Penguin68

37% responded to the consultation of which 69% were against the CPZ so to find the percentage of those living in ED who are against the CPZ it is necessary to find 69% of 37%. This comes to roughly 25%, a figure at great variance to the '67% of ED residents voted against a CPZ' quoted in the poster. The corollary of course being that whilst 25% of ED residents polled were against a CPZ - using your maths - only 11.5% expressed themselves in favour - or just under half as many as those polling (in the Market Research, not the election sense) against. And it should be noted that those 'creating' the council analysis have placed those wanting an all day CPZ time in just one results bucket whilst keeping those who wanted a shorter time in the various buckets they created for expressing an opinion - a 'majority' of those expressing an opinion in fact wanted a shorter time than all day, but different shorter times. The 'all day' bucket only 'won' because the other 'shorter than all day' 'votes' were kept discrete. Numbers can be made to dance to anyone's tune.

As the council is effectively privatising pieces of the street for individuals who want to use it for long term car storage If only that were true - actually the council is rationing (at a price, over which you have no control) the right to park in specific areas - with the hope that this will also exclude you from being able to park anywhere else locally (if they can extend the CPZs as they are trying to do by fair means or foul) and with absolutely no guarantee that you will in fact be able to park within the area that have paid to be entitled to (and certainly not in any fixed point close to your residence). If the area is blocked by skips, by other 'entitled' vehicles etc. etc. then you will be stuffed.

you mean "computer says no" and they are incapable of resolving the error, really???? And then asking you to provide proof of identity, it just beggars belief. Actually it doesn't. There are 2 sets of problems here, neither entirely of the practices making - firstly that the IT solutions that the practice has 'bought into' (pretty well with their arm up their backs, but they could never have afforded to develop their own) are flaky - and interlinking their own systems into them is difficult - hence difficulties about e.g. appointment making on-line - NHS computerisation has a tragic history, frankly - and secondly that no one is sure how data protection should actually work - hence proof of identity stuff in case anyone inadvertently hands over personal data. Combine that with a slightly jobsworth attitude (almost certainly because individuals feel, or are, disempowered to buck the system) and you have a recipe for bureaucratic nightmares.

The problem with back pain is that it can be caused by mechanical problems with the spine, by problems associated with muscles, by problems associated with discs slipping and trapping nerves (different from mechanical problems where manipulation or exercise may be a remedy) or referred pain from some other condition - when I had a back pain problem (broadly) some years ago I was sent for a chest X-ray in case I had a lung tumour pressing against the spine (I didn't). So back pain can be very difficult to diagnose as it may have multiple causes, and be difficult to address. Some causes will respond to e.g manipulation and exercise regimes, others very definitely won't. Most specialists are specialists in their particular problem area. At times it may just be a matter of ruling things out, rather than quick identification. There are often no quick or sure fixes for chronic back pain, and little pain relief medication which is helpful and can be used long-term. Don't want to sound depressing, but don't hope either for miracles or believe that a 'good' doctor can sort it. Some of the diagnostic tools (full MRI for instance) don't come cheap, and NHS practices will aim to avoid over-use. And some remedies (like CT guided spinal injections of steroids) aren't normally available on the NHS. And some remedies (e.g. spinal surgery) have pretty serious possible side effects, like paralysis. The NHS tends to look for palliatives for chronic back-pain where they can (acute may be different, and opioids can address this, which aren't useful for chronic conditions).

The letter the council has sent out states 51,000 street properties impacted. The income expected would not just pay for the garden waste collection but also the entire foo waste collections. Effectively this proposed scheme is a tax on some who volunteer for all the food waste collections. This assumes that all 51k households will opt for garden waste collection - generating an annual revenue of ?1.53m. This accounts, as far as I can see, for under 10% of payments made to Veolia by Southwark (you can google for these though very up to date figures aren't available) - although these payments may cover more than just waste collection. Assuming Veolia costs are split 50:50 between organic waste and inorganic recycling/ non recyclables (as there are two collections a week) then that ?1.53m covers under 20% of the costs of Organic recycling. Southwark spends around ?65m on current account for Environment and Regeneration, I'm guessing no more than a third or less on waste collection. My guess is that the ?1.53m will not cover all of Southwark's organic recycling waste collection - and that is assuming that everyone with a large brown bin will decide to pay the tax and keep their bins. And the practice of many other boroughs not to collect garden waste at all, or to charge for it, suggests that a court challenge to this would not fly. This is not to support the proposal - which I think is ill-thought through and the processes for which appear to be stupid and costly - nor is it to support the council's clear desire to move as much revenue stream as it can off its Council Tax books to give it price-hike freedom, but I think you may have over-egged the pudding here in your analysis. Happy to stand corrected if you have access (or had access) to better Veolia contract cost figures.

