I am seizing the marvellous opportunity afforded to me by a five-second break in the clouds, and taking a holiday from the blog for a couple of weeks. So forgive the lack of postings between now and my bronze-skinned, wind-swept return. I will be back at the PC as soon as I’ve shaken the sand from my swimming shorts.

Rick

The Conservative group running Bury Council has once again created the type of headlines that make all local Councillors look like idiots. The only mild saving grace is that they look more idiotic than we do, but I’d much prefer it if the brand of arrogant silliness that seems to be running through the leading group at the moment went away entirely.

The Bury Times today told the story of one Conservative Councillor’s allegations of assault against another member of his group. The whole thing makes Councillors a laughing stock, and whilst I don’t know the details of the incident, quite why Conservative Councillors can’t control themselves is a mystery.

This comes hot on the heels of last week’s story outlining the squabbles between Labour and the Tories over some remarks made at a local meeting, and the subsequent lack of apology from the Tory Councillor who made them (the same one involved in the “assault”). The Tory won’t apologise, nor will he recognise the Standards Committee to which he’s been referred by Labour.

Again, it’s a ridiculous story that makes Councillors look like school children in the playground. We’re supposed to be running the town - looked up to and respected. And yet the papers are dominated by a game of “he said, she said” that wouldn’t look out of place in the toilets at a teenage disco. Come on guys, sort it out. Stop making stupid remarks, apologise if you do make them, don’t over-react if they’re made to you, and show respect to the procedures of the Council you’re elected to.

All this looks particularly bad for the Tories, because they look even more squabbly than Labour. It’s no wonder that one Conservative said she was “embarrassed” by the antics of her colleague at the centre of these allegations. I’m embarrassed too, and the quicker the Leader of the Council takes action to bring this type of thing to an end, the less bad it’ll look for him, and the less bad it’ll look for the rest of us.

Rick

Today has been spent on a work “Organisational Development” day, at the type of grim hotel frequented only by desolate business people on training courses, and couples conducting illicit affairs.

Despite the lacklustre surroundings, it was an excellent day, the undoubted highlight of which was the closing speaker - Simon Weston OBE, best known for being the most seriously wounded survivor of the Falklands War. His is a remarkable story of triumph in the face of unimaginable adversity, and a reminder not only of his own courage, but of the sacrifices being made by service men and women for the protection of our way of life every day. Mr Weston’s life in the 26 years since his injuries has seen him positively influence the lives of thousands of young people directly through his charity, and influence many thousands more through speaking engagements. His fundraising and other charitable activities earned him his OBE, and he continues to raise the profile of good causes today.

His story certainly puts local political squabbles into context, and his message of public service spurs me on to try and do more good things as a Councillor. I must confess though that because I was listening to him all day, I haven’t managed to do any good Councillor things yet today. However, I am about to go and chase up some emails and return some phone messages, so I can start putting that right straight away.

Rick

Good news today, with a promise from the Council that we’ll get some much-needed additional safety barriers outside St Mary’s Park in the next couple of weeks, just in time for the peak summer holiday season.

Since the re-modelling of the junction at St Ann’s Road outside the park, the gate is now much more aligned to the crossing, and the only thing preventing a hyperactive child flinging himself into the path of an oncoming Range Rover is a single small barrier. Given the ever-rising obesity numbers, several of the youngsters may soon be wider than the barrier itself, and so I have been asking for additional protection for some time, along with a local resident who has been prodding me on the subject too.

And now the Council say that we can have it. Apparently there will be two or three extra barriers there soon, which will make the whole place lots safer, and minimize the angst which I suffer every time I drive past there half expecting a tragedy to occur. 

All of which is good news for me and for local children, although bad news for those hand car wash places that are springing up everywhere.

Tonight I am going to see a band at the Manchester Apoloo, in an homage to my youth. I will probably complain that it is too loud, and suffer from tinnitus-like symptoms until a week next Tuesday. But it beats staying in.

Rick

As you may know, there is a strike of local government workers on Wednesday and Thursday of this week. This will have an impact on local schools.

The following schools in Bury will be fully closed tomorrow and Thursday due to strike action unless otherwise stated:

All Saints C of E Primary School
Cams Lane Primary School - part closed
Chantlers Primary School.
Chesham Primary School closing at 12noon each day
Christchurch Ainsworth C of E Primary School.
East Ward Community Primary School
Elton Community Primary school - part closed
Green Hill Primary School
Greenmount Primary School.
Heaton Park Primary School.
Hollins Grundy Primary School.
Lowercroft Primary School.
Mersey Drive Community Primary School - part closed
Park View Primary School.
Peel Brow school - part closed
Radcliffe Hall C of E/ Methodist Primary School.
Radcliffe Primary School
Ribble Drive Community Primary School.
Springside Primary School
Sedgely Park Community Primary School
St Andrews C of E Primary School, Ramsbottom.
St Peters C of E Primary School.
St Joseph & St Bede RC Primary School
St Joseph RC, Primary Ramsbottom
St Lukes C of E Primary School.
Tottington Primary School
Unsworth Primary School.
Whitefield Community Primary School.
Wesley Methodist Primary School - part closed
Woodback Primary School

High Schools:

Bury C of E High School
Castlebrook High School.
The Derby High School - closed, but school trips going ahead.
Elms Bank Specialist Arts College.
Parrenthorn High School
The Ark
Radcliffe Riverside School
Woodhey High School.
Tottington High School.

