Church and State blog: Declan barred from the IT centre at The (Church of England) Connection

Tuesday, October 20, 2009

Declan barred from the IT centre at The (Church of England) Connection

Last Friday Declan was barred from accessing the IT centre at The Connection at St. Martin-in-the-Fields (“St.Martin's”), which he had been using almost every day since the beginning of August to print copies of our CVs and requests for application forms and fight for the reinstatement of his joint claim for Jobseeker's Allowance (JSA). The Connection is a Church of England homeless centre situated at St. Martin-in-the-Fields – one of the most famous non-cathedral churches in London. According to Wikipedia, St. Martin-in-the-Fields is “famous for its work with homeless people through The Connection at St Martin's which shares with The Vicar's Relief Fund the money raised each year by the BBC Radio 4 Appeal's Christmas appeal”.

On 28 April 2008, the Archbishop of Canterbury, Dr. Rowan Williams, spoke at a special Service of Thanksgiving to celebrate the renewal of the church: in January 2006, work began on a £36 million renewal project; the Church of England got the money through public appeals and a grant of £15.35 million from the Heritage Lottery Fund. Anyway, you can read the Archbishop’s sermon on his website, but what interests us in particular is one of the notes which appears at the bottom of the sermon:

More specifically, among the many aspects of Christian ministry at St Martin's, there is a long tradition of caring for homeless people and those at risk of homelessness. This work continues with the Connection at St Martin-in-the-Fields, formed in April 2003 from a merger between St Martin-in-the-Fields Social Care Unit (working with rough sleepers and other vulnerable homeless people) and the London Connection (which helped young homeless people).

Furthermore, the Connection website also explains that in its IT Centre (“the Workspace”) users can get job search support like CV preparation, internet search, etc. The webpage states: “Since 1990, the Workspace team has provided employment training and education support for homeless people, people in temporary accommodation and people at risk of becoming homeless.” Well, I am puzzled! For more than 2 1/2 years (from 3 November 2006 to 13 July 2009) we slept rough on the streets of London, having been put there by the Department for Work and Pensions (DWP) because Declan did not “sign on” two days before he was actually due to do so (see “About us”). Moreover, for the last three months the DWP has given us an absolute nightmare (see, for example, blog of 7 October “After a huge run-around, the Department for Work and Pensions denies me a Crisis Loan”).

Declan was also getting lunch at the Connection – although it costs about £1.50, there is always a queue because many homeless people are receiving benefits (we only received notification of the reinstatement of Declan's joint claim JSA on Saturday). We were also puzzled when on 19 August the Providence Row charity denied us access to food by effectively barring us from entering their Dellow Day Centre in the morning (a coffee in the afternoon is fine!). Declan lodged a formal complaint of discrimination against the Congregation of the Sisters of Mercy with the head of the Roman Catholic Church in England and Wales, Archbishop Vincent Nichols (see here); having received nothing by way of reply, he took his complaint on 23 September to the Apostolic Nunciature to Great Britain, Archbishop Faustino Sainz Muñoz (see here); and finally he wrote to Pope Benedict XVI (see here). Shortly after Declan wrote to the pope, the papal nuncio replied (see here) ... to zero effect!

Perhaps also revealing is that Declan and I have been barred from the Methodist Church Whitechapel Day Mission. On 18 June 2007, the minister’s wife barred us due to concerns about our safety following an unprovoked assault on me in the canteen by another homeless woman (crime reference no. 4217341/07; see blog of 18 June 2007 “Assault and bar in the Whitechapel Mission”). Despite that the Whitechapel Mission’s website states that homeless people are not barred or excluded and that Declan wrote by registered post to the minister himself and to the then head of the Methodist Church of Great Britain, Rev. Graham Carter, we were never readmitted.

For the record, this is the email that Declan sent last Saturday to the CEO of The Connection Colin Glover (the letter to the Secretary of State for Work and Pensions to which Declan refers is published here):

Subject: The Connection at St. Martin-in-the-Fields

Dear Mr. Glover,

I refer to the attached copy of my email of complaint of 15 October to your IT floor supervisor, Ms. Diana Cimpanu ("ComplaintCSTM(15.10.09)”), which I copied to you together with the attachment therein referred to, namely, my email letter of 7 October to the Secretary of State for Work and Pensions The Rt. Hon. Yvette Cooper MP regarding the reinstatement of my joint claim for Jobseeker's Allowance (see attachment “Cooper(7.10.09)”).

I wish to confirm that yesterday I was denied access to computers and photocopier in the Connection at St. Martin's by your IT manager Bill (surname withheld), which I had been using since the beginning of August to access my Google Mail account (that is, when possible to do so, see attachment “ComplaintCSTM(15.10.09)”), print CVs and requests for application forms, and photocopying documentation relating to the reinstatement of my joint claim for Jobseeker's Allowance.

