I've just been informed by a mutual friend that Ray Ferguson, of Bedfont, sadly passed away on Friday. He had been suffering with lung cancer.
I first met Ray back in 1996. Having fairly much established itself in the south of Isleworth the ICG had had a letter published in a local newspaper inviting other independently minded individuals from around the borough to get in touch with us with a view to working together.
Ray was one of those who responded. Although a right-of-centre Conservative by disposition, Ray was a man of his own mind and was not completely happy with the direction his own party was taking. ICG founder Tom Reader (himself a Conservative) and myself visited Ray at his modest Staines Road home and we agreed to pool some ideas and resources. Ray and a couple of his associates attended an ICG meeting held at the old Jolly Gardeners pub in Twickenham Road, Isleworth and I even hand-delivered a few thousand leaflets for his newly-formed Hounslow Residents' Group (HRG). Ray lent us a PC, then a rare commodity, and a printing press but in the event I couldn't get either of them to work.
The HRG concentrated heavily on opposing the then rather substantial package of grants issued by the London Borough of Hounslow, then as now under Labour control, and it was indeed the case that many of these seemed to serve no purpose other than to sustain organisations that had delivered electoral and political support for the Labour Party. Indeed in one case it seemed likely that Labour was actually diverting public money to a group of activists in an unsuccessful attempt to arrest the growth of the ICG in Isleworth under the completely fictitious guise of an "anti-fascist" operation.
However the HRG's emphasis on opposing more or less all grants, and in particular its focus on single issue organisations, left some of us feeling uncomfortable and fairly soon the two groups effectively agreed to differ and to function separately. The goodwill between us remained but, in the view of many of us, there was no real common ground between the HRG's conservative ethos and the ICG's progressive communitarianism.
But whatever similarities or differences Ray and I may have had at certain times, one thing that always stood out for me was Ray's absolute honesty. In disagreement he was civil, but Ray was never two-faced or duplicitous. He was clear and open about the things in which he believed, and always took the trouble to call and offer his congratulations when I and my colleagues had experienced triumph, and his commiserations when we had experienced defeat. He called me on the telephone only a couple of months ago to express his displeasure both at the outcome of the recent local elections, and at some of the elementary political miscalculations by others, some of whom he considered friends, that had brought it about.
For those who knew Ray it was not possible to dislike the man. It was easy to disagree with him, but that is what honest discourse is about. He always demonstrated respect regardless of whether one agreed with him or not.
My sincere condolences go out to his family, friends and all who knew him.
Showing posts with label Tom Reader. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Tom Reader. Show all posts
Sunday, 8 August 2010
Sunday, 21 June 2009
Impressions from the Hounslow Homes Away Day
I've not long returned from the annual Away Day of the Hounslow Homes Board, of which I am now a member, which this year took place at the Richmond Hill Hotel, just outside the gates of Richmond Park.
Despite it being called an Away Day, it is actually an Away Two Days as proceedings began yesterday (Friday) afternoon, and finished today (Saturday).
Some of my colleagues - both coalition colleagues from the Conservative Group and fellow ICG councillors - regard at least the overnight aspect of the event as an extravagance. Its defenders argue that it is the only occasion on which fifteen hard-working members of the Board, who are unremunerated for their efforts throughout the year, can avail themselves of such an opportunity to bond.
I very much doubt whether there is a "right" or "wrong" view about this, but nevertheless for good or for bad I opted to participate. I ate the lunch, stayed the night and participated in every session other than the "walkabout" at the close of the day, when I had to sneak off home slightly early to take my daughter to a party at the home of a schoolfriend some in some West End backwater.
One recurring theme of the discussions at the Away Day, both formal and informal, was the relationship between the Board and the local authority. It is very difficult for me to consider this question entirely as a new Board member without calling upon my previous experience as Lead Member for Housing for nearly three years. I am pleased that my Board colleagues seem to accept my new role as having the potential to introduce some fresh perspectives rather than viewing me as somebody whose brief is to keep an eye on them.
Prior to my being appointed to the Board I think it's fair to say that my opportunities to interact with the body as a whole had been limited. Regular partnership meetings were held with the Chair and Vice Chairs and with senior officers, and with the latter I also of course had many dealings on routine and sometimes not quite so routine operational matters. On the one occasion during the last year that I attended a Board meeting business was sadly sidetracked by some frankly unnecessary politicking from a very small number of members who unfortunately dominated the session. There are undoubtedly those for whom old habits do die hard.
But at this weekend's session I saw nothing but a group of highly motivated and capable people (and I refer both to officers and Board members) whose singular objective was to map out the future direction of the company as far as was possible against a background of uncertainty and probable change in the whole field of housing provision nationwide. There was no noticeable political agenda at play, even from the politicals (who are now very much a minority anyway) and the discussion was focussed, intelligent and very, very useful.
