Sting in the Tail

The Localism Bill was presented to Parliament on 13th December 2010. “This Bill will shift power from central government back into the hands of individuals, communities and councils” - Says the report. It is supposed to be about abolishing the one-size-fits-all, top-down, prescriptive approach that has built up over many years of different hues of government. But the summary contains this paragraph:

PART 2: EU FINES
18. This part creates a power to recover funds from local authorities and other public authorities in England in order to pay all, or part of, a European Court of Justice ("ECJ") financial sanction imposed for a failure of the United Kingdom to comply with an obligation under the EU treaties.

Note how it is only “England” that is subject to this rule and that the sanction is for “failure of the United Kingdom” ie central government.

This despite EU Regulations saying that Fines are the responsibility of Governments, there must be a loss of determination by the Government if it knows it can pass on the cost to Public Authorities, who will have all the responsibility but none of the representation.

With thanks to Dopeyf.

Multi-Cultural Christmas

For those who are fed up with the Politically Correct Brigade’s “Winterval” here’s a piece from the Barking & Dagenham Recorder, sent in by Brother Wilson because he features, on how different cultures celebrate Christmas. My new Tamil neighbours have a huge Christmas tree in their front bay window, as did the Jewish ones before them.

Click on image to enlarge.

Support a new community school for Barkingside

Since our post on the 1st of December Barkingside 21 has joined together with local residents and parents to support the Council’s bid to open and run a new primary school on the site of the current Ilford Jewish Primary school. The online petition is still open at here and we have information leaflets available if anybody would like one. An open competition is being held to decide who should run it and bids were submitted by 3 organisations, including the Council, on the 13th of December 2010. There is a public meeting on 6th January where we will be able to hear from the proposers and we assume express our views, further details can be found on the link or are given below. On the 23rd of December details of the 3 proposals will be published and there is then 6 weeks for any interested parties to comment, so we will be campaigning until the end of January to ensure the views of those of us who support a community school are represented properly.

If you support the establishment of a community school please sign the petition so that your views can be represented in the bidding process. The petition can be signed online, see box below, and there is a letter which can be sent to the decision makers available at our resources page. If you wish to sign a hard copy of either document or have any questions please click here or use the email address on right of page.

As a quick reminder we support the opening of a new community school which would be wholly run by the Local Authority because:

• The school will need to serve all of the diverse communities in Redbridge. We believe this can be best achieved by a school which is under the control of publicly elected and accountable Politicians and Local Authority Officers.


• A very significant investment is required to buy and develop the site. If the Local Authority is to invest circa £3m of tax payers' money into this project we believe that it should remain a community asset which serves the whole community equally.

Online petition can be signed here and we have a Facebook page if you want to publicise the cause that way. Finally please come to the public meeting at Redbridge Town Hall in Ilford on 6th January either 5.00 – 6.30pm or 7.00.- 8.30pm

Matt

Get Stuffed

With Christmas fast approaching, and not having anything else to write about, I thought I’d do a nice seasonal post – about Stuffing. Many of you will be preparing to stuff your turkeys for the traditional Christmas day dinner. But the point is that when, or if (for some of you will be vegetarians), you stuff your turkey, it is already dead. Nobody would consider stuffing a turkey while it’s still alive, at least I wouldn’t think so.

But that’s exactly what happens to ducks and geese when they are used to produce Foie Gras. Where is the EU banning department on this subject? Ah, now I see!

Every year in France, 30 million ducks are forced into cages so small they can’t even stretch their wings. Trapped and helpless, a metal tube is thrust down their throats and vast quantities of food are forcibly pumped into their stomachs so that their livers swell painfully to up to 10 times their natural size. There is no escape and no respite.

Not very nice, is it. The practice of production is illegal here in the UK, but the product is not – it is imported. So, those who sell this product, and those who consume it, are perfectly entitled to do so and are acting within the law.

So, why am I writing about this now? Well, a regular user of Belgique in Wanstead has noticed that they have Foie Gras as a Christmas special and she wants to start a local protest campaign. In fact there is already a protest scheduled for Christmas Eve targeted at central London restaurants.

