James Barber

Hi bonaome, That ?700k is accumulated over a number of years. Regards james.

Hi pk, the last 10 local council by elections have had one swing from tories to Lab, 1 x indie hold and remainder tory holds. So no the Tories are fine. We've had no Lib Dem seats come up for by elections. Locally Labour have two councillors whose membership of the Labour party has been suspended. One for benefits fraud (second offence) and the other mysteriously no one quite knows. Hopefully one will result in a by election and that WOULD end the argument "are the Lib dem finished?" unless of course it proves we're not in which I'm sure we'll all return to this thread.... Hi DJ, Sadly that's not entirely how council rents work. Central government pays the interest on the monies councils have borrowed to build that housing. so yes they cream money of but return it by paying the interest. It is proposed to net of these loans and leave the council rents with local authorities. Those calculations are on going and should result in an overal simpler system and one where councils could choose to pay debt earleir to reduce interest payments to have more in thep ot for repairs etc. ie. be completely responsible for their housing affairs. Long overdue. One of the big problems with Decent homes is that when a kitchen or bathroom goes beyond a certain number of years its then officially not decent. Majority of Southwark ocuncil housing was built such that those homes have been going indecent. So a huge moving target. The recent report stated 2/3rd decent. The previous reports stated just over half decent. By my calculations it will take around another 8 years to truly make Southwarks housing decent including working lifts, security etc. Housing repairs. 120,000 made a year. One measurement of how successful this is, is how many councillors raise casework and how many people complain - effectively an issue being escalated. They tend to be complicated and really painful issued. The cross part scurtiny report highlighted in 2007 - 3234, 2008 - 2347, 2009 - 2500, 2010 - 2413 up until July but an election year. So undoubteldy the report has shown the call centre was around 15% out with its stats. Amazed the checks and balances not in place to detect this. But the number of complaints and councillor case work related to housing had a big reduction.

Hi Sue, All Southwark's markets have one centrally held ring fenced account. Legally it has to be ring fenced from other council monies. It currently has an accumulated deficit of over ?700,000. North Cross Road is making a surplus - but East Street market I understand is making a loss. Hence why the drastic changes proposed to boost revenue to NCR to subsidise East Street market and stabalise the deficit. Why is East Street market making losses? Long story involving dodgy dealing, mass sackings for gross misconduct and almost all the permanent traders with all the best pitches fighting any changes - having moved out of Southwark to live in Kent. I've asked offciers if any preference is or could be given to residents of Southwark to have market stalls at NCR market and outher Southwark markets but apparently firm no's to both. I've also asked whether each market could have its own seperate ring fenced account. The answer was no.

Hi DJ, The thread is "Are the Lib Dems broken". I'm sorry for you that after so much debate on this topic its been repeatedly shown they're not. I'm happy to continue debating particular of thread topics but would hope at some point you'd just accept different people have different views. Today's Southwark News yet again has an article with Southwark Labour leader Peter John sating numerous services are up for being merged with Lambeth and Lewisham. 66% of Southwark council housing is reported as meeting Decent Homes standards - the reaearch fo this was compelted last March. That's still many houses to be brought up to that standard. The change in govnerment makes this slightly easier in that council housing can now apply for government grants to complete Decent Homes works whereas under Labour national government they weren't allowed to. Hopefully Labour Southwark will submit a really good application. False housing repairs stats - I'm delighted that the cross party Housing Scrutiny report has been finally completed having been started under the previous administration. A lot of effort by councilors from all parties has gone into this along with council officers support. The report certainly resonates with the dramatic drop in council housing casework for councillors. So the service certainly made a step improvement but still has a long way to go. I think it was MORI that produced a recent report showing that non Labour voters views of the Lib Dems haven't changed much but that Labour voters are really angry with the Lib Dems. Is this the cause of your angst?

hi apmuso, Sorry. Time overtaken by Northcross Markets fiasco of a public consultation by council officers and now similar for Grove Vale proposed changes. The latter has recevied 11 responses with East Dulwuch councillors being ignored by officers. Proposals to spend circa ?100,000 on traffic calming on Tintagel Crescent - the proposed waste is truly incredible. So I need to get these sorted before turning back to the traffic issue. Again sorry.