When I first assumed the role of Lead Member in 2006 things were very different. Even something as basic as arranging a meeting with senior officers presented seemingly insurmountable difficulties, with irritable negotiations about at which level it was appropriate to engage with whom, whether such and such an officer was of such importance that demanded the presence of the Leader of the Council and not a mere Lead Member, and much more besides. Views were exchanged but promises could not be depended upon to be kept, with word reaching us sometimes within half an hour of a meeting having ended that something completely different had been done than had been promised, and so on. And then there had been the small matter of the ill-tempered Hounslow Homes Management Review.
Back in those days I was charged with overcoming a horrible dilemma. There was no way things could have continued the way they were. As a point of principle I disagree with selling off social housing stock. My instinct was to take it back in-house but I recognised that ideologically this may have been difficult to sell to our coalition partners. And so, despite in theory being in control of the situation, I was negotiating from a place in limbo, unable to continue with the status quo but reluctant due to limited options to do anything to change it.
As often happens, fate intervened and the "oppo" gave way. There were important changes in the management team and a good working relationship was established. There were, of course, a few hiccups and flashbacks along the way, but by and large the relationship developed nicely.
Against all this, however, and in the face of what seems to be a very real recognistion of the benefits of a more tenant-focussed agenda, my fear has always been that this new positivism would not survive a return to a New Labour administration, that with a few tweaks the structure remained in place for a swift and seamless return to the bad old days. This weekend I saw the first very real signs that this might not be the case, even in the increasingly unlikely event of a reversion to Labour control next year. People seem to want to open up the organisation, to involve tenants and leaseholders, not because it is being something they are being told to do by the Lead Member but because it is self-evidently right. If anything, any political uncertainties come from elsewhere.
I left the Away Day highly enthused and encouraged about the future of Hounslow Homes. There are some procedural efficiencies that seem to be required of the organisation, but it has its heart in the right place and the personnel to make things work. It was perhaps symbolic that the event should have been held on a hill with a clear and panaromic view over miles around, with Ivybridge staring out boldly from the very centre of it. The late, great Tom Reader would, I believe, be a very happy man.
Despite it being called an Away Day, it is actually an Away Two Days as proceedings began yesterday (Friday) afternoon, and finished today (Saturday).
Some of my colleagues - both coalition colleagues from the Conservative Group and fellow ICG councillors - regard at least the overnight aspect of the event as an extravagance. Its defenders argue that it is the only occasion on which fifteen hard-working members of the Board, who are unremunerated for their efforts throughout the year, can avail themselves of such an opportunity to bond.
I very much doubt whether there is a "right" or "wrong" view about this, but nevertheless for good or for bad I opted to participate. I ate the lunch, stayed the night and participated in every session other than the "walkabout" at the close of the day, when I had to sneak off home slightly early to take my daughter to a party at the home of a schoolfriend some in some West End backwater.
One recurring theme of the discussions at the Away Day, both formal and informal, was the relationship between the Board and the local authority. It is very difficult for me to consider this question entirely as a new Board member without calling upon my previous experience as Lead Member for Housing for nearly three years. I am pleased that my Board colleagues seem to accept my new role as having the potential to introduce some fresh perspectives rather than viewing me as somebody whose brief is to keep an eye on them.
Prior to my being appointed to the Board I think it's fair to say that my opportunities to interact with the body as a whole had been limited. Regular partnership meetings were held with the Chair and Vice Chairs and with senior officers, and with the latter I also of course had many dealings on routine and sometimes not quite so routine operational matters. On the one occasion during the last year that I attended a Board meeting business was sadly sidetracked by some frankly unnecessary politicking from a very small number of members who unfortunately dominated the session. There are undoubtedly those for whom old habits do die hard.
But at this weekend's session I saw nothing but a group of highly motivated and capable people (and I refer both to officers and Board members) whose singular objective was to map out the future direction of the company as far as was possible against a background of uncertainty and probable change in the whole field of housing provision nationwide. There was no noticeable political agenda at play, even from the politicals (who are now very much a minority anyway) and the discussion was focussed, intelligent and very, very useful.
When I first assumed the role of Lead Member in 2006 things were very different. Even something as basic as arranging a meeting with senior officers presented seemingly insurmountable difficulties, with irritable negotiations about at which level it was appropriate to engage with whom, whether such and such an officer was of such importance that demanded the presence of the Leader of the Council and not a mere Lead Member, and much more besides. Views were exchanged but promises could not be depended upon to be kept, with word reaching us sometimes within half an hour of a meeting having ended that something completely different had been done than had been promised, and so on. And then there had been the small matter of the ill-tempered Hounslow Homes Management Review.
Back in those days I was charged with overcoming a horrible dilemma. There was no way things could have continued the way they were. As a point of principle I disagree with selling off social housing stock. My instinct was to take it back in-house but I recognised that ideologically this may have been difficult to sell to our coalition partners. And so, despite in theory being in control of the situation, I was negotiating from a place in limbo, unable to continue with the status quo but reluctant due to limited options to do anything to change it.
