Month: Nov 2007

Categories
Ealing and Northfield

Sharma on the Mayor’s India jolly

Virendra SharmaAccording to the Standard this evening Ealing Southall MP, Virendra Sharma, is off with Mayor Livingstone on Sunday for a week to India on a jolly.

You might have thought that new boy Sharma would want to do some actual work now he has returned from the three month long summer recess. Talk about lazy.

I guess that Sharma was feeling a bit guilty about bunking off so he roused himself to speak twice (on Tuesday and Thursday) this week bringing to three his total appearances in Parliament. Here is a taste of Sharma’s rather emetic style:

I rise to speak in this debate immensely proud of the record of this Labour Government in international development. As a new Member, my political philosophy and political motivation have always been to fight against injustice and poverty wherever they are found throughout the world. I therefore feel a very personal commitment to support the work of DFID and the Government in this respect. Having been born in and lived my early life in India, I know first hand the challenges that poverty and the lack of economic development bring.

Categories
Ex-Mayor Livingstone

Roger Evans on ConservativeHome

London Assembly member and Tory transport spokesman Roger Evans has a good piece on ConservativeHome today looking at fare evasion and bus crime on London’s buses.

Apparently he has also been having a barney with the Mayor about bus fares. The Mayor is talking rubbish. Average bus fares were 56.4p last year. His figures. Evans is right this includes free fares, travelcards, etc. The Mayor is trying to spin a story about fares that is a fabrication.

The Advertising Standards Authority think he is untruthful too.

Categories
Ealing and Northfield

Ealing Trading Standards makes the news

Ealing Trading Standards’ work in clobbering phoney drug sellers, mainly in Southall, got national coverage this afternoon. I just heard one of our officers, Doug Love, being interviewed on the Radio 4 PM programme.

See Doug Love & co pounding the streets here.

Categories
Ex-Mayor Livingstone

Mayor loses the argument

The London Mayor has been trying his best to defend the lame duck Metropolitan police commissioner throughout November. In 14 days he has issued 11 press releases but all this verbiage has failed to win the argument.

  • Barnes must now provide basis of ‘malicious’ claims
  • Grieve and Davis attacks on police cynical attempt to obscure falling crime
  • Next Assembly meeting: Arbour and Barnes must withdraw false
  • Mayor welcomes MPA statement rejecting disciplinary action against Cressida Dick and Andy Hayman raised by the IPCC
  • Statement from the Mayor following publication of IPCC report
  • London Assembly members, Richard Barnes and Tony Arbour, must withdraw false statements over the Stockwell shooting
  • Mayor: Only al-Qaeda helped by Assembly vote
  • David Davis should stop undermining the Metropolitan Police in the fight against terrorism
  • Mayor – Politicians playing political games disregard damage to anti-terror police work
  • Mayor slams ‘irresponsible’ intervention by David Davis
  • Statement from the Mayor on the Stockwell health and safety trial of the MPS

    • Today the Mayor took his case to the Guardian where they allowed him, or one of his many PR types, to contribute to their Comment section. Now you might imagine he would be given the benefit of the doubt by their leftish readership. No. The Mayor got absolutely hosed. Here are some of their comments:

    The fact is that an innocent man was shot on a train in circumstances closer to Rio di Janeiro than London and the man at the helm has not held anybody responsible and refused to take any responsibility himself. If the Daily Mail is gunning for him (I don’t read it Ken) then they are doing the public a service.

    Mr. Blair impeded an independent investigation into what happened. In so doing, he demonstrated an extraordinary lack of accountability and an unwillingness to learn from mistakes. That’s why he should go.

    Mr Ian Blair may be a nice man, well-intentioned and even a good drinking and dining companion. This isn’t a personal attack on Mr Ian Blair. But if I were in charge of an organisation in which so much went wrong – and if the problems resulted in an unnecessary death – I would resign. It’s called taking responsibility. It’s a matter of honour.

    “The knives are out for Ian Blair”

    Good! That’s all I wanted to know. I hope he gets a few of them in the back (and the front come to that).

    The rest is waffle.

    Categories
    Ex-Mayor Livingstone

    £1 million buses

    Gold plated busesYesterday the Mayor proudly announced that he has paid £9.68 million for ten buses. They are wonderful American hydrogen powered buses but you have got to think that they must be gold-plated into the bargain.

    It is all very well pioneering the outer reaches of green technology but it is unaffordable. We know from TfL’s own figures that we are already subsidising London’s buses to the tune of £617 million.

    We know from TfL itself that its bus occupancy figure is only 15. In other words the average London bus has 15 passengers at any one time.

