legalalien

I know what you mean, the assembly meetings are particularly painful to watch.

Written answers are here, including cost of events team and contribution to parks budget.

https://moderngov.southwark.gov.uk/documents/b50015311/Tabled%20Items%20Wednesday%2022-Feb-2023%2019.00%20Council%20Assembly.pdf?T=9

ETA , I’ve just seen that some Labour councillors on the overview and scrutiny committee have “called in” the council’s decision to demolish and rebuild the Abbey field estate on grounds relating to inconsistency with the council’s visions / policies on housing and climate change strategy ( one of the councillors is Cllr Pollak who was formerly in charge of the housing portfolio I think). That’s a positive development in terms of local government democracy! https://moderngov.southwark.gov.uk/ieListDocuments.aspx?MId=7390

I see what you mean Spartacus, if I’m reading the table correctly only 156 Londoners were actually asked in that survey?

I’d favour a ban on wood burners in urban areas, it’s a simple message to get across to people.

(Speaking as someone who grew up burning most of our household rubbish - including plastic items - in a 44 gallon drum in the back garden - I remember lighting and keeping an eye on the incinerator being a childhood chore - different times! Makes me wonder what filters etc the council puts on the SELCHP incinerator - guess it’s in the climate strategy somewhere.)

One of the LD councillors has put a question about the commercialisation of parks and the cost of the events team on the agenda for tomorrow’s council assembly meeting (see pic attached). Will be interested to see what the response is.

Can I politely ask in a nutshell what the objection to the LTNs is? Not intending to be at all inflammatory as I am conscious it appears to be an issue that generates huge upset locally. I have never really understood why….and I’m keen to. Isn’t reducing traffic and pollution by encouraging walking/cycling/public transport hugely beneficial to all? Not looking for any hostility, but genuinely keen to understand what it is am I missing?

 

I would just add that it's also possible to hold the view that while in principle LTNs are capable of working, the success of any particular LTN is a function of its design in its local conditions, taking into account any other LTNs that are being put in place; and that the closures in Dulwich Village have been a design fail, both for local businesses and in the way that they have shunted traffic onto other roads - in particular Croxted Road, which is a significant bus route and a key active travel route to one of the local schools. The closures were rushed in despite TfL's request for a pause to consider the implications, and TfL still have some concerns, which the local council seems to be doing nothing to address.

For balance, the Conservatives in Thurrock seem to have crashed theh finances - the rise there is 10%, same as Labour controlled Slough.

There's going to have to be a reality check on local government ambitions across the board, I suspect. All the latest on Southwark's draft budget here https://moderngov.southwark.gov.uk/mgAi.aspx?ID=66539#mgDocuments

Just FYI Cllr King raised the issue of the Dulwich pool, showers, water temperature etc in yesterday’s audit and standards committee meeting in the context of discussing the insourcing and ensuring standards continue to be met in the remaining period before exit in June. The council officer in charge undertook to go away and look specifically at the issues around the pool.

FYI, consultation opening this week on a proposed school street closure on the Kingswood Estate - has implications for cutting off traffic up Bowen Drive, (in)famous for DPL drop-off traffic.

https://consultations.southwark.gov.uk/environment-leisure/kingswood-estate-school-street/

Just in case anyone is interested- there’s a further report on falling school rolls and the council’s plans to address them on the agenda for an upcoming scrutiny commission meeting, which is worth a read, it outlines the scale of the problem (potentially greater than flagged in the planning report linked above) and the implications for school finances (for example, indicates that a class size number of around 27 is the break even point and below 25 starts to be unfeasible.). Falling birth rates and unaffordability of housing seem to be key drivers.

https://moderngov.southwark.gov.uk/documents/s111761/Document%20Keeping%20Education%20Strong%20-%20Strategy%20for%20future%20proofing%20primary%20schools%20and%20protecting%20t.pdf

Information about particular schools should filter through in the next couple of months. The council can only take steps to close/ amalgamate non- academy schools, and as noted above I suspect most of those at risk are in more northerly parts of the borough.

Update based on what is in the most recent Forward Plan:

Decision due next month on supply of temporary “modular” teaching accommodation

https://moderngov.southwark.gov.uk/mgIssueHistoryHome.aspx?IId=50030451&PlanId=748&RPID=7198025

Decision on Phase 2 building contract still due next month

https://moderngov.southwark.gov.uk/mgIssueHistoryHome.aspx?IId=50030716&PlanId=748&RPID=7198027

As well as an additional

decision on increasing value of demolition and strip out works

https://moderngov.southwark.gov.uk/mgIssueHistoryHome.aspx?IId=50031194&PlanId=748&RPID=7198031

Looking at the forward plan more generally there are quite a number of new items relating to variation of various housing construction contracts to increase contract values, so seems to be a significant (and unsurprising) inflationary increase in construction contracts going on.

