Category Archives: Blog

Whittington A & E under threat

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I will literally fight them tooth and nail if they try and close or even reduce our emergency A & E services at the Whittington – which they (NHS London and the Government) clearly wish to do.

If you read the four options on the first letter sent out by Rachel Tyndall, CEO for North London Central NHS which was sent to all relevant  hospital CEOs and Medical Directors but not dated, you can see how stark and clear the message is about the future of A & E at the Whittington:

From the letter:

This provided 4 possible models for North Central London, namely:

 a)      Barnet and North Middlesex designated Major Acutes, Royal Free designated a major acute with specialist services, UCLH designated a specialist provider, Whittington designated a local hospital but with no emergency take and Chase Farm congruent with the BEH clinical strategy

 b)      Barnet and North Middlesex designated Major Acutes, UCLH designated a major acute with specialist services, Royal Free designated a specialist provider, Whittington designated a local hospital but with no emergency take and Chase Farm congruent with the BEH clinical strategy

 c)       designated a Major Acute, UCLH and Royal Free designated major acutes with specialist services, North  designated a local hospital with an A&E and medical take, Whittington designated a local hospital but with no emergency take and Chase Farm congruent with the BEH clinical strategy

 d)      North Middlesex designated a Major Acute, UCLH and Royal Free designated major acutes with specialist services, Barnet designated a local hospital with an A&E and medical take, Whittington designated a local hospital but with no emergency take and Chase Farm congruent with the BEH clinical strategy

As you can see – all four options kill off A & E at the Whittington. The position put out by Rachel Tyndall in her letter was crystal clear – that the Whittington would loose its A&E, and therefore its ITU, and acute medical and surgical services.

This position now, rather abruptly, appears to have changed with a hasty and strange press statement put out on 13th November to the effect that the letter had “led to some confusion”. No it hadn’t – it was perfectly clear – no emergency service at the Whittington. 

So – whilst they try and back-peddle to offset any mounting campaign to save our vital A & E at the Whittington – let me just make quite clear that I do not trust the Trust. They want to close our A &E. They don’t appear to understand that the 240 people a day who attend A & E are in great need and moreover could not make it to the Royal Free where the proposed services would have gone. The transport and access to the Royal Free for local people here in the West of Haringey is too dreadful for words. Moreover – local people want, need, deserve and have paid for an A & E here at the Whittington.

When will this dreadful Government and these dreadful, NHS beaurocrats, who seem only to rearrange and restructure, begin to understand what people want and need from their local health services.

Merging some services between the Whittington and the Royal Free is one thing – denying local people a local, 24 hour A & E and the services to go with it is another.

The consultation NHS North London claim to have done was a sham – a couple of weeks in August basically – hardly exhaustive given the dramatic nature of the proposed changes.

They may draw in their claws for now – but the letter makes quite clear where NHS and the Government want to go with their plans. No amount of weasel words will be able to deny their direction of travel.

The battle lines are drawn!

Night Stalker – arrested

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The news this morning that police had arrested a 52 year old, married man as a suspect in the case that has defeated them for years was of particular interest to me. The crime he has been arrested for is the rape and violence perpetrated on over a hundred older women aged between 65 and 93 over about a seventeen year period in South and South East London.

For several years I got involved in the search for the so-called Night Stalker in regard to the way the Met Police were collecting DNA samples from black men in South London. I was on the Met Police Authority for five years at that time.

I hope they have got the right man. The fear and terror perpetrated for so many years on older women who lived alone by this man was the most terrible thing in this part of London. It would put an end to a very long nightmare.

My involvement was really sparked by the police methodology used at the time when they asked for voluntary testing of the DNA of black men in the area.

As reported on Guardian on line:

The DNA trawl met some resistance in 2006 after the Met was accused of sending threatening letters to men who refused to take part.

Members of the Metropolitan Police Authority questioned its legality and warned it could inflame community tensions.

(I think their dates may be wrong – as I left the MPA in 2005)

The ask of local black men was to come in and clear themselves of any suspicion by having the DNA test – perfectly reasonable. Except that in the event if a black man refused to come in and refused the test – they were then effectively threatened into a position where ‘voluntary’ was in reality compulsory. Threatening letters were sent – I saw them.

It’s a very difficult situation where there is a real desperate need to find the person. The police knew from descriptions from witnesses that the man was a light-skinned black man. The decision was to test all black men in the area. Clearly co-ersion was not acceptble – but the frustration of the continued attacks and the years of non-success obviously took its toll.

