Category Archives: Blog

London's Olympics bid

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Barbara Cassani, who has been appointed to lead London’s Olympics bid, came in to the full London Assembly meeting this morning to answer our questions. The Mayor, Tony Winterbottom from the LDA and Barry Broe from Transport for London accompanied her to aid her with any questions which she could not answer.

Very impressive woman. She set the background to her role in the bid very ably and the questioning, at least to her, was generally supportive. The bid being very important to London, no one wanted to particularly rock the Olympic boat.

But then, life happens. In the Transport for London brief for the Olympics, they state that London rail, tube, etc will have a single control and command structure . Now we have all been fighting for this since the establishment of London Government – but the Train Operating Companies (TOCs) and the Strategic Rail Authority (SRA) won’t play ball. The TOCs are a law unto themselves and their interest lies only in their long haul profitable train journeys. Try and persuade them to stop and put some service into the London commuter end and they virtually tell all and sundry where they can stuff London.

I am hugely supportive of our Olympic bid. I think it will be a fantastic coup and a catalyst for all sorts of good things to happen in London. BUT – a tinge of reality has to make our package believable to the International Olympic Committee. So I asked if Barbara was aware that the ‘single command and control policy’ might be a ‘pigs might fly policy’? I want Barbara to be armed with the facts so that she can make sure our bid is a winning bid – not a pie in the sky bid.

The current Mayor leapt in, and whilst admitting that the TOCs and the SRA were impossible to deal with – stated that if they couldn’t reach an amicable agreement on this, the Government would step in and legislate to force compliance.

Well – I hope he is right. But just in case that is another one of his unsubstantiated claims, I am asking Simon Hughes to table a question for Prime Minister’s Question Time asking the government to commit to guaranteeing that this is the case – and in writing!

Far be it from me to doubt Mayor Livingstone’s word…

Man with bike

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Saw a man about a bike today. It’s a striking idea called Sky Route – putting bicycle routes in clear tubes through the skies above the crowded streets. I thought idea was far-fetched until I met him today. It was a really impressive presentation and business case. So just maybe … one to watch in a capital city with no more road space!

David Rendel visits

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David Rendel, MP – shadow Higher Education spokesperson for the LibDems – came to Hornsey as our guest of honour at a party social.

He came to have a look at a couple of schools with me – given the untenable pressure on schools around Crouch End, the Lib Dems have been campaigning for a new primary school – and to Priory Road where we are campaigning for a pedestrian crossing to be introduced.

David spoke very eloquently about our fantastic by-election success in Brent East and what that meant for us in Hornsey & Wood Green. If we replicated that swing, we would take this seat by 15,000 votes. Way to go …

However, he then upset us all by saying that he believed IDS would go within two weeks. Now we love IDS and want him to stay. Between such a damaged and ineffectual Tory leader and a prime minister who has abused our trust (regardless of whether we were for or against going to war) the LibDems are doing pretty well right now.

Safety at Coldfall School

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I went to meet concerned parents and the Travel Group this morning outside Coldfall School where they have been having a nightmare of a time with parents parking irresponsibly when dropping off children. And not only the dropping off – but the maneuvering of their cars to get out of the cul-de-sac in Coldfall Avenue is lethal. Over recent weeks, I had managed to get the local beat officer and the PCSOs (Police Community Support Officers) to drop by to try by their presence to ensure better behaviour.

I had also gone to have a look at what might be done to deter parents from driving badly by physical means – perhaps bollards to stop people reversing over the pavement and a widening of the pavement itself which is extremely narrow in front of the school. There is a bid in train for money from the ‘Safe Routes to School’ pot – but even if successful it will take some time. Personally, I think Haringey Council needs to act quicker than that on a few of the small but really helpful measures. I will ask to meet an officer next week to look at the possibilities.

While there, the beat officer turned up in person. It was wonderful to watch the salutary effect he had on miscreants! One woman had double parked her 4 by 4 quite a little way back from the school, keeping what she probably thought was a safe distance from the police officer. But he caught her on the way out and hopefully put the wind up her enough to stop her doing it again. We can but hope!

But we also need the Council to get its act together on those other measures to reduce the problem.

Victoria Climbie

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The parents of Victoria Climbie came to this afternoon’s meeting of the Metropolitan Police Authority’s Planning Performance Review subcommittee, on which I sit. This is where I and others scrutinise the performance of the Met. On this occasion, one of the agenda items was an update from the Met on progress in meeting the recommendations of Lord Laming’s report on the tragic events around Victoria’s death.

As they sat watching our proceedings, I couldn’t help looking at them and wondering how on earth they can bear all of this. The weight of the responsibility on all of us sits heavy. The reality of their presence and their loss brought into sharp focus our duty in that room.

I was particularly struck by one paragraph in the report which was about Haringey. Haringey, post Climbie, acted to fill its vacant social services posts. The lack of staff to deal adequately with caseloads had been one of the criticisms and possible causes of the tragedy. To do so, Haringey upped the stakes and offered way over the going rate for the job. Consequently Haringey filled their positions. The report notes, however, that having the full complement of social services staff in place has resulted in a quadrupling of the number of police officers now needed to attend to the work involved.

