Mary Reid

I've just got back from Audit Committee, where I learned a new acronym.

The Statement of Recognised Gains and Losses is known to the accountants as the Struggle.

That's right - one silk scarf sent from the suppliers in a stout box measuring 36cm x 30cm x 14cm.

In the next couple of weeks, Moor Lane Junior School is beginning a new life as the Integrated Service for Children with Disabilities.

In the past, parents of children with disabilities have had to endure a complicated set of procedures to make appointments and visit different professionals across the borough - GPs, consultants, nurses, therapists, social workers, special needs teachers etc. None of the individual professionals were able to construct a complete picture of the child's needs; only the parents were able to do that. But they were struggling to find the services they needed at the same time as having to come to terms with, and adapt family life to, their child's disabilities.

Some four years ago I worked with the Director of Children's and Learning Services to develop the framework for an integrated service. The vision was that parents and children would be able to find all the services they needed under one roof, and that the professionals would work closely together to develop holistic assessments of the children's needs.  Parents were fully consulted and were on the steering group for the project.

At last this is about to happen.

On top of that, last week the Neighbourhood councillors were really pleased to have the chance to put £100,000 towards a playground for children with disabilities in the grounds of the new centre.  The funding has come from the national Playbuilder scheme, which has awarded £1.1 million to Kingston.  This is in addition to the earlier grants of £270,000 for the playscape in Jubilee Way.

We were also able to propose some community play areas that could benefit from a refit, including King Edwards, Churchfields and Malden Rushett.  We should hear soon which of these proposals will actually go forward (the one at Moor Lane is certain). Whatever the decision is, children will be heavily involved in planning the play areas, as they were in Jubilee Way.

When we put the hospital on the spot over maternity services yesterday evening we didn't realise that the issue was going to feature as the front page story in the Comet today.

One of my rôles is Vice Chair of the Health Overview and Scrutiny Panel. This is unique among all the Council Committees, because the councillors have the task of scrutinising non-Council services provided by the NHS. The Committee sends a standing invitation to representatives from NHS Kingston (the renamed Kingston Primary Care Trust), Kingston Hospital and South West London and St George's Mental Health Trust, and their most senior staff attend.

Back in January last year, the Healthcare Commission judged the maternity services at Kingston Hopsital to be 'least well performing'. I blogged about my concerns then with links to the official reports.

A report was placed on the Health Overview Panel agenda in March 2008. At that meeting I was unhappy with the response from Kingston Hospital, especially as they did not send someone along who could answer our questions properly. We were unable to see any progress towards an action plan to deal with the shortcomings. We were even told that one of the figures was provided in error by the hospital to the Inspectors - a worry in itself.

The key issue then was inadequate staffing levels, since that has a knock-on effect on all the other indicators. The hospital said that it had reduced the staffing ratios from 1:43 to 1:38.  No-one could quite explain how these ratios worked - clearly one midwife to 43 women, but was this per month, per year, or what?

I asked for the Hospital to prepare a new report to the Health Overview Panel which would explain exactly what steps the Hospital was taking to improve maternity services for local women. And I wanted to make sure that next time they sent someone along who could answer our questions.

We waited.

Finally, we were promised a presentation this January. And when we saw it, we realised that we had been fobbed off once again with something that did not address the concerns that had been raised by the Healthcare Commission. Instead we were shown a PR exercise which covered general aspirations for maternity care, not hard action.

I was pretty unhappy with this, and insisted that we must be given a proper report. Kate Grimes, the new Chief Executive of the Hospital, was attending Health Overview for the first time, and she undertook to provide us with what we were entitled to.

And that is what happened yesterday. At last we received the Action Plan that addresses the issues raised by the Healthcare Commission about maternity services.

It took 17 months to see that document.

I wish I could say that I am now confident about the quality of the service, but I'm not.

The report states that the staffing ratio had now dropped to 1:34. However, 'The Hospital hoped to continue to improve this ratio to the nationally recognised standard of 1:28'.  I queried the word 'hoped' - shouldn't it have been 'planned' or 'intended'?

I was then told that the 'nationally recognised standard of 1:28' was not a standard, nor a target, but should be viewed flexibly. Indeed, we were told that better ratios would be expected in deprived areas. My response was that no woman deserves a lower standard of care than the nationally recognised standard, whilst those who are the most disadvantaged should be receiving a standard above that.

I made it clear that the Panel was very disappointed, and we requested an update report in six months time.