There are two schools which will be closed on the 16 July, which is the last day of the school term.

Guardian Angels Roman Catholic Primary School
St Maries Roman Catholic Primary School

Broad Oak High School will be closed on 16 July, but open on 17 July as a large number of pupils will be on school trips.

St Johns C of E Primary School will be closed on 17 July only.

The Council can be contacted on 0161 253 5000 for further information.

Rick

Today I’ve been chasing up a couple of things. The missing street signs on Butterstile Lane and Carr Avenue remain AWOL. I was told six weeks ago that it would take ten weeks to replace them. I refuse to believe this, since it would take me less time to enrol on and complete a metalwork course and make the damn things myself. So I have been prodding the Highways Department about that today.

In addition, I noticed this morning that the sign at the end of my own road can no longer be read since it has been overcome by nasty-looking thorned weeds. So I asked them to sort that out too, whilst they’re in the area. I’d do it myself but there are nettles and I am delicate…

Later on this week there’s the next meeting of the St Mary’s Conservation Area working group. I am looking forward to finding out the latest plans for this important local area.

One of the issues involved for anyone living in the area is around buildings and planning, which reminded ne today to chase up the planning application for the site of the former Park Hotel on Lowther Road. This site has been derelict for a few years since the pub was knocked down, and now there has been an application received for some flats. I think that opinion may be divided on this one – we don’t want a building site, but not many people like flats, especially if they’re overly tall. So I am talking to a resident with concerns, and would be happy to hear any others. We need to make sure that whatever happens, the development minimises its impact on the surrounding homes – i.e. enough car parking spaces, retention of privacy and light for existing residents, and a commitment to actually build something rather than keep the land vacant for years.

I’ll put any updates on here as they arrive.

Rick

My blog has been hijacked by pornographers.

Normally I get a couple of comments a week, which is all very nice, and shows me that at least it’s not just me reading the blog. The other day though I logged in to find 534 comments had been left in the hour since I’d last been on. “Hmm…” I thought to myself. “Clearly my report in the Local Area Partnership meeting has captured the public’s imagination.”

Sadly it was not to be, as I discovered that instead of a varied discourse on the merits of the Prestwich Plan, my comments were all very generous offers from a foreign gentleman wondering if I was interested in some free movies he had to offer. All I had to do was click on the link he kindly provided, and I was promised certain lewd acts which bordered on the illegal but which were without exception free.

I declined his repeated offerings, but sadly he has not gone away, and keeps bombarding me even though I have told the blog many times that his IP address is spam.

Apparently this is happening to a lot of my fellow bloggers, and it’s very annoying because not only does it take time to delete them, but there’s also the chance that the occasional genuine comment on the merits of Bury Council will get washed away in the torrent of free naughtiness. Like the digital-age version of a nun getting lost on Haight-Ashbury in 1967.

Any words of advice on dealing with the problem will be gratefully received. Although I reckon you should email rather than comment…

Rick

Contrary to the picture painted in “Hello” magazine and various other society journals, the life of a suburban Lib Dem Councillor isn’t one canape party after another. In fact, quite often I am bored to tears at weekends and forced to flick through the Sky TV directory until I stumble across the inevitable repeat of “Only Fools and Horses” somewhere.

This weekend though has been nothing short of a social whirl, as weddings, farewells and gatherings have collided to make it seem for a brief period as if I do indeed have some semblance of a life. Unfortunately, the social occasions have merely re-affirmed my suspicions that my emotional development is not sufficient enough to cope with the rigours of having friends. In particular, there seems to be a glut of my mates leaving for foreign shores at the moment. And my fragile ego isn’t coping at all well.

A few years ago it was fine. My friends lived in various bits of the UK, but nowhere that couldn’t be reached in four or five hours by car, even with a stop for a Ginsters at a service station on the way. So I would see them all a few times a year, and birthdays/christmases wouldn’t come and go without at least an evening somewhere loud.

Now though my life is taking on a definite international flavour, and not in the cosmopolitan way that I’d like. It all boils down to the fact that my mates are deciding to live in various parts of the other side of the world, and leaving me rattling around England getting bored and fat.

Saturday night saw me in a pub in Altrincham, bidding farewell to a girl I’ve known since I was at school. And bear in mind that I went to an all-boys school. Finding a girl friend at all against those odds is like digging up potatoes from the garden and unearthing the Cullinan Diamond. But I did find this one. I didn’t mind that she went to university in Durham, because I was in Birmingham anyway, and at holiday time there we both were, back home. Now though she’s going to live in Hong Kong. And that is far too far away to pop out to for a drink when I want reminding I can’t be old because, look, here’s someone I knew from school!

And with her go all the other friends, the hangers-on who I know through her, see twice a year, and am reminded each time that they’re actually a lovely bunch. I never think of them beforehand, and don’t notice if they’re not there. But after two hours chatting to them I realise that my life is touched by a hundred lovely people I never see as much as I should. And last night on my drive home from Altrincham, probably the only thing that kept me from crying about that was Tam sitting next to me offering practical tips like texting them once in a while.