But here at Barkingside 21 we don’t go in for that sort of “non-violent direct action”. We prefer to inform and persuade. I guess there will be some who don’t care and will continue to endulge. But equally I think there will be others who just don’t know and would not if they did. That’s the purpose of this post. Apart from all that it is exteremly bad on the cholesterol front, says he who is now on Statins.

Have a Happy Christmas everybody and a healthy New Year.

Redbridge Grit

Can anybody report any road in Redbridge that has been gritted, or not, either yesterday [Friday 17th] or today [Saturday 18th]. Particularly bus routes and emergency routes, eg Forest Road, Roding Lane North.

Fullwell Avenue: Bus route 169Tomswood Hill: Bus route 275

Images credit: Flesh is Grass

Stars of the Night

Bats are amazing animals, and an important part of our natural environment. There are 18 species of bat in the UK (17 of which are known to be breeding here), all of which are protected by law because their numbers have decreased so dramatically.

The Bat Conservation Trust (BCT) is working towards a world where bats and people live in harmony, to ensure they are around for future generations to enjoy.

And so our own local Bat Girl, Tajinder, highlights a new project – Green City Bats.

The Trust is providing free bat information packs, training and events to community groups in London that look after parks and greenspaces. During 2010 over 45 ‘Friends Of’ groups have joined the project. The work is funded by London City Bridge Trust and the Heritage Lottery Fund.

The scheme has already run many bat walks this summer for local residents and trained over 35 Friends groups’ members in the city in how to lead bat walks, use bat detectors and identify some of the 10 bat species present in London. It is now contacting all community groups across the city to sign up and receive a free pack with information on London’s bats, bat-friendly park management and running batty events.

Project officer Xavier Hamon says “London is a great place for bats. Ten out of the 18 UK species can be seen and many of the city’s parks and greenspaces being hotspots for foraging bats. As a result bat walks in the area have proved extremely popular. We’re keen to help local groups involved with the management of parks and greenspaces learn about their local bats, how they can help them and how they can run batty events for local people to get them out and active in their local parks. Bats are an excellent way of getting people out and about, planting bat friendly allotments and flower beds, building homes for bats or simply learn more about these amazing and misunderstood mammals."

The scheme can loan out bat detectors, free of charge, to the registered Green City Bats and is running training workshops on how to use them and run your own batty events. Want to join the scheme? Simply click on the Green City Bats link above or contact Xavier at on 07549 834 442 or email.

It’s not just the community groups though who are being asked to go batty. The project is keen for all London residents to watch the skies this next spring/summer and give wings to bats for the International Year of the Bat 2011-2012. Xavier says “We want to build up a big picture of bat hotspots in the capital and are hoping that people will look out for bats and log them on our Big Bat Map.

Who Runs Redbridge?

Whether we like it or not, the spending cuts are here. How will you be affected? What can you do? Find out Who Runs Redbridge, Tuesday 21 December, Ilford Town Hall, 6.30pm

Dear B21,

As a prominent Redbridge blog I just wondered if you could let your members know about the 'Who Runs Redbridge' event being held on 21 December, as we would like as many people, as possible, from the area to attend:

The governance of our local authority and city has become increasingly complex: Where does power lie? Who, at a local level has responsibility for our education, or indeed for representing our views and concerns on the Council? How can ordinary residents effectively interact with and influence the kaleidoscope of public bodies and institutions that make decisions over our daily lives?

Operation Black Vote (OBV) in a unique and ground breaking partnership with the London Empowerment Partnership’s Targeted Support programme is holding an event Who Runs Redbridge? – the event will provide local people with the platform on which to engage key participants of their civic governance – MPs, councillors, magistrates and school governors – on issues that matter to them.

Speakers include: Mike Gapes MP; Councillor Thomas Chan – Former Mayor; Aneeta Prem JP – founder of Freedom Charity; Andrew Thomas JP; Bunmi Shodeyi – School Governor

All people in the borough and surrounding vicinity are welcome to attend.

Date: Tuesday 21 December

Time: 6.30pm

Venue: Ilford Town Hall, High Road, Ilford, Essex, IG1 1DD

Hot drinks and refreshments will be provided at the event.

To be added to the guest list you will need to register by emailing ashley@obv.org.uk

For further information please call 0208 983 5430.

Kind regards,

Ashley Burton-Lynch

King to Queen ..