An additional issue was that when DNA samples were taken from these thousands of black men – that DNA was also retained on the database forever – regardless of the fact these men were innocent. Of course, with the recent case in Europe, the Labour Government have been forced to agree to no longer keep information on innocent peoples’ DNA on their database. Typically, however, the Government has decided that it will keep it for six years.

DNA is the most brilliant detection tool – but it still can only be used for corroborating evidence in a court of law. So let’s hope that the man they have arrested is confirmed as the attacker by his DNA – that is the purpose of DNA evidence. 

What is less known or talked about in terms of DNA is that it was the policy of the Labour Government to collect the DNA of people who might (in their view) be likely to commit crimes in the future. This was a complete turnaround on our justice system where we have been used to being ‘innocent until proved guilty. Here was a policy that said basically that you are guilty until proved innocent. Hence the astounding position of the black community who find that around a third of the whole black and ethnic minority population of this country is held on that database . That happened – because of the high rate of disproportionate use of Stop and Search on that community. The other community over-represented on the database is the youth population.

Some years have passed now since my time on the MPA – but the issues around DNA, disproportionate use of police powers and the retention on the database of potential future suspects who are actually innocent at the point of having their DNA taken are still an issue.

I will be very interested to see why this man has taken so long to catch (if it is him) because, whilst eliminating suspects by DNA tests is a logical move, another problem with the DNA route to detection is that the police for that period were so focused on getting black men to come forward for DNA testing – they may have been distracted from perhaps more fruitful lines of enquiry.

Well – we will see when the details come out as to how and why the ‘night stalker’ was arrested and hopefully that will inform us whether DNA was the key to detection or simply to corroboration.

Mitzvah Day!

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It’s Mitzvah Day today. Mitzvah is the Hebrew word for ‘good deed’ and Muswell Hill Synagogue had about one hundred of its congregation out doing those good deeds today.

The Rabbi, David Mason, joined parents and children at Stationer’s Park planting tulips, daffodils and crocus bulbs around the base of the trees. In February – it will be awash with blooms! There were also lots of other activities such as outside Sainsbury in Muswell Hill where more volunteers asked those going into shop to buy one extra thing to give to a local charity. Last year – when I helped with this activity – people were so generous we could hardly keep up with the volume of stuff being donated.

What is so fantastic is that it is about giving time not money – and that makes people feel good about themselves too! And given the storms and the downpour – the sun actually came out for the day’s planting. They say the sun shines on the righteous.

Well done to Muswell Hill Synagogue and all those volunteers across the country who have given up their time for Mitzvah Day.

Teenage pregnancy

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A recent report showed that Haringey has the fourth highest teenage pregnancy rate in London. So I met up with the borough’s dedicated teenage pregnancy team to find out what is being done to tackle the issue.

At the meeting were representatives from Haringey Council and the local health service who told me about their various initiatives to spread information and target prevention work with particularly vulnerable teenagers.

They are working closely with local schools to improve sex and relationship education, and to help identify groups of young people at risk. The team also uses a special dedicated website to help schools and parents learn how to reach out and talk to young people about the relationships and safe sex. There are also plans to set up special vending machines to give young people across the borough access to contraceptives and Chlamydia testing kits without having to approach an adult. To check out the website go to: http://www.ruthinking.co.uk/

There wasn’t much said about educating the boys – which has to be as much part of the answer as the rest of the program. However, there clearly are genuine efforts being made to tackle this issue – the answer to which ultimately must be about aspirations so that young girls don’t see falling pregnant in their teens as the answer to life.

I am meeting some of the young girls in a scheme that sees them volunteer in a nursery with a support team discussion after each session as to their thoughts and feelings. The meeting is scheduled for later this month. The idea behind that is a dose of reality as to what it is really like spending time with babies and toddlers – not all sweetness and light!

You can also watch it on YouTube here.

Just a few things………..

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Broke my toe on Thursday morning rushing out door to get to engagement (but did nothing about it except hobble and moan)so hobbled to British Association of Social Workers conference where they had invited me onto a panel to talk about my experiences during Baby P. What was lovely was the amount of social workers who came up to me and thanked me for what I said. I was really pleased – for during the whole Baby Peter tragedy I was very careful to refer to the need for proper support for social workers – and to point to what happened in the Victoria Climbie case. In that case the only person to take the blame was the social worker on the end of the food chain. It was the Labour leadership and chief officers and managers who all got away completely from any consequences – actually it was that that motivated me to speak out when Baby Peter died. I wasn’t going to see another tragedy blamed on the social workers.