It seems that the midwives themselves are sufficiently anxious about this problem to do some whistle-blowing. They wrote a letter to the Comet, which I have seen today. Had I seen it yesterday I would have read it out to the Panel. As it happens, the Comet did not publish the letter but turned it into their front page news item. So I am giving it in full here:

Dear Editor,

We are writing out of absolute desperation in the hope that the press will be able to assist in highlighting the shocking staff levels that have become common place in many hospitals, but particularly at Kingston Hospital, Surrey.

Numerous incident forms and complaints from staff about conditions within the maternity unit have had no effect and substandard staffing levels are becoming more and more frequent; some shifts having as few as three midwives on the labour ward.

We urgently neeed more staff to cope at Kingston and nobody seems to be taking us seriously.

Kingston NHS Trust has decided to increase the number of women booking at the hospital from 5,000 women to 7,000 women per annum. Last year we delivered approximately 6,000 babies, which stretched our services to the limit. Extra staff were recruited, but unfortunately these were off-set by staff leaving or retiring.

To compensate for the increased numbers we opened six extra beds on one of the postnatal wards; and have introduced a new discharge policy to encourage women to go home after two hours following the birth of their baby, if stable. [It was] stated that under no circumstances were we to convey that there was a bed shortage, but explain to these women that home is the best place for them to be.

However, despite these initiatives the beds are continually blocked, women have to wait in the reception area for a bed to become free, sometimes they are in strong labour and clearly require pain relief. Women being induced on the antenatal ward have to wait sometimes two days or more for labour beds, occasionally they have to labour on the antenatal ward because there is nowhere else for them to go.

The labour ward is like a conveyor belt, as soon as you deliver one baby you are informed of another admission. After a birth the mother needs time to bond and feed her baby, invariably she needs suturing, assistance with bathing, the written records need completing and then the information is duplicated for the computer records. Yet the main priority is to transfer your woman as quickly as possible and at the same time you are being told to admit the next person.

When the room is vacated all blood spillages to the bed and floor are cleaned by maternity staff before the domestic staff will enter, the room is then quickly prepared for the next person. Sometimes there is help from a maternity assistant but this isn't always the case as their numbers are equally low.

The Malden Suite is a mix of low risk women in labour and postnatal women. The turnover of cases is rapid and with labouring women being given priority it is difficult to give mothers and babies the support they need.

The postnatal midwife is focused on discharging women as quickly as possible to free up beds. Therefore other women on the ward requiring examination are rarely given the attention they deserve.

We are also seeing an increase in our re-admission rate, where perhaps women or babies have been sent home too soon. To alleviate staff shortages some community staff are asked to work in the unit and postpone their visits until the next day. The midwife on call for home births may continue her shift through the night on the labour ward, which means women wanting a home birth have to be transferred to hospital instead.

Over the last 15 years the role of the midwife has changed and we have taken on tasks that were once performed by Drs e.g. administering intravenous drugs, inserting IV cannulas, suturing post delivery and now, some midwives are trained in performing the paediatric examination. However, the midwives staffing ratio has not increased to compensate for the extra tasks performed.

We work 12.5 hour shifts and are entitled to an hour's break during this time. However, on some shifts we are not getting any break and others just 30 minutes. Sometimes we can't go home at the end of the shift as there is no-one to replace us.

Staff on the antenatal, and both labour wards have to wait sometimes 8 to 9 hours to be relieved for a break.

We are not allowed hot drinks in the unit and had to figt for permission to drink water. Breaks are taken in a small room off one of the ward areas so that staff can be called back to assist when necessary. In contrast the managers meet collectively for their breaks where they go over to the restaurant. In an email to a union rep [it was] stated that if staff had a problem with time management she would work with each individual to address the problem. Staff don't want to miss breaks. They do so because the unit is unsafe to leave.

What has angered staff is that one midwife of retirement age wanted to reduce her hours to work one day a week, she was told that this wouldn't be cost effective as the Trust would have to pay for her mandatory training days; the experienced midwife has since left. How many other prospective staff wanting part-time work have been turned away? We need all the help available no matter how limited.

To reassure women still to come to Kingston, a recent poll of women, remarkably gave us favourable results in terms of staff attitude and care. I think this shows the level of dedication from staff who are highly skilled, conscientious and professional; and in an emergency work well as a team. Whilst some will see this letter as scaremongering, I think it is important that these circumstances are made public with a view to obtaining change and assistance. We cannot continue working in these conditions indefinitely. The Trust has a duty to provide a safe environment for women to deliver in and to protect the welfare of its staff. This is not the case at present.