Images, Michael Maggs [1], [2], [3]

The latest move in the chess game between “Health for North East London” and the local community was made on Wednesday evening [15th December] at the old Stratford Town Hall. The local Primary Care Trust and local General Practicioners voted to proceed with their proposals to close the Accident & Emergency and Maternity units at King George Hospital in Chadwell and move those services to Queens Hospital in Romford.

But that’s not the end of the game - the King is still standing. The pawns [us] may be a tad annoyed but there is still some mileage left in this match. All the local MPs are opposed to these plans as are the local councillors from all elected parties.

Here is Mike Gapes on the subject.

And Lee Scott’s leaflet has just dropped through my letterbox.

A call has been made for an extraordinary Council meeting with suggested dates of 4th or 6th January, but in any case the Health Scrutiny Committee meets on 27th January and the racing certainty is that they will refer the decision to the Secretary of State, Andrew Lansley.

Meanwhile, Wilson has popped out of retirement and is organising a protest march for 29th January that will leave from Little Heath Green at 12noon and end up in Ilford Town Centre at 2pm. Please behave yourselves, we’ll have no kettling in Redbridge unless you are making the tea.

If you haven't signed either of the two online petitions now's yer chance.

Wilson’s petition

RedEye’s petition

Hyperlink Tension

As I’ve mentioned before I am on first name terms with certain members of the UK Cabinet. Quite how they got my primary email address, which I have not used for several years, I don’t know, but I’m not going to unsubscribe because I like to know what’s going on. Like:

Eric wants to put me back in control.

The Con party wants me to help them win the tuition fees debate.

Theresa is putting policing at the heart of my community.

The trouble is that by providing you with the hyperlinks above I am, apparently, infringing their copyight and I am also infringing Ellee Seymour’s copyright by linking to the post that tells me I am infringing their and her copyright.

Don’tcha just love the internet? Look! If you put something up on the internet in the public domain [not behind a pay-wall] then the point is that it's there for anyone to access, you want people to access it and read it - you want an audience, that's the whole effing point isn't it? So the more links - recommendations - you get the better. Why would any internet content provider wish to restrict access to their site and their advertising revenue potential?

Unless they want their cake and eat it!

Note: I could just say try Googling "Should web links be free? ellee seymour" and her link comes up in first place. So, how are these legal people going to handle search engines?

[Facepalm]

Time and Motion in Health

Report from KGH meeting last Thursday [9th December]. Organised by Lee Scott MP, chaired by Chris Carter, Editor of the Ilford Recorder and in attendance Helen Brown, Stephen Burgess, Carol Drummond and Ken Aswani.

The audience/public included several councillors and campaigners such as Andy Walker, Bill Howe and Loraine Sladden. They were mostly hostile to the proposals to close the A&E and Maternity Units at KGH as you would expect and were also sceptical as to motives. We were informed that there will be a meeting this coming Wednesday [15th December] where the decision to proceed or not will be taken and that if it does then the Redbridge Council Leader has the option to ‘call it in’ for the Health Secretary, Mr Lansley, to review.

This, as follows, is as near as I can get it to the rationale for the proposals as outlined by Stephen Burgess, divisional director for surgery.

The proposals are geared to improving outcomes, that is suvival or success rates. What they have found is that a variation in the time taken to reach a Hospital is not [within reason] a significant factor in outcomes. What is critical is the time taken for a Paramedic to reach the patient and stabilise their condition and then being taken to a Hospital that has the facilities and expertise to deal with their condition. Well, that seems sensible, even I can understand that there is no point turning up at a Maternity Unit with a broken leg.

But things have already changed. For some time now all major Traumas go direct to either the London Hospital or Queens where they have the specialist staff and facilities to deal with that sort of thing. Heart attacks go to the London Chest Hospital and strokes go to the new Stroke centre [I forget where that is, but they did say]. All well and good. They have found that this approach works – so much so that the model is now being implemented elsewhere. No problem with that.

So we come to the closure of the A&E and maternity units at KGH. The rationale here is that they just don’t have enough senior consultants to operate both units [4 miles apart] on a 24/7 basis. If you turn up to either of them when there’s no one there to treat you, you are not going to get treated and your outcome is not going to be satisfactory. So they want to merge the two at Queens, so that when you turn up at Queens you get the best they can offer. Yes, I can see the point here, but only to a point – and here is the question I was not allowed to ask, because others [you know who you are] kept interrupting.

