James Barber

Hi KK, I was asked questions which I responded to. Some questions are impossible to answer without being political. But zebra crossings rarely have such political sides. This area of the forum is meant for General ED related issues. The lounge or drawing room would be better for more political debates. Next time I'm asked a question which trigger all this I'll suggest responding in a more appropriate part of the forum.

Dulwich Park. Really interesting problem I was PM'd. Dulwich Park has a few disabled parking bays in the park. But no benches near any of those bays. Incredibly obvious problem once pointed out. The parks team immediately agreed we should have benches near those bays. They should be in place within 6 weeks.

Hi ZT, I agree and am resisting further response to PT. Hi PT, Happy to have dialogue via PM.

Hi PokerTime, You're still re writing and making up history. The Lib Dem led council built more than 10 times more council housing when the Labour government was opposed to this than the current Labour council when the national government has supported councils housing being built. If you opened the excel spreadsheet I posted you'd see nearly 6,000 homes were sold under the Right To Buy. The council has no choice but to sell them to tenants. So telling us of for obeying the law isn't helpful. Closing the Heygate Estate and rebuilding it was a cross party agreed policy as part of recreating the E&C and had been talked about for many many years. But the details of the contract for doing this does not have cross party agreement. The Lib Dems negotiated a deal that due to Purdah was blocked from happening before the 2010 local elections. The new Labour administration threw this ready contract away. Southwark News has reported that ?50M was thrown away as a result, they say that Labour settled for ?50M less and no automatic 35% social housing. I'm not legally allowed to tell you the figure as Labour Southwark are determined to keep it a secret having spent ?70,000 so far on legal fees to stop this information being made public - fighting the Information Commissioner. This week they've just lost another round and are considering appealing to a higher court at more council tax payers expense. ?100M on a call centre. Not sure where you plucked that from? Do you mean the cost of running the call centre over many years with many hundreds of thousands of calls each year? Southwark Council was created in 1964. For all but 8 years in the last 50 years Labour has run the council. Frankly when Lib Dems took control in 2002 it was a complete mess. It did a huge job of turning that around. The recent Labour administration has benefited from that.

Hi PokerTime, The Lib Dems didn't sell the Heygate estate. Labour did shortly after taking office in 2010 and Southwark News reported for ?50M LESS than the Lib Dems deal on the table with the developers had been proposing. Also the Labour deal didn't include 35% social housing. The deal struck over the Heygate Estate was by Labour and they chose to accept as you've stated 3% social housing. Under the last Lib Dem administration of Southwark Council 368 council homes were built. Please se SE1 for useful background to all this http://www.london-se1.co.uk/news/view/7565 Hi ITATM, I hope not. I'm stuck. If I don't respond people will read things into that or think I'm being rude and if I do respond I get people like PokerTime re writing history. Hi Renata, Please see attached latest council data about house sales, demolition, etc. Looks a lot different to 16! NB. The demolition is a weird one. Most of those are the Heygate estate which has only just been demolished but for accounting purposes is recorded as demolished when people leave their homes as it's going to be demolished.

Hi Zebedee Tring, If Sainsbury's now saying 2 May then 20 May I would expect to be the new reopening date.

Hi Nigello, Will check this out. Hi Zebedee Tring, w/c 20 May. Hi Dun, Will take a look tomorrow evening.

Which bit/s Dun? I know a few tweaks to standardise parking are coming which generally slightly increase parking availability. But they shouldnt need any suspension of parking.

Hi ITATM, My figures are slightly out. 38,000 council tenanted properties with 16,700 leasehold properties where Southwark is the freeholder and the lease held by a private individual.

Hi KK, Local East dulwih pledges http://jamesbarber.mycouncillor.org.uk/?p=2547 We have a great record on delivering our pledges despite being in opposition. And Southwark wide pledges as per above.

Hi first mate, For our Manifesto please see http://www.southwark-libdems.org.uk/manifesto For our older people pledges see here: http://d3n8a8pro7vhmx.cloudfront.net/simonhughes/pages/160/attachments/original/1393868415/Older_People_and_social_care.pdf?1393868415

Hi GinaG3, and anyone else, If you spot things like dead foxes in a public place in Southwark do call 020 7525 2000 and report it. If you find nothnig happens for a couple of days then do escalate to a local councillor. I've reported the dead fox. Grass cutting. I have had casework about this before about 18months ago. I agree that sme areas could be more attractive if managed as grass meadows. Potentially this would also save money. Can you email me about this and I'll then make enquiries to see if this has been considered and if it has why not persued.

Hi KK, If my party was selling all East Dulwich ward council homes as they become vacant I would be declining the whip and telling people why and trying to change the policy and campaigning to do this. But we're a very democratic party and I'd hope never to have to take such drastic action as we make group decisions for such important issues. So sorry I can not feel unity for Renata (as much as I personally like her and respect her) about her political party selling all East Dulwich ward council homes when they become vacant. Lastly, before I hope we get back to the reaosn for this thread, councillors are not all the same. They each bring different amolunt of effort. Many do it for the Southwark wide stage. Many like me and ward colleagues do it to change their area for the better. If we lose on 22 May I'll still be campaigning away to finish what we've started.