As often happens, fate intervened and the "oppo" gave way. There were important changes in the management team and a good working relationship was established. There were, of course, a few hiccups and flashbacks along the way, but by and large the relationship developed nicely.
Against all this, however, and in the face of what seems to be a very real recognistion of the benefits of a more tenant-focussed agenda, my fear has always been that this new positivism would not survive a return to a New Labour administration, that with a few tweaks the structure remained in place for a swift and seamless return to the bad old days. This weekend I saw the first very real signs that this might not be the case, even in the increasingly unlikely event of a reversion to Labour control next year. People seem to want to open up the organisation, to involve tenants and leaseholders, not because it is being something they are being told to do by the Lead Member but because it is self-evidently right. If anything, any political uncertainties come from elsewhere.
I left the Away Day highly enthused and encouraged about the future of Hounslow Homes. There are some procedural efficiencies that seem to be required of the organisation, but it has its heart in the right place and the personnel to make things work. It was perhaps symbolic that the event should have been held on a hill with a clear and panaromic view over miles around, with Ivybridge staring out boldly from the very centre of it. The late, great Tom Reader would, I believe, be a very happy man.
Monday, 12 May 2008
ICG Public Meeting to take place later this month
The Independent Community Group (ICG) will be hosting a Public Meeting at the Isleworth Working Men's Club in St. John's Road, Isleworth on Friday 23rd May, starting at 7.30 pm.
We are hoping that all six community councillors will be present at the meeting, and available to answer questions from members of the public about what they have been doing in their various posts and positions, as well as giving some insight into our plans for the remaining two years of the current council.
Those who have been with us throughout that fantastic voyage which commenced with our formation on 1st January 1994 will be mindful of just how far we have come since those days, when five or six comrades would sit around a beer-soaked table with me in the now-demolished Harlequin pub and bemoan the unfairness of the old administration's shenanigans which kept them off their own residents' association.
Most of those who serve the Group today were not involved in that particular battle, and have no first-hand experience of the issues which led to the creation of the ICG and forced our entry into the electoral fray which resulted in us having a councillor elected in 1998, three councillors elected in 2002, and six councillors elected in 2006 to a council with a new administration of which we are now part, with myself being given responsibility for the part of the Housing portfolio which oversees the local authority's relationship with Hounslow Homes and our various residents' associations around the borough. Nevertheless the principles and the desire for fairness and openness which inspired the creation of the ICG back in 1994 remain with every one of us as we set about the business of trying to reshape the local authority and imbue it with a new culture of transparency.
The ICG Public Meeting - much beloved of our first Chair, the late Tom Reader, and the Class of '94 - doesn't look a lot different today to those we held in those uncertain times. Whilst we crammed 200 people into Isleworth Public Hall last year to discuss the possible imposition of Controlled Parking Zones in and around South Street and St. John's Road, we are still capable of drawing in less than twenty on a bad day. It tends to depend on what the big issues are at the time.
Hopefully there is enough going on, and sufficient questions to be asked, to inspire a good crowd along to the IWMC on May 23rd. The Public Meeting is where we learned our trade, and in these heady days of Executive meetings and training conferences we forget our roots at our peril.
We are hoping that all six community councillors will be present at the meeting, and available to answer questions from members of the public about what they have been doing in their various posts and positions, as well as giving some insight into our plans for the remaining two years of the current council.
Those who have been with us throughout that fantastic voyage which commenced with our formation on 1st January 1994 will be mindful of just how far we have come since those days, when five or six comrades would sit around a beer-soaked table with me in the now-demolished Harlequin pub and bemoan the unfairness of the old administration's shenanigans which kept them off their own residents' association.
Most of those who serve the Group today were not involved in that particular battle, and have no first-hand experience of the issues which led to the creation of the ICG and forced our entry into the electoral fray which resulted in us having a councillor elected in 1998, three councillors elected in 2002, and six councillors elected in 2006 to a council with a new administration of which we are now part, with myself being given responsibility for the part of the Housing portfolio which oversees the local authority's relationship with Hounslow Homes and our various residents' associations around the borough. Nevertheless the principles and the desire for fairness and openness which inspired the creation of the ICG back in 1994 remain with every one of us as we set about the business of trying to reshape the local authority and imbue it with a new culture of transparency.
The ICG Public Meeting - much beloved of our first Chair, the late Tom Reader, and the Class of '94 - doesn't look a lot different today to those we held in those uncertain times. Whilst we crammed 200 people into Isleworth Public Hall last year to discuss the possible imposition of Controlled Parking Zones in and around South Street and St. John's Road, we are still capable of drawing in less than twenty on a bad day. It tends to depend on what the big issues are at the time.
Hopefully there is enough going on, and sufficient questions to be asked, to inspire a good crowd along to the IWMC on May 23rd. The Public Meeting is where we learned our trade, and in these heady days of Executive meetings and training conferences we forget our roots at our peril.
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