The dustbin-shaped spectre of town-centre grot has raised its head again this weekend in three separate emails I’ve received from residents drowning in a sea of discarded litter.

Last year local Lib Dem Councillors launched a high-profile and successful campaign for a “deep-clean” of the Village centre, using high pressure water jets to get rid of grime. We also secured commitment for extra cleaning on weekends to get rid of the litter. Unfortunately the scourge of dirt is making a re-appearance, with particular grot-spots near to the Fairfax pub and on a couple of the side-streets off Bury New Road.

This is hugely frustrating, and the problem won’t be solved properly until we get real commitment not just from the Council, but from businesses and local people as well.

The Council need to be a lot more rigorous in their cleaning. Residents tell me that the promised twice daily sweeping of the Village doesn’t happen as regularly as it should. Despite Council promises of an information board showing where and when the last and next cleaning session will take place, no such board has yet appeared. It is difficult to know what to do beyond continually shouting at them to provide it as promised, other than kidnap a street cleaner and hold him to ransom (let’s not do that…) until the Council learn to do more than give us empty promises. The Council should also up its enforcement now, in partnership with the Police, so that people chucking litter about like confetti at a wedding know that they can’t get away with it.

Local businesses have a role to play too. So often I see trade waste pile up outside shops, in loading bays and outside big bins. This isn’t on and needs clamping down on. If businesses need more bins, they should ask me and I’ll get them. If they need recycling help, let’s get together and sort it out. Let’s not just dump rubbish everywhere and have it blow about the street like tumbleweed.

This is particularly acute for the licensed businesses and takeaways in the area. It is extremely annoying to drive through the Village on a Saturday morning and see hundreds of beer bottles, food wrappers and cigarette ends. These businesses should provide more bins outside their premises, offer to take in rubbish when it’s generated, and work with us and the Council to sort the problem out.

And I appeal to the people of Prestwich too. We are to blame for the litter problem as much as anyone. So often I see local people throwing litter on the floor, not using the bins, treating the street like a dumping ground. The behaviour goes unchallenged, unsupervised and unstopped. And our communities and streets suffer as a result. I appeal to everyone locally to remember the effect that just a single piece of dropped litter has in adding to the growing problems locally.

I have been talking to the Council about possible solutions, but of course the only way we can truly eradicate the litter problem in Prestwich is through joint working locally between businesses, the police, the Council and ourselves. And that’s what we’ll keep trying to do.

Rick

I have been in exasperated communication with the Council today regarding the continuing drama of the missing street sign on Butterstile Lane.

The sign has been missing, presumed nicked, for three months now. I reported it when it disappeared, and since then the forlorn signposts have been standing vacant like a football goal waiting for a cross bar.

I have blogged about this before, expressing my shock at the Council’s advice that it would take ten weeks to replace a sign. I was of the view then that it’d be quicker to design and build my own iron forging plant and cast the sign myself than wait for the wheels of Council bureaucracy to creak round and get this sorted. When I chased the matter up a few weeks back this view was confirmed when I was told that ten weeks actually meant twelve weeks. The reason for the further delays was not explained to me, so I can only put it down to someone not doing their job properly and treating the issue with the contempt it doesn’t deserve.

So we arrive at today, at the end of the revised waiting period, and still no sign. Quite why something this small yet this important to drivers and walkers and, well, anybody really who wants to know where they are, can’t be sorted in less time than it takes to walk across Europe is a mystery to me.

So I have made my feelings clear to the people in charge. We still don’t have a sign, but I feel slightly better and it makes me feel that at least I’m trying to do what I was elected for, rather than just having ineffective Council officers crush any notion I might have of making even a tiny difference for local people.

Honestly, sometimes I think talking to the Council and asking them for something is about as useful as begging a shrub to cook me my dinner. But we live in hope – my main current hope being that the press pick up this blog post and embarrass the Council, thus joining me in trying to up the pace towards “snail” from its current level of “corpse.”

Rick

Lib Dem leader Nick Clegg has warned that Visiting Britain’s energy security is under severe threat as a result of the Government’s disintegrating energy policy, which will lead to an ever-increasing dependence on vulnerable foreign energy supplies.

Setting out Liberal Democrat proposals to secure energy independence for Britain yesterday, Nick argued that politicians of all parties need to demonstrate the kind of vision, application and political will behind the Apollo Project that succeeded in putting man on the moon, in order to head off the threat to the security of our energy supply.

Nick Clegg said:

“The Government has been looking at energy from the wrong end of the telescope.

“The scale of its failure to plan for Britain’s energy security has been brought into sharp relief by the Georgian crisis, which underlines the risks of increasing dependence on foreign energy sources as North Sea oil supplies run down.

“Rather than use its period in office to reduce Britain’s dependency on vulnerable supplies from unstable regions, Labour has dithered and flip-flopped for over a decade. Instead of an energy policy, we have a potential economic, environmental and national security disaster waiting to happen.

“But we have an enormous opportunity to create real energy independence for the UK, freeing ourselves from the shackles of foreign oil, coal and gas.

