Church and State blog: Letter to the Leader of Tower Hamlets Council

Wednesday, May 13, 2009

Letter to the Leader of Tower Hamlets Council

For the record, below is the email that Declan sent this afternoon to the Leader of Tower Hamlets Council, Councillor Lutfur Rahman, concerning Idea Store Whitechapel, the borough’s flagship library, learning and information service. We frequently run into trouble in this library, especially with internet access and computer bookings; but this afternoon it was particularly bad: I was bullied by two security guards into vacating (which I didn't do) the computer I had booked, and told by a member of staff that I was lying. Although Declan is tired of writing to Cllr. Rahman on the subject, he felt he was left with little choice in the circumstances.

Subject: Idea Store Whitechapel

Dear Cllr. Rahman,

I am writing to you in your capacity as Leader of Tower Hamlets Council to refer further to the attached copy of my most recent correspondence with the former Head of Idea Stores, Mr. Ian McNicol, to whom the former Leader of Tower Hamlets Council, Cllr. Denise Jones, referred my original complaint of 21 January 2008 regarding Idea Store Whitechapel and the repeated loss of computer bookings and internet access on both my wife's card (card no. D000350314) and my card (card no. D000355837) since 14 November 2007.

I wish to draw to your attention that this afternoon my wife had computer 13 on floor 1 in Idea Store Whitechapel booked from 1.15pm to 2.15pm; she made the booking yesterday evening. As soon as she logged in, the computer re-started with another name, Suhel Miah, on the monitor. Not wanting to vacate the floor in the circumstances, she asked a security guard if he would be so kind as to call a member of staff to her table. Ten minutes later no member of staff had appeared but along comes Mr. Miah, and he wants my wife to vacate her chair. Two security guards then appear and rudely, aggressively and in a bullish manner attempt to move my wife out, and this despite her pointing out to both guards that she had been waiting for almost 15 minutes for a member of staff and that she had booked the computer for the hour. A member of staff then comes along and also insists that my wife moves out: there is another name on the monitor. This member of staff is followed by a supervisor: she hadn't booked a computer from 1.15pm to 2.15pm, my wife is told by the supervisor, and there is nothing wrong with the computer; she must vacate. My wife is let log in after 1.30pm.

I reconfirm that since my complaint of 21 January 2008 to Cllr. Jones, my wife and I not only have experienced repeated loss of computer bookings and internet access, but several other problems to boot. For example:

(i) 1 February 2008: the Principal Idea Store Manager, Mr. Sergio Dogliani, wrote to me advising that the restriction by Idea Store Whitechapel of both my wife and I to a 3-hour maximum free computer use per day as from 29 January stands, despite that for several previous months we were given "additional time" subject to computer availability and in accordance with the Council's then and current "Idea Stores PC Usage Policy";

(ii) 24 June 2008: at approximately 12.30pm, a member of staff threatened my wife with security if she did not give her computer up to another card holder, despite that thirty minutes earlier a member of staff had confirmed in writing that my wife had booked the computer from 11.30am to 2.30pm;

(iii) 3 August 2008: both of the computers my wife and I had booked the previous day contained an identical virus which spread to the two USB drives we were using. This rendered my wife's portable programs inoperable. It also corrupted some of my most valuable data: a Word document containing a categorised list of over 150 British signatories of a petition of mine to the United Nations on therapeutic cloning, and a related database containing the names, email addresses and contact information for over 3,000 scientists and academics from around the world;

(iv) 6 August 2008: at approximately 2.45pm, MIMEsweeper blocked access to my Google Mail account due to "Porn Detected". At 3.10pm, following the restoration of my access to the account, I was informed by the store's technician, and without explanation, that "it may happen again for any length of time".

As I explained in my original complaint to you of 4 August 2008 following (iii) above, since 22 October 2007 my wife and I have been using computer time in Idea Store Whitechapel to contact scientists and academics to invite them to sign my petition to the United Nations on somatic cell nuclear transfer (SCNT), sometimes referred to as "therapeutic cloning". This petition to date has been signed by 591 scientists and academics, who include recognised authorities from the world's leading universities and research institutes, as well as 24 Nobel Laureates.

I once again acknowledge receipt of an email of 7 August 2008 from your Personal Assistant, Ms. Rachel Bielby, stating: "Cllr. Rahman is now on leave until the end of August. I have asked the office of the Director of Communities, Localities and Culture's office to deal with your correspondence." I reconfirm that on 9 January I received an email from Senior Management Support Officer, Ms. Sharon Ball, questioning only whether any of the reconfirmed information above is "actionable" by Tower Hamlets Council.

Please would you acknowledge receipt.