This Hong Kong revelation has come hot on the heels of another very good friend of mine informing me that he is emigrating to New Zealand, a place so far away that it’s a long haul flight further on than Australia. It took the crew of Apollo 11 only marginally longer to fly to the moon than it would take me to fly to Auckland. And so rather than being able to meet up in Manchester and drown our sorrows after the typically horrific working week, now any meeting requires buying shares in Qantas. It’s awful. I won’t lie to you like I’ve lied to him. It’s just plain awful.

The guy I used to live with, and had two of the most dangerous years of my life sharing a bathroom with, now lives in San Francisco. My sister is one step away from packing it all in and going to live on a commune in the Ganges. A former colleague to whom I have come to rely on an unhealthy amount for emotional reassurance informs me that she’s chucking in Chorlton for Dorset. Fair enough it isn’t Cape Town, but it’s beyond the end of the M5, and that’s far enough away to warrant serious pre-planning. Others around me are planning their various escapes, all requiring passports. Is there a disease here I haven’t heard about? What’s the rush? Where’s the need?

My oldest friend, to whom I was introduced my my grandpa at the age of 0, now lives in Melbourne. Granted, it’s a handy stopping off point on my epic journey to New Zealand, but his presents living arrangements are very inconvenient indeed for someone who enjoys wallowing in self pity and contemplating the passage of time as much as I do. Just flying there would give me enough free time to depress myself into oblivion. He is back in England at the moment, and in the snatched few hours we’ve had together between him showing his Antipodean girlfriend the London Eye and me messing about delivering Focus leaflets, he told me he mightn’t be back for two years.

What can a I say about that? Two years? These people I love leading their lives so far away, for two years??… How can friends stay friends when lives go by in different time zones?

People tell me to look on the bright side - that at least I won’t have to pay for hotel rooms. But frankly I like hotel rooms, and I don’t like using other people’s bathrooms. Nor do I want to get off a 24 hour flight and have three nights on a sofa to look forward to. There is no plus side in this. Not for me.

My address book is beginning to resemble the call sheet of the United Nations switchboard. One after another the players in my life are stuffing their wallets with weird currencies and jetting off into the sunset, then the sunrise, then the sunset again, before landing somewhere so far away that they cease to exist in reality and are just an email address that beeps at me once in a while.

The best argument I could hear right now against globalisation is that without it, people like my friends wouldn’t leave people like me. Two generations ago, adventurous people might marry an actress from Melton Mowbray. But they’d still come back for birthdays. Now they dice with death living on top of the San Andreas fault line or commute to work via the Sydney Harbour Bridge. And they don’t come back for two years. Or five. Or ten. Or ever.

The best argument against an expansion of air travel isn’t that the world and everything in it might die from carbon overload, but that if they cancel flights people I know can’t go and live in New Zealand.

I’m not leaving. I love this country. I start getting home-sick in the airport departure lounge because they take Dollars at the tills. But I wonder how much of what I love about it is because of the people in it? And, no joke, the best ones I know are all leaving. Not because they believe the rubbish in the papers about being stabbed or paedophiled to death here, but because they don’t get sweaty-palmed at Passport Control. I can’t stop them going, but I wish I shared their outlook, or they shared mine, because frankly I like my friends, and making new ones is far too nerve-wracking.

Anyway, work in the morning. That’ll cheer me up…

Rick

Liberal Democrat Leader Nick Clegg MP on our opposition to the Government’s ID Card Scheme

Prestwich Local Area Partnership, which brings together your local
Liberal Democrat Councillors together with local partners and
community reps, have agreed a number of grants for local projects and
groups:

We’ve also provisionally agreed to fund:
£1,000 towards the family health, skateboard and BMX summer festival
in St Mary’s Park organised by Prestwich and Whitefield Methodists

At the end of tonight’s meeting of Prestwich Local Area Partnership, I nicked one of the brochures brought along by the Council’s Prestwich Youth Manager, which outlines the activities for families and adults taking place in Bury over the summer.

I have to say that I am absolutely astounded by some of the things on offer, and I urge any local resident to check out the events on offer at www.bury.gov.uk/events. There’s something to do virtually every single day between now and October, much of it completely free. I am already excited about going up the Peel Tower next Sunday (for the princely sum of £1), and if I was off work all summer like Tamsin (who’s a teacher), I could keep myself well and truly amused with walks, nature activities, arts and crafts, events, shows and other activities.

In Prestwich alone, before this month is out there is the chance to enjoy Salsa, swing and jive dancing, and pond dipping in Philips Park. And in the wider Borough there’s talks at Bury Art Gallery, a tour of the town hall, ranger quests in the parks and walks all over the shop.

For families over the summer there are many things to do with the kids. Thomas the Tank Engine appears at the East Lancs Railway on the first three days of August, there are mini-beast hunts in parks, mask making, and a family fun day in St Mary’s Park in the ward on 16th and 17th August.