Some form of experimental traffic orders relating to E-bike and E-scooter parking appear to be on the way - not yet clear whereabouts in Southwark

https://moderngov.southwark.gov.uk/mgIssueHistoryHome.aspx?IId=50031189&PlanId=748&RPID=7198016

Will keep an eye out for the decision and post if local.

indeed - I saw a forwarded message from the local Safer Neighbourhood Team that said

"A burglar responsible for recent commercial burglaries was arrested by AS officers caught red handed last week. He was remanded in custody and taken straight to court and was sentenced for the offences."

ps for those interested in cycle hangars, some info about the retender of the cycle hangar contract

https://moderngov.southwark.gov.uk/ieDecisionDetails.aspx?Id=7806.

Cyclehoop are providing the hangars going forward, maintenance etc is being brought in house (to Southwark). Numbers wise,

"As of 31 October 2022 there are 8,874 requests for a space in a cycle hangar

(each hangar can take six bikes). Only 352 of the 3,582 spaces currently

provided were free (9.82%) at this time. This is a clear demonstration that

there is scope to do much more to encourage cycling in the borough by the

provision of safe and secure storage.

5. In acknowledgement of this the revised council delivery plan (2022-2026)

includes a commitment to deliver 1,000 cycle hangars in the borough by end

of March 2026."

(So I guess that's 6000 new hangar spaces, but each hangar likely to have an average 10% vacancy rate as demand is presumably not entirely equally distributed about the place. That's assuming no increase in demand by 2026? or alternatively - I haven't checked the council delivery plan it might be that the target is 1000 hangars in total, rather than 1000 new hangars - if that's the case it's a lot less new spaces... as there are already 597 hangars (if my long division skills still work))

Just a quick look at the policy documents. The existing 2019 Movement Plan says that " Our aim is to reduce trips made by

car/motorbike to 13% by 2041", but there doesn't seem to be a hard target in the Sustainable Transport Strategy currently under consultation, or in the Climate Change Strategy/ Action Plan, so possibly the 13% aim has been quietly dropped?

 

Southwark do not want to ban cars either.

They do want to reduce the number of car journeys, reduce congestion, pollution and road casualties, and increase the amount of active travel. These are all aims that everyone on here (and even the most vociferous anti-LTN folk) say they support too.

You can't have it all ways. If you make it super easy and convenient to drive, with no restrictions on how, when or where people use their car, you wont' progress those aims.

The problem, as with all things, is that we want others to change, not ourselves.

Some more info here

https://www.southwark.gov.uk/assets/attach/153798/SSP-Bessemer-and-Goodrich-PS.pdf

Seems to be some provision for residents’ permits for those living within the zone.

It looks as though economic circumstances have done for Southwark’s aim to build 11000 new council houses by 2043- with this honest appraisal in the report for Cabinet:

“ The current economic uncertainty makes accurate financial forecasting less certain. The cost of living crisis, the rise in energy prices and and the Russia/Ukraine conflict has increased political and economic volatility and made financial projections extremely difficult to determine. For example, the government target for CPI is 2% but CPI rose by 10.7% in the 12 months to November 2022 which is obviously significantly higher than the government target. Social housing rents have been capped at 7%, much lower than CPI+1% which is normally the calculation mechanism. Build and repair costs have increased even more significantly and have

impacted on the monies available to finance the housing capital programme. The Building Safety Act 2022 has brought about legally compliant costs which have to be funded from within existing council resources. The council’s move to carbon neutrality by 2030 will also incur costs not previously accounted for. The target to build 11,000 new homes by 2043 is unattainable due to the lack of financial resources, increased build costs and the increase in interest costs on additional borrowing, where the base interest rate has increased from 0.1% in March 2020 to 3.5% in December 2022.

12. All in all, the circumstances facing housing local authorities now are very different from those faced two years ago and the council has to adapt to meet the challenges, of increased capital spend priorities but insufficient resources to meet those needs.”

This is take from a report about one of the buildings on the Abbeyfield estate and it’s a sorry tale of stripping the building for refurb, leaving it empty for an extended period, realising what seems to be quite late in the piece that the building wasn’t structurally sound enough to cope with an additional rooftop build… and they’ve now decided to pull the whole thing down (a further £4 mill on top of £15 mill spent to date) and if I’m reading it correctly they can’t afford to build a replacement. I guess that means they end up selling to developers?