We will still have the same number of senior consultants, albeit in one place, and they will still have a limit on their time. We can’t clone them, yet! They may be more efficient, granted, but the fact is that if they are dealing with more patients they must eventually spend less time with each patient. These sort of efficiency trade-offs always produce a U-graph where there is an optimum point or plateau and beyond that things start to get worse. This is the bit that worries me. Just how thinly can these senior consultants be spread? It all depends on load and with an increasing population demand is set to rise.

Maternity: as outlined by Carol Drummond. Again as best I can relate it. The same rationale as for A&E applies here, ie shortage of senior consultants. And again it depends on demand, or the choices expectant mothers make. They want to give mothers a choice in between birth at home and birth in a full Maternity Unit, ie a [I forget the exact phrase] but a homely/hospital setting for low risk pregnancies. And they would like one of these at KGH if it is viable, but experience suggests that mothers will choose a location for this option where there is a full Maternity service just along the corridor just in case, ie Queens.

And the notion that the KGH will be closed and sold off for housing? Not so, so they say. There will still be an Urgent Care Centre at KGH. I think this means if you can get there under your own steam you are not an accident or emergency. They also want to develop KGH into a scheduled treatment centre. To deal with conditions that are not life threatening but need treatment or surgery that can be planned in advance. That, I suspect, is quite a big chunk of the work done by the NHS.

So, I’ve done me best to give you the other side of the story, take it apart if you like but please don’t shoot the messanger.

The Ilford Recorder.
Chadwell Labour [Party not Ward, er not Maternity ward]

Redbridge Cuts Cut

The Local Government Finance settlement has been announced.

The deprived London boroughs of Hackney, Newham and Tower Hamlets are among a group of local authorities to have received the maximum reduction to their spending in today's local government finance settlement for the first year of the spending review period.

These boroughs each face a cut of 8.9% equating to over £40million.

Redbridge has a cut of 2.61% equating to £5.9million [source].

The good people of Redbridge who completed the You Choose survey managed to make cuts of £25million AND reduce Council Tax by 4%. I make that £19.1million to the good – so can we have a replacement swimming pool now please [smile]?

The Case for Nuclear

Following on from the previous post about Climate Change sceptics, who almost without exception are critics of Wind Turbines, I thought I’d do a post on the possibilities of Nuclear Power which should be right up their alley. There does seem to be some support in those circles for such an approach, though possibly not what I am about to propose here.

I shall do this in the form of a thought experiment so that the non-technical among you can follow the logic. I have to say before I start that I am not exactly a novice, but neither would I describe myself as an expert, in fact I’m probably a bit rusty.

OK. The notion is that Nuclear power is the way to go to stop all that nasty CO2 stuff crapping up our climate systems.

But the way we think of Nuclear Power is in large “centralised” power plants. Not that they are exactly “centralised” being out on the periphery where nobody dares tread, i.e. Scotland. Think about it. Where did the energy intensive industries of the industrial revolution locate? They located where the energy was. The Cotton Mills of Lancashire sited where there was water power. The Steel and other heavy industries located where the coal was. So they did not have the cost of transporting the fuel or the losses in energy transmission over long distances. By this logic Canary Wharf - where the lighing, heating and computing energy usage is comparable - should have been built in Dounreay.

But it doesn’t have to be this way, does it. Think about it. We have Nuclear powered submarines and aircraft carriers. In fact there are also commercial ships powered this way. It provides the means of propulsion under or over the ocean waves, the lighting and heating on board plus cooking, not to mention all that technical electronic stuff.

An Aircraft carrier like HMS Invincible is what, the size of a small town or perhaps a large village like, well like the people of HARM or those villages in Kent who don’t like Wind Turbines because they spoil the view. Well HMS Invincible is up for sale [thanks Dizzy] but the “engines” have been removed. So, there is a small Nuclear Reactor going spare that could fit into the back room of your local Mutual Post Office and light up your community.
Small scale distributed nuclear power is both technically possible and practical. It’s been wandering around under or on the high seas for years. There’s nothing stopping it being rolled out to local communities.