The “What’s On” guide also details the activities ongoing throughout the year, and local societies and clubs to join. I just wish I could give up work and do all these things! I’d be busier than I am now!

I am not normally one to give PR to the Council, because often they make me want to hurl myself out of the window in anger. But on this occasion and with this range of activities on offer for residents, they have excelled themselves. I am going to put some dates in the diary right now.

Rick 

Don’t forget that it’s Prestwich Local Area Partnership tonight, from 18:30 at St Monica’s High School. Part of the agenda will be dedicated to the Prestwich Community Plan, which will outline the vision for Prestwich’s improvement over the next three years to 2011.

What is the Community Plan?

The Community Plan is a document which sets out the Local Area Partnership’s (LAP’s) priorities for Prestwich between 2008-11. It is the document which says how Prestwich will become a better place to live in the next three years.

The Community Plan contains ten priorities overall, with the aim to create a Green Prestwich, a Thriving Prestwich, and a Strong Prestwich.

Each of these 10 priorities contains some specific actions which the LAP aims to achieve by 2011.

The first Prestwich Community Plan was created in 2001, with a second Plan in 2005. The first two plans were aspirational documents, but this new plan sets out targets for the LAP to achieve, building on the successes in Prestwich in recent years, and setting the scene for progress in the future.

Who was involved in creating the Community Plan?

The Community Plan has been created after joint working with a wide range of partners, including the Council, Police, Fire Service, NHS Primary Care Trust, the voluntary and faith sectors, and other agencies. There have been a number of events held in the last year in Prestwich and Bury, such as the Bury Community Conference and the Bury Community Planning Event, involving all partners in setting priorities for the area.

Local people have had their say too, via their local Councillors and through the opportunities to comment on drafts presented to previous meetings of the Local Area Partnership. The Developing Communities Working Group of the LAP has met 7 times to discuss the Plan during its development.

In addition, evidence such as government policies, current Council plans, surveys and local intelligence information like the Prestwich Neighbourhood Intelligence Assessment has been used to inform the priorities in the Community Plan.

After extensive consultation and analysis, the Plan was brought together by Carran O’Grady, the Prestwich LAP Manager, with assistance from Councillors and other partners.
What are the Plan’s priorities for Prestwich?

The Community Plan sets out the LAP’s joint priorities for Prestwich. There are 10 in all:

A Green Prestwich
1. Improve Parks and Leisure Facilities for Prestwich
2. Achieve a reduction in car usage in Prestwich
3. Reduce air pollution in Prestwich
4. Improve the Prestwich environment by reducing litter and graffiti

A Thriving Prestwich
5. Create a clear vision for the redevelopment of Prestwich town centre
6. Support for the retention and growth of local Prestwich Village Town Centre businesses
7. Create Better Facilities for the most deprived areas of Prestwich

A Strong Prestwich
8. Make Prestwich healthier
9. Make Prestwich safer, and reduce crime and the fear of crime
10. Create a Prestwich for people of all ages

How will we make sure that we achieve our priorities?

Each of the 10 priority areas detailed in the Community Plan contains agreed actions and target outcomes. There are approximately 70 actions overall that will need to be completed by 2011.

Every action has an identified person and/or agency responsible. All the partner agencies, including the Council, Police and NHS, have agreed to the Community Plan, so everyone knows what they have to do. The identified people and agencies will regularly report back to the LAP and the two LAP working groups on progress, and we can make sure we achieve our aims.

How does the Prestwich Community Plan link to the wider plans for Bury?

Prestwich LAP is one of six LAPs in Bury, each with their own Community Plan. All the Community Plans link to an overall Team Bury plan for the whole Borough.

Each of the 10 priorities in the Prestwich Community Plan links directly to a Bury Borough priority. This means that Prestwich improves in step with Bury as a whole, and everyone in the Borough is supportive of Prestwich’s plans and priorities.

What about things that aren’t on the Plan?

Obviously there are many things that aren’t in the Community Plan. This doesn’t mean that they aren’t important. Although the Community Plan identifies 10 priorities, a huge range of actions and targets are contained in the plan, and the priorities themselves will ensure that if a viable project requires LAP support to make Prestwich better, then it will receive the LAP’s help.

Come along and learn more tonight, as well as the usual LAP goodness including updates on everything that’s going on in Prestwich.

Rick

Don’t forget the Prestwich Local Area Partnership meeting, which takes place tomorrow (Thursday) night at St Monica’s school on Bury Old Road. God knows I can’t…

Amongst other things on the agenda, there’ll be an update on the URBED Prestwich Town Centre regeneration project, and the ceremonial unveiling of the Prestwich Plan 2008-11, on which I’ve been beavering away nicely for quite some time, and of which more tomorrow.

It’s an open meeting, and everyone’s always welcome to come along and hear the updates on what’s been going on in Prestwich recently. There will be representatives from the Council, Police, Fire, NHS and other partners there. So if you have a problem, if noone else can help, and if you can find them, come to the LAP and ask your question.

My mouth is still burning from last night’s pizza with the local Police, that unbeknownst to me had the Devil’s Vegetables on it, and was as hot as the centre of the Sun. Normally close proximity to the long arm of the law brings me out in a sweat, so such heated conditions weren’t entirely unexpected during dinner with the local Sergeant. However it’s not often that my mouth is the epicentre of the warmth.