    If the Mayor was really green rather than just being a poseur he would not be buying gold plated buses. He would work out how to increase occupancy. Only this might involve him having to look at some services that are not actually used enough. Empty buses costing us £617 million are not green. If he was still intent on spending cash after that he might look at increasing the efficiency of current buses. That wouldn’t be very exciting but it might be a whole lot more effective.

    Categories
    Parking Services

    Parking Services back on Thursday

    Parking Services Specialist Scrutiny PanelThe third meeting of the Parking Services Specialist Scrutiny Panel will take place in Committee Room 4 at the Town Hall. After a quick follow up on some of the issues raised at the last session we will major on the finances of Parking Services.

    This might seem like a dry topic but lots of people wonder how much money is raised and where it goes. Come and hear the answers at 7pm on Thursday.

    Categories
    Ealing and Northfield

    New library is popular

    Northfield library

    Back in August I reported that the new library in Northfield looks great. Apparently the redevelopment has encouraged more people to actually use the library too so great result for the library service, see stats below:

    Categories
    Ealing and Northfield

    Airedale hazard – opinions please

    Airedale hazard

    Back in August an employee of a local business raised the pedestrian crossing at the junction of Airedale Road and South Ealing Road with various councillors including me. I asked the transport planning people to look into it and they have just reported back after a site visit on 11th October. The picture above shows how obscured the pedestrain crossing can be as you drive north up South Ealing Road. This picture is a worst possible case as there is a van parked in front of the crossing. That said there is nothing to stop vans parking there.

    One recommendation the transport people are likely to make is that the two parking bays in front of the crossing should be removed and the zig-zags extended. Although people won’t like losing the parking the crossing is well placed I think and well used so it best be safe. The photo makes it look like an open and shut case to me.

    The greengrocer’s awning is another potential hazard but it is on their own property so it is hard to see what we could do about this.

    Let me know what you think.

    Categories
    Ex-Mayor Livingstone Policing

    Livingstone defends the indefensible

    Today some of the papers are gunning for the Metropolitan Police Commissioner, Sir Ian Blair, following yesterday’s publication of the IPCC Stockwell One report. The London Mayor has tried to defend Blair by saying that he was only in post for five months at the time of the shooting.

    Blair should be hung out to dry but not for the shooting. He needs to go because he specifically ordered the Met to keep the IPCC away from the case.

    The IPCC Chairman, Nick Hardwick said yesterday:

    The Commissioner attempted to prevent us carrying out an investigation. In my view, much of the avoidable difficulty the Stockwell incident has caused the Metropolitan Police arose from the delay in referral.

    Blair showed precisely the wrong instinct. At a time when Londoners needed clarity all we got were mixed messages that gave the impression that the victim was somehow to blame for his own fate. Instead of the Commissioner loudly saying up front that a terrible mistake had happened and that he had called in the IPCC we instead had him writing to the Home Office to get the IPCC off his back.

    The Mayor’s press machine went into a frenzy of activity yesterday coming up with three releases on this subject. Compare and contrast what the Mayor says with Hardwick’s statement above:

    There is nothing in the IPCC report today that justifies the political witch hunt of David Davis against the police and the Commissioner – a witch hunt which has been condemned in strong terms by the Association of Chief Police Officers, The Metropolitan Police Federation and the national Police Federation.

    There is something Mr Mayor. The smoking gun is the IPCC saying that Blair’s getting in their way made for “much avoidable difficulty”.

    Categories
    Ex-Mayor Livingstone Policing

    Papers calling for Blair to go

    Telegraph

    The Commissioner is a guileful political operator with powerful friends. But in clinging to office he displays neither a sense of honour nor any real concern for policing in the capital, which, under his discredited leadership, will be ill-prepared for the challenges ahead.

    Guardian

    Almost his first act on the day of the shooting was to write to the home office and explain that he had “decided” that the IPCC would not be allowed to investigate. It emerged that he had no power to decide this and the IPCC work was soon underway. But its chairman, Nick Hardwick, stated yesterday that “much of the avoidable difficulty the Stockwell incident has caused the Metropolitan police arose from the delay in referral”, and he put the blame for this delay squarely on the shoulders of Sir Ian.

    Daily Mail

    Last week on our front page we called Sir Ian “a man without honour”. Yesterday, he proved it again.

    If the Commissioner hasn’t the decency to resign by the time the Metropolitan Police Authority meets next Thursday, they must sack him.

    Andrew Gilligan in the Evening Standard last night said:

    If the Met had shown itself more willing to admit criticism over Stockwell, it might have found more Londoners willing to give it the benefit of the doubt.