Mary Reid

Kingston Council will recycle your Christmas tree - but only if it is a real one!

Just leave it out with your green box on the date when your recycling is collected between 7th and 18th January.

By the way, you can check here if you're not sure when your bins will be collected this week.

Jo Anglezarke has tagged me with another meme - this one is to say what my eight wishes for 2008 are.

These could be anything from personal to political. But I promise I won't do the "I just wish for world peace" thing, and will try instead to describe some specifics for my bountiful fairy godmother to work on.

So I'm wishing for (in no particular order, as they say) .....

1. Lots of positive media coverage for Nick Clegg and the Liberal Democrats
2. Health and happiness for young Eli, and for Michelle and Jay's baby when she arrives
3. Recognition by the Anglican Communion of the validity of gay and lesbian relationships
4. Removal of Mugabe and the installation of a democratic government in Zimbabwe
5. A just and peaceful resolution of the situation in Gaza
6. Unqualified acceptance of the threat of climate change by the USA and a commitment to exceed the Kyoto targets
7. Greater democratic participation in local government in the UK
8. More older people on Facebook (we don't need the Saga version)

I have to admit that I worked these out before we heard the appalling news from Pakistan.  It's difficult to know exactly what to say about that, or what indeed can be done to restore democratic rule, but it is obviously a wish that we all share.

The Campaign for Gender Balance ( a Lib Dem group) has just launched the Gender Balance Awards - and they don't all have to go to Lib Dems!

The categories are:

• Best blog by a woman Liberal Democrat
• Best blog post by a woman Liberal Democrat
• Best blog by a woman non-Liberal Democrat

So get nominating!

James Graham has challenged me to suggest:

THREE Blogs that should be nominated for in the Best Blog by a Woman Lib Dem category

Lynne Featherstone - still the only female blogging Parliamentarian; perhaps the others are frightened off because she is so good at it.

Alix Mortimer - welcome to the People's Republic of Mortimer; witty and sharp observations of political life

Suzanne Fletcher - a councillor, and also fellow Mayor last year; Suzanne blogs pithily about local events

THREE blog posts that should be nominated for the Best Blog Post By a Woman Lib Dem category

Sunday, 29 April 2007: Asylum Monologues - this post by Suzanne Fletcher was shortlisted for the Lib Dem Blog Post of the Year, and it still moves me to tears.

Campaign for gender balance, Jo Swinson and female bloggers - Jo Anglezarke's succinct post attracted comments from many of us, and sparked off and informal campaign to get more Lib Dem women blogging 

Simon Rules ...OK - Linda Jack's blog is always lively, and often controversial; this post is about the informal house rules that can gum up organisations, such as the one that says that the Party President should not openly support a leadcership candidate

THREE Blogs that should be nominated for in the Best Blog by a Woman Non-Lib Dem category

Assuming I can suggest someone who blogs for another party ...

Antonia Bance - a feisty Labour councillor on Oxford City. She was outside the Oxford Union protesting while our Jonny Wright was inside blogging about the event - two fascinating pieces of citizen journalism.

Er ....

THREE living women you would like to see blog

Shirley Williams - my political hero who personally encouraged me to stand for Council; and it would be good to see a woman older than me blogging!

Helen Mirren - she's been my favourite actor since I saw her play Cleopatra at the age of 18 with the National Youth Theatre; she is still at her peak with no signs of a facelift - how does she do it?

Julia Goldsworthy - about time you joined us, Julia. And she can't pretend she doesn't understand the technology because we worked together on Matthew Taylor's website

So now I'm off to tag some others to do the same - and to do the nominations.

Congratulations to our two Kingston MPs on their new posts in the Liberal Democrats Shadow Cabinet.

Nick Clegg has appointed Edward Davey as Shadow Secretary of State for Foreign and Commonwealth Affairs,. He also retains his position as Chair of Campaigns and Communications.