But as well as downing fire-extinguishing mugs of water all morning, I have been talking to the Council’s parks people about a potential skate park in the ward. Such ideas often bring about gasps of horror amongst local people who suspect that such a skate park will attract trouble. The reality is often different, and I think it’s important to provide a safe local place for young people to skateboard about if they want to. Quite why anyone would want to is a mystery, but if the kids like hurtling through the air on a bit of plastic with rollerskate wheels on it, then that’s fine by me as long as they don’t hurt old ladies in the act. Sticking them out in a corner somewhere, which seems to be the approach favoured by the Council, doesn’t help with engaging them in the wider community.

The Parks department are a bit reluctant to get involved because of bad experiences in the past ,but I think that if we design it right, and involve everyone in the planning, we could come up with an idea that’s acceptable. Then of course we have to find the money to fund and maintain it, and short of turning the sofa upside down I don’t have any ideas about this at the moment. But we’re working with people to see if we can find an answer to this too. I will keep you informed. I am going to bring it up at the LAP meeting tomorrow night, which is yet another reason, if one were needed, to come along and join the fun.

Rick

The spectacular Politics Home Index website has alerted me to yet more gems today, in the shape of a couple of articles defending MPs and taking a swipe at the screeching media who are enjoying lambasting them with even more gusto than normal at the moment.

The first half of this article, and the whole of this one provided readers of The Times and The Independent with an opportunity for a more balanced opinion of the current debate raging about the merits of MPs, and the dubious rationale for their wages and expenses.

I’ve said on here before that I have more sympathy for the MPs than I do for the screaming hacks attacking them. Obviously there are the money-grabbers and the expense-fiddlers, and they should be rooted out. But find any group of 650 people and there are bound to be one or two bad apples. I believe that the vast majority of MPs are decent, hard-working people who do their very best for tens of thousand of constituents many hundreds of miles from home. They need second homes, they need things to put in them, and they need to be paid good salaries.

I read crazy things every day - that MPs should be paid the minimum wage, that they should receive nothing but the state pension, that they should pay for a second home from their salary. These two articles redress the balance somewhat, and provide some sane analysis of what might happen if these things came to pass.

MPs don’t make it easy on themselves. They do look foolish when they aren’t as transparent as they might be. And the few naughty ones being plastered on page 1 of the News of the World makes them all look bad. But these are the people elected by us to make our country better. We shouldn’t begrudge them a good salary and some reasonable extras for doing that.

Rick 

This evening I had a very enjoyable and informative “working dinner” with the Prestwich Local Area Partnership Manager and the local Police Sergeant, discussing police targets for the Prestwich Plan.

It was the second time I’d been for tea to Croma in 48 hours, and having admired my Sunday night companion’s pizza from across the table then, I ordered it tonight. And thus I have a top tip for anyone likely to be eating in front of a policeman in the near future - don’t order food with jalapeno peppers on it, because you end up coughing and spluttering all over the poor officer, and looking like an idiot. So Sgt Campbell, I apologise for that.

The meeting itself was a success, and we now have a framework of police targets to go into the plan, which will be presented to the Local Area Partnership later in the week. I was a bit confused before about how the police measured their performance, but now we can see how local police are doing against their Divisional targets, which will give local people much more of an idea about how local law enforcement are making Prestwich safer.

We also talked quite a bit about how to engage more between councillors, the police and local people. We talked about joint surgeries, which might start happening soon, and broader discussions at local meetings regarding crime. So look out for them in the near future.

Rick

Last week’s rejection of an elected Mayor for Bury is welcome. The proposals were a waste of money, democratically damaging, and I am glad that local people did not fall for the lies and spin on the issue of congestion charging.

However, the fact is that 10,000 people and 40% of those who voted indicated their desire to change the way Bury is run. I don’t think we should ignore their dissatisfaction with local services, nor their indictment of the way the Council is run. They voted for a Mayor despite the compelling reasons not to. I bet that many of those who voted “no” did so not out of love for the Council but because they took heed of the consequences of a “yes.”

Council services in Bury have been consistently cut over more than two decades of control by Labour, and more recently in the past couple of years by the Conservatives. Over that same period, Council Tax bills (and Community Charge and Rates before them) have gone up as we have been asked time and again to pay more for less. Every year the story is the same, and I bet I can write my budget speech for next year this weekend and barely have to change it on the night. It’s predictable even now that bills will go up and services will go down.

More disturbingly still, the power of local communities to have a fair say on local services continues to diminish. Post Offices have closed in Bury, as have maternity services and libraries, all in the face of significant public protest. The government and Council may pretend to “consult,” but their consultations are in fact information campaigns. I am as insulted by their lack of honesty about this as I am about the fact that they don’t listen to local views at all.

The Labour government, both nationally and locally, started this rot, and the Conservative administration in Bury since 2007 have done nothing to stop it.

Liberal Democrats in Bury have consistently supported local people in their attempts to stop the appalling cuts in local services. We led the successful fight to stop the closure of local secondary schools in 2005, and have also led appeals to save hospital facilities locally. Just last month a Liberal Democrat motion ensured Council support for an end to local Post Office closures, and our petition on the same topic has thousands of signatures. We are also the party who secured Council opposition to congestion charging.