But I think it was also what I was saying about the need for an open and transparent culture, about the job being about trusting social workers to use their instincts and critical faculties rather than ticking boxes – and outside of case load reduction – perhaps the main drum I bang is the way that the pendulum has swung far too far towards management holding sway regardless of professional and clinical opinion.

I hobble on to the Spectator Annual Awards where strangely Harriet Harman and Peter Mandelson won the main awards. Was it an ironic parting gift to those who would not be in power by the next time the awards come around?

After that, I gave up and came home and put ice packs on my foot and laid down for the evening. I managed to do my advice surgery this morning at Hornsey Library – but then decided I couldn’t go on. I had to reschedule my Big Lottery Tour this afternoon  (as I really can’t walk) so went to the Whittington and then came home. Hoping for tea and sympathy from my children…………………….

Serious Case Reviews – Baby Peter and beyond

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Here’s my latest column from the Ham & High:

I have reached the next stage in my quest to get the Serious Case Review into Baby Peter’s death published – and beyond Peter – the publication of all Serious Case Reviews. A Serious Case Review (SCR) is produced immediately after any such case by the agencies involved in that child’s care. It tells the chronological story of who did what and when. It is an invaluable document – but it is kept secret.

I have been battling to change this. I have asked the Information Commissioner to find in favour of publication in the public interest. I don’t believe that the ambition of that over-used phrase ‘lessons must be learned’ can ever be fully realised if the causes and actions are hidden as they currently are.

The Information Commissioner recently came back to me to ask for more information as to why I thought it would be in the public interest for the SCR to be published. I sent him my reasons (below) and now the Information Commissioner is going back to Haringey Council for further information.

As I await the decision – although I have previously blogged about this – I regard continued public scrutiny as so important that am putting all of this in the public domain again.

This was my email in response to the Information Commissioner’s request:

Having been Leader of the Opposition on Haringey Council when Victoria Climbie died and now MP in half of Haringey during the Baby P tragedy – I have come to the conclusion that a contributing factor to cases like these (and others) is the secrecy, the closing ranks culture and the lack of transparency.

The Serious Case Review (version 1) which I was allowed to read virtually under lock and key in the Department of Education (where I could not make notes or record any part of the document) was an eye opener to me. The executive summary of the same document which is published did not reflect the key problems, in my view, that were at least part-causal in the eventual tragedy.

The thing that struck me most was the litany of casualness with which people did their jobs (appointments missed, not followed up; files lost, handovers not done, meetings not attended). There was a litany of failures like these at every level, virtually by every person and every agency. I think that most people would expect that once a child is on the protection register and their case being brought to the Safeguarding Board – that there would be a rigour about all aspects connected with them.

This casualness and lack of care is only really demonstrated if you get to read the whole document. It does not come through in the summary and itself is cumulatively causal in my view.

Literally hundreds of professionals across the country emailed me about their knowledge and experience – as did the general public. I believe that the phrase which is dragged out ‘lessons will be learned’ won’t be fully possible if the facts of the case and the failures in the case are kept hidden. As I say, the Executive Summary does not reveal the extent of the small, but cumulative failures – which I believe many professionals would recognize in their own fields and therefore be able to do something about. Therefore it must be in the public interest to be able to see the whole document.

Simply issuing another 150 Laming-like recommendations every time a tragedy happens simply adds procedures that take professionals away from their work without ever being able to see the why and wherefore of such recommendations – nor to judge or be able to critique the new ways from an informed position. The issues are kept between local authority, the other agencies and the Government – so keeping out those who would, could and should benefit from reading the whole story.

I am not an expert nor a professional – but unless and until we really open out all the issues around cases such as these – there will continue to be an air of defensiveness and self-protection which work against the safety and well-being of children at risk.

Social workers need to work in an atmosphere of support and good management – which can only come from opening up the real events, letting them stand there for all to see – and those in the professions taking those lessons away.

The argument Ed Balls makes to me against publishing the Serious Case Review is that staff would not speak freely if they knew that what they said might be published. My view is that anyone working in any field where there is such an event has a duty to speak and say what happened. They would have to if the case goes to public inquiry or hearing. Names and personal information should be anonymized. It was anyway in the SCR I read and social workers were referred to as social worker 1 or social worker 2. It is also the case that quite a lot of time elapses between the event and the publication as the SCR is written immediately (usually) and the case and the trial and exposure comes much later.