Hi KK, I was asked a question and responded. Renata responded and I responded to her. I genuinely think it a long-term problem for East Dulwich if it doesnt remain a mixed community. Hi KoolBananas, We havea shool places crisis that we've been worknig on solving by getting new free schools built since 2011. The latest pahse is a secondary school after securing primary schools. We've also campaign to make Lordship Lane 20mph and aded crossings, new cinema. We've made a lot of things happen locally scuh as the Dulwich Leisure Centre ?6.2M revamp. So I think it a bit unfair to choose one element of our work and criticise us for being one dimensional.

Thanks LondonMix about admissions. Hi Bumpkin, I can't imagine a new foot bridge and the Green Dale footbridge would mean crossing JAGS land. That's quite an assumption being made about JAGS especially with children safe guarding these days. HI LondonMix, Sports facilities and other facilities have been discussed. We have made it very clear we'd expect sports halls, etc to be located so they can easily be opened for the local community out of school hours. Hi ITATM, we're proposing 2/3rds of the hospital site be used for a new secondary school with remaining third being the size the local health organisations have said they need.

Come on Renata people aren't that daft. No, the requirements for major repairs to be needed causing the council to sell homes ended when your party took control of the council. Even ?1,000 of repairs caused the sale of a 4 bedroom house. Perfectly good homes are being sold and the threshold for selling is ?300,000. In East Dulwich ward we have no homes for sale under ?300,000. It doesn't take Einstein to work out this mean social cleansing. You can't pretend this isn't your local parties policies causing this. Over 900 council homes have been sold or demolished since your party took control of the council in 2010, you've promised to build 11,000 new council homes but only built 26 in four years. And the council doesn't have 55,000 properties. It has 55,000 freehold properties but 13,500 of those are leasehold properties and not for the council to sell.

The Dulwich Festival Fair on Goose Green had a an area for the Parents Steering Group and Haberdashers' Aske's Federation to talk about the school we're proposing. We also had ex.pupils, year 9 pupils and Haberdasher's Hatcham College Vice Principal talking to local families. I thought it really useful. Hopefully others did as well. Setting it up first thing today I was worried about the weather but it didn't seem to dent the spirits at all.

Hi ITATM, All our local secondary schools operate banding except The Charter School. So it would be odd for a new secondary school to not operate banding. Hi EDmummy, Both ED Harris Boys and Girls Academies are full.

Hi Penguin68, Yes, Southwark Council sell council properties worth over ?300,000 when they become vacant. These rules are the policies from the Southwark Labour Party who currently lead Southwark Council. It means that all council properties will be sold as no properties are on the market for less than ?300,000 in East Dulwich ward. Clearly this threshold needs to be raised if we're to keep any council social housing in East Dulwich. Effectively without changing the threshold this will social cleanse the area. We currently have around 800 East Dulwich ward council tenants. One argument might be the receipts for such sales could be used to improve the remaining stock. But the council is sitting on close to ?100M of unspent receipts.

Yes, and we all want the fairest possible admissions polict resulting in the most comprehensive intake possible. This is fair for the school and importantoly other schools. Banding is present in a number of existing Southwark schools. So it isn't anything new to the area.

Hi ITATM, It's a but more complicated than that. They have to fully consult, etc, and open to challenges etc. But for the proposed Haberdashers' Aske's East Dulwich College we anticipate it consulting on banding and distance within banding after the usual things like looked after children, siblings, etc. The reasons the last Labour government and current coalition government aren't allowing local authorities to have free rain to open council schools is because many councils around the country are doing a very poor job of it. Any well run council can attract the free school provider they want and have the bonus of central government paying all the capital revenue bills. Hence why doublnig Ivydale Primary School not a great decision - takes it to twice the optimal size for primary school - and will costs Southwark Council tax payers ?5M for the priviledge

Hi Ant, Can you please email me more details - it's the border between College ward and Village ward so keen we pin point it precisely for officers to explain their plans. Hi Sue, It is good. How about your street joining in?

Lovely piece of casework. Residents on Heber Road asking about how to enable kids to play on the street - http://jamesbarber.mycouncillor.org.uk/?p=2461 Today's Southwark News lists 4 dates, 1 a month starting Sunday 25 May 2.30pm to 5.30pm, where Heber Road between Cyrena and Landcroft Roads will be open for kids playing on the street. If you'd like this to happen on your street please get in touch so we can help you organise this.

Hi TE44, That is being planned but the Goose Green Fair seems a great way to continue a process of engagement I started last December publicly.

Hi Biped1, No one has turned education into a market. As Belle has said it's trying to ensure we have the support of the community to create an outstanding new school. That any questions or concerns are fully addressed. I'm rather proud of all the effort going into trying to be as open as possible and accountable. Hi Otta, Hopefully next to. We are very lucky that two such great school providers are so keen to create our new school. To think until 8 weeks ago the council said no new school was needed and we had no provider. This has become one of the projects I'm proudest to have initiated and been a key part of.