Our respect for true devolution of power to communities can be seen in how we run the Prestwich Local Area Partnership – with real consultation with local people, and a variety of community groups having a legitimate say in how local money is spent. I recently took the chair of the Developing Communities Working Group, which has developed since its inception to be a leading forum for the community to have their say on the future of Prestwich.

The preservation of local services and obtaining value for money as well is no pipe-dream. It can be achieved through fairer local taxation, which is something that Lib Dems have proposed for a long time in the abolition of Council Tax and the reform of business rates.

The Mayoral referendum was not the right way to seek reform of our Council. But what it did achieve was showing those in charge that they are disappointing a great number in our communities. The failings of successive Labour and Conservative policies locally are clear, and there is lots that we need to do to improve. Local Liberal Democrats will continue their hard work for local people across Bury in the hope that we can create better local services that provide real value for the people of Bury.

Rick

Like a lot of people, I stave of suicide-by-boredom by spending Saturday afternoons strolling around bleak city centre shopping arcades, occasionally spending money on stuff I don’t need. Yesterday, in a fit of artistic over-reaching, I spent £25 on acrylic paint and brushes, in the laughable belief that I would use them to create something worthy of hanging over the fireplace. The moment has passed now, but sadly the receipt is in the bin.

Most weekends I end up in Waterstone’s at some point. And yesterday I was thumbing through the the varied contents of one of their door-side piles when a middle aged couple in sandles and beige clothes approached me. The man picked up a book and said “Mmm… Murakami is everywhere at the moment, isn’t he? Have you read Norweigan Wood…?” His companion nodded sagely and said “Yes, but I hear this one explores much broader themes.”

Such exchanges disturb me, mainly because I am incapable of having them. I have no idea who is “everywhere,” or why. I know there’s a book called “Norweigan Wood,” only because I picked it up once wondering how anyone could’ve spun a yarn that thick about the Beatles song. I put it down again when I found out that they hadn’t, and I have genuinely no idea what it’s about. I don’t know who Murakami is either. Put on the spot I’d have guessed he was a chef.

I hope that by “everywhere,” the woman meant “in the snippets of the Guradian culture pull-outs that I’ve read in the hope that I’ll appear impressive.” But there is this nagging doubt that actually she does mean everywhere. In every learned conversation. Around every sophisticated dinner party table. On the lips of every member of the congoscenti and in the minds of every person in Britain with a brain in their heads. Except me. Oh, how they laugh at me, these people and their novels.

Going into Waterstone’s is always a humbling affair. There are people in there, strolling around the literary criticism section with their hemp shopping bags and flowery skirts, who know more about books than I would do even if I lived in the shop doing nothing but reading for twenty years. Where do they get the time? It takes me weeks to read a novel, even if I devour one page after another, simply because after I get though about five of them it’s time to go to a meeting or go to bed. Are these booky people devoid of all other things in their lives? Do they go home to their charming Victorian semis in Chorlton and find nothing within but a pile of books? Do they not work? Or sleep?

I am insanely envious of these people. Their conversations about novels make them sound interesting and cultured, whereas my conversations about the Bury mayoral referendum make me sound geekish and nerdy. They know about authors and themes and narrative arcs. I know about local government performance trends, road maintenance budgets and the Prestwich Plan. They have a favourite passage from Ulysses, I have a favourite political website. They can talk about the new McEwan (and they’d probably scoff at it too…), and pretty young students fall at their feet. I can name the Shadow Home Secretary, and pretty young students run away. Literally, they run from me. 

Maybe it’s because books are sexy and councils are not. I need to find a better way of turning that equation round than quoting recycling statistics.

Even the fun stuff that I know about, like the Premier League and The West Wing, just make me seem a bit over keen. There is a casual effortlessness about literary discussion which seems to go hand in hand with sophistication. And now I’m thinking about how I know nothing about wine either… Was there a week in school where all this was taught? Was I off sick? How do some people know all this stuff, and I don’t? I hope to God they’re faking.

It’s not that I don’t read. I think it’s that I read the wrong stuff. I bet if I asked that couple in Waterstone’s what they were reading, they’d have named a novel so obscure yet so influential that I would’ve been swallowed up in a vortex of panic at my own ignorance. I though am currently reading six things. I am reading The Economist, the Lib Dem News, Private Eye, LGA First Magazine, a novel by Mark Haddon so lightweight that it needs lead weights to stop it floating away, and Nelson Mandela’s autobiography, which I picked up after his birthday concert the other week, thinking that I probably should.

Maybe that’s the problem. If I had six novels on the go at once, before too long I’d be able to at least hold a conversation about them all, so long as it didn’t venture towards comparing their endings. Maybe these bookworms never read anything but novels, and so whilst they can chat relentlessly about Doris Lessing, they don’t have a clue about Robert Mugabe.

