UPDATED EVERY THURSDAY
Thursday 1st April 2004
All content © New Journal Enterprises, 2004.
 
 
 
 
 
NEWS   BY RICHARD OSLEY

Activist Petra Dando signs up Olive McCarty pictured here with her sons Ricky Warman and Connor Stewart

Housing Minister Keith Hill MP

Now minister blames the New Journal
THE housing minister who called tenants fighting the government’s flagship plans for council housing as “communists” and “Trotskyists” has also unleashed an attack on the New Journal for its extensive coverage of the debate.
In an unprovoked attack on this newspaper’s reports of Camden’s failed bid to join Whitehall’s Arms-Length Management Organisation (Almo) scheme, Keith Hill MP said: “If I may say so, Camden had a singularly hard struggle. They had to face an absolutely unremitting campaign on the part of the local newspaper, which is very widely read, the Camden New Journal, which certainly did not hesitate to misrepresent its interview with me. I had to send in a correction to them.”
His comments were made before a Parliamentary Select Committee earlier this year and can be found in the same transcript unearthed by the New Journal last week which confirms Mr Hill’s “communist” jibe at tenant activists.
He was referring to a tape-recorded meeting with a New Journal journalist last year, quotes taken from which were used accurately.
The New Journal presented both sides of the argument ahead of a ballot on the Almo programme, which would have seen management homes transfer from the Town Hall to a new board of tenants, councillors and independent appointees.
The pro-Almo and anti-Almo lobby were both given space in the newspaper’s weekly ‘Forum’ slot to air their opinions.
It was only after 77 per cent tenants and leaseholders who took part in the referendum voted against the scheme that the New Journal joined the united campaign for direct investment formed by residents and politicians from all parties, including Holborn and St Pancras MP Frank Dobson.
The campaign, which includes the popular petition circulated in the newspaper over the past two months, demands £283 million earmarked for the now aborted Almo plan is sent to Camden immediately.
Urgent repairs and upgrades will not be completed without it but so far ministers have not budged because residents have rejected government policies. We continue to urge readers to sign the petition demanding the money is sent directly to the Town Hall so that the work can begin.