One of the drivers is to cover the markets deficit by raising money from Sunday trading on Northcross Road. It would raise an extra ?20K and officers seem very focused in the public report to the Licensing Committee to that end. Since the Licensing Committee a report to council Cabinet about the markets department suggests an insource partly funded through expanding Northcross Road market into Sundays. So it does feel like a potential risk officers might be strongly motivated by self interest rather than truly listening to residents or running a fair consultation.

For heaven sakes. Did you not read the Labour leaflets! At least the Lib dem ones were based on facts and record of behaviour - Southwark Labour had said housing in Southwark was rubbish and they planned to merge services. So are the Lib Dems broken - think we've established from last weeks election - no they're not.

Hi Crumpie, Could you please PM or even better email me your address so I can help officers pin down which crew is responsible. Many thanks in advance. Regards james.

Hi Keef, I think you're beign a little disingenuous. The proposal sent out as a public consultation appears to have been very poorly managed - officers said issued to all homes within half mile radius which would be around 10,000 homes but only 2,000 questionairres printed. Lots of people satying they've never received one. The consultation never mentioned a road closure - despite ward councillors asking exactly that question when the questionairre was being prepared and told no road closure. The actual area proposed for the extra stalls was the north side of NCR outside the terraced houses between Archdale Road and Lacon Road which have miniscule front gardens. The market traders arrive well before 7am and are very noisy setting up their metal pole stalls. So residents would be disturbed from 5 or 6 am onwards having been disturbed by late night revellers. I can entirely understand residents being alarmed at these suggestions which were NOT made clear in the consultation.

Hi corley, I don't know of the top of my head about the Southwark Outreach Service but will find out. I suspect this will take a few days to find out. IF you could email me or PM your husbands name and address that would speed up finding out. George Osbourne is a fabulously wealthy man - I suspect we'd all like to inherit such wealth. I'll also find out about DLA - I could tailor the response to your case with more details but will provide general feedback unless you send me further info. Hope this is all ok. Regards james.

Hi Sue, They will all have received the council formal markets consultation. of the 2,000 questinoairres 89 were sent back. Clear that this tiny reponse didn't catch the mood - especially as it didn't ask about closing any roads. So local councillors plan to leaflet everyone including those roads and knock on all doors on Northcross, Nutfield, Archdale and Lacon and the NCR end of Fellbrigg. Would you like to help?

Hi DJ, Before the May elections Southwark Labour party were stating they wanted to share services with neighbouring boroughs. They could'nt name any services they wanted Southwark to lead on partly because the Lib Dems had led Southwark for 8 years so it had to all be bad in their minds/their publicity. Lambeth Labour party also said they wanted to share services and the first thing they did when they took power from the Lib Dems in Lambeth in 2006 was outsource all council housing - not part of any publicised manifesto. This was partly in response to National Labour policy of not putting central government grants toward decent homes into council run housing but only into Housing Association run or Arms Length Managemen organisations run ex.council housing. So, we genuinely thought if Labour ran Southwark Council and central government Southwark council housing would be outsourced to Housing Associations and ALMO/s. Still a risk of this as I don't beleive I've seen any statements they wont. However, the coalition government has said the government grants to help with Decent Homes are no longer limited to husoing run by Housing Associations or ALMO's so this driver has been removed. As for the scrutiny report into Housing repairs - I hadn't yet read it until you piqued my interest. The report can be seen at: http://moderngov.southwarksites.com/mgConvert2Pdf.aspx?ID=4339&T=9 It shows a dramatic initial reduction in councillor casework. Unsurprisingly casework went up in 2010 when everyone's door was knocked on during election campaigns. I was disappointed with the recommendations - doesn't mentioned any interest in audit plans by the suppliers or council officers. Another useful technique I've used is Graded Audits where field engineers have to take before and after photos of their work and submit them - works wonders on quality. So I've contact my three colleagues on the committee to follwo these up. Hopefully still room to improve the draft report.