Anyway, it’s an issue, this Waterstone’s thing. I go in there and come out full of remorse that I haven’t dedicated my life to reading the great novels, and full of the knowledge that even if I started now I’d still never finish. Every week I’d read a couple of books, only for twenty more to be published that make the critics gush with praise. I need to find a way to reconcile myself to the fact that I probably won’t ever read the wonderful works of classic literature. I will probably never have time to appreciate the power of the written word to convey humanity’s strongest and deepest emotions. Which is sad but, I fear, a necessary sacrifice for now if I’m going to fully understand this quarter’s housing maintenance statistics.

And, whilst the book people can moan about congestion charging and post office closures round their dinner table, making no difference to anything, I can… Well, at least I get my picture in The Advertiser from time to time.

Rick 

As well as spending £100,000 and countless hours staging a referendum that moved us precisely nowhere and yet which still managed to please me, the Council has also this week given me my debut on the Licensing and Safety Panel. This is the group of Councillors who decides whether to grant licenses to taxi drivers (in the main) and whether or not to take them off the naughty ones.

Obviously there are loads of applications for licenses every year, and so the panel only gets to see the ones that aren’t clear-cut decisions. Most people applying for licenses are perfectly decent people wanting to earn a living performing this important public service. But an important public service it is, and so everyone wanting to do it has to be a fit and proper person, and when they’ve got a criminal record as long as the Tyne Bridge, it’s up to me and the rest of the panel to decide.

This is an important job. Not only are we talking about the livelihoods of the people involved, but also their families and of course the safety of their passengers. It’s not to be taken lightly.

We had about half a dozen license revocation issues at the start. This is where license holders have done something naughty (usually getting caught plying for hire rather than picking up pre-booked customers like they’re supposed to, although occasionally something very naughty indeed like beating someone up) and now come before us to see if it’s naughty enough for us to take their license off them.

After that was a dozen or so applications, where we were tasked with deciding whether people with criminal histories were now reformed enough to be given a license. For some it was easy, either because their discretions were so few or ancient as to barely be worth a mention, or because they had more form than Reggie Kray. But for others it really was touch and go. It doesn’t feel pleasant watching a man trying to make a living be denied that opportunity by us.

What irks the most is spent prosecutions. Under the enhanced CRB check that taxi drivers must submit to, all the convictions ever recorded, spent or not, are disclosed. So we have cases of people with long records stretching over a number of years, but who have been conviction free for a decade or more. What do we do with people like this? And, should they even have to tell us? What is the point of a spent conviction if it is never truly wiped away? One fella had a trivial conviction the best part of 20 years ago. Why should he have to declare that no matter what job he’s going for? He committed the crime but he paid the punishment and has obviously reformed since.

It was an interesting evening, and the legal advice we got through light on some interesting issues, like the achingly slow criminal justice system. Unfortunately these meetings aren’t open to the public because of the confidential things discussed. It’s a shame because unlike 95% of the other Council meetings, watching one of these would probably enthuse people about what we Councillors get up to. Sadly the public are stuck with scrutiny, where it’s now wonder the average audience is nil.

Rick

The people of Bury voted “No” to an elected Mayor yesterday, rejecting the proposals by a 60:40 margin.

The final result was 15,425 votes “No” and 10,338 votes “Yes”, with a turnout of 18%.

Lib Dems in Bury campaigned hard for a “No” vote in the referendum, and I am glad that the idea of an elected Mayor has been rejected by local people. As I’ve been saying on here all week and elsewhere for ages, a Mayor would have been an expensive and democratically disastrous move for Bury.

The “Yes” campaign suggested that the voting for a Mayor would help defeat plans for a congestion charge. In reality the idea that a Mayor could stop the congestion charge was always false, and I always thought that local people wouldn’t believe it. Bury Lib Dems continue to oppose the congestion charge, and the Council is now free to continue working hard to get improved public transport for Bury without this additional tax.

It is a shame that the people behind the original petition cannot be brought to book for their half-truths and rumours - the effect of which has been an expensive and time-consuming referendum which has achieved nothing but keep some people’s faces in the papers.

I maintain that this referendum was never really wanted by the people of Bury, many of whom were tricked into signing a petition they thought was about something else. The massive rejection of an elected Mayor is a victory for common sense and a defeat for those who try to trick local people.

The issue of the Mayor was always about more than the congestion charge. A Mayor would have meant a less democratic system for local people, and would have cost a small fortune every year, taking money from vital services to pay for a vanity exercise.

The result last night has had several spin-off effects. On ths plus side, I can now stop writing about it, which is a relief. On the negative side though, I am regretting getting fitted up for those ermine robes now. I suppose they will have to go back now that we won’t be having a Mayor…

Rick

Today polling stations are open in the referendum to decide whether Bury should have an elected Mayor.
People should vote at their normal polling stations (that we used for the elections in May). The polling stations are open from 7.00am - 10.00pm. You do not need your polling card to vote.
If you have a postal vote which hasn’t yet been returned, you can fill this in in the normal way and take it round to your local polling station.

The local Liberal Democrats are urging everyone to vote NO in the election because we believe this to be an undemocratic waste of public money. Lots of people have questions about this important issue, the local Lib Dems have produced this factsheet
to answer some of your questions.