But that’s not what you want is it? You want somebody else to suffer the risks or have their view spoilt.

How to make people 'love' nuclear power.

Every Time it Snows…….

…. Some joker pops up and says “you’re a green, is this a good time to explain Global Warming to me?”

My episode was off-line but you can see it here at Green Reading and as Suitably Despairing relates.

So you do, but they still don’t buy it. They’re not going to buy it. It’s like they don’t want it to be true and are grasping at straws to prove it’s wrong, just like the smoking lobby did a few years back. So, out come all the old excuses.

• The medieval warming period.
• The apparent cover up of dissenting facts at East Anglia.
• The reports that there has been no rise in the temperature in the past 10-15 years.
• The number of scientists who disagree with the 'pro' view.
• The vast industry in 'Climate Change', including such things as emmission credit trading, vastly expensive conferences that seem to do nothing but raise emission levels in the area concerned.
• The utter hypocrisy of many of the high profile figures involved in seeking to convince us amongst other things that a few newly planted trees will more than compensate for god knows how many flights on chartered jets!
• The fact that the politicians do not appear to have any more radical solutions than the continual raising of taxes to fund all of the above (I think petrol/diesel tax is now above 70% isn't it?)
• And finally how greens take an absolutist approach and preach rather than discuss [a factor from which I was excused, please note].

Taking that penultimate point first, chancellors have never, to my knowledge, needed an excuse to tax alcohol, tobacco or petrol. And true greens are the first [usually] to criticise the carbon intensive and utterly useless junkets and conferences for “world leaders” and their entourages to fluff up their feathers and preen themselves in front of the media. The point is that globally we don’t have any green governments and very few green politicians. And people like Al Gore are not what I’d call green. So we are not going to get anything other than the greenwash of Carbon Credit trading until we elect people who are genuinely green. And until we do that we will continue to get lunacy like holding a World Cup in air conditioned stadiums in the hottest place on earth [hattip Glenn] and MEPs who don’t like the look of Wind Turbines desecrating the countryside with images of just that on huge ugly billboards.

So, after the snow here in north-east London/ west Essex have you noticed how warm it is. It was quite pleaseant going outside for a smoke on the fifth anniversary of Buncefield, yesterday. My grand daughter was born that day. And then we have the news that this November was the warmest on record. Not here in northern Europe, but globlally, see map below.Here’s some reading for you.

The arguments made by climate change sceptics

Climate change: A guide for the perplexed

Climate myths: It was warmer during the Medieval period, with vineyards in England

Climate Change controversies – a simple guide.

To round off here is a useful map of exactly who has the biggest Carbon boots per capita [Thanks Atween] and a report that suggests that behind the scenes a far more effective strategy to deal Climate Change is already underway and has nothing to do with politics or politicians.

Real Redbridge Life

Back in 2007 I started a little theme of highlighting Social Enterprises here in Redbridge starting with Barnabas Workshops and then the Afasic Youth Project based at the Downshall Centre in Seven Kings.

Three years later I was quite surprised to get a comment on the Afasic post from a Lavinia Scott who writes:

I attend this youth group and it has done awesome stuff for us! If it wasn;t for them I wouldn't be doing half the things I do now :D

Well, yes says Mark the Afasic Office manager: “Lavinia has certainly done a lot recently, including giving a talk at the House of Commons, from which she got invites to present at 2 party conferences!”

And last month [November] she and volunteer Abigail Beverly broke new ground by jointly delivering a session on ‘My speech and Me’ to qualified practitioners in Speech and Language Therapy and Education on an MSc course at City University.

Drawing on their own experiences growing up with speech and language difficulties they emphasised the good as well as bad practice they had come across and described strategies they had developed that could help others. They rounded up their presentation with some powerful Key Messages for professionals which they would like to see the students adopt in their work.

Transport for Some

Funding for accessible transport support de-commissioned

At a shock decision at the London Councils Grants executive committee on Monday [6th December], services to support disabled and older people using accessible transport (Service Area 14) were de-commissioned and deemed not a funding priority. More…

This meeting, attended by representative Councillors of all 33 boroughs – saw only 5 councillors contribute to the debate, with only one councillor; Cllr Ruth Dombey from Sutton, articulating the concerns of the dozens of voluntary sector representatives who deliver vital services across the capital.