Unfortunately names of employees cannot be divulged as it would lead to disciplinary action and possible jobs at loss,

Yours sincerely,

Concerned midwives of Kingston, NHS Trust.

Kingston Hospital has responded, thus:

Communication Channels

We are very disappointed that these members of staff have not raised these issues with senior management directly before speaking to the press about their concerns. Our Chief Executive is committed to, and promotes an open culture at the hospital. She writes to all staff every week, holds monthly open staff forums and regularly asks for feedback. We also have a very clear and well publicised whistleblowing policy which enables staff to raise issues anonymously and every concern raised is investigated thoroughly. We are very concerned that these members of staff have not used these well established channels.

Workload

We are a busy maternity unit. Last year there were 5,694 deliveries (5,802 babies) and this year we are aiming for a small reduction. This means sometimes there will be pressure points of increased activity, but these will be planned for. It is true that on occasions the labour ward is very busy. It is widely recognised across the whole organisation that the midwives, support staff and doctors all work incredibly hard and are very committed to providing the highest quality of care possible, in what is at times a busy and demanding environment.

Staffing

Like most maternity units we do have some vacancies. There are currently 130 midwives in post and we are funded for 157, which means we have 27 vacancies. This is in line with the national average and we cover these vacant posts with some of our own staff who are willing to work additional hours and with agency staff where necessary. We disagree that we are not taking the issue of staffing seriously. We have recently received extra funding from our local primary care trusts and are currently recruiting an additional 30 midwives and 40 midwifery support workers, whom we hope to have in post in the very near future.

The best way of measuring staffing levels is to explain it as a ratio of how many births there are per midwife. The ratio of births to midwives has reduced significantly over the past few years at Kingston Hospital.

In 2007/08 (the most recently published figures) we had a ratio of 38 births per midwife (1:38). This was as high as 1:43 in 2006 but has now reduced to 1:36.

The unit is currently going through a consultation on an alternative model of care which will be better for women. There is a government drive to improve maternity services nationally and this new model of care will offer local women more choice about where and how they have their baby.

This work will also enable us to reduce our midwife to birth ratio to 1:30.

Bed Shortage and safety

The process for women in labour arriving at the maternity unit is that they are seen by the receptionist in the reception area whilst they are booked in. The majority of them will have telephoned in advance, the team will be expecting them and will have prepared a delivery room for them. There will be some occasions when women may have to wait for a room to become available either because of the number of women in labour or because a room is being cleaned and prepared. The lives of women and babies are never put at risk.

If the unit is deemed to be operating unsafely then it would close to all further admissions. This is not a frequent occurrence. The last time this happened, due to bed shortages, was in 2006.

Number of deliveries

Between April 2008 and March 2009 there were 5,694 deliveries. This financial year we are aiming to deliver 5,600 women. There have previously been discussions to consider expanding the service to 7,000 deliveries per year but a decision has been made to maintain our current levels.

Discharge

It is true that it is the Trust's policy to encourage women to go home within 2-6 hours of delivery if they have had a straightforward birth, both they and their baby are healthy and there is no reason for them to remain in hospital. Each situation is assessed individually. This is in line with best practice across the NHS and is not linked to freeing up beds. We know that many women want to get home as soon as possible after having their baby and home is the best place for them.

Induction

Sometimes women waiting for an induction will experience a delay in being admitted. This is because high risk women are induced first and emergencies, such a caesarean sections, have to take priority in addition to those being admitted in labour. If an induction is delayed, it will not happen without a full clinical assessment. This is an area where we are working hard to improve.

Experience

We know that many women are happy with their experience of the maternity services at Kingston Hospital. This is reflected in the surveys that are undertaken, but also in the many personal thank you letters and cards that we receive. However, we do sometimes receive official complaints and informal feedback on occasions women are dissatisfied with the care they receive. Each of these is investigated and lessons learnt are taken forward.

Staff Breaks

When the unit is very busy, it can be difficult for staff to take their break at the allocated time.

However, every attempt is made to enable them to do this and it is seen as a priority by the managers.

Changing role of a midwife

It is part of normal midwifery (and nursing) duties to clean up blood and other bodily fluids. We would not expect this to be part of the domestic cleaning role. This is reflected across the NHS as a whole.