Susan Kramer is now our Families spokesperson, Shadow Minister for the Cabinet Office and for Chancellor of the Duchy of Lancaster (whatever that means)

The timing of the bin and recycling collections over Christmas and the New Year is always a bit confusing.  We've had this information from the Council.

If you go to the Council website and enter your postcode in the left hand column you can find out all sorts of useful information, including when your next collection day will be.

This afternoon we will learn who has been elected as the Leader of the Liberal Democrats.

Some of us were challenged to write a piece for Liberal Democrat Voice on what we thought the new Leader should do in the first 100 days. This is what I wrote:

We all know that our real power base is in local government. And it is here that some of the most interesting initiatives in community politics are being played out by Lib Dem run councils.

So I want to challenge the new leader to capitalise on our distinctive style of leadership out beyond Westminster.

He could begin by a fact-finding tour of the country, and, guided by local knowledge, align himself with the greenest or most citizen-centric initiatives that have been introduced by our councillors. Each one will be accompanied by a challenge to the other parties to show whether they have done anything similar.

Of course, this will only capture national press interest if it is planned with sufficient razzmatazz and imaginative photoshoots.

This could have both internal and external benefits - it will raise the profile of councillors in the party, and will demonstrate to the country that it is possible to bring about significant changes at a local level. It will also portray the new leader as someone who understands the real local issues that people care about.

But first, he needs to give himself a recuperative break over Christmas, and spend precious time with family and friends, because he won't be seeing much of them in 2008!

I'm pleased, though completely unsurprised, that the Liberal Democrats have rejected Cameron's offer to form an alliance.

You see, I don't think that either Labour or Conservatives understand how coalitions work.

Lib Dems have ardently supported proportional representation at all levels of Government. Indeed it is gradually creeping in at Assembly and European level, but Governments have so far resisted introducing it at Westminster.

In countries where proportional representation is normal at national level, it is common for no one party to gain an overall majority in a Parliamentary election. At that point two or more parties have to work together to find some areas of agreement that will enable them to jointly form an administration. Small parties can often bring specific issues to the table.

In the UK it is common for us to be governed by a party which has the support of less than 50% of the electorate. Under proportional representation (whichever system is used - and there are several) the final arrangements reflect the mood of the nation much more accurately.

So it is quite inappropriate for parties to agree to alliances before an election.  It is much better if they each promote their distinctive principles and policies so the voters can rank the parties in order.  The parties then have to respond to the preferences of the people and build a Government that matches their aspirations.

Since the dreadful accident outside the Hook Centre on Wednesday, several people have contacted us about safety at the Hook Road/Elm Road junction.

The Hook Road is controlled by Transport for London on behalf of the Mayor of London.  We have been asking them to improve this junction for years.

In fact, when TfL first proposed to introduce the Red Route, some of the local councillors and council officers had a meeting with Ken Livingstone. At that meeting he promised pedestrian improvements as part of the scheme, but we have never been happy with what was installed.

Since then we have been complaining regularly. In fact, I raised the problem again with TfL a few months ago, and was told that this junction was low priority because there had been no serious accidents.

Now I must make it clear that I am not sure of the exact details of the accident, and whether the layout of the junction contributed to it. Hopefully we will find out soon when the Police have finished their investigation.

But I do know that there is a lot wrong with the arrangement of traffic lights. When you cross Elm Road you can't see the lights at all, so have to guess which phase they are in. With no green man to guide, you sometimes just have to rely on guesswork.

Then people do seem to want to cross from the NatWest bank/Lucky Rover side to the Hook Centre, even though there is no pedestrian crossing on the Hook Road at that point.  TfL did install safety railings on the Hook Centre side to try to deter people from crossing, but it has not been effective.