The final decision will be made by the Leaders of Committee of London Councils on Tuesday 14th December.

I have asked who the “representative Councillor” is for Redbridge and also what the position of Redbridge Council is. Will let you know.

Boris Backs B21 Campaign

No sooner have the pixels from my last post faded from your screens, one of the recent “followers” of Barkingside 21 on Twitter [the Mayor of London] has responded with “London’s Wasted Resource” received and forwarded today by one of our members. Thank you, Sonia.Here’s the main page on the London Assembly website. It’s quite easy to navigate and is quite a light and easy read so please go and have a look around. There is also an easy online consultation which closes on 14th January 2011 so please fill it in. Here’s the bit I like, but the targets just aren’t challenging enough.

Reducing the amount of rubbish we produce is the most effective way to save money and avoid the impact rubbish has on our environment. This isn’t quite as simple as just putting less rubbish in the bin; this is about changing our consumption habits so that we make less waste in the first place.

As consumers there are a number of simple things we can do to reduce the amount of rubbish we produce; we can:

• Buy products with less packaging. This would also help boost demand for less packaged goods.
• Give your unwanted belongings like used furniture and clothing to a charity shop or reuse network like freecycle, or sell them rather than throwing them away.
• Get broken things fixed rather than putting them in the bin. This could also save you money on buying new items.
• Go second-hand - if you need to buy something try looking for a second hand one instead - this will probably save you money too.

Responsibility also lies with manufacturers - they should be making an effort to reduce the amount of packaging used so that consumers aren’t burdened with creating waste unnecessarily. This might mean eliminating excess packaging or designing innovative solutions to minimise packaging.

The Mayor wants London to:

• Reduce household waste by 10% per household from 2009 levels by 2020, and increase this to 20 per cent by 2031.
• Increase the amount of municipal waste reused or repaired from 6,000 tonnes each year today to 40,000 tonnes a year in 2015 and to 120,000 tonnes a year in 2031.

The Big Recycling Myth

You have heard it many, many times – Government Ministers wanting to cut waste in Whitehall – Local Councillors wanting to cut waste in the Town Hall. What you don’t hear so much, hardly at all, is them wanting to cut out waste in the Home, your Home. That is because our economy is built around waste, we are a throw away society - throw it away, buy a new one keeps the old ticker GDP going. But the arteries are beginning to clog up now.

The point is that local councils spend quite a lot of our money clearing up after us. As the man said, “we are all in this together” and we, the residents, can have an impact on reducing the councils spend and hopefully our council tax. Let’s take a peek at the figures published on this blog earlier this year.

Redbridge has just over 100,000 households and on average each produces just over a Tonne of waste each year. That’s a Tonne, just imagine how much room that would take up in your home. Now, what I didn’t have back in May was the costs, which we can now apply.

The council pays £114 (£128 next year) for every tonne of residual waste it processes. That figure includes an averaged amount for Landfill Tax (£48 per tonne, £56 next year) but it does not all go to landfill. Some of it goes to the BioMRF thingy down on the river bank –Frog Island I think? at Jenkins Lane.

The council pays £92 (£98 next year) for every tonne of recycled materials it processes. Recycling still costs, not as much, but it still costs. The differential next year is £30. So every tonne of waste diverted from residual to recycling saves the council £30. But they can save over 4 times that amount by preventing waste entering the system in the first place.

Reduce and Reuse come before recycle.

So, making a rough estimate, the council expenditure on residual waste is about £9million and on recycling £3million. Even if we push our recycling rate up to 50% (currently 31%) the saving only amounts to about £½million. But if we Reduce our waste by 10% the council saves £1.28million, double for 20%.

So, what is our council considering? They have been across the border to have a look at what Barking & Dagenham are doing. They [B&D] have introduced the dreaded wheelie bins, but with a catch. Each household gets one 140 litre [about 37 gallons for anyone over the age of 50] bin and that is ALL they will take. If you can’t get it in the bin they won’t take it. They are imposing a limit on the amount of waste per household they will collect. Mind you 140 litres is still quite a big bin, it would take me at least 5 weeks to fill that up. Nevertheless it has reduced their waste considerably as well as a consequential increase in recycling.