The role of a midwife has changed and they are taking on more responsibilities as part of an intended career path as they increasingly develop additional skills with training. Some specialist posts have been created at the Trust to take on specialist tasks such as a paediatric examinations etc and they have been fully trained in these roles.

I thought I'd publish the list of expenses that I have claimed in the last two years as a councillor.

Here is the full list:

I'm speaking on e-petitions soon at a conference in Edinburgh.

That's a variant on coals-to-Newcastle, since the first government in the world to introduce online petitions was the Scottish Parliament. The system was developed for them by the International Teledemocracy Centre at Napier University, in Edinburgh.  (Its name indicates that the ITC was founded before the term 'e-democracy' was coined)

Following that success, in 2004 the ITC contacted the National Project for Local e-Democracy, which I was chairing, to ask if we would like to pilot e-petitions in local authorities. I volunteered Kingston, and Bristol joined us.

That was how the very first local government e-petitioning system was set up in Kingston. Since there has been national, and indeed international, interest in the project.

But I have to say that it was accepted in Kingston with a shrug of the shoulder - it just seemed an obvious extension of Kingston's existing and well-used petitioning process, and fitted in well with our innovative e-government practices. Kingston had, and still has, a robust process for handling petitions which means that they are given serious consideration by both officers and councillors, so the online versions did not require any major changes in practice.

Last week the Department of Communities and Local Government published some very substantial research with the title "Empowering communities to influence local decision making". I'm pleased to say that it Kingston gets some very positive mentions in the chapter on petitions.

You can download the full pdf file by clicking here.

David Smith spoke and answered questions at Neighbourhood Committee this week. He's the Chief Executive of NHS Kingston, the new name for the Primary Care Trust.

David described the proposed developments at Surbiton Hospital, which will turn it into a polyclinic. A number of Surbiton GPs will be based there, but it will also offer a number of consultants' clinics.

Down in South of the Borough this means that we will be able to attend clinics at Surbiton instead of Kingston Hospital. We will have to look again at bus routes when this happens, but it sounds like good news to me.

Even better, they are hoping to hold some clinic sessions in the Chessington area as well.

Another piece of news related to the the mini-health complex at the corner of Gosbury Hill and Orchard Gardens. Anyone who is registered with the two practices (Grays and Orchard) will know that their buildings are far from adequate. Next door, the Hook Clinic does not seem to be over used.

At present all the buildings are owned by NHS Kingston, and the GPs lease their section. The NHS is now putting up the whole site for sale, so it can be redeveloped as a decent GP base. The existing practices have first refusal. At least one of the practices indicated at the meeting that they are very excited at this opportunity and want to pursue it.

There is still some mystery about the tender for a GP-led walk-in clinic. Apparently, the contract will be awarded at the end of June. Residents are concerned that this would take patients away from the four GP practices in the Chessington and Hook area. David Smith did say that he would expect the new providers to work closely with the existing practices, and that we are, in any case, underprovided for GPs.

There is also some puzzlement about the planning application for the Old Coach House to turn it into a doctor's surgery.  I can't comment about this because a new application has been submitted and I don't want to compromise my position when it comes to committee. But I can say that the planning officers were not happy with the first application.

All may become clearer when we hear who has won the contract for the walk-in clinic, but the Old Coach House site does not seem to be large enough for that use.

This is a plug for a concert this Saturday - and I'm singing in it. Don't worry, you won't be able to hear my voice above the other 100 or so singers!

The programme is quite beautiful:

Haydn: Nelson Mass - incredibly cheerful, with familiar themes that Haydn re-used in The Creation

Fauré: Requiem - one of my favourite pieces of all. I want to die listening to it. (I recognise that isn't the best of recommendations, but if you know the work you'll understand that it is the most gorgeous, ethereal music ever)

Elgar: Serenade for Strings - just wonderful.

The Kingston Choral Society concert starts at 7.30pm in KIngston Parish Church. You can buy tickets at the door for £12.

And here's a secret - you can sneak in for free and hear the dress rehearsal from 2.30pm.

I attended the funeral service today of Graham Child, but as you might expect from his family it was billed as a Service of Thanksgiving. 

Graham died suddenly on 4th June at the age of 66 - far too soon. It is difficult to sum up in words just what he had given to this borough, but the fact that the church was packed, with an overflow in a hall next door, is one way of measuring his impact.

I knew Graham best through his contribution as a key member of the Mayor's Charity Committee. This group provides ongoing advice and support to the Mayor, each year, as they try to raise money for their chosen charity.