OFSTED did an audit of Serious Case Reviews and found that nearly two thirds, I believe, were inadequate. So – additionally – this would not have come to light without OFSTED’s exposure. If they were published – these inadequate SCRs would have been exposed much earlier. So – whilst the Serious Case Review I am most concerned about is obviously the Haringey one – it is clear there is a wider issue too.

So – I believe it is totally in the public interest for the Serious Case Review to be published. Secrecy, lack of transparency and openness and closing ranks are at the heart of the problem in Haringey.

I hope you find in favour of publication.

Kind regards
Lynne Featherstone

Caste Discrimination and the Equality Bill

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I moved an amendment at Committee stage of the Equality Bill which would make it against the law to discriminate on grounds of caste. The Bill moves to protect a number of ‘protected characteristics’ such as sexual orientation, disability, race, age and so on – but not caste. The Government would have none of it. As far as they were concerned they had seen no evidence. They had consulted – and there was no evidence in the responses of any problem.

Of course – the Government had consulted with essentially those organisations who condone the caste system – therefore (as I pointed out to the Minister) it was hardly surprising that the responders found there to be no problem.

I did, however (a bit cleverly I thought) in my closing statements to that stage of the Bill get the government to agree that if further evidence came forward – they would consider it. It’s in Hansard. They said they would!

So – I tabled another amendment to include caste in the ‘protected characteristics’ for Report Stage – which will hopefully be scheduled to come to the floor of the Commons soon after the Queen’s Speech. I hope the Speaker selects it for debate – but it may not get selected – in which case the next opportunity comes when the Bill is debated in the Lords.

So – action stations the Anti Caste Discrimination Alliance and Caste Watch – two organisations who then took up the challenge to go get the much needed evidence.

Yesterday – the Anti Caste Discrimination Alliance had an event in Parliament to launch the Report of that evidence. It is compelling. It is quite clear that caste discrimination exists in the UK. There are legions of examples – all put together in ten weeks. The evidence is compelling – so hopefully – the Government who said that they would consider any evidence coming forward will now bring forward their own amendment to include caste.

Fingers crossed!

National Liberal Club Annual Dinner

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The National Liberal Club is so beautiful – the rooms of great elegance and glorious design – and such a friendly, non-stuffy atmosphere. The Reverend Paul Hunt is in his third year as Chair and was warm, and friendly and welcoming – as is the club itself. It has all the charm, grace and magnificence of a club – with none of the stuffiness.

When I had looked in my diary for my Wednesday night engagements, I had seen ‘Toast to the Health of the National Liberal Club’ at their 127th Annual Dinner. I had met a young man at the remembrance service last Sunday who said to me ‘I am so sorry I can’t come to the dinner next Wednesday with you as Guest of Honour – I would love to hear you speak’. It was at that moment that I realised that ‘toasting the health of the National Liberal Club’ was code for ‘ speaker’ – which when I anxiously telephoned the Club the next day – proved to be exactly the case.

As I scrambled to find what would be the appropriate subject – I decided that despite the sombre nature of the subject – I would talk about Afghanistan and terrorism. It was Armistice Day – and I wanted to make a speech that would voice the views (almost identical to the Liberal Democrats anyway) of some of those in the forces who had spoken to me of their concerns and their views as to our mission.

This is my speech:

Mr President, Chair, Honoured Guests, I am delighted to be here tonight to toast the health of the National Liberal Club.

My instructions were to be short and be funny –

short isn’t the problem

Anyway – they say women aren’t any good at jokes – and I’m not going to prove them wrong – I’m going to leave the gags to Chris (Huhne) tonight – no pressure Chris.

For I want to be serious.

In honour of our forces today on Armistice Day – I want to speak about Afghanistan and terrorism.

And whilst the Sun Newspaper may wish to reduce this to some political row or opportunity to attack Gordon Brown – and although attacking Gordon Brown has its attractions – the fact someone with such poor eyesight can become Prime Minister should be something to praise, not something to belittle.

I have a certain distaste for furore this week and the tape recording of the conversation between him and the grieving mother.

The issues around Afghanistan and our role there should not be trivialised – or used as a political football.

I remember when we first went into Afghanistan.

There were dire warnings that no invading force ever succeeded – beaten back by landscape, tribal warriors, drug barons or harsh, unbearable winters.