This has two serious implications. If that situation were replicated across London and all boroughs filled their vacant posts (about a 20% deficit) what would that mean for police resources? And secondly – it seems to indicate an extremely large unmet need which must be residual in all understaffed boroughs. What risks is that unmet need be posing?

The Met will continue to report back to my committee regularly on progress with this.

Finsbury Park champion

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This morning I met the ‘Finsbury Park Champion’ – nothing to do with boxing, but a technical officer employed to pull together the modernisation of the Finsbury Park station interchange. This is about the bus station, traffic, cycling interchanging at the station – not the station itself.

Looking at the plans the concept seemed well-thought out and workable, but I am a bit concerned about how it’s going to look. However, it will definitely be a vast improvement on the rather sordid, dirty and unpleasant current situation.

Well done to Transport for London for seeming to understand the importance of getting effective, efficient and pleasant interchanges as a must for better public transport usage.

The ‘champion’ is tasked with driving the project through and following up on all the promises made at meetings by the varying partnerships and stakeholders involved in the area and the project. The finish date should be 2006.

Highgate CPZ

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Last night was the Highgate CPZ (controlled parking zone) call-in by the Lib Dem councillors in Haringey.

The Labour executive had conducted a consultation on their proposed Highgate CPZ which got an 82% no response. But the Labour Exec decided that there were about 5 roads where the vote was close and decided to proceed with a statutory consultation on putting the CPZ in just those roads. Given the controversies over the consultation, the Lib Dems called in Labour’s decision for examination by the Overview and Scrutiny Committee.

There were some excellent speeches from deputations both for and against the CPZ and Cllr Neil Williams and Cllr Bob Hare (Lib Dem Highgate councillors) both spoke in a measured and balanced way about the deficiencies of Haringey Council in its process and its flawed reports.

As the Labour lead member, Cllr Ray Dodds insisted that in these 5 roads there was a ‘blurring’ and the result was something like 53% against and 47% for (although different accounts said differently). One of the deputations pointed out that if Labour had won an election by 53% to 47%, they wouldn’t be calling that a ‘blurred’ result – but a clear victory.

What was clear was that Labour were in a mess having proposed something, got an answer they didn’t like, and tried to railroad residents into a half-baked version of a mini-CPZ. Now CPZs can be good or CPZs can be bad – it really depends on the accurate analysis of the parking stress, the specific nature of the roads involved, the design of the scheme and so on.

Sadly, Haringey Labour’s track record on consultation and fine design is not good (understatement). And of course the real problem is nothing gets resolved properly.

Anyway – the upshot was that the Overview and Scrutiny Committee voted by a good majority to refer the decision back to the Executive, who now have 5 days to consider their next move. There certainly was a feeling that the new proposal was half-baked and that they should go back to the drawing board. We wait with baited breath …

How to sex up travel planning

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Sexing up travel planning – that’s my challenge. Not easy! But I am 100% convinced that individual travel planning (which I will explain in a moment) is as likely to reduce congestion as congestion charging, and without spending a penny on new infrastructure.

I get really annoyed that travel planning, car sharing, car clubs, cycling etc get termed ‘soft measures’. I reckon that’s a put down – as though they aren’t as important as the big transport infrastructure projects. Forgive the discrimination – but the boys like the big toys – the Crossrails or the macho game of ‘who’s got the biggest airport’.

And the so called ‘soft measures’ get short shrift on funding. Yet individualized Travel Planning in a project in Perth, Australia reduced congestion by 14% – nearly as much as the Mayor’s congestion charging scheme – but without a penny having to be spent on infrastructure.

Travel planning is basically taking a group of people, finding out about their lives and then giving them individualized travel plans helping them to use public transport where before they would have used their cars.

You see – it’s just not sexy! BUT that sort of cultural or social shift is probably more sustainable and more effective than the big transport projects. Of course, it’s not either or – both are needed.

I forced (too long a story) Transport for London into running four pilots of the ‘Perth’ scheme in London. The reports on how successful or otherwise they have been should be out in a short while.

I was opening speaker at the NHS Travel Plan Forum this morning. This brings travel planning to institutions and corporations and the NHS is one of the biggest employers in London. Transport for London are working with the NHS across 18 major hospital sites in London to begin to try and plan travel for up to 40,000 staff – who face the added challenge of 24 hour working patterns. It was the first meeting of the forum and I think it’s going to be the way to go for corporate or institutional responsibility in the capital.

Road safety in Lewisham

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Just back from Lewisham where I was inspecting two dangerous junctions where pedestrians take their life in their hands to cross.

As I arrived early, I trotted across the junctions to test for myself. Even though it was only 9am on a Sunday morning, I only narrowly avoided getting squashed myself. Have previously written to Mayor Livingstone about these junctions at local peoples’ behest, I’m now even more committed to getting proper pedestrian crossings in place.

Seeing is definitely believing …