At the end of my mayoral year I wrote about the Charity Committee and how valuable it had been. I've repeated the photo again here; Graham is on the left of the picture.

Other Mayors shared my gratitude for Graham's work. The current Mayor and Deputy Mayor attended the service today, and I counted a further eight former Mayors and Deputies there as well.

Graham was a leading light of Rotary, was deeply involved in the Malden Fortnight, was on various fund raising committees across the borough, chaired a number of youth and charity organisations, and, famously, was the Chair of Kingstonian. He was one of those people, as someone said at the service, who leave this world a better place than when they arrived.

Many roads in the borough were damaged by the severe weather earlier in the year.

Interestingly, the South of the Borough took a greater hit than the other Neighbourhoods - apparently temperatures tend to be a least a degree colder out here than further towards Kingston town. Ah, the joys of living in the outlying districts (as Chessington and Hook were once described, to my annoyance, in a tourist leaflet).

The Neighbourhood has been allocated £150k to repair the winter damage, and quite a lot of the work has been completed already.

In addition the following pavements will be getting the full resurfacing treatment:

• Devon Way
• Church Rise
• Chantry Road, on the odd numbered side from Mount Road to the first bend.

We may be able to add some other projects - either for pavements or roads - later in the year, but the funding is tight. 

Well, it's back to normal life and a South of the Borough Neighbourhood meeting next Wednesday (17th) at 7.30pm in Tolworth Girls.

Except we are doing something new this time, by holding a workshop on planning procedures at 6.30pm, before the main meeting begins. Everyone is welcome to attend.

Planning decisions are often the most controversial ones that we councillors have to make. And no planning application has been as controversial for many years as the one submitted by Tesco for the site near Tolworth roundabout. You may remember that a public meeting was called - and Tesco withdrew their application right at the last moment, following a massive campaign.

Tesco's very complex proposal triggered some questions about planning processes in the minds of the Chessington and District Residents Association, which they passed on to me. They were interested in, among other things, what weighting is given to air pollution, noise pollution and potential flooding in arriving at recommendations.   

So I suggested we held an open workshop, when anyone can ask questions of a senior planning officer. The officer won't be discussing specific applications, but can help explain some of the finer points about how applications are handled, what can be considered etc.

So do come along if you'd like to learn more.

After the workshop we will launch into the Neighbourhood meeting proper, when, appropriately, we will be hearing two planning applications. The first is for six flats to be built on 17 Church Lane, Chessington, replacing a bungalow. The other is to replace the large greenhouse at Chessington Nurseries with a timber frame building with grass roof.

Before then, David Smith, Chief Executive of NHS Kingston (the new name for the Primary Care Trust) will be talking about the proposals for Surbiton Hospital and the benefits these could bring to people in our Neighbourhood.

Everyone is welcome to the workshop, or the full meeting, or both.

Following my blog yesterday, I've spent an unpleasant half hour reading the Constitution of the British National Party, which can be found on their website.

The leaflets portray them as kindly family-orientated people. On the website, the darker side is revealed, but you have to read the Constitution to see what really drives them.

First, their basic principles include this:

The British National Party stands for the preservation of the national and ethnic character of the British people and is wholly opposed to any form of racial integration between British and non-European peoples. It is therefore committed to stemming and reversing the tide of non-white immigration and to restoring, by legal changes, negotiation and consent, the overwhelmingly white makeup of the British population that existed in Britain prior to 1948.

Now for membership (these conditions are not mentioned on their website):

2) The indigenous British ethnic groups deriving from the class of ‘Indigenous Caucasian' consist of members of: i) The Anglo-Saxon Folk Community; ii) The Celtic Scottish Folk Community; iii) The Scots-Northern Irish Folk Community; iv) The Celtic Welsh Folk Community; v) The Celtic Irish Folk Community; vi) The Celtic Cornish Folk Community; vii) The Anglo-Saxon-Celtic Folk Community; viii) The Celtic-Norse Folk Community; ix) The Anglo-Saxon-Norse Folk Community; x) The Anglo-Saxon-Indigenous European Folk Community; xi) Members of these ethnic groups who reside either within or outside Europe but ethnically derive from them.

3) Membership of the party shall be open only to those who are 16 years of age or over and whose ethnic origin is listed within Sub-section 2.

You might like to check out this and other racist aspects of the BNP on the Is the BNP racist? website.

