Building a council that listens to and learns from Hackney’s residents, workers and small business owners

We believe that Hackney Council belongs to the people of Hackney – It is ours and how the Council works and makes decisions must reflect that. 

Unfortunately, under Labour, Hackney Council doesn’t listen to Hackney residents and it doesn’t trust or respect us. With residents, as with workers and small business owners, it shuts people out rather than opening up and learning from them. 

“From Low Traffic Neighbourhoods to Children’s Centre and school closures, from estate regeneration to Pension Fund investments, there is widespread discontent with how Hackney Council consults residents.” (Morning Lane People’s Space)

The current Labour-controlled Council doesn’t just shut out its residents, it stifles debate and manipulates decision making inside the Town Hall. 

We believe that if Hackney Council listened, it would do a better job. For example, it could have avoided the Fashion Hub fiasco on Morning Lane. We will work to transform how our Council operates, to ensure that its resources meet the needs of everyone in Hackney.

A socialist council works from the bottom up not top down

As socialists, we believe in a society based in equality not hierarchies. We will bring lived experience into all decision making. We want to use our collective knowledge, skills and experience to make Hackney better. That means our Council will involve EVERYONE in its decisions. People of all ages, abilities, backgrounds, heritages, incomes, faiths, genders and sexual orientations.  Everyone.

We’re working to restore trust

We’re collaborating with residents and campaigns groups, by:

• Holding regular People’s Forums where we can learn from residents about the issues that matter to them.
• Supporting residents speaking in Council meetings on issues they care about including school exclusions, housing repairs, and road safety – and we have kept them on the agenda.
• Continuing to demand, alongside Hackney Unison and local Palestine solidarity campaigns, that Hackney ceases to invest workers’ pensions in Israel’s war crimes. 
• Securing with parents, students and professionals, the first ever safeguarding review of a whole school. The external report on behaviour management at Victoria Mossbourne Academy exposes the harm done to some young people’s mental health and life chances. We continue to challenge punitive behaviour policies and high exclusion rates across the borough. 

We are active in local Tenants and Residents Associations (TRAs), trade unions and campaigns – against gentrification, for renters’ rights, road safety and more.

What we’ll do if we run the council with the Greens after May

There is no point in doing consultation, only to ignore the results. Our key priority is to work with residents to co-produce a Consultation Charter which will commit the Council to honest and open engagement and to implementing the results.

To support this, we will: 

• Make all Council documents accessible, shorter and easier to understand, with clear signposting to find what you need. 
• Create a user-friendly version of the budget and accounts, with online and offline ways for residents to ask questions and get answers.
• Hold a referendum on whether to get rid of Hackney’s directly-elected Mayor – currently the Mayor and the cabinet dominate Council decision making. Other Council structures can give all the elected councillors a bigger say in decisions.
• Work with unions to ensure that Council staff have high-quality working conditions. As part of this we’ll bring more jobs in house, reducing outsourcing, agency work and consultancy.
• Build powerful Hackney networks, with the Council working alongside TRAs, community organisations, charities and workers to put real pressure on central Government to provide the resources Hackney residents need and deserve.
• Involve residents, business owners and workers in the decisions that affect them, such as, changes to parking when there are long-term building works.