The final problem is vehicle speed. The camera further  up the hill has helped to slow traffic down, but when it is pointing north cars and lorries do tend to speed up once they have driven past it.  Of course, Red Routes were designed to keep traffic moving, in other words, to speed it up. That is why we put in a spirited objection to the Mayor, because we wanted traffic to slow down on what is, essentially, a residential road.  The outcome was that the Red Route only operates during peak hours.  Which was, of course, exactly when the accident happened.

I made sure that Council officers were in touch with TfL the following day. Perhaps they will take our concerns seriously now.

Many of you will have heard about the fatal accident outside the Hook Centre on Wednesday afternoon.  Sadly Mike Cowley of Woodgate Avenue died on the spot.

Mike was a good man and a wonderful community-minded person. He was an officer of the local branch of the Labour Party for many years and regularly stood as a council candidate (albeit without success).

But his involvement in the community went far beyond political activity - he was a governor at Chessington Community College and at Moor Lane Juniors. In fact, the last time I met with him was at the opening of Castle Hill Primary. He used to attend Neighbourhood meetings from time to time and always made helpful contributions to discussions, and he was an active member of Chessington Methodist Church.

So Ian and I send our sympathies to Judith and to all his family and friends. He will be greatly missed.

It seemed very fitting that the first performers in the completed Rose Theatre were these young people from Bedelsford School. They did a wheelchair dance to 'Let it Snow'.

The Primary schools in the Kingston Town cluster enjoyed the privilege of putting on the first show in the auditorium since it has been fitted out. The stalls were crammed with parents, of course.

But I also spotted a number of people present who have been involved with creating the vision of a theatre for Kingston - and a unique one at that. It was a very special day for them, and indeed for me, having served on the Board for 8 years.

So, if you haven't done so already now is the time to book tickets for the season opening on 16th January (although I've been told that the first night is sold out).

Kingston was the first place in the UK to launch a Business Improvement District, under the name Kingston First. This was a joint venture of the Kingston Town Centre Management and Kingston Council.

It means that Kingston First can levy a 1% extra rate on businesses - amounting to £1 million per year - which, instead of following the rest of business rates to central Government, can be spent on the town centre.  All the businesses have signed up to this.

At the State of the Borough debate yesterday we heard from Graham McNally, the Kingston Town Centre Manager. He told us that back in 2002 the project set itself two targets - to bring 1 million more visitors per year to Kingston, and to reduce violent crime by 25%. The extra visitors would, in fact, bring the number of visitors back to the level experienced in the 1990s.

Graham told us that the vistor rate had indeed met the target.  Violent crime had reduced to0, to just a little below the target at 23%, but still a noteworthy achievement. Kingston First and its partners (including the Police) should be congratulated.

There's a great bit of animation on the Kingston First site showing the different ways you can travel to Kingston.

This evening is the annual State of the Borough Debate. It is a special meeting of Full Council when members of the public can raise questions about the broader issues within Kingston.

Community leaders have been specifically invited, but anyone can attend and join in. They will have to put up with speeches from the Leader and Leader of the Opposition, as well as other councillors - it's our chance to analyse achievements and failures, and set out a vision for the future, as well as listen to residents of the Borough.

The meeting will be at 7.30pm in the Council Chamber in the main Guildhall.

There is one disappointing aspect to this evening. The Council was offered the chance of holding the meeting in the Rose Theatre. The building has just this week been handed over by the contractors and it could have been the very first event in the completed auditorium.

For reasons that I don't really understand - apart from their ambivalent attitude towards the theatre - the Conservative Group opposed this, so we are back in the Council Chamber.

We don't often get a chance to go to the cinema, but we have now been to see 'The Golden Compass' - and, yes, it has superb cinematography and convincing CGI effects. 

Nicole Kidman is terrific, Ian McKellan's voicing of the ice bear is Churchillian at times, and I wish we'd seen more of Daniel Craig.

But ...

I couldn't work out for some time what the 'but' was.

Then I realised that the first part of the memorable 'His Dark Materials' trilogy has been reduced to yet another enjoyable, but essentially trivial, fantasy film.

