24Mar 2021 by Sam Al-Hamdani
£2.5M cut from elderly and vulnerable yet only six paper responses to the proposals received

£2.5M cut from elderly and vulnerable yet only six paper responses to the proposals received

Borough news
With £2.5M in cuts that will hit the elderly and vulnerable in the next few months, Oldham’s Labour Council has failed to ask for the opinions and feedback from the very people who will be most affected by these cuts that will start to bite from April. Local Liberal Democrat campaigner, Mark Kenyon said: “Despite the Conservatives promising to help with Covid financing, Oldham’s Labour Council is proposing nearly £2.5 million of cuts to services for those in sheltered housing, adult social care and supported living. Many users of these services don’t use the internet.” Mark Kenyon continued: “Despite receiving assurances that those without the internet would be consulted, only six paper responses were received. More than 9,400 homes in Oldham do not have access to the internet. Digging deeper,…
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24Mar 2021 by Sam Al-Hamdani
The UK Shared Prosperity Fund, “let’s get it done”, say Liberal Democrats

The UK Shared Prosperity Fund, “let’s get it done”, say Liberal Democrats

Borough news
The Oldham Liberal Democrats want to see the Conservative Government honour the promise it made after the British people voted to Brexit to replace the funding received from the European Union with a new UK Shared Prosperity Fund. In the last round of European funding (2014–2020), the ten authorities of Greater Manchester received £322.75m, from the European Regional Development Funding (ERDF) (£176.78m) and the European Social Funding (ESF) (£145.97m). Over each of the six years this represented £53.8m per year. In the Conservative Party Manifesto for the 2017 General Election campaign, the party pledged to create this new fund to ‘reduce inequalities between communities across our four nations’. To help shape the fund the incoming Conservative government committed to ‘consult widely on the design of the fund, including with the…
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23Mar 2021 by Sam Al-Hamdani
£2.5M cut from elderly and vulnerable yet only six paper responses to the proposals received

£2.5M cut from elderly and vulnerable yet only six paper responses to the proposals received

Borough news
With £2.5M in cuts that will hit the elderly and vulnerable in the next few months, Oldham’s Labour Council has failed to ask for the opinions and feedback from the very people who will be most affected by these cuts that will start to bite from April. Local Liberal Democrat campaigner, Mark Kenyon said: “Despite the Conservatives promising to help with Covid financing, Oldham’s Labour Council is proposing nearly £2.5 million of cuts to services for those in sheltered housing, adult social care and supported living. Many users of these services don’t use the internet.” He continued: “Despite receiving assurances that those without the internet would be consulted, only six paper responses were received. More than 9,400 homes in Oldham do not have access to the internet. Digging deeper, it…
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23Mar 2021 by Sam Al-Hamdani
Sykes takes fight for pubs and hospitality industry to party conference

Sykes takes fight for pubs and hospitality industry to party conference

Borough news, Parliamentary news
Liberal Democrats endorsed Shaw Councillor Howard Sykes’s plea for more government and council support for the hard-pressed pub and hospitality trade at a special online fringe meeting hosted by Councillor Sykes at the party’s spring conference (Saturday 20 March). In addition to being Leader of the Opposition and the Liberal Democrat Group on Oldham Council, Councillor Howard Sykes MBE also serves as Leader of the Local Government Association’s Liberal Democrat Group, which has 2,400 elected members in England and Wales. Attendees from councils across the UK were able to listen to speakers who included campaigner Ellie Hudspeth from Britain’s biggest consumer organisation, the Campaign for Real Ale (CAMRA); Daisy Cooper, Liberal Democrat MP, spokesperson for Justice, and for Digital Culture Media and Sports; and councillor Chris White, Leader of St…
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23Mar 2021 by Sam Al-Hamdani
Pay your way – Liberal Democrats seek tax on excess online profits

Pay your way – Liberal Democrats seek tax on excess online profits

Borough news
Oldham’s Liberal Democrat Councillors are proposing a motion to the next full meeting of Oldham Council (Wednesday 24 March) calling on the Government to introduce a new tax on the excess profits generated by online traders during the COVID-19 Lockdown. The Leader of the Opposition and the Liberal Democrat Group, Councillor Howard Sykes MBE, is proposing the motion, backed by his colleague, Councillor Diane Williamson. Commenting Councillor Sykes said: “It seems singularly unfair that whilst high street businesses have spent the last year suffering under Lockdown, either being entirely closed or under significant restrictions, larger national and international businesses who have benefited from online shopping and home deliveries, and made bumper profits, are not paying their way in terms of taxation. “The Liberal Democrats believe that the government should introduce…
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19Mar 2021 by Sam Al-Hamdani
Lib Dem councillors push for step free access to Greenfield Station