Hi Sue, I've spoken to about 10 very close residents to Northcross Road Market and they tell me that they will be running a door to door petition against Sunday opening. Seperately my Lib Dem colleagues and I will be leafletting the area & knocking on doors to talk to all residents, talkingg to traders and shop keepers about the community council making it recomemendations and inviting people to attend to give their views.

Hi BrandNewGuy, Friday's SLP Pulse section back page definately talked about Dulwich Leisure Centre and a weekend of free use by using the Fusion token they'd printed. The next edition of SLP comes out tomorrow so you still have today to buy Friday's version.

I've just pulled of the December 2010 crime stats for Southwark by ward.For December East Dulwich slipped a couple of 'league' places but it's only one month out of the year - see attached.

Knocking on doors across East Dulwich it seems about 10x as many people reading EDF as posting. I've had many emails, texts and a few PM's that broadly correlates to the ration of people for or against. They clearly didn't feel they wanted to expose themselves to some of the direct responses that do sometimes appear on the forum. This thread was meant to test opinion in finger in the air way. It was never meant to be definitive but an indicator.It has been really useful in achieving that small simple aim. THANK YOU to everyone who's responded in whatever way felt best for them.

So to answer the original question - the by election results in Oldham East & Saddleworth. Clearly shows the Lib Dems are not broken. The Lib Dem vote seems to have held up very well. More people voted Labour. http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-politics-12187965 I was a little involved in this campaign. We didn't have the 500 people Labour bused in on Saturday for example. What's really sad is how many people there didn't vote. They told me politicians are all the same, etc, etc. The damage that the likes of Woolas and Illsey have done to politics should'nt be underestimated. I was also stunned how many openly told me they would be voting BNP. The results demonstrate this. Another fall out of the dirty politics these voters have witnessed first hand.

Today's South London Press newspaper have a free offer for a Fusion weekend pass. SLP costs 50p. Seems like brilliant value to get a weekend of swimming etc at the new Dulwich leiscure centre pool.

I'm astounded. This site is in South Camberwell ward but is formerly Metropolitan Open Land. The who larea used to be sports grounds for Kings College and was sold allowing the Sainsbury's to be built and Dulwich Hamlets football ground with car parking etc.

Hi BrandNewGuy, I'm sorry about your experience in 2002. Council officers under the Lib Dems were directed to find a way of not charging for street party street closures and persauded local papers to provide a very low rate for the legally required advertising of the street closure. If you ask residents of Upland Road they've been having great street parties for a number of years and it is now much cheaper than your describe or when they orignally started. I'm sure the Labour led administratino would be equally supportive of street parties. If anyone finds problems with the councils support please get in touch with me straight away to try and smooth things.

I'd be slighlty cautious about what a Police officer tells you without knowing their provinence. If they're a member of the local Safer Nieghbourhood Team then they will know if this type of crime is on the rise at that location. If it is from a member of the rapid response cars then they're probably generalising for the whole borough.

The best street parties I've helped with have lots of keen residents. The part of Lordship Lane you propose has relatively few residents. The bus route diversions would be complicated and that a lot of bus routes diverting even for a bank holiday. Equally its main emergency service route without any traffic calming. What would work really well is side roads having street parties and I hope lots do use the royal wedding to hold a street party. Fingers crossed it s a sunny day. BUT if anyone is thinking of holding a street party you'll need to get cracking as the noticing etc of closing a road and getting police, fire, ambulance agreement takes 6-8 weeks and the that bank holiday is only 14 weeks away.

Hi Terry TYhomas esq, I've PM'd you about this. Regards james.

Around this area is a little unusual in that two different distinct times at each end of the school day - private schools where kids have to be present between 8.15 and 8.30 and local schoold such as Heber which start at between 8.50 and 9.05am. So clear gap between these groups of kids when the lollipop people relax. It did get me thinking though. The Government gives money for all schools to Southwark Council. It then takes a small percentage (from memory about 8%) for centrally provided services for schools and kids and then passes the rest ot schools. My understanding is that that tiny percentage pays for lollipop people. With increasing numbers of schools chosing to become academies the pot that that tiny percentage comes from will be getting smaller. Who will be paying for lolklipop people going forward. I'll find out.

But this is a key point going north-south, and east-west for kids walknig to school.