Half-arsed apology, bigging myself up and re-stating my mission

 To The Trustees of Southwater Area Community Centre re St Leonards Warrior Square Station & clarifying my Southwater Area interests.

Unfortunately, last Friday, there was something of a “run-in” with the Southwater Area Community Centre Manager whilst I tried to hold myself accountable for some on-line behaviour and find out what the consequences of my over-hasty actions had been.

What has clearly compounded the difficulty of the communication with the community centre manager is that she has apparently been set up to have a negative view, or at very least, an un-rounded view of my 2011-2015 time as one of your office tenants, and towards the end of that time, a fellow trustee.

This letter, in my opinion, needs to address all the above within the context of my passion for accountability and healing which has led me into becoming the Independent Candidate (for Hastings & Rye parliamentary constituency) 2019-2029?. Two Sundays ago, in the middle of the night the same passion led me to “drop a pin” on Warrior Square Station platform using the Google Business app. My intention was to mark that this is the epicentre of where my main company, Mediation Support Ltd, wishes to continue to mediate unresolved matters that block people's energies from generating the “Sharing and Care4Caring” community we could have to get through difficult times.

As I said last Friday, having dropped that pin named “Mediation Support Ltd” on the northern platform of St Leonards Warrior Square station, I “got carried away”, for, when asked to confirm the location by means of Google sending a card in the post, I let myself down in asking the card to be addressed to the Community Centre, rather than, for example, a nearby friend's address. Not only did I not have permission to use the Community Centre address in this way but, when last asking to be considered as a tenant again at the Community Centre whilst shaping the last general election campaign to “Move Forward More Together” I was told that my being an active political figure required the Community Centre trustees to refuse me use of the facilities, lest it undermine your charitable status. 

The impact of my actions on a computer two Sundays ago -and then turning up at the office- has been, at the very least, to reinforce a concern that I have on ongoing wish to re-associate myself with Southwater Area Community Centre.  And yes, whilst I will respect the boundary that has been set, I do wish to see if we can disentangle matters, including the possibility of Mediation Support Ltd renting space to undertake mediation work, whilst political interviews are to be held, as one was last Friday, on Warrior Square Station.

It was on account of being told the location of the main fire-starter on Hastings Pier ten years ago that, once I'd resigned my job in London to initiate a community mediation/restorative justice process around the loss of the iconic structure of the town, that I located at Southwater Area Community Centre. For my own crime it took supportive conditions and eleven years before I was ready to take responsibility and, via a community mediation service, approached those whom I had harmed. The dialogue that followed was very moving and I felt freed-up to make full recompense, which I did. From there on, I became not just an advocate of restorative processes but a major player on the UK Restorative Justice scene, with my work recognised, amongst other ways, by a personal invitation to be thanked at 10 Downing Street “for my work on behalf of the victims of crime.”

Those who were on Hastings Pier on the night of 5th October 2010 have not fared so lucky in terms of their friends guiding them towards (restorative) resolution of the consequences of their past intentions and actions. I write this on the basis of my interactions with the founders of the Hastings Independent newspaper who knew one of the two individuals detained on the beach that night, having jumped off the burning pier, who had been bailed for 6 months before the Crown Prosecution Service chose not to advance to prosecution. These founders of the Hastings Independent had accepted six whole-page adverts for St Leonards Sharing Consortium's #2066Timebanking initiative, but they then refused (and refused further discussion over) the advert which was seeking to build on the Pier Fire history to establish a model for how #HastingsJustice might be done in enlightened times.

Maybe I've strayed too far from the immediate concerns of the Southwater Area Community Centre trustees but I presume it to be helpful for you to be clearly informed of the lives to which the services you provide (or withhold) are highly significant. I wrote up the history of Mediation Support Ltd at Southwater Area Community Centre on the blog where this notice is going -additionalinfo.blogspot.com- as follows:

“There has been a bit of a North/South divide in relation to the railway bridge towards the Seaview Centre, Southwater Rd – the road I was told that the main person responsible for the 2010 pier fire lived; hence my establishing the Mediation Support Ltd office from 2011-2015 at the Southwater Community Centre which I kept afloat and which,as a Community Development worker (freelance but head-hunted by the Hastings Trust) I kept positively in the eye of our most senior politicians in the years 2011-2015 -and the Sussex Police into whom Mediation Support Ltd went into informal partnership, whilst doing commissioned work for Hastings Pier and White Rock Trust which was not honoured by payment for services received. I do believe that if they had taken to heart the harmonisation policy for Trustees which  I and a colleague had produced then the Hastings Pier Charity would not have had to go into administration.”(#PoliticsOnThePlatform blog post)

If an alternate history of my time there is being circulated, I would request that it be provided to me in writing so that the requirements of accountability and fairness are met. Then, I predict, it will be easier to clear the air and return to a working relationship of goodwill and co-operation, which is dear to me and more likely to be of wider benefit.  If there are tensions of which you are aware in the Southwater Area community, Mediation Support Ltd would like to offer support.

Once more, for clarity, I confirm that I will not attempt to use the community centre address, though the locus of my attention remains around the postcode TN37 6LA as I continue the #PoliticsOnAPlatform series of interviews.

Yours faithfully

Paul Crosland

Director, Mediation Support Ltd, Restorative Technology Ltd & Freelending CIC (Community Interest Company), all of which sit under the umbrella of St Leonards Sharing Consortium 

How we missed out on the most healing PM since Atlee

In the forthcoming #BookOfFourQuarters, in the quarter called The #MythOfTheHeartlessTory I will be putting the case that in 2019 Britain lost out on the most healing of British PMs since the post WW2 Labour Administration that founded the #NHS... https://youtu.be/9xCMXdGSNoU

Politics On The Platform (#PoliticsOnThePlatform)

On the 17th October 2020, aged 54, in the second film below, I came out as “an elitist” and created the hashtag #ComingOutAsAnElitist for you, in due course. We may think that we are egalitarian until we realise what DirectDemocracy could well produce. This struck home after a dialogue on St Leonards Warrior Square station the day before. Here is the last 45 seconds of that first #PoliticsOnThePlatform series, part of my “Levelling Up” my YouTube channel so that the user can choose between different kinds/levels of films, which I'll further clarify in later posts. In the future you'll be able to initiate a #WeZoomedAcrossDifference Conference on Zoom co-hosted by myself and a specialist in your chosen area of concern/influence.

For now I want to give more background to the developing #PoliticsOnThePlatform playlist:

- Political interviews of depth & originality whilst I test #KinderPoliticsWorkingHypothesis001 that #KinderPolitics will produce #DeeperAccountability. (Other benefits to self & other which you may presume please put into the form of a hypothesis to be tested)

-PoliticsOnThePlatform -initial invite sent out to “Common Treasury”, “Isolation Station Hastings”, and Maria Arpa, MBE (“for services to mediation” -see the blogpost “I've got your back Sally-Ann and Peter” composed with Maria in the aftermath of the 5th December 2019 Hustings “Minimum Wage -Did you Read the article?” debacle that prompted my beginning to write “The Myth Of The Heartless Tory*” (for 2021 publication?) *In the #BookOf4Quarters

- Other invitees intially to be those I am more easily able to go deeper with on account of friendship, starting on 16th October 2020 with my longest standing friend of 43 years, Author & Historian from St Leonards, Chris Gidlow. Soon it will be the turn of Tony May; our ten year friendship began on YouTube -& here's a playlist demonstrating some of that rich story:

Please email me with subject heading #PoliticsOnAPlatform if you want to join me on the bench which Transition Town Hastings has put there.

NB There has been a bit of a North/South divide in relation to the railway bridge towards the Seaview Centre, Southwater Rd – the road I was told that the main person responsible for the 2010 pier fire lived; hence my establishing the Mediation Support Ltd office from 2011-2015 at the Southwater Community Centre which I kept afloat and which,as a Community Development worker (freelance but head-hunted by the Hastings Trust) I kept positively in the eye of our most senior politicians in the years 2011-2015 -and the Sussex Police into whom Mediation Support Ltd went into informal partnership, whilst doing commissioned work for Hastings Pier and White Rock Trust which was not honoured by payment for services received. I do believe that if they had taken to heart the harmonisation policy for Trustees which  I and a colleague had produced then the Hastings Pier Charity would not have had to go into administration.