The overall cost was about £375,000 but unlike Redbridge they did not have to modify or replace their collection vehicles, so it doesn’t look like a starter here. [Wipes forehead] Another option would be to reduce the residual waste collections to fortnightly, which has been done by other local authorities but not so far, we understand, in London. Or they could do what Islington are doing and fine residents who do not recycle. Several London Councils already do this and have found that enforcement, ie fines, have not been necessary whilst delivering considerable increases in recycling rates.

One thing that is definitely on the cards is kerbside collection of cardboard, which is already being trialled here in Redbridge, Hooray! About time.

Mission Impossible? Your task, should you choose to accept it, is to REDUCE the waste you produce by 20%. Well, allright if you are reading this you’ve probably already done it, so pass the message on.

Sign up to the Mailing Preference scheme so you don’t get junk mail.
Sign up not to have unwanted directories delivered to your door.
Keep it on the screen rather than print.
Put a sign on your front door saying what you don’t want – leaflets, free newspapers.
Buy unpackaged from the butchers or fishmongers section in the supermarket.
Hand back the inserts in newspapers and magazines to the retailer.
If you have a garden get a composter.
If you are not going to use the “two for one” don’t take it.
Repair things. Reuse things.
Be inventive and creative.

Bottom Line: Recycling is good, but it is nowhere near as good as Reduce and Reuse. And it could reduce your council tax.

After thought: We might need a bit of "big government" to help us bring back bottle returns.

Redbridge Cuts & The Big Society

Last Monday [29th November] there was a “scuffle” [depending upon which website you read] down on the other side of the river at Lewisham Town Hall. They were having a council meeting to approve a £60 million cuts package apparently drawn up before the coalition government was formed. The locals were not amused, but were, it seems, barred entry to the meeting. The package was approved with Labour councillors voting for, the Liberal Democrats sitting on the fence abstaining and the two Conservatives and one Green voting against. What topsy turvey times we live in.

We’ll have none of that nonsense here in Redbridge, we are much more well behaved, except when a JP, a Vicar and sitting MP are ejected from the council chamber for being “a rabble”.

So, the Greens alternative is……

· cutting senior pay for top council executives
· reducing the millions spent on expensive private sector consultants
· cutting down on glossy PR and council spin
· reducing council fuel bills by making our schools, libraries and other buildings more energy efficient
· working more closely with other public sector bodies to cut admin costs

Well, whad’ya know? That’s not a million miles away from what our own ConDem coalition council are looking at. They have already announced proposals for reducing the number of senior officers/directors. And made a commitment not to employ CONsultants when there is no prospect of the project being implemented this side of the forth Millenium. Redbridge Life is being cut back and could even be scrapped completely. Councillors have been over to Kensington & Chelsea to look at what they are doing to share admin facilities. Which leaves item 4. Oh, and we've also had the You Choose consultation.

On Thursday 2nd December I attended the Redbridge Budget Scrutiny Working Group at the invitation of the Chairman Cllr Robert Cole. This was because I had a rant back in September about the lack of savings through environmental measures.

The problem here is delegated budgets and outsourcing where the council have no direct control over fuel bills. Schools pay their own electricity and gas bills, and Shanks [our refuse collector] pay their own petrol bill. So, for the most part it’s down to “influence”. But on lighting and heating there are things the council can do. There was a report recently, I forget where, about how much CO2 could be saved if shops didn’t leave their front doors open. Forget the CO2 and think £s. Now, if you are one of those naughty greens who shop in Tescos you will have noticed that they have installed a double layer of automatic doors to keep the heat in. Cllr Mrs Cole will certainly have noticed this because she was in the Barkingside porch with her poppy tin last month. Where the private sector goes the public sector eventually follows ….eventually!

Other things being considered are rationalising office space, going open plan and hot desking. Blimey, even I remember this in the private sector and I have been retired for 15 years!!

So, where does the Big Society of the post heading come in? Well, that is all about waste, not council waste, our waste, and that deserves a whole post on its own….next. Stay tuned.

Transport For Londoners

Last Tuesday’s meeting on Transport for All was not very well attended, perhaps because of the snow, or perhaps because of “transport issues”? Anyway the next meeting will be on Wednesday 23rd February 2011, 2-4pm, venue to be confirmed. This is a formal invite to Roger Evans AM.