“Renewable energy is no longer a pipe-dream. It is realistic and achievable. All it requires is the leadership and vision that has been lacking under years of tired Labour thinking.

“That’s why today I am setting out Liberal Democrat proposals to become energy independent by 2050. This will require the kind of ambition and political will that succeeded in putting man on the moon.

“We need an ‘Apollo Project’ for British energy independence.

“Just as Britain invested in the North Sea in the 1970s to transform our energy prospects through oil production, we must today make similar investment in renewable technologies to harness Britain’s vast renewable energy resources, combined with major reductions in energy consumption.”

Rick

You may have seen in the news last week that local Lib Dems were oppsoing the Council’s ludicrous heavy-handedness over the issue of graffiti.

The Council had sent letters out to local people who had graffiti on their homes, threatening them with court action and a £1,000 fine if they didn’t get the mess cleaned up. Many of the recipients of the letters were scared and annoyed, and local Lib Dem Councillors were livid. The Council were not only abdicating their responsibilities to act to prevent and clean up graffiti, but the letters were outrageously over the top.

Now though, after a campaign against this action, the Council have relented. The threat of court action and fines has been lifted, and local people will soon be contacted offering them free use of graffiti cleaning kits. This comes on top of news that four of the main culprits have been detained by Police, and will be given the option of cleaning their mess themselves as part of their punishment.

Whilst this is a major move forward, and a victory for common sense, I still think that the Council needs to do more to remove graffiti itself. Nothing displays crime in an area more than graffiti, and it sends a clear message that the law-breakers have one over the law-keepers. At the moment the Council doesn’t prioritise its removal, and I think it should. Our local environment is important, and whilst home-owners should be involved in cleaning up graffiti, the Council and its partners shouldn’t rely on them exclusively to clean up after vandals.

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

A quiet day today, dominated by work and the return of Tamsin, who arrived back from France this evening, riding a bicycle, sporting a bunch of onions round her neck, and promptly going on strike and blockading the front garden. She surrendered fairly quickly though, so all is now well bar grumbling of discontent about the length of the working week.

Ward work wise, I found out a little more about the baffling dog waste non-prosecution today. This caving in by the forces of good against the forces of irresponsible canine carelessness is the result of my work in reporting the dog fouling on Agecroft Road West. Dog fouling which, to remind you, took place seconds after dog and owner had left their house, right in front of my eyes.

Apparently though, having the act witnessed and reported by a local Councillor is not enough. I am now told that since I didn’t manage to get the offender’s name (it’s owner’s name, I presume), no prosecution papers can be served. Instead, the best that can be done is to encourage the whole family to accept a formal caution, which has no practical effect, but in theory will be taken into account next time the offender is caught and, after surrendering his name to the witness, prosecuted. Oh, and the whole thing needs to be broadcast live on Sky News and then immortalised forever on the back of the new £20 note. Otherwise there really isn’t enough evidence.

Cast your wearied mind beyond the acres of red tape that apparently separate me from common sense on this issue, and ponder the strangely international flavour that this tale now takes on. I am told that the offender’s mother has told the dog wardens that her son has fled to Spain since the incident, and will remain there for “an indefinite period.” So, whilst I may not have extracted £50 from this filthy and respect-free individual, I have at least ensured that he’s fled the country. Prestwich now has its own Ronnie Biggs.

I think I may have taken this as far as I can. I have had a look on the Interpol website, and he’s not on there. The Spanish embassy don’t seem interested either, and I can’t afford a private detective. But apparently his Mum has accepted the caution, and the streets are safe once more.

Rick

The other week I saw a local man leave his house with his dog, and proceed to let it foul the footway immediately, before repeating the trick 50 yards down the road. The man looked on in amusement, and left his gift for the community right there on the pavement.

There’s an old saying about not crapping on your own doorstep, but my mind wasn’t occupied with those particular wise words at the time. Instead, I took busy-body-dom to a whole new level and reported him. I was told that I’d have to fill out a statement, and that a prosecution would follow.

So I did just that. And this morning I am told that because of a lack of evidence, the prosecution can’t go forward.

I wonder, what more compelling evidence can there possibly be than a signed statement from an eye-witness who is also a local Councillor, confirming the time, date and place of the incident, the description and address of the dog owner, and that it happened twice within 50 yards? Was I supposed to take a swab?

So I am a bit annoyed at that. God knows how we are supposed to get dog mess under control when it looks like the only way you can prosecute naughty dog owners is if their pooches relieve themselves in the magistrate’s lap. It isn’t the fault of the dog wardens, who seem as peeved as me. But for some legal reason of which I am unclear, this guy can’t get the fine he deserves. And as a result our streets keep getting dirtier, bad dog owners keep getting away with it, and the majority of good dog owners don’t see rewards for their fairly unpleasant efforts in cleaning up mess.

But we’ll keep on trying, and next time I see a dog owner walk away from his mutt’s pavement deposit, I will pounce with a plastic bag and mail it myself to the Council’s lawyers. Although, on reflection, this might get me into a bit of trouble myself…

Rick

Just a brief post today, since I have been out all day and haven’t had the time to compose a longer one. I am also tired, having stayed up way past my bed time watching the football, and then been kept up even longer by the whooping neighbours and their fireworks / honking car horns. I’d like to think that my disdain is more to do with being above all that than it is to do with jealousy. But it really isn’t.

