Wayne Hoban, councillor for Alexandra ward, has decided to stand down from Haringey Council after six years of working hard for local people.
I know this was a difficult decision for Wayne, but following a change of jobs he had to move out of London to be closer to his work.
He was a fantastic colleague and we will all miss him. I wish Wayne and his family all the best for the future.
UPDATE: The Ham & High has a piece this week about this.
The Liberal Democrats are currently reviewing our policy on a range of issues which affect women – and the working group has created a group on Facebook to help reach out to a wider audience. As the group says:
Some would ask whether, in the 21st century, it is still necessary to produce policy specifically aimed at women. Why the special treatment? Shouldn’t men have tailored policies too?
As Liberal Democrats, we are rightly concerned at the injustices that women face in our society. During its work, the group will bear in mind the questions above; after all, often when there is inequality for women, men are part of the solution. Focusing solely on one gender won’t work.
Tasked not just with developing policy, but also how it can be communicated to reach out to women, the group plans to produce a report that will be read with interest.
Some of the issues we will look at include:
• Money – pay, pensions, benefits
• Sex – sexual orientation, abuse, maternity
• Relationships – work / life balance, carers, family
• Health & Beauty – body image, health
• Power – representation, fear of crime, Public role models
We would love to read your views, personal experiences and professional expertise on this Facebook page.
The headline pretty much says it all – Neil, councillor for Highgate ward, is now blogging at neilwilliamslibdems.blogspot.com
Back yesterday from three days in Edinburgh – a festival virgin! And it was fantastic. I have clearly come to this cultural feast late in life – but enjoyed it hugely. One real bonus – everything was arranged and booked by a friend who has been doing Edinburgh for about 20 years – so knows a thing or two. Without boring you with every detail about what I saw – just to mention one completely brilliant play called Regretrosexual. It’s a love story – basically – but a modern one! If you get a chance – go see it.
One comment, however, is that I am often aware when I go out of London that not everywhere is as diverse as here. But I was shocked by the almost complete absence of non-white folk at the Festival. Why is it so white? Answers please!
And one postscript – or swipe at National Express. The toilet was filthy so I told the staff person who catered our train carriage. She said – it wasn’t her job – catering staff couldn’t touch toilets. Well no – but you would have thought that all staff had a system for reporting any problems. She said use another one anyway. So I did. And as punishment – having soaped up my hands on conclusion of activity – there was no water! But the announcements were all very PC and polite!
Oh my goodness! So the Government now plan to give themselves even more powers to stop us knowing what they’ve got up to. The provisions, under a clause in the Counter-Terrorism Bill, allow the Home Secretary to stop a jury being summoned, replace the coroner with a government appointee and baring the public from inquests.
I do sometimes have to pinch myself . Sadly – it’s the real deal. I think it all stems from the deepest of insecurities and the psychotic state Labour has got itself into in terms of believing that it must always have the most macho policies of anyone – and then some – and that introducing new legislation is the correct response to just about any problem. Well – I think they’re wrong on both scores.
Fighting terrorism requires public support and confidence in the official authorities – and the way to achieve that is by being open, transparent and frank. Labour’s measures, if introduced, won’t protect our security – they’ll just feed beliefs in cover-ups and conspiracies. The more people believe the state is the bad guy, doing things wrong and then covering them up, the less help people will give the state to fight terrorism. And that help is certainly needed.
Popped into Greig Academy – the school next door my constituency office – just to see how results were going. There were three girls there (Inas Himedan, Taimmy Hango and Janet Kanyange) who had just received their results.
The Deputy Head came out to say hello and overall – congrats definitely to Greig who have hugely improved results.
I always feel hugely sorry for the students now – as each year so much of the media coverage isn’t about celebrating their (and their teachers and families) success – but about knocking the results. Yes – there’s a time and a place for debate over exam standards, but there’s also a time and a place for celebrating success – and someone sitting an exam can only do the exam paper put in front of them.