Next up, freedom of speech:

No member of the party may be interviewed by, or give any statement to, the news media on national issues who has not been given prior authorisation to do so by his or her Regional Press Officer, or by a National official of the party.

Finally, the BNP claims to be a democratic party. You judge:

Once elected, the National Chairman shall have full executive power over all the affairs of the party. This will include:-

(a) Power of appointment to all other executive offices in the party, with the exception of the Party Auditor, who shall be appointed by the Advisory Council as specified in Section 5 and who shall not be the same person as the National Treasurer. These include the Directors of Group Development & Regulation, Administration & Publicity, the National Press Officer and the National Treasurer as well as any other offices which may need to be created as the situation demands. Not all such appointments need necessarily be made by the elected National Chairman directly. They may also be made by subordinate officials. Nevertheless, all such appointments, direct and indirect, are made upon the authority of the elected National Chairman and may be over-ruled by him.

(b) Power to determine, and where necessary change, all organisational structures within the party and to determine all rules and procedures whereby such structures are governed.

(c) Power to determine all routine executive, administrative, policy and tactical decisions made by the party.

(d) Power to determine, and where necessary change, all policies relating to the political objectives of the party whilst remaining within the framework set out in Section 1 of this Constitution.

Whilst the Liberal Democrats do not claim a monopoly on anti-racist and democratic practices, it is nevertheless a relief to get out my own party membership card and read this, the preamble to our Constitution:

The Liberal Democrats exist to build and safeguard a fair, free and open society, in which we seek to balance the fundamental values of liberty, equality and community and in which no-one shall be enslaved by poverty, ignorance or conformity.

There, I feel better just typing that...

The "but" is usually followed by an excuse for voting for the BNP,

like "... I think we should get out of Europe"

or "... the UK should restrict immigration".

Neither is sufficient reason to vote BNP. Although I don't agree with either of those policies, nevertheless they are perfectly legitimate political positions to take. Both are supported by many Euro-sceptic Tories, or, if you must, UKIP.

So why did 1450 people in liberal, intelligent Kingston vote for the BNP instead of one of those alternatives?

Was it just the protest vote? I would have expected that to go to UKIP, yet oddly their share of the vote in Kingston actually fell this time.

Or were they simply duped? - misled by the cosy images and ambiguous language of the BNP leaflets.

I've written before about the BNP and their take on British culture. Since then, Nick Griffin has instructed his members to always refer to non-white British citizens as "racial foreigners".

In other words, they have redefined "British" to mean "white".

Now read one of their leaflets again, if you can bear to, and substitute "white" for every use of the term "British".

When Gordon Brown said, perhaps unwisely, "British jobs for British workers", he meant that we needed to create more employment in this country. When Nick Griffin repeated it, he meant that whites should be given preference for any jobs going.

In fact, until recently the British National Party had a policy of compulsory repatriation. In other words, they wanted all non-white inhabitants of the UK, including British citizens, to be "sent home". They have modified that view in public and substituted voluntary repatriation - still suggesting that British citizens should be encouraged to leave the country. However, it is perfectly clear that they want to create a climate of antipathy towards minorities that will eventually make compulsory repatriation acceptable.

So, let's see ... Lenny Henry, Sir Trevor MacDonald, Dame Shirley Bassey - wait there, hasn't her family lived in Cardiff since the mid 19th century? - Linford Christie, Errol Brown (who used to live in Hook Road!), Tessa Sanderson, Floella Benjamin, the list goes on ... according to the BNP they are all "racial foreigners" and should be thrown out of the country that loves them.

And it is even possible that the Queen herself could be at risk. Queen Victoria's grandmother was Queen Charlotte, who was of black Portuguese descent.

But to get back to the very serious matter of the European elections. Now that they are claiming a democratic mandate, the BNP is probably going to have to defend its fundamental racism in court. For a start, they only allow white people to join the party.

I shudder at the thought that people who live near me, and whom I meet on the street, actually voted for these fascists.

If you did, then either you are racist or you were duped. Which label would you rather have?

On Saturday I wrote about Election Day on Thursday and the verification process that took place on Friday.

Yesterday we finally got through the count itself. Once again, the process took over five hours, but, hey, that's democracy.

This time the counting clerks had to start by taking the bundles of ballot papers and then assigning them to boxes according to who the elector had voted for. The first run just concentrated on the main parties, with the rest going into boxes marked 'Other parties' or 'Independents'. There was a full set of boxes for each pair of counting clerks.

