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Monday 24th September 2007

Presentation of School's winning FAIRTRADE poster

It was a real privilege and pleasure to be invited to St Peter's C of E High School this morning to present the professionally produced vesion of the poster designed by five of the school's students. I spoke for five minutes at the whole-school morning assembly about how we take for granted that what we want we expect to find on the supermarket shelves. How every different it is for millions of people in developing countries where they struggle to get their basic needs. The least we can do when scanning the supermarket shelves is to choose FAIRTRADE goods, and thereby make a difference. The poster competition was a rather last minute idea for the one day Citizenship Conference which focused on Fairtrade, held during Fairtrade Fortnight earlier this year for High School teachers and their students. Five of the 15 schools that participated in the day submitted a poster entry.

I presented a poster to each of the designers and one for the school. It really is an eye-catching poster with vibrant colours, and an excellent punch line to its question:

Fairtrade makes a big difference: Just think about what you buy!

And the further good news is that St Peter's High School has embarked upon the journey to become a Fairtrade School. 

Saturday 22nd September 2007

Decade dedicated to compiling roll of honour

Life Member of the War Memorials Trust (see web link) City resident Ray Cope has spent hundreds of hours researching the names of those who died in the First World War for the Tunstall War Memorial which has never had any names inscribed. Ray spent another Saturday today at the indoor Tunstall market with an eye-catching exhibition which attracted interested shoppers even before Ray had put the finishing touches to it!  During the next few months Ray hopes to have completed the definitive, verified list of names. Earlier this year, along with ten other enthusiasts, Ray became a committee member of the newly formed Friends of Tunstall & District War Memorial, which has the express aim of raising funds so that the names can be displayed in an appropriate form within the Tunstall War Memorial garden, at the centre of which is the stone War Memorial obelisk. 

I am a member of the group and have enlisted the support of the City Council neighbourhood manager who is arranging for the production of draft drawings with indicative costings of various suggested ways in which the names will be displayed. The options will be displayed in various prominent places in Tunstall and responses of local people actively sought. Ray's  research has revealed some 400 names and today's outreach event was just one of dozens has has organised over recent years.

Friday 21st September 2007

RECOLLECTION  

airspacegallery, 4 Broad Street, Hanley, Stoke-on-Trent. ST1 4HL

David Bethell and Andrew Branscombe, the inspiration of the recently established airpsacegallery, initially at the disused Falcoln Pottery (Town Road, Hanley) and now at 4 Broad Street, Hanley, have brought together five stimulating newly graduated arts students from Staffordshire University. Anna Francis has provided a beautifully poignant introduction to the 8pp A5 catalogue, RECOLLECTION, the title of the exhibition, which runs until 20th October 2007. "A collection of objects belongong to a particular person can be called 'things' but this does not even begin to reveal the significance or personal importance attached to a seemingly disparate grouping of items, loving curated  over a lifetime...We each leave a trail through our lives of objects owned, touched, affected, loved, cherished and eventually discarded."

Stuart Porter, who lives at Leek, has discovered the joy of working with lead. "My work tends to replicate simple everyday objects that at some point may have captured a time or an emotion. My biggest fear is to forget why I have saved these tiny mementos, because this would mean I have forgotten an important time in my life. One example is the lead letter. The original letter was discovered at the back of a drawer, my wife said: 'What's this?' It was dated and had laid in the drawer for 19 years. How could we forget my son's second letter to the tooth fairy, we both remember fondly placing it in the drawer.

One day these coveted pieces will be dismissed as rubbish.

I also feel we can related to each other's 'objects'. A visiting artist related to me how she felt when looking at my lead clock. (in the picture above) As a young girl staying at her grandparents' house, she stopped the clock because the ticking kept her awake. The guilt she now felt made her feel sad at the memory." The exhibits of the other four artists are equally thought-provoking. There is much in this show with which to make a personal recollection and reflection. Congratulations to David and Andrew for a stimulating show.

Thursday 20th September 2007

...and so we say goodbye to the dearly loved Post Office as Labour's modernisation programme ploughs ever more deeply and widely in the interests of private profit...

