patrick Garton and Dr Lauren Sullivan, leader of the opposition at Kent County Council.
18:09 Patrick, this is happening in your backyard, in Maystone at least.
18:14 An interesting innovation. Do you welcome it?
18:16 Indeed. And it is a success story so far.
18:20 KCC, I was critical of KCC earlier.
18:23 KCC is, again, it was too big for the service they provided.
18:27 It's a non statutory service. It doesn't have to be provided.
18:30 But if you provide it, do it properly. And KCC never did it.
18:33 The community warden, his old patch was right up to Parkwood, to Shepway, the Maystone Shepway.
18:42 And then he was doing holiday relief in Staplehurst and some other wards.
18:47 So now he's only responsible for the parish of Headcorn.
18:52 And that works very, very well.
18:54 And it's 90 pence per month per household.
18:58 So if a community wants a community service, then let the community pay for it and get proper quality service.
19:06 At the end of the day, you get what you pay for.
19:09 A kind of cooperative approach to community policing.
19:11 Absolutely.
19:12 It's an interesting idea. Is there a model here for people to follow?
19:15 Well, I think parish councils don't have a cap on the precept that they set.
19:20 And clearly, this community warden has done a fantastic job.
19:24 As do most, if not all, community wardens across Kent.
19:28 And it's been a real shame that they've had to pull back the funding and cut the funding so much.
19:33 We proposed in our alternative budget that we would expand the community warden service.
19:38 Because we recognise that they also are social prescribers.
19:42 They are also navigators, because they know all the different services that are going on in a particular area.
19:48 And can signpost.
19:50 So we find that there is so much duplication that's happening, either with the NHS or with Kent.
19:55 That if you just bring it all together, you could have a service with 20 community wardens in a district.
20:03 That's incredible.
20:05 In terms of whether it helps with deprived areas as well, and just involving community, giving back confidence.
20:12 So many of our community wardens help with scams, as in educating older people about scams.
20:18 Giving back reassurance when there's been a major incident.
20:23 They are phenomenal.
20:25 And I can't speak highly of them, enough of them.
20:28 It's interesting, you mentioned disadvantaged areas there.
20:31 Obviously, you were mentioning a parish can organise itself to do something like this.
20:35 There'll be other parishes around Maidstone, I'm sure, watching this with interest and around the county.
20:40 But not all areas have a parish level of council.
20:43 So let's say urban parts of Maidstone where a non-parish, but they have very specific community issues.
20:50 They're not part of the town centre.
20:52 Don't get that police presence in the same way as we've heard there from Headquarters.
20:56 They don't really have a mechanism for doing something like this.
20:59 Are we going to see a haves and have-nots between rural parishes and kind of suburban estate areas?
21:06 There's an unfairness in the council tax system that those areas which have parishes pay substantially more council tax.
21:14 So if we increase or if we are having a town council for Maidstone, another layer of, a third layer of local government,
21:24 then the town council with taxing powers and spending powers could take care of community wardens of town centre refurbishments, etc.
21:35 to serve the local community.
21:39 I think it's very good to have a unitary authority and a very local lower layer below,
21:47 but not the mishmash we've got of three, maybe two local authorities and you're responsible for the middle of the road
21:55 and we are for the side, for the curb of the road.
21:57 It's nonsense what we're having at the moment in Kent.
22:00 It's interesting, the answer to all problems seems to be a complete restructuring of local government,
22:03 which would sound quite terrifying I imagine to a lot of people.
22:06 Invite me for a late night discussion on your problem and we can go a bit more into detail.
22:11 Look, shouldn't the police be doing this job though?
22:14 Well yeah. I mean there's a huge element, so the PCSOs were brilliant,
22:20 although Kent Police had a policy that they would stay in an area for two years and then move on.
22:25 That just doesn't make any sense because you make those relationships and it's relationships, it's trust.
22:32 You need to know that individual.
22:34 The community wardens have been fantastic for building those relationships and trust.
22:38 The police, absolutely. And I think the neighbourhood policing model worked.
22:43 We just see them going around in police cars.
22:45 I mean they are such under pressure, the police officers at the moment,
22:49 we know that they've been cut back in funding, so they do a great job.
22:53 But in terms of getting out there in the community and giving back confidence,
22:57 I think that's where we'd like to see our police officers and build that relationship with them.
23:01 I don't think it was a police policy actually.
23:05 Matthew Scott was always keen on keeping his PCSOs on the patch,
23:10 but the individual PCSOs wanted then after two years move on to become proper policemen with a proper pay package.
23:18 So I think that's where the problem was in the system.
23:21 If you have a policeman with the arrest powers and with the right pay package on the ground, they will stay there.
23:29 I want to ask you just as we come towards the end of the show tonight,
23:33 we've had an awful lot of focus this week on the way that people conduct themselves around politicians.
23:37 We've seen what's happened with Diane Abbott and the language that was used about her and Downing Street's response to that.
23:44 We've also had that locally this week in Whitstable,
23:47 two Labour councillors were being verbally abused, called the police for help, the police didn't come.
23:52 What do you think, from your point of view as someone who's running for parliament,
23:58 as someone who is a councillor at two levels, is there a problem here that is not being addressed well enough?
24:05 I think there is a problem with safety. I think there is a problem with discourse.
24:13 I think, you have an opinion, I have an opinion, we need to preserve the right to have a voice, have an opinion,
24:20 and not have their threat of violence upon having an opinion.
24:25 I have to make sure that I'm prepared in where I go, that there are security things,
24:30 but at the end of the line though, I want to know that I've got confidence that there is going to be a police officer if I need it.
24:37 I think that's the same for all residents in Kent, whether that be a burglary, whether that be a break-ins,
24:42 whatever it may be, we want that assurity that there is going to be a police officer that arrives when we need it.
24:47 In terms of vitriol against, in particular, women candidates as well,
24:53 we're looking to our other male allies to also come in and weigh in, and that's not acceptable.
25:01 You wouldn't say that to your mum, why would you say that to a random woman that really wants to make a difference
25:07 in the community that she stands in? So I think it's incredibly important that we keep shining a spotlight on this,
25:14 so thank you for doing that, because it can be better, and I think politics is only better when you've got more people
25:20 from different diverse backgrounds in it making decisions.
25:23 How do we detoxify that?
25:26 I think this whole thing of toxic relationships or toxic meetings with constituents is part and parcel of the game,
25:33 and I think you've got to have thick skin to enter politics.
25:37 There's got to be a limit though, hasn't there?
25:39 And there has to be a limit, and the problem with today's society is that we are too much in our boxes,
25:43 be it in our cars or in our social media, we are no longer interacting with people,
25:49 and that's why this behaviour becomes more and more aggressive, more and more vile towards people in society.
25:56 So I think that's where the biggest problem is. Maybe I can finish on a little anecdote.
26:03 When I was doing my rounds and knocked on every house in my ward at the last election,
26:09 the people who were the rudest to me were the first ones to ask for help within three months after the election.
26:15 I don't know what we learned from that, but that's an interesting observation.
26:19 But that's all we have time for tonight at the Kent Politics Show.
26:22 Thank you to both of my guests for coming into the studio. We'll be back next week.
26:27 Don't miss more politics news, analysis and opinion at Kent Online,
26:32 including the Kent Politics podcast featuring the local democracy reporters that cover across Kent.
26:37 Stay with us tonight because Kent Tonight is coming up with all the latest news from around the county.
26:42 Have a great weekend.
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