But of course we had to go there – to the heart of the world’s crucible of evil where Osama Bin Laden was meant to be hiding.

The West was angry and hurt, scarred by 9/11 – and its author cloaked in mystery – a millionaire, billionaire who forswore all worldly goods and who seemed in control of a network of devotees ready to die at his command.

Terrorist Al-Qaeda members all over the world seemed able to activate anywhere, anytime – a mixture of amateur and superb sophistry and deadly as hell.

So – we had to go and fight to rid ourselves of the scourge of terror. And we Liberal Democrats supported this mission. We believed it was the right thing to do.

And now we have been there for eight years and have lost 232 of our troops and rising. They stare at us from the front of our newspapers.

Every Prime Minister’s Questions the three leaders give condolences for someone’s brother, son or father.

We pay genuine tribute to the bravery of our fallen soldiers – week after week. And as we stare at the unbelievably young faces, boys of 18, who die for Queen and country, only now there is the widespread asking of why and where and how.

Operation Panther’s Claw – made possible the elections in Helmand Province – but I felt absurd using the language of games and comics to describe that push to rid area of Taliban prior to the presidential elections.

To what avail – with a corrupt government unable to command respect or trust?

So up spoke Nick Clegg and put a great big fat question mark over what we are doing there. Not that we shouldn’t be there. But we should be clear about why, what we can achieve and how we exit..

Nick Clegg opened the floodgates as he broke the cozy consensus around our sortie in Afghanistan. From the inadequacy of the equipment for our troops to the need for a strategy that delivers an ending.

Of course – the truth is that in the end the solution will lie not with making war, but with making peace – with restoring enough of a stable government across enough of the country involving enough of the stakeholders so that the future fate of Afghanistan can rest in the hands of those Afghanis who do not see the future as one of perpetual war with their neighbours.

So tonight I want to speak for those in the forces who cannot speak for themselves because they must remain voiceless in this battle.

I want to give voice to a young, handsome, navy officer who came to me on Remembrance Sunday and said please speak for me as I cannot. I put their case – which is all but identical to the Liberal Democrat case.

There is a pressure now, since we Liberal Democrats spoke out about the need for a strategy, not just for a government of national unity, not just for an end to corruption, not just for better equipment – but a real pressure to sound the retreat – and to be frank who would not be tempted by that scenario.

Memories of our position on Iraq encourage those thoughts – but unlike Iraq – we did not vote against this war.

The forces do not want us to go so far so fast. They beg us to find a political solution. So – if a political solution is the way forward then it has to happen in the Afghan way.

Last time in December 2001, in the midst of the US-led rout of the Taliban, the United Nations brokered the so-called Bonn Agreement – creating a roadmap for the development of a new government in Afghanistan.

Central to the process laid out in the agreement was the convening of an Emergency Loya Jirga, the traditional Afghan Grand Council.

That spawned the first President and Cabinet – post invasion of Afghanistan.

That government no longer commands respect or trust amongst the many many leaders of local tribes and communities.

So we need once again to devolve power down to those local leaders – that is why we need another emergency Loya Jirge – to chart an agreed pathway acceptable to all the players.

As Ed Davey, our Shadow Foreign Secretary said at our autumn conference, it is time for us to talk with the Taliban.

And we need to understand that the continuation of civilian casualties – where we only report our boys dying – there are thousands of Afghani casualties that undermine the legitimacy of fighting terrorism and the credibility of the Afghan peoples’ partnership with the international community.

And then we wonder why their population is so angry with us.

And we need to look at what it will take. If we need to buy loyalty – then let us buy loyalty.

If the Taliban pay £10 per day – then let us pay more. Of course – that is too easy to be the answer on its own – there are no easy answers, no magic solution that fixes everything whilst keeping all our morals purer than pure – instead we have to choose between sometimes uncomfortable options, and the least worst is to pay for time to build stability…

We must pursue an end to the killing and to 30 years of war in Afghanistan, and the start of a regional peace process, not contingent on ‘Western’ forces ‘having the upper hand militarily’ – and the pursuit of a ceasefire, leading to a political & constitutional settlement within Afghanistan.

Our Government must press the US government to end its ‘military first’ approach, and shift priority to the economic, political and social development of Afghanistan.

Our stated purpose is – that we are now there – to stop terrorists here.

But the terror of terrorism is not only the deaths on our streets in 7/11 but that terror removes our civil liberties.