I feel really sorry for tenants in the two buildings next door who are now going to have repairs etc which they have to contribute to, plus a lengthy period of uncertainty while consultation about next steps happens and a massive demolition on their doorstep.

https://moderngov.southwark.gov.uk/documents/s111617/Report%20Abbeyfield%20Estate%20-%20A%20way%20forward.pdf

Credit to Cllr Newens, the LDs bring the electric bike up again in Tuesday’s meeting and she sticks to her guns (at 1:38)

Fair play to her (some of her colleagues not so much)

Apparently there was some other “late” document from the Equality and Human Rights Panel saying that the equalities impact assessment that was done is insufficient/ inadequate. Which is a problem for the scrutiny process. Wow.

The committee are going to flag the issue to the cabinet. Again can’t see the document anywhere but hopefully will be posted online in due course. There’s some suggestion that the document has always been intended to be ready for cabinet but not necessarily for the scrutiny committee. Everyone seems more than a little nervous.

Apparently the equalities panel received the budget on Friday evening for a Monday turnaround. See from around 17 mins in particular, but worth watching from the start

Just started watching the next instalment of this meeting ( Tuesday evening, following the all day Monday meeting) and it starts off with Cllr Chamberlain deriding some sort of climate change impact analysis that he’d asked about the whereabouts of the previous day. Based on his description it’s not worth the paper it’s written on and is critical of the bulky waste charge. It doesn’t seem to have been published on the website yet. Will report back if any further developments in the meeting :)

I have a whole new respect for,Cllr Newens for her suggestion of a mayoral electric bike

At 3:43:45, the feedback from others made me smile.

She was closed down on various other budget related issues on the basis that she was raising “policy issues “ so is probably in trouble with the powers that be, but I think it’s great to see local councillors speak up and say what they think.

I have a whole new respect for,Cllr Newens for her suggestion of a mayoral electoral bike

At 3:43:45, the feedback from others made me smile.

She was closed down on various other budget related issues on the basis that she was raising “policy issues “ so is probably in trouble with the powers that be, but I think it’s great to see local councillors speak up and say what they think.

Just a FYI, CPZs came up in this week’s overview and scrutiny committee meeting going through next year’s budget, seems pretty clear that there will be a borough wide roll out over the next two years.

1:48:30 ish onward.

They seem to be forecasting £1.3 million extra in CPZ and parking enforcement income next year, even though this is slightly randomly described as savings from Active Travel (it’s listed in the income generation document so I think it is actually additional income).

Not quite sure what the point of the consultations are when income is already included in the budget? Presumably the amounts budgeted take account of timed restrictions? If you have longer timed restrictions on your street do you pay more/ less than shorter ones? I have no idea...

Have been watching the video of the Overview and Scrutiny Committee meeting going through the next year’s council budget.

The proposal is to increase the annual charge for garden waste collection from £40 to £60 and the bulky waste collection fee from £25 to £35 per booking.

Some interesting discussion about the potential for this to create an increase in fly tipping here at about 1:31

A little earlier there’s some discussion about moving to some sort of “needs based” approach to scheduling of waste collection which is sold as enabling increased collection in eg night time economy areas, but against a background of cuts to overall budgets, makes one wonder if standard residential collections might reduce. Let’s see....

Have been watching the recent Overview and Scrutiny committee meeting on this year’s budget. Really interesting watch (for the small minority who like this kind of thing). I testing discussion from 1:23 on Part 2

about the Kpop festival in Bermondsey - Cllr Rose does appear to say that without commercial events there won’t be grant money for community events.

I agree with DKHB on this, even though my natural instinct is to say that parks shouldn’t be used for private events.

For those interested in council budgets, the Overview and Scrutiny Committee is going through the current one as we speak, I believe. Lots of painful detail here:

https://moderngov.southwark.gov.uk/ieListDocuments.aspx?MId=7388

(Btw looks like charges for garden waste and bulky waste are going up, am sure people will have views on that!)

To some extent we should think ourselves lucky that, as a central London council, Southwark has some decent revenue- making opportunities- were that not the case council tax would have to be much higher . As it stands there’s a proposed increase of just under 5% this year plus the uplift in the GLA component of the tax.

My biggest concern about council finances is the amount they’re potentially going to have to borrow to meet their housing targets and the cost of servicing that debt in a climate where interest rates are rising. I’m more than happy for them to spend events income on boring day to day activities rather than nice to have free activities for teens etc.

There’s a link in this Forbes article

https://www.forbes.com/sites/carltonreid/2023/01/19/study-londons-ltns-reduce-motor-traffic-on-residential-streets-but-not-main-roads/?sh=72b8c48f42e7

The authors make some interesting observations about the quality of data collection and analysis by local authorities.