You will note that I am once again taking the time to copy the Chief Executive of Providence Row Jo Ansell into my current situation. As I mentioned in the aforementioned email of 15 October to Ms. Cimpanu, it was Ms. Ansell who, on 19 August, denied my wife and me access to food in the Dellow Day Centre run by the Sisters of Mercy in spite of our unstable circumstances (see attachment "Cooper(7.10.09)").

Perhaps you would be so kind as to forward this email and its attachments to the Justice of the Peace in the City of London Lady Diana Brittan, Chair of the Connection at St. Martin's. Ultimately, I will be lodging a formal complaint with the Archbishop of Canterbury His Grace Rowan Williams; by which time I expect to have an alternative contact address for Lady Justice Brittan.

Please would you acknowledge receipt.

Yours sincerely,
Declan Heavey

Email: dheavey@gmail.com

Home address:
83 Priory Gardens
London N6 5QU

cc Lady Diana Brittan, Chair of the Board of Directors of the Connection at St. Martin's
Lord Lloyd of Berwick, Master of the Salters' Company
His Excellency Most Rev. Faustino Sainz Muñoz, Apostolic Nunciature to Great Britain
His Grace Archbishop Vincent Nichols, Archbishop of Westminster
Sr. Coirle McCarthy, Congregational Leader of the Sisters of Mercy
His Grace The Duke of Norfolk, Patron of Providence Row
Alderman Sir Michael Oliver, Vice President of Providence Row
Mr. Simon Bartley, Chairman of the Board of Trustees of Providence Row
Ms. Jo Ansell, Chief Executive of Providence Row
Mr. Howard Sinclair, Chief Executive of Broadway Homelessness and Support
Superintendent Lorraine Cussen, Snow Hill Police Station

And this is the email that Declan sent last Thursday to the Workspace supervisor, Diana Cimpanu:

Subject: The Connection at St. Martin-in-the-Fields

Dear Ms. Cimpanu,

I refer to our conversations this morning and wish to reconfirm that between 11.15am and 12.00 noon I was unable to access my Google Mail account from the Connection at St. Martin's. I attach copy of my email letter of 7 October to the Secretary of State for Work and Pensions The Rt. Hon. Yvette Cooper MP, to which I was unable to gain access.

I regret that I am unable to provide you with a list of the particular days and times I have experienced this anomaly at your day centre since the beginning of August. However, as I told you, this week it has been particularly bad and getting progressively worse; moreover, I have yet to hear another client of yours complain of any such difficulty. In future I will keep accurate and daily records of the time I spend on your computers and any difficulties I experience accessing the internet, for your future reference.

You will note that I am taking the time to copy the Chief Executive of Providence Row Jo Ansell into my current situation. As I have previously explained to you, it was Ms. Ansell who, on 19 August, denied my wife and me access to food in the Dellow Day Centre run by the Sisters of Mercy in spite of our unstable circumstances (see attachment "Cooper(7.10.09)"). I am also copying this email and attachment to, among others, the Justice of the Peace in the City of London Lady Diana Brittan, Chair of the Connection at St. Martin's c/o the Chief Executive of the Connection at St. Martin's Colin Glover at info@cstm.org.uk. (To compound our difficulties, we our in possession since 14 October of neither a tenancy agreement nor a rent book, despite our repeated requests from our live-in landlady for both items.)

Please would you acknowledge receipt.

Yours sincerely
Declan Heavey

Email: dheavey@gmail.com

Home address:
83 Priory Gardens
London N6 5QU

cc Lady Diana Brittan, Chair of the Board of Directors of the Connection at St. Martin's
Mr. Colin Glover, Chief Executive of the Connection at St Martin's
Lord Lloyd of Berwick, Master of the Salters' Company
His Excellency Most Rev. Faustino Sainz Muñoz, Apostolic Nunciature to Great Britain
His Grace Archbishop Vincent Nichols, Archbishop of Westminster
Sr. Coirle McCarthy, Congregational Leader of the Sisters of Mercy
His Grace The Duke of Norfolk, Patron of Providence Row
Alderman Sir Michael Oliver, Vice President of Providence Row
Mr. Simon Bartley, Chairman of the Board of Trustees of Providence Row
Ms. Jo Ansell, Chief Executive of Providence Row
Mr. Howard Sinclair, Chief Executive of Broadway Homelessness and Support
Superintendent Lorraine Cussen, Snow Hill Police Station

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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Tuesday, October 20, 2009

Declan barred from the IT centre at The (Church of England) Connection

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