Park Ward Hustings on the 17th April 2016

Attended
John Peach CON
Beki Sellick LD
Mohammad Yousaf CON
Ali Shan GREEN
Absent but sent apologies
Richard Ferris LAB
Arfan Khan CON
John Shearman LAB
Graham Whitehead UKIP
Absent and no apology received (or read out)
Sabra Yasin LAB

This account is a transcription of my notes, intended solely for me and makes no pretensions to completeness. In view of some snide and bitter comments in the latest In Touch I am setting the record as straight as I can. The chair was Tony Forster. All are welcome to add statements or comments.

As the person coordinating for the Greens, I did get all the preceding emails and the decision making process was perfectly clear. No date will suit everybody, and ultimately it is the decision of the host when to hold an event. In my view people can wear two hats, and often have no choice but to do so and can do so with style and skill. And there is nothing wrong with missing an event.

Statements from candidates who were present

John Peach CON

Has been a councillor for 28 years and a community activist. Produces an eight page monthly newsletter and a weekly email.

Is concerned about HMOs and private rented properties. Says we need to check ownership.

Beki Sellick LD

Part time transport consultant. FOR selective licensing. AGAINST the super council and why it isn’t really devolution.

Said quite a lot, but I didn’t transcribe it.

Ali Shan GREEN

Said he was new to the Green Party. Wants to see safer roads and green spaces better protected.

Mohammad Yousaf CON

Went to St Paul’s School (no longer exists), then to Peterborough Regional College and is now an accountant, with an office opposite Kings School. Opposed the unitary authority move. Said that Stewart Jackson wants to take a stick to slum landlords.

Concerned about fly tipping, drug dealing, green spaces, anti social behaviour and cyclists on pavements.  Unclear about 20mph limits, but wants safe routes to schools.

Thinks we need a CANDO approach to rubbish and an education campaign, enforced by letting agents and landlords.

New property owners already get a booklet from the council: this should include waste.

Has a soft monotonous voice which almost sent me to sleep.

 

Statements received from absent invitees

Richard Ferris LAB

FOR selective licensing and 20mph speed limits. Has introduced community skips and is working to identify fly tip hot spots.

Arfan Khan CON

Apologies and was visiting a sick relative in hospital.

John Shearman LAB

Apologies and why he can’t ever get to events on Sunday evenings. That he will remain committed to his work for the ward, despite being a carer and having as a consequence rather awkward personal circumstances.

City Council administration is dithering over 20mph.

Graham Whitehead UKIP

Sorry he couldn’t come, but had to take his children to a pop concert. Had organised the slate of 29 UKIP candidates this year. A long & (I thought) well written (compared to last year’s) statement was read out.

Spot the Difference

2016 04 16 14:47 at the beginning of a leafletting session. Not reported: with a crowd and didn’t want to hold people up.

2016 04 16 18:13 Now alone and on my way home from leafletting, thought it worth posting a report on my lovely Fix My Street app. Could not believe what I saw. Decided to post the first picture on my Fix My Street app.

Click here to find Fix My Street which works extremely well on a smart phone.

This May, Be The Change

The almost invisible Holdich Motion

The Motion which was not properly discussed at last night’s Extraordinary General Meeting in Peterborough was this:

Ferris motion

The full text reads as follows:

”

EXTRAORDINARY COUNCIL	AGENDA ITEM No. 3
13 APRIL 2016	PUBLIC REPORT

MOTIONS ON NOTICE

The following notice of motion has been received in accordance with the Council’s Standing Order 13.1:

1. Motion from Councillor Ferris, Councillor Fower, Councillor Johnson, Councillor Knowles, Councillor Murphy, Councillor Sandford and Councillor Shaheed

Council notes the announcement by the Chancellor of a devolution deal for the East in his Budget on 16 March; but regrets that the deal, in its current form, is not acceptable to this Council.

Council requests that the Chief Executive write to the Secretary of State for Local Government to bring this resolution to his attention.

The proposed East Anglia Devolution Agreement can be found at the following link:

https://www.gov.uk/government/uploads/system/uploads/attachment_data/file/508115/The _East_Anglia_Devolution_Agreement_FINAL_with_signatures_and_logos.pdf

A hard copy of the document will be available in each Group Room.”

But this was not debated. Instead:

The wishy washy “Holdich Amendment” was passed.

You wouldn’t pick up what happened if you just watched the BBC News at 10pm (which I did and which Cambridge City Council members may have done). And if you looked for what follows on the council’s website, you wouldn’t find it (as I write).

