Gospel Oak councillor Maeve McCormack tells Labour group she is standing down
MAEVE McCormack has told the Labour group in Camden that “the ongoing housing crisis affects councillors too”, that she’s moved out of this pricey borough and… is standing down as a councillor in Gospel Oak. She won a by-election there in 2013.
Here’s her email to group sent this afternoon:
Dear all,
I’m emailing to let you all know that it is with deep regret that I have decided to stand down as a councillor. Sadly the ongoing housing crisis affects councillors too, and high prices have now forced me to move out of Camden to live elsewhere.
I’ve had to make a really tough choice between what I love doing and where I can afford to live now and in the future.
It has been a real privilege to serve the residents of Gospel Oak as their councillor, and I know they will be in safe hands with my ward colleagues Larraine and Theo, who I have greatly enjoyed working with over the last four years. In that time, I’ve been really proud of the work which, as Camden Labour, we’ve delivered for Gospel Oak – new council homes in Bacton, major redevelopment at St Dominic’s, Carlton and Gospel Oak primary schools and inmore.
My resignation will be formalised later today. Before then I wanted to thank all of you for all of your support over the last four years – I will always be proud to have been a member of Camden Labour group, which continues to deliver for Camden residents despite financial constraints. Gospel Oak has benefited hugely from the commitment of councillors across Labour group – it’s thanks to all of you that we have been able to deliver much needed new homes, investment in local schools and much more. I know that work will continue.
With thanks, and best wishes,
Maeve
Richard Osley 
There’s a tragic irony in the fact that Ms McCormack cites the ‘housing crisis’ and the affordability of housing as a key reason behind standing down as a councillor and moving out of the borough of Camden.
That she then also claims that “residents of Gospel Oak… will be in safe hands with my ward colleague… Theo [Blackwell]” is the very bitter icing on the cake. Theo Blackwell is the prime mover behind the “disposal” of publicly owned assets and “land we no longer need” [(c) Theo Blackwell] resulting in the almost endless building of predominantly hugely unaffordable “affordable” housing on what were formerly publicly owned sites.
No doubt Mr Blackwell will respond here within minutes championing the huge successes that he — if nobody else — seems convinced have arisen as a result of the great Camden Community Investment Programme giveaway.
It will be interesting to see how Mr Blackwell proposes he continues to fill Camden Council coffers in the face of continued and growing central government funding cuts now that there’s precious little publicly owned land left to deliver into the hands of preferred developers, or on which to build the desperately needed and genuinely affordable council homes for which the borough is crying out.
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Actually, the Community Investment Programme relies mainly on regeneration, and has very few sales.
The council has a new interactive website so everyone can see for themselves, rather than read these angry and ill-informed political attacks.
http://1.cip.camden.web19.rocktimeweb.net/
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Not exactly a great loss. Maeve MacCormack was just yet another Labour clone mediocrity who actually didn’t achieve anything much apart from going through the motions in the same old way. It will be interesting to see if the Lib-Dem are now resurgent and/or the Conservatives will make inroads given Labour’s incoherence on just about anything under the sun.
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I keep hearing about the threat to our way of life if all the thousands of EU workers we depend on leave our borough due to Brexit. Where are they housed and where do they live, especially considering the incredibly low salaries they are paid? If Ms MacCormack cannot afford to rent here how do these EU workers on whom we depend? Could it be that they live in very overcrowded conditions in what the council calls ‘homes of multiple occupation’ and are being charged outlandish rents for the privilege by absentee landlords possibly assisted by tax payer subsidies? I wonder, as those in a similar position to Ms MacCormack leave, the property vacated is sold to outside financiers or sub divided to provide inadequate housing for low income immigrant workers. Is Camden becoming an increasingly divided community – low paid exploited immigrant labour living in overcrowded conditions on the one hand and wealthy property (much of it foreign) owners on the other?
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I agree with Jo Black no loss this one!. in effect suffering through her own policies and Blackwells of course, Affordable housing ~WHERE?
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