The job for people like me - agents and counting agents appointed by the candidates - was to check that ballots went into the right boxes. We could also challenge any votes that looked as though they might be invalid.

The second run involved sorting out all the other parties and independent candidates.

As the piles of ballot papers grew they were collected and placed in - bizarrely - baker's trays labelled by party. It seems baker's trays are just the right length for the ballot papers, and a local supermarket had kindly lent them.

This was the first chance to get a picture of how the parties were doing. All the way through the Lib Dems and Conservatives seemed to be neck and neck.

At that point the sub-agents were called over to adjudicate on doubtful votes. The idea is to see if the voter's intention is clear, so a tick or any other relevant mark is allowed. Sometimes people placed a mark against just one of the names in a party list, but it still counted as a vote for that party.  Sometimes the voter had scribbled out their first choice and then placed a vote elsewhere - this is not to be advised as you can always ask for another ballot paper if you make a mistake, but if the intention was clear then we allowed it.

Some ballot papers were clearly invalid - some had votes for more than one party, some voted for no-one at all. I was intrigued by the handful of electors who had taken this opportunity to send a message to the candidates - usually a very rude one! They are entitled to spoil their vote if they wish, but maybe they don't realise that the candidates don't see the messages, so it is a bit of a wasted effort.

The next stage was the count itself.  The ballots for each party were counted and put into bundles of 50. The ingenious positioning of bulldog clips indicated how many times each bundle had been checked. I reckon each ballot paper was counted at least six times during the whole process.

Then each bundle was checked once again to make sure that all the votes were for the same party, and then put back into baker's trays. As the fully checked bundles were put in place, numbered markers were inserted showing 500, 1000, 1500 etc votes. So we had a pretty good idea of how things were going. Once again, Conservatives and Lib Dems were evenly matched.

The count finished soon after 8.30pm, but the Returning Officer was not allowed to announce the actual figures until after all the polls had closed across Europe at 9pm.

Of course, this was just the vote split in Kingston, and the numbers had to be sent up to City Hall to be combined with those from the other 32 London boroughs to arrive at the final result.

Here are the figures for Kingston:

So, the supposed Conservative resurgence doesn't appear to be happening here, as their proportion of the vote is much the same as last time.

The one thing that gave me the greatest cheer was to see that the BNP had been beaten by the Tamil campaigner, Jan Jananayagam.

As you are probably aware,  London elected eight MEPs - 3 Conservative, 2 Labour, 1 Liberal Democrat, 1 Green and 1 UKIP.

So, finally, many thanks to everyone who supported Sarah Ludford and the Liberal Democrats.

It's been a busy few days.

On Thursday I was running what is quaintly known as a Committee Room. This is the operations centre for an election, and in our case we organised two wards from my home.

To keep on the right side of the law I had to display a sign saying 'Committee Room' in a window. We also had to post up a Committee Room Poster, which has the following headings: Bribery, Treating, Undue Influence, Personation, Illegal Practices, Illegal Payment and Employment, Forgery, Punishment. I usually keep a copy on the door of the downstairs loo, but for the election it had to be visible in the living room.

Until not many years ago, we were issued with a poster that must have been written over a hundred years ago, because it talked about bribing drivers with hay for the horses. The new version is pretty daunting, but omits the hay.

One thing I am always reminded to do is to leave a bowl out, so that anybody working in the Committee Room can pay for any refreshments. If I didn't, the tea, coffee and finger foods that I provide could be considered as treating, defined as 'any meat, drink or entertainment or provision to or for any person ... on account of that person having voted or refrained from voting, or being about to vote or refrain from voting'.

It's a long day, with the polls open from 7am to 10pm. I did a lot of walking and driving, but managed one two-hour stint telling at a polling station, when I was able to sit down for a bit.

European Election Day is always a bit of an anticlimax, because we don't go off at the end of the day for the adenalin delights of the count. Most other countries go to the poll on Sunday, so the count in the UK has to be delayed until then.

But yesterday I did have to attend a process known as verification. This year I am the sub-agent for the Liberal Democrats for the Borough, which means that I have to keep an eye on all the processes, and, with the other agents, give my judgement on any disputes.

In a local or general election the verification and the actual count take place one after the other, but for the Euros they are undertaken on separate days. Which is a good thing, since the verification took five and a half hours, and I gather it was much the same in other boroughs. The main reason for the length of time was the length of the ballot paper.