Tomorrow (Thursday 3rd July) the people of Bury will have their chance to vote in a referendum. The referendum will ask whether or not we should change the way the Council is run and have an elected Mayor instead. I will be voting “NO” in the referendum, and have already written about how a Mayor will cost a fortune and do nothing to stop congestion charging. But the biggest reason I have for voting “NO” is because an elected Mayor will be a disaster for local democracy.

At the moment, there are local elections in three out of every four years. So local people get the chance to elect a local Councillor almost every year, and the party with the most councillors runs the Council. There will be a Leader and a Cabinet making the decisions, and these will be scrutinised by the other Councillors and eventually voted or blocked. Who does the governing and who does the scrutinising can change every year, and if local people don’t like it they can change things regularly.

In addition to this, there are lots of decisions made at a very local level, at Local Area Partnerships (LAPs) like the one in Prestwich and the ones inb all the other small constituent towns of Bury. Local groups sit on the LAP and have a real say on Council policy and developments locally.

If we replace the current system and have an elected Mayor instead, we will be placing all of the powers of the Leader, Cabinet, and LAPs in the hands of just one person. And crucially, this person will only be elected every four years! What if the person we elect can’t do the job? What if his policies damage Bury? We’re stuck with them and him for years.

I believe that local people should be at the heart of decision making. I believe that if there’s an issue affecting a community, then the people of that community should have their say. We should make decisions at a local level, not give one person sat at the Town Hall the power to make those decisions.

Where the decision has an impact on all of Bury, let the Council as a whole decide. Don’t let’s give all the powers of the Council to one person and have them do as they wish. It might please some people, but if local people don’t like it then they are stuck with the Mayor for four years and won’t be able to change their minds. At the moment if the Council screw up, we can send them a message every year. We won’t be able to send that message to a Mayor.

A Mayor won’t mean that Bury will be cut from the types of bureaucracy that hamper the Council now. A Mayor won’t get bring any extra powers to Bury – it just means that the existing ones will be concentrated in one person.

So when you have the chance to vote on Thursday, consider whether you want more local power and the chance to elect Councillors to run the Council every year, or whether you want one person to hold power and sway for four years. I am for local and accountable decision making, not concentrating power centrally in one person, so I will be voting “NO” in the referendum.

Rick

Don’t forget, the polls will be open from 7am – 10pm on Thursday to allow you to vote in a referendum. The question on the ballot paper will ask whether or not you want to scrap the current way that the Council is run, and replace it with an elected Mayor. If people vote “Yes,” we will have a Mayor, and won’t be able to review the decision for at least 10 years. I will be voting “NO” for lots of reasons. Yesterday I talked about how the “Yes” campaigns rumours about congestion charging are not true. Today is my second most important reason for voting “NO” on Thursday – the cost of an elected Mayor.

We all want better local services, and lower local taxes. More often than not it’s a choice between one and the other, and it’s only very rare that we can achieve both. But we keep trying all the same. What we really don’t want is something which means that taxes have to go up, or service quality has to go down. And yet that is exactly what an elected Mayor will mean, because the office of elected Mayor will cost a fortune.

Just asking the question about Mayors is costing lots. The cost of the referendum will be £100,000 when we take into account the posting of ballot papers, closing of schools to make polling stations, the cost of the count and the time taken to make sure everything works. If there is a “Yes” vote, we will have to do it all again for the election. Another £100,000.

If we have an elected Mayor, we have to pay him (or her) big money. There are about a dozen elected Mayors in England (they’ve been rejected everywhere else), and the average salary for an elected Mayor is £66,000 per year. Some of them are paid well over £100,000 per year, and many have Deputy Mayors also paid many tens of thousands of pounds.

At the moment we have a Council Leader who is paid around £30,000 per year. So we may see the amount spent on a Mayor trebling the amount we spend on a Leader. Plus the cost of a Deputy’s salary.

On top of that, we have the cost of running an office – the actual room itself, which will need to be provided, furnished and decorated; the cost of staffing the office with researchers, administrators and other staff; the cost of a vehicle for the Mayor, and other incidental expenses. It has been estimated that, in total, we could be looking at £250,000 per year. Over 10 years that’s £2.5m.

And that’s in addition to current expenditure. We’d still have 51 Councillors, there’d still be a Cabinet (reporting to the Mayor now though, not a Leader), and we’d still have exactly the same financial and legal constraints as now, because although all the Council’s powers would be concentrated in one person, there’d be no new powers overall.

So, £2.5m of public money will be spent on a Mayor. To make up that money, the Council only has two choices – either raise Council tax dramatically, or cut services dramatically. To put £2.5m in context, that’s TWENTY THREE TIMES MORE than the entire roads maintenance budget for Prestwich for a year. Over ten years, we would be spending more on this Mayor than on cleaning local streets. Or we would have to put Council Tax bills up by far more than inflation to pay for the Mayor.

This is not a trade-off that we have to make. With Council budgets stretched already, why push them past breaking point with a costly white elephant like an elected Mayor? It would mean less money for the elderly, less money for children, for parks, for streets, and for roads. Or it would mean massive Council Tax increases.

There is no need to have to cut these budgets or raise taxes if we vote “NO” on Thursday.

Rick