Anyway, so tonight it’s the inaugural meeting of the St Mary’s Conservation Area Action Working Group, which will get together periodically to discuss ongoing things to do with the local conservation area. We are lucky in this ward to have a lot of natural and man-made beauty. Unfortunately we also have a lot of entirely-man-made ugliness such as the dire Radius flats and various awful bits of Prestwich Village. So we’re trying to stem the tide of horrific-ness, and extend the good stuff where we can. Part of this is making it harder to knock down grand old buildings and replace them with carbuncles, and part of it is to do with not allowing parkland to be concreted over. Unfortunately, not everyone agrees about what’s any good and what’s not, and it is around these blurry edges that much of the discussion will take place, I’m sure. As well as making sure that everything else that’s supposed to happen happens.

Other than that, I have been chasing up missing street signs today - Carr Avenue and Butterstile Lane, to be precise. For some reason people nick them. If it was Penny Lane or Sir Matt Busby Way, I could understand, but the reasons for these thefts are mysterious… Anyway, I discovered today that it takes TEN WEEKS from reporting the sign missing to getting it replaced. Six weeks to get the sign made, and another four to install it. As far as I am aware the signs aren’t made of plutonium, nor are they made in New Zealand. So the reason for the delay is as odd as the theft in the first place… But they’ll get done eventually, and that’s the important thing.

Rick

Last night’s Prestwich LAP contained one gigantic disappointment - the list of roads identified as most in need of repair, and the frankly laughable amount of money given over to repair them.

As in previous years, the top dozen roads are identified. These, remember, are the least well-maintained roads, the ones with most pot-holes, cracks, loose paving stones and all the other hazards and unpleasantness that makes driving or walking down them dangerous.

The total estimated cost to repair all twelve is £596,000. The total budget allocated to fix Prestwich roads this year is just £108,000. That’s only 18% of the money needed to fix even the twelve most needy! That figure of £596,000 doesn’t even consider the 13th worst road, let alone the 14th, or the 114th, or the countless other roads with holes and cracks.

We have less than one fifth of the money necessary to repair our dozen neediest roads, and this is a disgrace.

Six of the dozen roads have been held back from previous years because of funding problem. One of them, Fairway in Sedgley, will cost by itself nearly £50,000 more than the entire budget allocated for roads. In St Mary’s, Sunny Drive and Barnhill Drive have been identified as needing work, but if both of these schemes get the go-ahead, this will account for nearly half of the entire available budget.

This is a matter which Liberal Democrats will certainly be taking up at Council level, to try and convince the Council to provide more funding for roads which are verging on the dangerous. The costs of compensation for trips and falls must surely point to the dire need for investment. But at the moment the people of Prestwich are very badly done to when the cost of replacing the pavement alone on Parrenthorn Road in Holyrood is more than the whole budget for roads and pavements for the whole of Prestwich.

The decision on which roads get repaired will be made by the Town Centre Regeneration Group, which is a sub-group of the LAP. I will make representations to this group on behalf of residents, but unfortunately this grossly inappropriate funding means that many local people will be left sorely disappointed by a Conservative council failing to prioritise roads in a budget already cut to shreds by a Labour government.

Rick

So, my birthday is over. There’s only one thing more depressing than contemplating a birthday and seeing another year fly by. And that is contemplating the day after a birthday, and realising that it’s a whole year until the next time anyone gives you cake with candles in it and lots of presents. That is essentially where I am today.

However, I am keeping the howling wolves of Time’s unstoppable force from my door by dabbling in some case work.

Now that we’re out canvassing, it means that rather than ring me up to ask for things to be sorted, local people can just stay at home and wait for me to knock on the door.

I have chased up a couple of things this morning on behalf of local residents who I’ve spoken to on the doorstep in the past couple of weeks.

There is an issue in Rainsough at the moment with the new roofs being put on the leased houses. A lot of the privately owned houses in the rows are being affected by the works, although obviously aren’t getting a new roof. So I have been making sure that the construction workers are considerate in removing the debris and keeping the disruption to home-owners to a minimum. It’s great for the tenants to be receiving home improvements, but the people who own their own home mustn’t be inconvenienced if at all possible.

Also today I have been working with the Council to get a patch of Woodward Road cleaned up. Yesterday a resident of that road pointed out the very bizarre green slime that has accumulated, and is creeping down the road due to what I presume is a drainage issue beneath the pavement. I hope it’s that anyway, or else we have been invaded by a strange alien life-form, which I could do without at this election time. In any event, I have been told that the street care inspectors and the cleaning team will head down to take a look at it later, and take whatever action is needed, such as a mechanical clean or engaging Ghostbusters.

I will keep you informed.

And we’re out again somewhere tonight (I don’t do the organising, and am not told where we’re going to canvass until about half an hour before, like it’s a secret gig of some sort at a dank underground nightclub). So there’ll probably be more issues tonight. Assuming the slime doesn’t get us all first.

Rick