Penguin68

Have you contacted Conways - at least that might rule out (or in) Southwark as the client? http://www.fmconway.co.uk/contact/index.aspx

I have a sycamore in my front garden (wild planted) that has grown in just the right position. Other's don't and I pull them up (or mow then if in the lawn). I would have preferred a London Plane (cousin of the American Sycamore which is not in fact related to the true sycamore) - but beggars can't be choosers. I also have wild planted Oak, Mahonica and Rowan - all again growing in places I am happy with. Enjoy nature's bounty! Sycamore's are beautiful trees, and being deciduous, don't steal scarce winter light. Their nuisance factor (easy seeding and autumn leaves) seem a fair price to pay for their beauty. And there is some evidence that established large trees, such as sycamores, are environmentally beneficial. http://www.theecologist.org/News/news_analysis/843749/do_smaller_trees_play_any_real_role_in_tackling_carbon_and_pollution.html

The 'rule-of-thumb' that most city dwellers run by is that neighbours are 'allowed' 2-3 loud and late parties a year at weekends - particularly Friday or Saturday night. Good neighbours will alert adjacent houses to the fact of an up-coming party (when they haven't invited them!). Some nights (New Year's Eve, Bonfire Night) are accepted as party nights where loud behaviour is anticipated. Unacceptable behaviour is very loud music (particularly a throbbing bass line) after midnight, or regular parties every weekend. Of course other people enjoying themselves in a thoughtless manner can (rightly) be annoying - but if you live in a city (and we are in an inner London suburb) you live by city rules.

Absolutely - condolences. Focus on what's important (in the grand scheme of things that's not this forum).

Recently he has tended to get back on the forum in a flurry - answer immediate questions and add value where he can to other threads and then go quiet again. I believe he has a pretty full life - handling the forum (which does not form any part of his constituency 'duties') may well take a lower priority than his full-time work, his active councillor duties and his role as a family man. We are lucky that he and Councillor Hamvas (and Robin whilst she was on the Council and after) are so prepared to engage with the forum.

In which case it will be a bit of an own goal for someone who owns a pub to wish to build so that they reduce its value as a pub, unless the long game is to close the pub and bring the whole plot into residential use. The reason why the Estate has let the Grove lie fallow for so long is to allow a change of use to residential as there is more money in that, or so I understand.

I'm afraid there is a further potential down-side to this, in that a future owner of the new property (even though it is obviously adjacent to a pub) may object to e.g. noise etc. of people in the pub garden - thus further reducing the enjoyment of the pub. Many pubs have been blighted by people buying properties close to them (knowing they are pubs) and then making objections to their continued trading as pubs (unless run as if by Carmelites). I don't know how this can be addressed, other than by some restrictive covenant being placed on future owners of the new property against their objections to pub noise (if such a thing could even exist!)

Steel railings leaking lead particles? How does that work? I imagine they were painted with a lead-based paint - very common once (particularly white lead) and a quite good coating for steel, although zinc galvanising would have been better - and this had started to flake. Lead paint flakes were a far more common source of environmental lead poisoning in urban areas than tetra-ethyl lead used as an anti-knock fuel additive. Proper treatment would have been to remove the railings, burn off the paint in a controlled atmosphere and re-paint - pretty expensive - burning off in the open would have spread the lead particulates. So probably not worth the expense. Sad.

If you haven't already, register with a credit checking agency - this can be free if you agree to be marketed to, otherwise you can pay a one-off charge - if your name is being used 'in vain' then it is remotely possible that your identity may have been stolen. Probably not, but best to check.

But remember that if you think a crime is happening, or threatened, or appears imminent, then 999 is the right number to dial.

Just to add to the turmoil, I would guess that Admin has noted (as rendelharris says) the same IP address for two different posters - however if they are neighbours and friends they may be legitimately posting comments whilst sitting together using the same WiFi connection - so this may be collusion but not necessarily personation. Clearly others (definitely unconnected) have also been impacted by these noisy neighbours - wasn't this sort of behaviour what ASBOs were for? Certainly call in Southwark Noise Control and (if the shouts are offensive) tape these (phones can do that now) as evidence. If there is any suggestion that these may be commercial parties this is certainly against the law if run un-licenced from domestic premises.