One of the recruiting drives of Al Qaeda and its ilk has been its calls to cleanse the world of corruption and immorality.

Just the sort of corruption and immorality that results in governments, for example, turning a blind eye to drug cultivation in their territory because some are being bribed and others are ensuring a tax-rake gets taken off the drug payments.

Only – the government I am thinking of in this case is Al Qaeda’s own top favourite, the former Taliban regime in Afghanistan, with Osama Bin-Laden not just letting the drug trade take place under his nose – but benefiting from it too.

It shows a remarkable degree of ineptness that this actual record – sordid, corrupt and immoral – is so little known, giving those same extremists a free hit in claiming to be different, better and purer.

With terrorists and extremists attracting support for opposition to corruption, our own activities to tackle it need not just to publicise this hypocrisy, but also to fight corruption itself. Too often the UK drags its feet on international anti-corruption standards.

In conclusion – as we wait for President Obama to decide what to do with regard tot General McChrystal’s demand for 40,000 extra troops for counter insurgency – I welcome Obama’s long pause for thought.

I take some hope and inspiration from the fact that he is a thoughtful and intelligent man.

He is going away tomorrow and it is very doubtful that a decision will be taken before he goes – but I hope that the conclusion he reaches delivers a strategy that understands Afghanistan. That understands the impossibility of continuing to act as some imperial force imposing democracy, that respects the Afghan ways and delivers a way ahead that let’s us leave that country.

And to the handsome naval officer who is due to go to Afghanistan on counter insurgency operations in 2012 – I hope I have given you a voice here tonight – on this day – on Armistice Day.

Mr President, Honoured Guests, Ladies and Gentleman, can I ask you to charge your glasses and please be upstanding

The Health of the National Liberal Club

If I ruled the world…………

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That was the title of my writing competition for local democracy week. Alexandra Park and Highgate Wood schools entered whole-heartedly into the whole spirit and submitted a huge amount of entries (and there were a few from other schools too).

I read every single one – and have to say that many, many of them were utterly brilliant. It was very heartening to see how much our children cared about poverty, pollution, homelessness, knife crime, drugs, poor children in Africa and of course – world peace above all

However, when it came to choosing a winner, I couldn’t help but be totally engaged by the entry from Roela who is at Alexandra Park School.  Roela has written a beautiful and inspiring piece that really pulls your heartstrings. It tells of such a fundamental and essential thing as the need for people to have families who love and support them, and how more love in our society would mend many of its ills.

Read it!

Roela will now come and shadow me for the day at Parliament. But I also am giving very high commendations to eight other entries – and want to say – what a very difficult time the high quality of the entries gave me. And to congratulate all who took part.

Supermarket sweep…..

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It was a good experiment – holding an advice surgery in Budgens in Crouch End – to see if putting myself where people are enabled those who normally might not get round to making an actual appointment to see me as their MP – bring their worries to my attention.

First thanks to Budgens – who placed me in the vegetable and fruit department (warm thank goodness – unlike the cold cabinets) Lynne Featherstone's advice surgery in Budgens, Crouch End– right by the entrance so highly visible. Excellent position.  We had chosen Budgens because Andrew Thornton and the staff are so involved in the community that we thought they might agree – which they did. We chose Crouch End so that the vast majority of shoppers would be local.  There was one woman who came to chat who I couldn’t help because she lived in Islington – so referred her to her own MP. We want to do this in other areas too – but it gets trickier the nearer to the constituency boundary you go – as inevitably a higher and higher proportion of people will not be from the constituency.

Anyway –  in the two hours about 13 or 14 people came to sit and bring one thing or another to my attention. It was interesting to see how people made that decision to voice something that had been on their mind. Mostly – they came in, noticed the table, fact sheets on recycling and how to burglar-proof your house, walked on to do their shopping but came back when they remembered something they had always meant to raise with me.

Most of the issues, as expected, were not as heavy duty as those that are brought each week to my advice surgery where it is by appointment, as lengthy as is needed generally (although 15 minutes is the allotted time) and are generally about the most serious of cases – along with lobbying and local more general issues.

For a couple of people who came to talk – we agreed to make a surgery appointment where we could have proper and more private time – so that will happen. But for the rest – it was a good place to hear peoples’ concerns on a variety of issues which I will take forward as normal casework.

And it was also jolly nice just to say hello to people who seemed very pleased to see me sitting there – in the middle of the store – accessible.