At verification each ballot box was emptied on to a table and the counting clerks employed by the Council had to straighten them out and put them in bundles of 50. Unfolding the long papers - each had 19 options on them in London - was very time consuming.

The papers were counted face down, in order that no-one could see where the crosses had been placed.

The total number of ballot papers for each ballot box was then compared with the totals that were given out by the polling clerks. And they matched for every single polling station in the Borough. That is pretty impressive and meant that throughout the long day none of the clerks made a mistake, and none of the voters had walked out of the polling station with their ballot paper.

We were told the turnout for the Borough - it was 38.16%.

The actual count will take place tomorrow.  I'm expecting that to be pretty long, too.

I will be voting for the Liberal Democrat list in the European elections tomorrow. Well, you would expect me to say that!

But the most important message is that everyone who cares about international issues should make sure they vote.

The Westminster expenses scandals have seriously overshadowed the attempts by all the parties to explain their aspirations for the European Parliament. There is a real danger that electors will express their disgust at cheating MPs by turning their back on the European elections, even though the two issues are not related.

Why danger? - well, a low turn out will probably favour the extreme parties like the BNP. Who wants our country to be represented in Brussels by a bunch of racist thugs? I'm sure you don't, so make sure you vote for a party that will fight for British interests in Europe.

Which brings me to today's article in the Guardian, "Anti-gay, climate change deniers: meet David Cameron's new friends", which echoed Edward Davey's letter and my earlier comments. Although appearing cuddly at home, the Tories are forming alliances with unpleasant hard right parties in Europe. Do you really want them to speak for you?

And why would anyone want to vote for UKIP, who spend all their time (when not fiddling expenses) opposing the very organisation that they have been elected to? 

Liberal Democrats have been always been committed to a strong voice for the UK in the European Parliament. We also believe that co-operation with other European countries brings huge benefits to the UK, for example, in enabling the speedy extradition of criminals.

In spite of that, or maybe because of that, Liberal Democrats have called for referendum on whether the UK should stay in the EU or not. That is the right and democratic context in which those who oppose membership can have their say.

At present London has one Liberal Democrat MEP, Sarah Ludford, but we came within a whisker of electing a second one last time round. I'd be over the moon if we could get two MEPs this time.  Voting for a party list (whilst not my favourite form of proportional representation) does mean that every vote counts.

By the way, if you have a postal vote but forgot to post it, you can still hand it in at a polling station tomorrow.

The Conservatives have not exactly told the world that they are breaking away from the centre right grouping in the European Parliament. (I blogged about it here.)

So who are they hoping to align with after the elections? It appears that they have been talking secretly (or not so secretly) with hard right parties, some of which are clearly racist.

Edward Davey, who apart from being our local MP is also the Liberal Democrat Shadow Foreign Secretary, has written a letter to William Hague, and has allowed me to publish it here.

Rt Hon William Hague MP
House of Commons
London SW1A 0AA
29^th May 2009


I am writing to ask if you will publish a list of all the parties you have been in secret talks with over the establishment of a new group in the European Parliament.

Liberal Democrats are unashamed of our colleagues in Brussels and Strasbourg. We will continue to work with other liberal parties from across Europe to deliver on issues like the economy, crime and the environment. Our record is open and transparent.

By contrast, the Conservative party's refusal to name its future partners in the European Parliament denies the public the information they need to make their choice at this election. This wall of silence, despite your many secret meetings with potential partners, is utterly disingenuous.

David Cameron says he believes that belonging to a political group is not a just a technicality. It is a clear indication of where your party stands on Europe. Political groups in the European Parliament are the platform for joint political agendas. In Brussels and Strasbourg, the politics of the wider group often informs the voting choice of the national delegation of MEPs.

Is it not then grossly hypocritical for you to leave the European People's Party on the basis that they do not reflect your views, only to go about obscuring those parties you will work with after June 4th? Is this because they are reportedly made up of homophobes, anti-Muslims, climate change deniers and Nazi sympathisers?

The electorate is entitled to know what secret deals have been made. What manifestos have been prepared behind closed doors but not put before voters? Where will you stand on climate change? On civil rights and equality? On the economy?

More radio silence from Conservative HQ will merely confirm the suspicions of many that you are ashamed of your new partners and will do everything to keep them hidden away until after the election.

Alternatively, you could come clean today and be honest with the electorate about the people you have been talking to. At least do the voters that one simple courtesy.

Yours sincerely,

Edward Davey MP
Liberal Democrat Shadow Foreign Secretary