Ghulam Rasul Shahzad
Labour Party
Milkstone & Deeplish Ward
Address
49 Henry Street
Rochdale
OL11 1EN
I have lived in Rochdale since 1976 and have strong links in the community. All three of my children were born and raised here and I have a long record of campaigning for improvements in Milkstone and Deeplish.
My experience of being a team leader for the Community Based Action Area scheme and a former Chairman of the Milkstone and Deeplish Area Forum has given me an ideal background for understanding the concerns of local residents.
Our area is benefiting from our Labour Government’s investment in our new health centre near the train station and we will soon get the Metrolink.
The Labour Government have also put millions of pounds into Housing Market Renewal for our area, unfortunately for us the Liberal Democrat’s who control our council are pressing for it to be spent elsewhere.
I will work hard to make sure they are unsuccessful and that we get the much needed housing grants to renovate our homes.
A few years ago I was involved in a Kerb Crawling Campaign to drive prostitution out of the area but more work needs to be done to stop the sex trade from laying down firm roots in Milkstone and Deeplish.
We need to work hard to bring back respect to our area and drive prostitution out. I am pleased that a Labour Government is looking to change the law to make it illegal to pay for sex but am disappointed that the Liberal Democrats have called for prostitution tolerance zones. This is not the answer.
A training and development officer for Rochdale Council for 18 years, and the recipient of many awards for my voluntary work, I say Milkstone and Deeplish needs better representation on the council to provide residents with improved services and opportunities.
This ward is not getting enough attention from our council. Liberal Democrat councillors like Elwyn Watkins have been reported as saying that Asian areas get preferential treatment in Rochdale. This is a myth and we need a people’s champion to get decent youth facilities and proper action taken against people who dump rubbish in our area. I am disgusted that our Liberal Democrat council has only made one prosecution in the last year against fly-tippers. I will be working hard to address this and make sure that people who dump rubbish and damage our environment are treated as criminals.