It goes against what the majority of people who took part in the survey said they wanted, and will have a huge impact on everyone living in the area. But it doesn't (1) go against Tooley St.'s stated policy to drive cars out of the borough or (2) their desire to create revenue streams off-community charge or (3) in order to further aims 1 and 2 above to ensure that decisions will force neighbouring locations to clamour in their turn for a CPZ to exclude 'foreign' cars from their streets. This is not and never has been about meeting the needs of local residents - these are just a wedge for a far wider agenda. Herne Hill (Lambeth, not Southwark) is a good example of a listening council here - with a limited CPZ around a station, on limited hours. Something you won't see in Southwark (or I think Lewisham) with a very different agenda.

New Southwark question - 'and how would you vote if the alternative was for your children to be sold into slavery and your spouse's brain hooked out with a boat-hook? Oh, it looks like 100% in favour of a CPZ, then!' Putting in a consequential in a survey like that is deplorable, once again confirming that politicians, certainly in Southwark, cannot be trusted and certainly cannot be respected.

I thought biomass was being used for energy by Veolia. If so, charging for the one thing being put to good use seems... odd. Veolia's finances and Southwark's are entirely separate. I assume Southwark, in determining the fee they pay Veolia will have factored in 'value' in the waste collected - of course if less garden waste is collected because of price rationing then Veolia may be able to claim a higher fee from Southwark for waste collection, depending on the terms of their outsourced deal. But the ?30 annual fee is going to Southwark as a further tax on residents, it is not going to Veolia (although if they have to incur further costs by Southwark's action they may be able to be recompensed for that). Delivery of new bins and collection of old ones, if Veolia does that, will be charged out to Southwark, I'm sure, and reasonably. But Veolia's income streams, and Southwark's are connected only through the outsourcing fee paid by one to the other.

Ah, so the answer to the food waste is we put the bags in the tiny brown caddies and our large brown bins are taken away if we don't subscribe. Could not see that spelt out anywhere. No, I think they will issue, on request, 'kerb-side caddies' - with about 3-4 times the capacity of the tiny kitchen caddies. And you will not be able to put any kitchen waste in a large brown bin, even if you have retained one. They will now only be for garden waste.

Can uou pay cash for this service? I imagine you can buy the paper sacks for cash from an outlet, but the council suggests you can only pay for the brown bin service via credit (and I suppose debit) card, although they are examining a direct debit option for the future.

Although if all the people who use the garden waste collection service continue, or a good number of them, the same work levels will operate.

The ornamental cherries locally have been magnificent this year - I suspect the balmy period in February helped that along - but for a couple of weeks that planting in the streets has really worked. [And private magnolias have also been particularly good].

I think we can reasonably be certain that the chosen method of implementation will be the one that places major parking stress on adjacent roads - this is part of the 'spread (by which I don't mean alleviate) the pain, increase the revenue, spit on car owners' policy of the council.

If the two compostable components are not combined at the curb side - does this really mean that Southwark will have 2 collection lorries attending the same property every week for the collection of compostable waste? Reading between the lines, I suspect that the garden waste collection frequency will at some time drop from weekly to some longer period, and may even be withdrawn in the winter months. The Veolia people on brown bins (the actual collection guys) certainly believe at the moment that they will be making a joint collection of food and garden waste together, but that may change. The one watchword I will not go for is 'trust the council to get it right.' The evidence is that they won't (based on their wholly flawed logistics so far). The actual process they should have followed is (1) get people to sign-up, or not, for garden waste collection - (2) issue bin stickers (for the large bins remaining) and (3) automatically supply kerb side caddies to all - (4) Then, and only then, change the collection process and (5) then collect unneeded large brown bins (to make sure no one is left without an organic waste collection method. The chances of them getting this sequence right is, frankly, minimal, based on their current logistics approach. There will be many (the elderly, the disengaged) who, despite the one letter so far received will find ali this change as a shock and surprise. There is no evidence that anything has been factored in for this. Which will, as I and others have indicated, actually incur additional and unnecessary cost to add to the council's money problems before any revenues will even kick-in. I suspect that they hope that Veolia will be forced to pick up an additional cost burden on all this - but even that company, prepared, to get the contract, to put up with a lot, may baulk at bailing Tooley St. out.