The first thing we decided is that the new group should not be just for the disabled and the infirm but for everybody. We all need a reliable, safe, clean, affordable public transport system, and we will only get it when we all start shouting.

The second thing we decided is that we are not asking for anything “extra”. We just want London Transport to live up to its publicity. We want it to do what it says on the tin. If it says it is a step free station then we expect it to be step free, ie the lift is working and has not been out of action for 6 months. And when it says all buses are wheelchair friendly we expect the ramps to work and when they do, not to be obstructed by a lamppost or other street furniture when the bus pulls into a designated stop. And we expect bus drivers to be trained properly and know the rules, re: disabled bus passes and children’s buggies. The space may be used by buggies IF IT IS NOT required by a wheelchair.

Third. We have to complain when things go wrong – I know some of you do this already. Don’t telephone, that doesn’t work. Write or email and copy in your local London Assembly member. Ours is Roger Evans.

For a more detailed manifesto see Max Reid’s CARTBUS here.

UPDATE: There's an e-petition.

Localisation

Local Works have been pressing the government to urgently deal with the proposals already made under the Sustainable Communities Act. They have been successful. On Tuesday 16th November, during a debate in Parliament the Decentralisation Minister, Greg Clark MP, stated that all the proposals made under the Sustainable Communities Act would certainly be dealt with by the end of January 2011, and that it was also his intention to try and deal with them all before Christmas this year. This is excellent news and is welcomed by Local Works and Barkingside 21.

So we now have a timetable. Next we look forward to seeing the negotiations between the Government and the LGA Selector Panel to reach agreement (as required by the Act) on which proposals will be implemented. Results will show that the Act can really be used to gain and achieve change.

The Sustainable Communites Act was championed through parliament as a Private Members bill by Nick Hurd MP whilst in opposition and he is now the Conservative Government’s Minister for Civil Society. He will be speaking at a Parliamentary reception organised by Martin Caton MP on this very subject on Wednesday 15th December from 5:30pm to 7pm. The Minister for Decentalisation, Greg Clark MP is also speaking. This event is free to attend.This should be an interesting event. The Government are in the final stages of dealing with the proposals already made by communities and councils and the second invite for proposals is to be issued by the end of the year. We hope the Minister will make an announcement.

Local Works have a guide to the Act here, and they have identified a ‘Vision for Local Sustainability’: a list of 30 proposals on the shortlist that they regard as vital for protecting and promoting thriving communities and upon which they are lobbying the Decentralisation Minister. You can view the list here. Not sure I would particularly agree with all of them, but hey, let’s have some of them.

Petition for a community school in Barkingside

As B21 reported in the 9 o’clock news earlier this week there is currently a public competition underway to choose an organisation to run a new school on the site of the current Ilford Jewish Primary school.

The need for additional primary school places in Redbridge is well known and the requirement to conduct a competition originates from the Education Act 2006. This means that any suitable organisation can apply to run and maintain the school. The recent consultation showed a high degree of support, over 99%, for reopening a school on that site. It also showed overwhelming support, nearly 92%, for providing a Voluntary Aided faith based school.

However for a number of reasons we support the opening of a new Community School which would be run by the Local Authority and have set up a petition in support of this principle which can be signed on line here. We are supporting the creation of a new community school because,

1) The school will need to serve all of the diverse communities in Redbridge. We believe this can be best achieved by a school which is under the control of publicly elected and accountable Politicians and Local Authority Officers. In this way all members of the community can have equal and transparent access to those who are ultimately responsible for the quality of the education provision and running of the school.

2) The cabinet report from 21 June 2010 sets out the very significant investment required to buy and develop the site. If the Local Authority is to invest circa £3m of tax payers money into this project we believe that it should remain a community asset which serves the whole community equally. We do not believe this is guaranteed if the school is run by a faith based or other organisation with special interests.

As the Local Authority has been granted permission to submit a proposal the decision about who runs the school will now not be taken locally but by by the Schools Adjudicator. The competition closes on 13th December 2010 and so the petition will be open until then. We would like anyone who supports the establishment of a Community School to sign the petition so that your views can be represented in the decision making process.

And of course please pass it on to other contacts! New Community School for Barkingside Petition.

Matt