So following my shock at my oldest friend's views on defending against burglary and his strong case as to what Direct Democracy might produce in terms of legal support for shooting intruders in the back etc after #SleepingOnIt I headed off for my Flu Jab with an emerging need to honour the oft-hidden Elitist within me, who whilst being accountable to the Deeper Democracy envisaged by #GrassrootsManifestoes of 4-10points per citizen, leading to a #DemocracyOfNeeds; a concept I have worked-up from the work of Nonviolent Communication's (leading light?) Miki Kashtan.

 

I will be putting a link to this blogpost on Twitter.com/paulcrosland and then in the next blog post I will list the 10 points that constitute “#GrassrootsManifestoes #HastingsAndRye #HastingsCitizenManifesto @paulcrosland #PaulBasicIncomeCrosland* (*on Facebook)”

Fond Memory of "A Good Week", 2011, attracting support across the political spectrum; the letter from Amber Rudd, MP, being reproduced in the 2019 Independent Candidate Election Mailing to all 56,400 postal addresses in Hastings and Rye constituency. (Inside of A3 folded to A5)

Sally-Ann Hart has my blessing to “Get Brexit Done”, to strive towards “Kinder Politics” & “Deeper Accountability”. Also to do her best for those bringing their Hastings & Rye constituency problems to her, but not to vote on penal matters without prior discussion of our respective experience in Criminology and Criminal Justice administration.

“Deeper Legitimacy” is the movement I hereby launch today; subscribe to this blog to receive a blog post that lays out the composition of the #DeeperLegitimacyParliament, in which Sally-Ann Hart (gaining only 49.6% of the Hastings and Rye constituency vote in 2019) is only mandated by my (#AsIfByMagic) 1% of the vote only in these matters:

- #GetBrexitDone 

- #KinderPolitics and #DeeperAccountability

I favour a #BeyondPolarisationInPoliticsAlliance rather than the less principled #AntiToryAlliance; and part of my track record in advocacy for positive campaigns is recorded in the Hastings  & St Leonards Observer.

2066 Country (General Election 2024) Battle Cry: “Pensions At 30”- paid for by Land Value Tax of 3%

In what may seem Utopian(?) or Outrageous(?) to your sensibilities/conditioning  (but is to me one of three “obvious” intermediate steps to “Universal Basic Income”; the second being the abolition of the Minimum Wage for those over 30; freeing them up to do the #WorkCryingOutToBeDone in every community), “Pension At 30” is one of the (nonviolent) Battle Cries in @2066Country Hastings And Rye Constituency General Elections henceforth.

For anyone whose 1st birthday was around the time Saddham Hussain was toppled in Iraq (ie born in 2003),  a pension check at HMRC online would look like this:

Tweet clarifying matters.

Above I spoke of 3 steps to be taken alongside #PensionAt30; the third being a “Citizens Assembly”(or Sociocracy-type of representative forum) to overhaul Housing Benefit and lower rents without lowering quality of rented accommodation. Increasing accessibility to rental accommodation by those living only on £175/week benefits (ie Pension instead of Universal Basic Income)  is one key consideration and Acorn Tenants’ Union a key voice to consult with & challenge. The incentive to increased sharing of accommodation is foreseen; reducing the pressure to build new housing that pushes up rental prices. 

I propose -and await your “Grassroots Manifesto” of 4-10points that may well have a better proposal that to get rents down all Housing Benefits be cut by 50% on the day that the £175/wk pensions for those aged 30+ are introduced.

The incentive for landlords and tenants to get involved in direct democracy to restore (or reconfigure) Housing Benefit is very clear.

The larger pot of money from which the change comes is the introduction of a 3% Land Value Tax on all properties or land of greater value than £400,000. This is an arbitrary figure designed to shift the balance between expensive and less expensive places to live. It would generate a “return to the country” in a pincer movement of tax burdens and tax breaks. What figures do you favour for the cut-off points for taxation and are the differences between what I’m proposing and the 10 most important policies to you such that you will be committing any of your 4-10point #GrassrootsManifestoes in seeking an alternative taxation and spending plan?