Switch the mains switch on, then switch each of RCB protected switches on, then, if there isn't a short in doing that, switch each of the 32 amp (with power sockets on your board) and then each of the 16amp switches (with lamps) on. That way, when the board shorts again, you will know on which circuit the fault lies. Once you have isolated that, keep that circuit off and you should be able to have all the others switched on OK. You can then check what might have triggered the problem, it's probably an appliance, but remember that many appliances (such as computers and TVs and phones) can be 'on' at any time. If nothing triggers the problem, then the appliance (or whatever caused it) may already have burnt out and be dead to the system. Nowadays boards are made to be very sensitive, so it may be quite a minor problem which has triggered this (possibly with your dishwasher as that's what was running). If you know which circuit that is on already, switch that on last in sequence. If you can't identify the problem yourselves (look for e.g. burnt-out plugs), then you will need an electrician, who will have circuit testing kit. The first bank of switches is probably for downstairs power, the second upstairs.

Hi P68, I'm puzzled. I think you're suggesting the inconvenience of people being delayed can be calculated for specific journeys, hours, days but that the loss of sleep for local residents for each night could not be calculated. I don't see why not. When Southwark Council had works to do they made much more effort to minimise nigh time disturbance than TfL have taken. There are existing algorithms which calculate traffic delay as a function of economic loss - that was the basis of the creation of a congestion charge which was hypothesized would lead, with increased traffic speeds, to improved economic efficiencies. So a simple traffic log of average traffic speeds through the junction would allow an economic value to be placed on increased delays because of road works. There are no algorithms that I know of (and indeed no studies) of very short term (under a week) broken sleep (but only probably of some people, and not many in that particular position with very little residential housing in close proximity) on their economic productivity. My own experience as a parent suggests that the impact of much longer periods of broken sleep had little or no impact on my work productivity. But my case was actually hypothecated (see earlier posts) on the impact of extended queuing day-time traffic on road pollution (and in particular NOx) - which is typically output by the commercial vehicles which might be expected to be queuing during day-works at that point. Free(er) flowing day traffic seemed to me to be a fair trade off for the broken sleep, over only a very few days, of a relatively small group of residents.

Oh, James, and by-the-way... People don't function as well with insufficient sleep. That results in them being less safe and less productive. ...excellent argument against having children - clearly rather than the government paying parents a child allowance, parents should be paying higher taxes to compensate for their chosen reduced productivity and increases in being unsafe for others.

Hi P68, People don't function as well with insufficient sleep. That results in them being less safe and less productive. That may well be true (I believe it is) as regards long-term sleep deprivation, which I acknowledged in my post - but I very much doubt whether deprivation for the short period of the road works would have any measurable economic effect (which was what you were claiming), particularly when you consider (1) how few people would have been impacted in that specific spot (there are not that many residences around it) and (2) the fact that some people are not as effected by extraneous noise as others when it comes to sleeping. Which is not to downplay the (albeit short lived) inconvenience and annoyance of the night works to those impacted. However (and the point I was making) was that the night works were 'trading off' against long queues of traffic during day time rushes which would have led to higher pollution levels - so I trade your 'broken sleep patterns' against my increased incidence (and exacerbation) of asthma, emphysema and bronchitis, which (as pollution drifts) is more likely to impact more people as regards social and economic impact. And is more likely to have a long term effect continuing after the nightworks had completed. You can catch up on sleep, but damaged lungs are damaged for much longer. But (in the grand scale of things) either set of impacts, over only the short duration of the works, is actually going to be relatively minimal. I believe (on balance) the greater good was served by the night works, you clearly don't.

It is worth noting that those in Central and North Southwark will find cycling into work (if over the river) much easier, with dedicated cycle routes and fewer hills (and Boris Bikes). For those of us in the the South cycling is a longer, and tougher, call. So a 'one size fits all' approach to Southwark does not make any sense. And when the weather isn't encouraging the opportunities for alternative public transport solutions for the Tooley St gang are substantially better than for us. For those of us in the South, whatever the transport and infrastructure problem the answer is not always 'Bikes'.

