Bowes Park Community Association (BPCA) had their AGM tonight. What makes this group particularly impressive is that they have created a range of sub-groups that DO things.

There is the Community Garden sub-group, that despite early and vocal opposition brought to life and use a piece of unloved green space – now winning flags for achievement. The fear raised by objectors six years ago was that if you made it nice and put in benches it would become a nest of drug takers and alcoholics. It hasn’t. It has become exactly what the vision was – a lovely oasis where community picnics or sales or events take place and a garden proper.

There is a walking group, another garden group (different space), a social group (quizzes etc) and so on. And yes – they do lots of work on traffic and rubbish and so on – but it’s a positive group doing good things!

Third call of the day is to Bowes Park Community Gardens where the local association is having a table top sale to raise a bit of cash for their activities. They are a very active and committed residents’ association – including fighting hard for Myddleton Road to be properly looked after. I remember so many promises from my time as a councilor made by Haringey Council about ensuring proper rubbish collection and action on the strange (and possibly unlawful) building that seems to go on behind closed shop fronts on this road. I will write to the Council to ask the status and legality of all the development that appears to have gone on here – as there were worrying tales of overcrowding and inappropriate and inadequate accommodation. I believe it is all privately developed – but the Council must have had to give planning permission – and if not, then their enforcement team must take a look.

The other big issue for the residents’ assoiation is the illegal left turns that traffic makes into Brownlow Road by Bounds Green Tube. It is extremely dangerous and needs to be redesigned with safety first. The residents are gathering a petition at the moment – and when done then we need to push this up the agenda. Promises about next year, sometime never aren’t really good enough.

So today I sit on the front bench of Westminster Hall for the debate on ‘Accreditation in the Security Industry’. It comes down basically to the licensing of the individuals and the companies within this trade and follows on the licensing of bouncers and clampers – i.e. a very good thing. But it becomes clear that there is a big ruck between two Labour members – the one who secured the debate and one who clearly has extensive and long knowledge and relationship with the security industry.

It would seem that the SIA (Security Industry Assessment quango) cannot get the licensing done quickly enough for an approaching deadline. To circumvent having unlicensed employees, the industry appears with the SIA to be rushing through a scheme that approves the company – and if you get that accreditation you can employ unlicensed operatives. Well to me that negates the whole purpose. And that is was the debate hinges on. I simply reiterate that the whole point of this legislation for what have been pretty shady industries is to protect us from dodginess. There should be no fast track that evades the licensing process.

Meanwhile back in the Chamber (the main House of Commons – the one you see on TV at Prime Minister’s Questions etc), my colleague on the front bench Lib Dem Home Affairs team, Alistair Carmichael, is holding forth on the Asylum and Immigration Bill – to which I have to go and vote periodically throughout the afternoon. At the final vote we find ourselves in the lobbies alone – thus once again demonstrating that we are the opposition!

I dash to Bowes Park Community Association for their AGM – and arrive late because of the vote. However, the subjects as ever, are traffic and how the money (sweetener) from the proposed North Circular works will be spent. Rubbish, parking and recycling are the other key issues. It is a well-attended meeting and a very good and active association.

I commit to contacting Haringey Council over what they are going to do about the junction outside the old Middlesex University. I did take traffic officer Tony Kennedy there to look at the very dangerous alignment of bollards where motorists – frustrated by having to wait – go on the wrong side of the road to avoid the jams. Tony K said they would tackle it as part of the development of the Middlesex site – and as that is nearly done and I can’t see any change to the road layout – I will pursue!

Last, but not least, I pop into our HQ to catch the very end of the local Lib Dem exec meeting. I like to try and get there and this is the first meeting after our AGM with lots of new members stepping forward to take some of the important officer positions.

First appointment of the day fails to show up – so left twiddling thumbs until Hansard Society Interview. Extensive interview on how I find various aspects of being an MP after the grand total of around 9 weeks. Hansard are doing an in depth study of a number of MPs and will follow us through our first term. As I say – ask me in a year what I think – as right now I don’t even know what I don’t know or what I need to know. However, always a useful exercise talking to a stranger – helps consolidate own thoughts – even ones I didn’t know I had.

In the afternoon I visit Arbours Crisis Centre in Crouch End. This is an establishment working in the mental health sphere that doesn’t fit – doesn’t fit into categories that would encourage the Government or
Haringey Council or any specific body to fund it. And yet it does invaluable work and has a world-wide reputation.

It’s a small site – one house – where the clients and therapists live together. A novel approach to mental health issues. Of course – being outside the box – funding is a struggle. And perhaps of even more concern is the Government being unable to treat them as a one-off. No says the Government – they must be an institution that comes within the care homes standards. I can see the point, but surely there must be a way which allows different sorts of therapeutic environments to survive – and perhaps have standards that would apply more to a normal house than an institution.

In the evening went to a meeting with the Bowes Park Residents’ Association and officers. It’s about Myddleton Road. This is a road that’s as a microcosm of every problem in the borough. It has numerous small shops, many of which fail and are only open for a short time. Amongst the shops is a trading timber yard that started small, has grown (hurray) as a business, but now through loading and unloading, huge lorries and huge loads on a narrow residential street, no longer really fits being in that location. Add to this – lots of property owners converting every spare inch of space into properties for rental as temporary accommodation and tales of illegal immigrants, twenty to a dwelling creeping in and out. And even more – no apparent enforcement of planning laws, parking laws, health and safety laws and trading laws – and you have – voila – Myddleton Road.

Now the good news is that the residents’ association seems good and strong. They have got together an action plan of which some of the easy stuff has been done – e.g. a couple of raised levels on the road corners. But the tough stuff is untouched. To be fair to the council, some of this stuff – particularly the housing for immigrants – is a hard nut to crack. However, if the council would put someone in charge of pushing forward the Myddleton Road scheme, it could happen – or at least most of it could happen.

All the council officers in attendance at the meeting seemed really committed and full of good intentions – but you could see that without a driving force it would just drift along not happening. We agreed to meet every three months with a list of things to be sorted in the meantime and a report back on the action plan.