Paul Prentice

Railway media type | Councillor for Barton on @canterburycc | Chair, Planning Committee | TSSA Union | Dog dad | 🚄 🏳️‍🌈 🌹🐝

[Will Hutton @williamnhutton]

This Burnham campaign video deserves a retweet (and many more). Take a look at the vast (shady) money and professional media operation behind Reform. It’s going to be an existential battle.Wherever you stand on the Labour leadership, this seat must be won.

[Paul Prentice @paulprentice]

@thomasbowell @CroydonLabour Congratuations Tom! Excellent news.

[Paul Prentice @paulprentice]

@RowennaDavis Stick around Rowenna. We need more people like you in politics.

[Paul Prentice @paulprentice]

@lnikol Yep. Just voted for a 15-year local plan vision that will see thousands of homes built, of various tenures. It’s not popular with everyone and there are not as many social homes as I’d like but it’s the reality of our planning system and being a councillor in a semi rural area.

[Paul Prentice @paulprentice]

Yes, Labour does say the Green Party is anti-homes.

In Canterbury, Green councillors not only vote against new homes but against desperately needed brand-new council housing on council-owned brownfield sites🤷‍♂️

[Farrukh @implausibleblog]

Liam Shrivastava (who jumped from Labour to Greens),

"Labour always want to say that the Greens are anti homes"

"It really demonstrates that they have massively failed when it comes to house building"

"A lot of affordable housing isn't actually affordable"

"We want good quality family homes"

[Paul Prentice @paulprentice]

@lnikol I don’t disagree that a wealthy borough like Wandsworth should be held to account for spending money on temporary accommodation (hopefully very short term) but I’m no expert on their situation. Let me guess, Labour are still dealing with the Tory inheritance left to them in 2022.

[Paul Prentice @paulprentice]

@lnikol Don’t want to get in a ‘I’m more left wing than thou’ fight but would point out that not all Greens are socialists and that some make spurious arguments for not voting for council housing on sustainable brownfield sites. I’ll call out poor decisions when they clearly are.

[Paul Prentice @paulprentice]

@lnikol It’s why we’re buying up properties in Canterbury for temporary housing as well as permanent social housing and not spending the money on private hotels (which surely can only be a very temporary solution).

[Paul Prentice @paulprentice]

@lnikol Also, we’re a left-leaning Labour-Lib Dem coalition council here, I’m a Labour and Co-op Cllr myself, don’t really recognise the Reform chasing locally except for simply building new homes which Reform voters supposedly want, and which Labour has committed to locally for years.

[Paul Prentice @paulprentice]

@lnikol 5k new homes is a lot to me - London boroughs are a different kettle of fish to a semi-rural district. What’s the mix of tenures and what is Wandsworth’s housing need? I’d agree that more council/social housing is needed but people do want shared ownership etc as well.

[Paul Prentice @paulprentice]

@lnikol Genuinely only speaking from local government experience and supportive of
good housing policy decisions over which I have some influence. There is always more we can do inside and outside Labour.

[Paul Prentice @paulprentice]

@dbooth3 This isn’t about Zack’s vibes or winning by-elections but about decent housing policy.

[Paul Prentice @paulprentice]

@lnikol True, I get that but one application was for council houses on a long closed site of a social club - went through thanks to Labour councillors. Another instance was voting down a local plan that will see hundreds of new homes built of various tenures (affordable rent and so on).

[Paul Prentice @paulprentice]

@lnikol I couldn’t speak for a local authority that I don’t I sit on, and perhaps a single screenshot doesn’t explain why something might get turned down or deferred initially so that improvements can be made (which happens all the time on planning committees)

[Paul Prentice @paulprentice]

@socialistfella @Libcon42 You must have missed those particular meetings of Canterbury City Council’s planning committee where Greens voted against new housing.

[Paul Prentice @paulprentice]

@cezthesocialist And how can voting against any new council housing be justified especially when it’s clearly a highly sustainable plan?

[Paul Prentice @paulprentice]

@cezthesocialist I’m looking at most recent HNA and draft housing strategy. As you know the current model relies on private developers building a minimum 30% affordable housing as part of any new scheme. We’re planning for 695 new affordable homes per year (1,215 homes of all tenures up to 2043).

[Paul Prentice @paulprentice]

@rachelmillward But Green councillors in opposition do vote against council housing on brownfield sites owned by the council as well as local plans that would deliver thousands of new homes. I’ve seen it on multiple occasions as a councillor in Canterbury.

[University of Kent @UniKent]

We are deeply saddened to confirm that one student from the University of Kent has died following a case of invasive meningitis.

Our thoughts are with the student’s family, friends and the wider university community at this extremely difficult time.

The safety of our students and staff remains our highest priority. We are working closely with public health teams and are in touch with staff and students to ensure they get the advice and support they need.

We will continue to monitor the situation and keep our community informed at https://t.co/qIhitoj6M9