That’s the headline in the Hornsey Journal this week:
MORE than 500 residents concerned about council plans to cut Haringey’s parks police force have contacted the Liberal Democrats, a councillor claims.
The news comes as Labour-run Haringey Council announced consultation will begin on proposals to axe the parks constabulary and replace it with community policing which, it is claimed, will increase supervision in parks.
But Councillor Ron Aitken, the Liberal Democrat spokesman for policing and community safety, said there was widespread apprehension.
He said: “The Liberal Democrats have had over 500 responses so far from people who say they are very concerned about the parks police being disbanded.”
You can read the full story, including details of how to respond to the council consultation, here.
Press called for comment on Haringey Council sending out a press release on a reduction in the number of parking tickets they have issued. Given the number of people who get ticketed wrongly by Haringey and come to me to sort it out (they still haven’t refunded the fines they levied on two of their illegal yellow junction boxes) the question really should be – how many do they write off out of the number issued due to wrongly issued tickets? And should Haringey not be fined every time they get it wrong?
No doubt Haringey are feeling a bit sore at the moment because of their poor record on confusing signage and illegal yellow junction boxes – let alone their own wardens not understanding their own signs. I suspect the timing of this ‘good news’ story is not coincidental!
You may have recently read about the horrific crash of a coach into two flats at the bottom of Muswell Hill. Here I am pictured with Andrew Smith and his wife – from one of the two flats which suffered catastrophic damage. There was also a young mother and baby in the other flat when the accident happened. A miracle that no one was killed.
Anyway, this morning I had requested a meeting between a top council officer and the residents of the flats to try and get proper action taken to protect them from further carnage. The accident itself was caused by a coach or lorry going uphill, running out of petrol and being advised by the police to reverse free wheeling back down. The vehicle went out of control and hit the flats as you can see – crossing the pavement and sweeping a bollard out of the way.
The bollards were installed a few years ago following an earlier campaign with residents and myself as this is an accident hotspot. Likewise – finally after about eight years of campaigning – a speed camera was installed on Muswell Hill about fourteen months ago. Seemingly – neither of these measures have quite been enough – although very welcome and undoubtedly better than before.
So – about six residents of the flats and two council officers (a head of traffic policy and an engineer) met this morning. First question was – what more could be done to prevent vehicles going out of control?
The anti-skid surface that was applied last year apparently hasn’t taken and is deemed to have ‘failed’ so the contractor will be obliged to come back and redo that job. But the officers will look at all sorts of records to establish causality – so that they can come back with proposals to improve the engineering to prevent it happening. No doubt the speed camera will have helped a bit – but clearly not enough.
The second thing they will consider is what measures can be taken to improve the safety should something go wrong and a vehicle go out of control? The hill and the camber make it virtually certain that under those conditions it is the bottom of the hill residences that are in line of fire.
So – we now wait for Haringey Council to assess the record and come back with proposals. It was a good meeting – and whilst passions are high – I felt that it was a positive meeting. We shall see.
It may be that the funding for any improvements will come from Transport for London – in which case I have offered to nag at the highest level. But it may be that it will come out of Haringey budget. We will have to wait and see.
My colleagues have been demanding a public meeting for local residents to have their say on a new planning application for the Concrete Factory in Cranford Way, N8.
London Concrete – who despite massive local campaigns against their planning application to create a plant right in the middle of a residential area – succeeded. But they only succeeded on appeal with the planning inspector imposing a significant number of conditions.
The new application seems to be trying to get modifications to those conditions – so plenty of reason for the whole community to be on its toes to make sure that having got the factory the firm now doesn’t get to change the rules it agreed to.
In Redvers Road, Noel Park, there’s been a problem – bus drivers and no toilets! After a brilliant piece of action by my Lib Dem colleague – Cllr Fiyaz Mughal – everyone will now be relieved! Until now, bus drivers caught short during the day, had been using bushes and the alleyway behind Hollywood Green cinema. Transport for London have now installed loos for the drivers to use. Hurrah!
Lynne Featherstone 