Philip Pullman's work is greater than this.

What the film lacked was the sense that this was an alternative reality - one that could have happened to us if other decisions had been made.

In the  book, the subtle differences between our Oxford and Lyra's emerge gradually, often in throw-away lines.  In heavy contrast, the film began with a scene-setting narration which took away all the surprises.

The sense of strangeness, of being jolted into an awareness that things are not quite as expected, and the loss of confidence in the 'known' - all this is missing. And yet, they are essential if the other books in the series are to be understood.

As I wrote on Thursday, I'm very unhappy about the market model being applied to health care, and particularly disappointed that Blair perpetuated Thatcher's misguided approach to the provision of public services.

Schools have been through a similar process, but have now emerged from the dark days and they are now re-creating, and greatly extending, the mutually supportive approach that they used to have.

When I started teaching, schools saw themselves as part of a network, and teachers freely exchanged ideas and shared materials. Local teachers' centres encouraged co-operation and professionalism. On the downside, teachers weren't too keen to work with other non-educational professionals, and it was not uncommon to hear them say "we are there to teach and are not social workers".

Then Thatcher told schools that they were to consider themselves as separate businesses in a competitive market. Teachers started being protective about their resources, and schools openly competed for pupils.

But in the last few years there have been massive changes in attitude. Much of this is due to the Brown inspired 'Every Child Matters' - which I have been only too happy to praise. That document, and the legislation that followed, envisioned a country in which each child, with their parents, could access all the services they needed, in a way that was simple and non-bureaucratic. At the same time all professionals who deal with children would be able to share information, especially about vulnerable youngsters, so that no child at risk would slip through the net.

The impact of 'Every Child Matters' has been far reaching. Teachers now understand how other aspects of a child's life affect their achievement and support a holistic view of the child. Health professionals work with schools, police and social workers to provide an integrated service to families.

The initial focus in Kingston has been on children with disabilities, and plans are developing well to provide a single service to children. Indeed, we hope that the Moor Lane School site wil play a significant role in this. 

And as I saw yesterday, schools are eager not only to work with each other but also to work with other professionals to support all families, especially those that are facing difficulties. I was invited to the cluster meeting for the South of the Borough; this brings together representatives of all the schools, the children's centre, police, health professionals, family workers and others to plan how they will together identify and support vulnerable children.

The session was highly productive resulting in the outline of a clear plan of action. I'm just so delighted to see the emergence of such positive co-operative proposals.

Some of us were pretty unhappy with the application from KFC to open a takeaway in Hook Parade. The proposal was to use the premises occupied by the beauty salon, plus the empty shop next door.

There were lots of objections from people living in the flats above and nearby. The Council turned the application down.

KFC appealed against the decision and I'm very pleased to report that we have just heard that the appeal has been dismissed.

The meeting at the Hook Centre this evening about the future of Kingston Hospital was quite an eye-opener. The Director of Nursing presented us with two main proposals - one is to apply for Foundation Hospital status, and the other is to contract out elective (that is, non-emergency) surgery to a private provider.

The interesting part of this was not the solutions that they proposed, but the reasons for wanting to take these two major steps.

The Government wants to reduce the number of District General Hospitals and replace them with larger specialist centres supported by polyclinics (which sound rather like cottage hospitals to me). This would put an enormous squeeze on places like Kingston Hospital - they will either have to expand to take on a more regional focus, or contract into polyclinics.

Everyone at the meeting agreed that we want Kingston Hospital to carry on providing services for the Borough, and for a wider catchment if necessary for its survival.

It was news to me that the amount of elective surgery is apparently dropping nationally. It seems this is the result of better drug based treatments, earlier intervention and also prevention. That must be good news from the point of view of the health of the nation.

But it puts the hospital in a difficult place. In order to train new medical staff (doctors and nurses) and give trained professionals a breadth of experience, staff do need to be involved with routine surgery as well as emergency work. So if the level of elective surgery drops too far the Hospital will not be able to recruit staff, will lose its training status, and eventually all surgery could cease.