Lib Dem councillors push for step free access to Greenfield Station

Borough news
Saddleworth’s Liberal Democrat Councillors are pushing again for step free access at Greenfield Station, signing the Step Free Access campaign’s petition to support accessible stations across the entire rail network. Local Liberal Democrat councillor Kevin Dawson said: “Greenfield Station is the only railway station in the whole of Oldham borough. It is a disgrace that it has remained inaccessible for all this time.” Councillor Garth Harkness who has been working for several years to reopen Diggle Station to provide Saddleworth with a second station, added: “With no other alternatives, it is an absolutely necessity that Greenfield Station gets step free access. This has been in limbo for too long – we have asked for a station elsewhere, but been rebuffed; we have been promised step-free access when the line is…
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19Mar 2021 by Sam Al-Hamdani
Failure to address flooding at Dunwood/Woodend, Shaw under fire from Liberal Democrats

Failure to address flooding at Dunwood/Woodend, Shaw under fire from Liberal Democrats

Borough news
Shaw Liberal Democrat Councillors will be demanding action from Oldham Borough Council to tackle flooding at Dunwood, after the continued failure by the Council and the Environment Agency to address the threat posed to local properties. Councillor Howard Sykes MBE said: “For many years we have had the problem of run-off rainwater from Whitfield threatening properties along Woodend and on Smallbrook Road, the owners of which are regularly obliged to deploy sandbags to prevent water entering their homes. After heavy rain it is also common to see the bowling green on Dunwood Park look like a lake, the footpaths unpassable on either side and Pencil Brook becomes a raging torrent.” After years of asking again and again for effective solutions to the problems at Dunwood, Shaw Councillors are once more…
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17Mar 2021 by Sam Al-Hamdani

Sykes seeks review of suspended sentence handed out to Shaw sexual offender

Borough news, CSE, domestic abuse and violence
Councillor Howard Sykes MBE, Liberal Democrat Councillor for Shaw Ward and Leader of the Opposition on Oldham Council, has written to the Attorney General, The Rt Hon Michael Ellis QC MP, seeking an urgent review of the suspended prison sentence handed down by Tameside Magistrates Court last week to Javed Miah from Shaw. Miah was convicted of a serious predatory sexual offence after he attacked a lone female in Oldham Town Centre. The victim was able to raise the alarm via an SOS function on her mobile phone causing the offender to run away. In his letter to the Attorney General, Councillor Sykes said: “Following the recent tragic death of Sarah Everard, the continued safety of women on our streets from predatory males will, I am sure, be especially at…
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15Mar 2021 by Sam Al-Hamdani
Local Liberal Democrat Councillors seek Council action over Shaw St Paul’s ‘travesty’

Local Liberal Democrat Councillors seek Council action over Shaw St Paul’s ‘travesty’

Borough news
Two years on from its partial collapse, and after £300,000 spent making the site safe, the pile of rubble that was the historic St Paul’s Church at the corner of Rochdale Road and Crompton Way remains a blot on Shaw’s landscape, and Shaw Liberal Democrat Councillors think action by Oldham Council is long overdue. Councillor Howard Sykes MBE has written on behalf of all three Shaw Liberal Democrat Councillors to the Leader of the Council asking for urgent Council action and funding to address the ‘travesty’ of St Pauls, reminding the Leader of his promise to the people of Oldham that the Creating a Better Place funding was to be used to make improvements across the whole of the borough, and that includes Shaw. Councillor Sykes said: “With Council intervention,…
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12Mar 2021 by Sam Al-Hamdani
Six-month Universal Credit extension a ‘disappointment’

Six-month Universal Credit extension a ‘disappointment’

Borough news, Parliamentary news
The Oldham Liberal Democrats are disappointed that Chancellor Rishi Sunak has chosen not to make the £20 uplift in Universal Credit permanent in the March Budget. Oldham Liberal Democrat Leader, Councillor Howard Sykes MBE, who also serves as Leader of the Liberal Democrat Group at the Local Government Association, joined over 30 Liberal Democrat Council Leaders and elected Mayors in England in writing to the government on this issue last month. Despite their plea to the Chancellor Rishi Sunak MP to respect January’s vote in Parliament calling for a permanent increase, the Chancellor has chosen only to extend the extra £20 per week uplift in Universal Credit benefit payments until the end of September. Councillor Howard Sykes MBE said: “Millions of people are suffering in this country as a result…
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