If you don?t already have one they can be ordered & a kitchen caddy will also be supplied. This is, of course, yet another costly policy insanity. Most people with brown bins already have kitchen caddies - it will be the kerb-side caddy they mainly don't have. Logistics would suggest that it would be far cheaper to deliver a kerb-side caddy to everyone who now has a large brown bin - and to collect at the same time those bins which are no longer required for garden waste. The costs of administering an 'individual order' scheme far outweigh the cost of inadvertently supplying an additional kerb-side caddy to someone who already has one with their large garden waste bin, particularly when the process will give most people a kitchen caddy they don't need (as they will already have one). This process only makes sense after the big 'change-over' when new residents come in requiring new services - when issuing the two food caddies together would make sense. If you are going to make a huge change having somebody (anybody) who understands process flow and costs would seem a first port of call. But not for the boys in Tooley St., evidently.

The government cuts are forcing even the most Labour of councils to behave like Tories. By stinging 'the rich'? - I think you'll find that's always been Labour policy - I think I recall the late and very much lamented Dennis Healey making reference to 'pips squeaking' - if memory serves. https://wordhistories.net/2017/09/10/until-pips-squeak-origin/ https://socialistworker.co.uk/art/44473/Five+reasons+to+squeeze+the+rich+until+the+pips+squeak

As the lorry will still have to drive up and down all roads emptying the brown bins and the food caddies, I struggle to see how it will save money. I don't think this is being prayed-in-aid as a cost saving exercise as such, but as a way of introducing charges to the (minority) of residents in Southwark with gardens. I have already argued that this will in fact probably lose money in the first year of operation (when the costs of large bin recovery and small bin issue are taken into account) and will have a minimal impact (taking account increased admin costs and the costs of sending out special bin lorries to collect paper sacks) going forward - at least at the initial ?30 p/a charge. [NB the large brown bins will originally have been costed in over their expected life-times - now to be substantially reduced by this early recovery]. I would however argue that this action (and others) are creating an environment when price hikes outside the normal community charge setting round (and outwith the controls and price cap on increasing community charges) will be only too possible.

To a all the people who claim they don't make any noise difference whether planes fly above us or not, please have a listen today - when they don't - and realise how badly Heathrow is located. Or how badly you are located? Or did you move to your current address before the airport was built?

I requested a new brown bin at the weekend (we share ours with neighbours and as much as I?m unhappy with the charge and Southwark?s ludicrous reasoning behind it, I still want to continue green recycling) - turns out they won?t be supplying anymore until the charge is introduced. Loathe as I am to giving any credit to Tooley St., but it does make sense to hold up issuing 'new' brown bins until they have gone through the exercise of collecting lots of old ones (they assume) which they can then re-issue - that at least is a reasonable approach to cost saving.

For completeness - I have also posted the message below on James Cash's councillor thread, as I would like a local councilor's opinion on this:- I have now had a chance of reading full details of the council's planned garden waste scheme. It appears that in future even for those paying the ?30 annual fee only a single brown bin of garden waste will be collected weekly. Any additional waste (in paid-for paper sacks) will have to be collected only by subsequent special arrangement with the council. My garden (and I'm not alone in this) gets 'blitzed' on a monthly basis March-December - and at some times - e.g. autumn - I generate far more green waste in such a blitz than I can reasonably compost ( most of my garden would become a compost heap). In the past I have had as many as 10 paper bags filled in addition to my brown bin. At the moment all the waste is collected at once, meaning that there is no need for an additional collection (with the costs that that entails). If residents are to either pay for sacks and/ or brown bin collection for garden waste surely the most efficient method of collection is to collect once a week from streets taking everything (which will have been paid for one way or another) at once. Otherwise my only conclusion is that the council is interested in reducing organic recycling - or encouraging people to e.g. pave or landscape more of their gardens away. Neither seem to me to be a 'green' approach. We are being asked to pay for a service which was previously covered by Council Tax, and in paying for it, it is also being reduced. Taking away with one hand and then taking away with the other. And you wonder why we are cynical about politicians local and national?