The solution, as they see it, is to become more competitive and attract more business from a wider area.

Now I'm pretty unhappy about this market approach to medical care - and it gets worse when the Hospital tells us that the only way they can acquire the expertise to expand and market themselves to a wider area is by handing it over to an independent provider.  However, I do appreciate that the Hospital is having to take a pragmatic view about what is most likely to achieve long-term sustainability in the current political climate.

They did reassure us that the care would still be offered under the NHS, although they hope to make the private beds more profitable as well. 

In principle I'm also against offering Foundation status to hospitals - it should be quite unnecessary in a properly run National Health Service.  The reasons for Kingston Hospital proposing to do this are not quite so clear-cut. They say they want to avoid bureaucracy - but as we have seen with Foundation schools, extra layers of bureaucracy have to be added in, and there can be some loss of economies of scale.

The real reason for the application for Foundation status appears to be so they can compete with GPs who want to provide more and more services, such as diabetic care, or terminations, in their own surgeries. From the Hospital's point of view they have to win the custom in order to survive.

But where is the patient in all this? It may well be much more convenient for a diabetic to receive all the care they need in a local GP practice, rather than in a hospital.

And behind all of this I have a very real local concern.

GPs can no longer refer patients directly to specialists. They have to send a request to the Primary Care Trust, in the guise of the Kingston Clinical Assessment Service, who then decide whether they will commission the treatment. And the PCT is currently £22 million in debt. So no guesses what their role is - to act as a doorkeeper to services, driven not by need but by cost.

The Thatcherite policies of the 80s and 90s were based on the clearly false premise that a competitive market will be responsive to social need. Sadly this Labour Government has espoused this dangerous doctrine. By pitting the providers (ie hospitals and some GPs) against the commissioners (ie the PCT) all parties are forced to expend large amounts of energy, time and creativity on fighting each other.

I have huge sympathy for Kingston Hospital and wish it well - my anger is directed towards the Labour and former Conservative Governments who have adopted a competition-driven business model for what was once viewed universally as a service.

I wish I could add some sparkling wit to the blogosphere, but all I can report on is Christmas shopping. 

So whoever left their bottle of Umberto Giannini styling spray on the counter at Boots could contact me I'll gladly let them have it back. I've inadvertantly paid for it, and no doubt the original shopper has as well.

The one place I would recommend is Kingston Parish Church for charity Christmas cards. Volunteers sell cards from about 40 different well-known organisations and all the money goes directly to the charities; compare that with buying charity cards from a retailer when the chances are that only 10% will actually reach the charity. The Church shop is open every day.

And there's some excellent busking in Clarence Street.

Back in September I complained to Kingston Hospital that they had ignored this end of the Borough when arranging their consultation roadshows. And to their credit the Chief Executive responded by announcing an extra roadshow - it will be this Wednesday, 5th December, at 7pm at the Hook Centre.

Sadly there seems to have been minimal publicity about this event, so I'm doing my best to encourage people to go along.

The purpose of the meeting is to hear about the Hospital's proposals for Foundation status, and also to discuss their plans for working with the private sector ... not sure what that is about.  It will also be a good chance to raise other issues with senior staff.

Supermarkets want us all to do some marketing for them by carrying around plastic bags emblazoned with their logos. In the past I always felt a bit embarrassed about carrying a bag from one chain in a rival store.

But now I've decided to stop using one-trip carrier bags, for all the obvious environmental reasons.

Of course, the main supermarkets all realise that attitudes are changing and are wisely selling, or giving away, their own branded 'bags for life' or organic cotton bags.

Budgens hasn't yet woken up to this change in consumer habits. At the checkout today in their Hook branch, as I started putting my purchases in a Marks and Spencer bag for life, the assistant asked me "Don't you like using our bags then?".