Councillor Howard Sykes, MBE, Leader of the Real Opposition and the Liberal Democrat Group on Oldham Council, has written to the Lord Chancellor and Secretary of State for Justice, Robert Buckland MP, seeking a change in the law after receiving a frustrating letter denying him a review of an unduly lenient sentence.
On 15 March, councillor Sykes wrote to the Attorney General’s Office asking for a review of a case in which Shaw resident, Javid Miah, 23, had sexually assaulted a woman in a frightening attack in Oldham town centre, but Miah had inexplicably not received an immediate custodial sentence for his crime.
Councillor Sykes said: “This case caused many of my constituents’ real disquiet. This offender lives in my hometown and yet he was set free to continue to pose a threat to my female constituents and to other women living elsewhere in Oldham. For a crime such as a sexual assault only a custodial sentence is in my view appropriate.”
After sending a reminder to the Attorney General’s Office that a response was long overdue, councillor Sykes was informed that ‘it is not possible for us to refer this sentence to the Court of Appeal. Although the Law Officers (the Attorney General and Solicitor General) do have the power to ask the Court of Appeal to review certain sentences which appear to them to be unduly lenient, this power only applies to sentences passed in a Crown Court.’
“Clearly then in this case the law is an ass,” added councillor Sykes. “This seems an appalling oversight in the legislation and I have now taken this matter up with the Lord Chancellor and Secretary of State requesting the power to review unduly lenient sentences be extended to those imposed in magistrates, as well as in Crown Courts.”
“An exciting prospect,” is how councillor Howard Sykes MBE, Oldham Liberal Democrat Group Leader, described the recent revelation by the Government’s advisory Climate Change Committee that up to 18% of all of Britain’s heat could in future come from disused coal mines amongst other sources.
The committee has just reported that waste heat from abandoned mines, industrial plants, data centres and sewage works could be redirected through district heating schemes to warm up to one fifth of all the UK’s homes, hospitals, schools and offices. Almost 40% of all Britain’s carbon footprint comes from burning gas for heating.
Such a scheme for Oldham town centre would represent the vision that councillor Sykes first suggested to the Leader at the Oldham Council meeting in October 2014.
“At that time, a certain Labour Cabinet Member was very dismissive of the idea, but to me it represented common sense,” said councillor Sykes. “Anyone who has visited the Square Knott photographic panorama in Gallery Oldham will see that in our Victorian town centre there were several coal mines scattered amongst the houses, pubs and shops, and across Oldham we operated coal mines to power our cotton mills.”
Floodwater in abandoned coal mines is heated by the Earth’s core, and the heat can be extracted using pumps to supply district heating schemes.
“Coal mine water heat represents a low-carbon source of energy and it is there ready to be extracted,” added councillor Sykes. “Ironically it is a green source of energy derived from a past activity that once polluted our environment that could be used to heat the many new homes planned for Oldham town centre.”
Councillor Sykes is hoping the recent good news about the Oldham Council’s Towns Fund bid will mean the project can go ahead. He concluded: “Oldham has just been awarded £24.4 million. Although this is only over half of the £41 million we asked for, it is nonetheless a substantial sum.”
“Part of Oldham’s bid involved financing exploratory work on a coal mine heat scheme in our town centre. I hope now the Labour Administration will prioritise this project as it will represent a significant and exciting step forward in helping to make our borough greener.”
Oldham Liberal Democrats have welcomed the adoption by the leaders of the world’s wealthiest nations of a proposal to levy a uniform 15% tax on the profits of multinationals, especially as it is similar to their own idea brought to the March 2021 Council meeting.
Chancellor Rishi Sunak, who is hosting the meeting of G7 leaders in London and Cornwall, announced an agreement in principal of a plan to introduce a 15% global minimum corporate tax rate on multinational corporations. Many of these domicile their head offices and declare corporate profits in no-tax havens or low-tax nations as a means of tax avoidance.
Commenting, the Leader of the Liberal Democrat Group, councillor Howard Sykes MBE said: “It would be nice to think Rishi Sunak did have the chance to read our March motion as this proposal mirrors our own idea to impose a tax on the excess online profits of multinationals, albeit on a national, rather than international, scale. Although 15% is too low a figure to impose on companies like Amazon, Facebook and Google, who report consistently obscene profits, it is a start as this is the first international agreement of its kind. So to Chancellor Sunak I say, ‘Tax a lot’.”
“There now needs to be more pressure from enlightened governments, politicians and faith leaders; charities and civil society groups; and concerned citizens to continue to press the G7 to make this tax real, substantial, and unavoidable”, added councillor Sykes. “And the money raised must be directed to where it is needed – alleviating the suffering of the world’s poor, tackling climate change, and supporting the recovery of our Covid-hit economies.”