Holdich Amendment not included screen shot at 10:10 on 16:04:14

The council did publish it on its Twitter profile: ***

Cllr Holdich is now proposing an amendment to the original motion pic.twitter.com/K75VrhvGvd

— Peterborough Council (@PeterboroughCC) April 13, 2016

//platform.twitter.com/widgets.js

The ruling Conservative Party’s Holdich Amendment was discussed and voted FOR. It thus becoming the substantive motion and the only item which could be voted on. This removed any opportunity to discuss the original motion. It also positioned the council as unhappy, but wishing to remain in the conversation. At least one councillor believes that the city would have been excluded from discussions on the “proposed East Anglia Devolution Agreement” #ToryDevolution #EasternPowerhouse or what I think it is: #PseudoDevolution had it voted FOR the Ferris Motion.

 

EGM PCC 16 04 13

Holdich amendment

The council published this, but only on Twitter at 7.15pm last night (the meeting began at 7pm). The council has not published this, which is the Order Paper and which shows how the Amendment took precedence over the Motion. I believe it was highly discourteous to Cllr Ferris, the author of the motion to reveal it to him only at c 9.30 on the same day, especially since most people know he holds down a full time job as well as his councillor role.

Cllr Chris York and (I think) Cllr Yasmeen Maqbool did not make the meeting and didn’t send their apologies. The other absent councillors are listed below on my annotated Order Paper.

Nobody asked for the vote to be recorded, so electors cannot identify (nor could I) who voted for what on the second vote.

 

Air Pollution and Peterborough City Council

FIONA RADIC·TUESDAY, 15 MARCH 2016

Picture is at http://uk-air.defra.gov.uk/aqma/lis… and the status of the Air Quality Management Area (two small areas in Whittlesey) has not changed since 2007 when the breach of legal limits was notified to the Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs (DEFRA).

Peterborough City Council’s other progress on air pollution since then:

Council has never had a public information campaign to stop domestic and commercial burning of landfill, construction and commercial wastes, which is particularly prevalent in high housing turnover areas close to the railway station. Smoke and smog affect visitors’ perceptions of the city as they step onto the platform and air quality has a serious and ongoing impact on residents’ health and wellbeing. Many people living in the city have actually forgotten what fresh air smells like: they are no longer aware they are living in smoggy conditions: they simply don’t smell the smoke any more. These fires (many of them illegal) are set in the evening, just as council officers go home and since they are usually “safe” (i.e. someone is supervising the fire and it isn’t getting out of control) the fire brigade is not required to take action.

Council decided to approve, construct and launch (2016) its very own landfill waste incinerator with Cllr Kreling (on the planning committee at the time of approval) observing that if she couldn’t see anything coming out of the stack (the planning committee was taken on a tour of a similar monster), nothing was coming out. The council has never agreed to and is not live streaming data about its emissions from the stack.

Peterborough Renewable Energy Limited who were the first to propose an incinerator for the city did agree to live stream their emissions data on their website. But this is not the incinerator which has gone live.

The Chair of the Planning Committee, Councillor for East Ward, the ward with both planned incinerators sitting in it, offered to throw Richard Olive and me out of the council chamber She couldn’t throw us out because she couldn’t find a bailiff. But she was perfectly able to make a lousy decision without listening to evidence. For me, this was my introduction to the realities of politics in Peterborough. Most people have a vague sense of trust in their elected representatives. I lost whatever tiny bit I had left that day.

Between then and now council decided to knock down and pulverise numbers of large buildings made of brick, cement and plaster (Thomas Deacon School and several other predecessor-to-PFI schools, Bridge House, Peterborough District Hospital & assorted buildings on site). No dust suppression in place during the works and no coverage of the remaining mountains of dust (I observed the 20 ft high mountain of grey dust next to Aldermans Drive yesterday: 14th March 2016).

The Junction of Taverners Road with Bourges Boulevard is close to and downwind of the pile of pulverised sky scraper hospital and is also in a high density residential area. This junction is now close to breaching traffic pollution limits and that is according to official monitors. Are we surprised? Hardly. Cough Cough.

In London it has been shown that official monitoring is significantly understating the true state of affairs: http://cleanair.london/?s=monitorin…

People feel there is nothing they can do. But there are a few things.

• More people need to observe democracy in action, even if it does mean risking getting thrown out of meetings. The dishonour of getting thrown out is not yours.
• We could choose not to reelect councillors who fail to help improve air quality and who drive themselves around in heavy overpowered diesel vehicles.
• We could vote in councillors who don’t drive. Or who drive electric, hybrid and low emissions vehicles. The importance of leadership cannot be overstated.
• We could vote in councillors who understand that a 20mph speed limit in Peterborough’s residential streets would make cycling and walking pleasanter and would reduce the number of journeys taken by car.
• We could find a real time air pollution app which relies on independent air monitoring and which works in Peterborough, so that we are not obliged to rely solely on council owned data.
• The council could live stream its incinerator emissions and on street air pollution monitoring data on its website. If it is proud of what it is doing, there should be no qualms in showing off its achievements.