Khalid Mahmood
Main Page: Khalid Mahmood (Labour - Birmingham, Perry Barr)Citizens Advice Bureaux (Birmingham)
Khalid Mahmood Excerpts(13 years, 3 months ago)
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John Hemming
I have been working with the city council on funding proposals to maintain a substantial part of the CAB service, so that has been happening.
Mr Mahmood
The hon. Member for Birmingham, Yardley (John Hemming) is not dealing with the real issue. I have two CAB in my area—one in my constituency and one just outside—which serve some of the most deprived people in the area. Those people have real issues in respect of health, housing and mental health. An organisation called COPE: Black Mental Health Foundation, which provides advice on mental health issues, will close in the next two months because the city council is not providing any support. The Asian Resource Centre is also closing. As my hon. Friend the Member for Birmingham, Erdington (Jack Dromey) says, there will be huge issues around support for the most vulnerable in our society, but there has been no dialogue at all with the city council on that.
Jack Dromey
My hon. Friend is, of course, right; it is not just the CAB. Some of the 13 organisations that are threatened are the Afro-Caribbean Millennium Centre, Age Concern in Birmingham and Perry Barr, the Birmingham Asian Resource Centre, the TUC Centre for the Unemployed and the Chinese Community Centre. A whole range of advice services catering for the needs of the various communities of Birmingham are all facing closure. In total, between 80,000 and 100,000 people seek advice from those 13 advice services each year. That is one in 10 of Birmingham’s citizens, or one in four families. Such is the scale of need that those admirable institutions meet at present.
It would appear that the cuts are not just cruel and callous; they may be unlawful as well. The National Council for Voluntary Organisations, an admirable organisation, has written to Birmingham city council to raise concerns over the legality of the cuts in relation to consultation and equality impact assessments. Many of us will give evidence in any proceedings that are held because we know from our experience that there was no proper consultation in advance, and that no serious impact assessments were conducted. The council made the decisions just before Christmas, and it has gone hell for leather to implement the next stages without proper consultation or impact assessments.
It is essential that the Government and the council act. If a solution is to be found that will secure the long-term future of these admirable organisations, there will need to be at least interim funding while we seek a long-term solution.