The motion taken to the March 2021 meeting of Oldham Council by the Liberal Democrats (and approved) read:
Council 24 March 2021 – Notice of Opposition Business
Motion 1 – A Tax on Excess Online Profits
Council notes that whilst smaller High Street non-food retail outlets have been forcibly closed, and are facing business failure, because of the COVID-19 Lockdown, larger national businesses and multi-national businesses offering on-line products have thrived, reporting bumper profits.
Council notes that recent proposals from the UN and the EU are working to establish an international consensus on business taxation, to minimise profit-shifting for the purpose of avoiding corporation tax, but that these proposals are not likely to be introduced in time to have any impact on the excess online profits that some companies have made off the back of the coronavirus epidemic.
Raising a bespoke tax on excess online profits has precedent in the UK, and Council expresses its disappointment that the Chancellor has not yet introduced such a tax and believes that if we are, as the Prime Minister claims, ‘all in this together’, then the excessive profits of such on-line businesses should be subjected to a greater level of tax, and that the revenue raised employed to support our hollowed out public services (local government, schools and health) and the financial recovery of our High Street retailers.
Council resolves to ask the Chief Executive to write to:
The Chancellor of the Exchequer, The Rt Hon Rishi Sunak MP, urging him to introduce such a tax as soon as possible as one means to ensure that we are ‘all in this together’.
Our three local MPs, the Greater Manchester Mayor and the Leaders of the other nine AGMA authorities to seek their support for such a tax.
Proposed by: Seconded by:
Councillor Howard Sykes MBE Councillor Diane Williamson
A £40 million cut in support for renters – to below pre-pandemic levels – is likely to drive up homelessness rates across the borough, warns Shadow Cabinet member for Housing Sam Al-Hamdani.
The cuts to discretionary housing payments provide support to people claiming housing benefit or universal credit who face rent shortfalls, or for assistance with deposits. They are to be cut by 22%, in a change which was put through without attention being drawn to it in the spring budget.
Local Liberal Democrat Councillor Sam Al-Hamdani said: “So many people have spent the last year trying to manage in extraordinary circumstances. People’s jobs are at risk, and the last thing we need is for people to have emergency support withdrawn.
“The Government’s own figures show that three times as many private renters are behind on their payments as before coronavirus, and that as many again thought that they would fall behind in the next six months.”
The furlough scheme is due to end in September, and a ban on evictions during Covid was recently ended.
He continued: “Oldham is again likely to bear the brunt of this change. We have more people in tenuous accommodation, in precarious jobs, and who have borne the brunt of the pandemic’s impact.
“Once again, it is a decision taken by the Conservative Government in Westminster with little or no thought on the impact it will have on towns like ours.”
The Liberal Democrats want to see the promised report from the review on historic allegations of child sexual exploitation to be published in advance of the 14 July meeting of the Full Council and for time to be set aside to debate the report at the meeting.
The Leader of the Oldham Liberal Democrat Group, Councillor Howard Sykes MBE, has sent his request to the Leader of Oldham Council and the Chief Executive on 25 May and yet has had no response or acknowledgement (a response has now arrived).
In November 2019, Oldham Council and the Oldham Safeguarding Partnership commissioned the independent review from the Mayor of Greater Manchester. Two experienced investigators, Malcolm Newsam MBE, a childcare expert, and Gary Ridgeway, formerly a senior police officer specialising in public protection, are now working to finalise their report.
In December 2020, the Deputy Mayor of Greater Manchester, who has just been re-appointed, promised to publish the findings in the ‘middle of 2021’ and councillor Sykes wants to see that promise fulfilled.
“We are now almost ‘in the middle of 2021’ so it is my hope that the report will soon be published and that an agenda item can be tabled for the 14 July Council meeting so we can debate it”, said councillor Sykes. “If there is a further delay, I have asked for a special council meeting to be held to discuss the report.”
The Liberal Democrats have urged the government not to transfer the management of the country’s National Parks from local elected authorities to Whitehall mandarins.
Councillor Howard Sykes MBE has written to the responsible government minister, Lord Benyon, with a plea to keep control in local hands after plans leaked that National Parks Authorities could be abolished and a new National Landscapes Service created instead.
Commenting, Councillor Sykes said: “Part of Saddleworth falls within the Peak District National Park, and Oldham Council has a representative on the Authority through which local councillors, and their constituents, can raise issues. If the Authority is abolished and control reverts to Whitehall, we will no longer have any say in how the park is managed.”
“The Liberal Democrats believe that local public organisations, like our National Parks, should be managed locally and be accountable locally. We are convinced that transferring management of our National Park from local organisations to Whitehall civil servants would be a retrograde step, both for our environment and for our democracy.”
“We shall see if the Minister is able to reassure me that this will not happen, but, as this government is already poised to remove local accountability in planning through its Planning for the Future legislation, I am not hopeful.”