They keep knocking at 9.30 at night because every so often someone is mug enough to actually give them money. Cheers. These gangs work frequently through intimidation - a late evening call (in the dusk/ dark) is more intimidating to the elderly or those on their own. People who 'give' may be less 'mugs' than frightened. It's safer to pay them off to leave, or so they think.

I think they are registered with a number of agencies, but I don't know which ones.

Unless it is clear that someone is actually in distress and in need of aid then you must avoid breaching their privacy. Many older people (I am one) value their privacy and whilst some will be grateful for evidence of being a caring neighbour, others won't. Maybe engage in conversation, offer to swap emergency contact details (yours with hers) so that if either should need assistance the other could help. (You might wish someone to be notified if something happened to your house whilst you were away, for instance). Find out if she has relatives (children?). At the moment you are afraid she is getting into difficulties, or might do shortly. But jumping the gun may not be helping her. Particularly if 'the social' try to move her from her house against her will. Ideally you might see if she does need help, perhaps with shopping, or gardening, or DIY. But remember that the elderly are (rightly) very suspicious of those trying to get access to their houses or lives. Respect that. Work slowly to gain her confidence.

Well, IT obsolescence is not what it used to be when I was a kid. The problem is that I am afraid only few parts may be reusable, and I'm not sure how to donate them. I wasn't really suggesting donation - I was noting that dead PCs are often sold on to recyclers by disposal companies - I think they are broken down for component parts and materials in e.g. the Far East. So much can be recovered rather than going to land-fill. If you take it to the council dump I think you will find it joins other such material. So much of it will eventually be reused (apart from any plastic housings I would guess).

Bits but not, if you've physically destroyed your HD, bytes

I would do more than just a 'secure wipe' of any data media. Certainly run a hard wipe, (ideally several, this writes random data across the whole disk) and then remove the hard-drive from the tower and smash it with a hammer. Data can still (potentially) be recovered from even this - but it would need some serious technical know how and equipment, and the chances are than any data which was recovered would be benign. Edited to add - computers are full of bits which are worth recovering for recycling, including rare-earth components. Even where the overall performance is flaky there may still be components which can be re-used as-is, although most would be quite old technology, I'm guessing.

RTAs are very different from heart-attack or stroke. There the most important issues are normally posture, bleeding and airways. Very different issues from dealing with heart-attacks or strokes - with heart attacks resuscitation (chest pumping and mouth to mouth) may help - but this is an immediate recourse - going off to get doctors from surgeries may not be quick enough. And the symptoms as described could also have covered (as has been noted) a fit - possibly epileptic. In which case being a patient of the surgery might be relevant, as has also been noted if there was a medical history to hand. The problem of reporting an incident which happens at a pub is that it may be immediately (and wrongly) assumed to be drink related - a different sort of emergency and perhaps not so pressing. It would be interesting to know when help did eventually arrive (and of course, for humanity's sake, how the patient fared).

they have an oath to do the right thing (paraphrased) but it'll be interesting to hear the other side of the story. Actually, not necessarily. The Hippocratic oath is no longer administered (as it stood, including non Christian religious aspects, it never was in the UK) and although many medical schools do use some form of oath as part of the graduation ceremony not all do. Most versions of the oath that I have looked at (on Google just now) do not require the doctor to attend patients willy-nilly, wherever they should be (the oaths are inter alia about the way you treat people who are your patients). French law does require anyone first at the scene of an accident to offer aid (this wasn't an accident, and the GP wasn't at the scene). Refusing to treat someone seems harsh, but if the GP believed such treatment was either beyond their competence (or that someone else would be more competent) probably justified.

A gp will have a defibrillator Portable? Boxed and ready to go? GPs are doctors, they are not either first-aiders or (more importantly) trained paramedics with necessary equipment. I have known GPs call ambulances to surgeries rather than attempt to treat patients themselves. As generalists they tend to be aware when it is a good thing to call in specialists. Responding to accidents (RTAs) may be different - but there non-emergency doctors will attempt to stabilise patients until ambulances arrive. Calling for an ambulance immediately was the right thing to do - if there was a 45 minute wait for paramedics for a suspected heart attack that's appalling so close to Kings - but that's also not the GP's bad. [And by the way medical insurance means that if it wasn't the doctors registered patient then he/ she had no insurance cover to treat them - registered first aiders - i.e. St John's - do have such cover].