James I have now had a chance of reading full details of the council's planned garden waste scheme. It appears that in future even for those paying the ?30 annual fee only a single brown bin of garden waste will be collected weekly. Any additional waste (in paid-for paper sacks) will have to be collected only by subsequent special arrangement with the council. My garden (and I'm not alone in this) gets 'blitzed' on a monthly basis March-December - and at some times - e.g. autumn - I generate far more green waste in such a blitz than I can reasonably compost ( most of my garden would become a compost heap). In the past I have had as many as 10 paper bags filled in addition to my brown bin. At the moment all the waste is collected at once, meaning that there is no need for an additional collection (with the costs that that entails). If residents are to either pay for sacks and/ or brown bin collection for garden waste surely the most efficient method of collection is to collect once a week from streets taking everything (which will have been paid for one way or another) at once. Otherwise my only conclusion is that the council is interested in reducing organic recycling - or encouraging people to e.g. pave or landscape more of their gardens away. Neither seem to me to be a 'green' approach. We are being asked to pay for a service which was previously covered by Council Tax, and in paying for it, it is also being reduced. Taking away with one hand and then taking away with the other. And you wonder why we are cynical about politicians local and national?

Just to make a point - but the bin lorries that collect kitchen waste will still be collecting weekly from each household, as before, and, as before, small amounts of waste will be consolidated by the bin men into large bins to be tipped into the trucks, with additionally a few household large brown bins with garden waste tipped in. In addition a number of large brown bins will be collected by Southwark (and done what with - presumably disposed of as plastic waste which can't be easily recycled?) and new kerb-side caddies bought and distributed. So we have one-off costs of collecting old bins and providing new ones - and I would guess very little actual time saving in organic waste collection. In the first year of operation this will presumably run at a loss, and subsequent years will see rental income (you are now renting your large brown bin at ?30 a year) - but no operational cost savings (but of course an ongoing operational cost to charge and collect rentals, deal with queries and complaints etc.). As a revenue generation scheme it looks poor, its NPV will I imagine not be that compelling compared with Southwark's overall budget. And it will lose (a certain amount of) votes. [Those who like to see 'the rich' penalised will still be voting labour, those who don't may chose not to, where they once did]. Overall and at the charge now quoted - but perhaps watch this space this will make a very small, if any, net contribution to council income (as a pack of a fag packet exercise).

Like the NHS 'free at the point of use' I suppose. It's a shorthand.

Penguin68 - Did you see my suggestions above? My initial post on this thread after the consultation report came out was to ask a few quick questions of people on here. I will repost it here for ease: James, it was precisely to your initial post that I was responding - I said Let's see how far our local ward representatives get in any toning down of the proposals they seek on our behalf. as an 'I hear what you say, but what impact will you (and other local councillors) actually have over the apparat?'. You have suggested a reduction in the geographic scope and a review of the CPZ time limits, based on any responses to you - which my post was intended to be. I rather thought I had been answering, in my way, your 'few quick questions'. I was then querying how effective local opinion being fed back to the Tooley St machine would be, based on their interpretation of their own polling results. I hope to stand amazed at your effectiveness.

... it's not about the amount, it's about the principle of charging for a currently provided free service that is generating all this upset Agreed, and once the principal of itemised charging is introduced, rather than charges on rateable value raised through the general community charge (which can be controlled) then further price rises can be engineered with very little chance to object - they fall outside the normal budget debates which surround setting the community charge. ?30 one year can become ?60 the next very easily. As can escalation of parking charges. It ceases to operate under principles of taxation. Indeed, they can become flat rate charges, without regard to ability to pay, rather like the hated and soon abandoned poll tax.