Yours sincerely
Declan Heavey

Church and State

MAYOR OF LONDON RSI PROPERTY
DAY 406 IN A WEEKLY PERIODIC TENANCY
SUBJECT TO A SECTION 21 NOTICE

(SEE PARA. 3 BELOW)

1. Our 308 Honorary Associates include 20 Nobel Prize laureates. Declan and I are engaged in a project that deals with the publication of issues significant to social policy in a number of key areas, e.g., climate change, population, futurism, atheism, and free speech. Established as Network for Church Monitoring, a non-profit company limited by guarantee, our main publication, found at the website, Church and State, calls attention to subjects, not the least which have been critical of the interaction between religious and secular institutions. We have been the target of numerous threats and actions, e.g., the former resulting in threats to Declan's life, and the latter, which have led to vandalism. The various incidents are on record with the police and other official agencies.

2. There are no less than 63 Nobel Prize laureates on the Church and State website from 20 Honorary Associates, eight articles, nine book excerpts and 33 petition signatories. (For example, one Nobel laureate signed our Nobel petition in support of human embryonic stem cell research and gave us permission to excerpt from one of his books.) Our list of associates also includes 18 US National Medal laureates, and six Turing Award laureates (the equivalent of the Nobel Prize in computer science). We have published one article and excerpted from the books of seven members of the British House of Lords. And there are 31 knighted professors on the site from 13 Honorary Associates, one book excerpt and 21 petition signatories. These figures are despite the never-ending assault on our email (this link reveals the targeting of our emails to, among others, a close colleague in Washington, DC as well as space advocates and Nobel laureates).

3. This is Day 406 for us living under the threat to life of a 'no fault' eviction by Peabody Trust.[1] We live in a Mayor of London's Rough Sleepers Initiative (RSI) property. Peabody's appalling new terms of tenancy have forced us into an unstable weekly periodic tenancy that poses a threat to Declan's life and inhibits our ability to exercise our rights. Declan accumulated quite a history with the Housing Ombudsman Service before he received the Ombudsman's decision not to investigate a referral from Lyn Brown MP on jurisdictional grounds. The Ombudsman was asked to consider whether or not our tenancy has been renewed like for like; and whether, if not, it should be in light of the landlord having accused us of not signing a like-for-like agreement. The Equality and Human Rights Commission will not accept a referral of discrimination from Ms Brown, the Commission's helpline (EASS) having grossly distorted the complaint against Peabody. We no longer have pro se access to the courts (see next paragraph).

4. This eviction matter came before District Judge Ruth Fine at the Central London County Court on 30 June 2020, when both counsel for St Mungo's (the charity in effective control of our tenancy) and Declan presented their positions. Declan lost the case and was ordered to pay £1,850 in costs. A publishing colleague in America cleared these costs within 24 hours of my blog post about this hearing for strike out on a related issue that was the essence of the claim, i.e., that St Mungo's would take a phone call to confirm that we are clients of the Mayor of London's RSI programme. Within a week of the hearing, St Mungo's had agreed to take this phone call for us both, the Court having ruled that they were not obliged to do so despite our circumstances. This time we escaped bankruptcy (counsel for St Mungo's asked for £3,407.50 in costs), but consider that to seek pro se access to justice in the courts has become far too dangerous for us. Declan currently has before the Parliamentary and Health Service Ombudsman the decision of the Information Commissioner that allows St Mungo's to continue processing coercive support plans without our knowledge or consent and that also poses a threat to his life.

5. When it comes to traffic, we have had 10.7 million hits in the past three years on Facebook; however, I left the platform on 13 March 2021 for one year rather than risk being banned for life. It is indisputable that with any sort of level playing field Church and State would have far exceeded 2.5 million hits last year. In addition to a large variety of blocks without explanation, Facebook had so severely restricted our Page's distribution by October 2020 that it was almost as good as an unpublished page.[2] Currently, we are up to their 85th block since 1 December 2015, and as usual without an explanation. This block records as one half of their 3rd double block in the first five weeks of this year that lasted 60 days. Our traffic has also been curtailed by over 2.5K blocks on access to Church and State since 26 July 2016, including 29 full distributed denial-of-service (DDoS) attacks since 17 May 2019 that have lasted for as long as 54 hours at a time.[3] About 70% of our hits are from Americans.

"This is precisely the hard hitting kind of response needed to clarify the unfair way Facebook is treating your highly reputable site." Don Collins, Founder, International Services Assistance Fund, Washington DC

Last updated: 26/06/21

_________________________

[1] Once a fixed term has elapsed, the landlord has the option to seek eviction even if the tenant has upheld their obligations in full (though of course the landlord must still apply for and obtain a county court order).

[2] 17/10/20: We have permission to publish this ISAF letter of 30 September to Facebook COO Sheryl Samberg. Facebook has so severely restricted our Page's distribution since 4 September that it's almost as good as an unpublished page

[3] Since October 2019, we have been defining a full DDoS attack as having such a high volume of up to 4-minute blocks on access to Church and State that we don't bother recording them all.

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Wednesday, May 13, 2009

Letter to the Leader of Tower Hamlets Council

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