So, particularly elderly people and people with disabilities will be adversely affected by the closure of the City-centre Crown Post Office in Tontine Street, Hanley. Tough! Well, that's how I began my contibution in Full Council today to the debate on the impending closure of the main Post office and a substitute facility being opened at the back W.H. Smith which is located at the far end of the upper floor of the Potteries Shopping Centre. An ideal location for Blue Badge holders, for example. How convenient for everyone to have to wade through the newspapers and magazines, CDs and DVDs, stationery and greetings cards to queue for goodness knows how long for the much reduced counter facilities! Except, of course, we are unlikely to see queues, after all most pensioners were blugeoned into signing up to have their pensions paid into a bank account. Business people with bulk posting, parcels and recorded deliveries will simply give up and turn to the private delivery companies. The Labour government stand four-square indicted of deliberately undermining the economic viability of the Post Office network having transformed it from a social service into a private profit-making set up. Consultation in recent years over progressively more Post Office closures has been a complete sham. Now, the government has the cheek to publish a Green Paper: Governance of Britain, a principal aim of which (apparently) is to facilitate more citizen participation! Who are they kidding?

...and now the GOOD NEWS...

Congratulations to Fegg Hayes Residents' Association, the winner of The Sentinel's OUR HEROES annual awards scheme in the Community Group category. Pictured below are Marie Mitchell (left) and Betty Gay, two of the long-standing committee members who put in hours and hours of voluntary time working on a wide range of community issues, from raising £140,000 from grant-making trusts for a first class children's play area, through running youth work projects, a weekly car-boot style fund-raising market market to countless varied individual issues for residents. As if that were not enough, they run a community house, focus for counselling and small group projects, located in a semi-detached local authority house.

And all this, forever with cheery smiles and far too few volunteer supporters!

When I was a teenager I wrote a passionate piece (or so my memory suggests!) against the honours system and I have never changed my views. But, recognition of group, co-operative endeavour is entirely different. The Fegg Hayes Residents' Association, led by a small core of dedicated, co-operative, community minded people is an exemplary group and I am glad they have been recognised. 

Wednesday 19th September 2007

Putting People First

I was one of three City Councillors amongst the twenty people taking part in this morning's excellent workshop, The Public Realm. It was one of the series Design in Action sessions promoted by our local Architecture & Design Centre, Urban Vision, based at the Burslem School of Art. Until recently, the conventional wisdom of planners and particularly highway engineers was that people were not a priority - traffic was. Hence, the multitude of signs which deface so much of our urban (and rural) landscape declaring this that and the other instruction, most of which we know anyway! Anyway, there are some revolutionaries at large proving that we can in fact save a lot of money and enhance the landscape by chucking the excess barriers, signs and lines into the recycling centre! And, surprise, surprise, putting people first in the streets, calms the traffic and REDUCES accidents! How simple!

Guest speaker, Ben Hamilton-Baillie shared his vast experience and expertise with a stimulating and well illustrated talk after which we walked into various parts of Hanley for an on-the-spot look at what improvements may make a huge difference. I was with the small group looking at Fountain Square and Tontine Square; not particularly separate nor particularly squares! We agreed there was little or no sense of place, little or nothing of a feel good factor about the spaces, nothing that encouraged one to want to linger and talk or sit (difficult if a few others have got to the only two benches first!) and no opportunity to buy a coffee and sit outside.  Where trees (presumably) had once grown in the centre of cast-iron grids we saw tarmac! Our symbol of twinning with Erlangen (Germany) is a not-so-healthy silver birch tree, within a few feet of an empty cast iron tree grid but not in one itself!  

Top left: looking NW through Tontine Sq into Fountain Sq. Middle: Erlangen tree. Bottom right: Fountain Sq. NE dominated by recently refurbished building finished with dominant "blank screen". Perhaps the wall-mounted sculpture will follow!

Tuesday 18th September 2007

Berryhill School sets out to be a FAIRTRADE school

I was a guest speaker yesterday morning at BerryHill High School (one of the City's 17 High Schools), invited to explain to the whole Year 9 students how a school can work towards becoming a Fairtrade school. The year group's day was devoted to researching Fairtrade. The Head teacher launched the day and then retired teacher Ann Worthington, a Traidcraft Fairtrader, explained very clearly how Fairtrade was different from free trade and the enormous difference Fairtrade made to the quality of life for Fairtrade producers in Developing Countries. I followed that with a powerpoint outline of the 5 goals and illustrations of each along the way.

Goal 1 Establish a FAIRTRADE group composed of:

Pupils   Teachers   Governors   Parents   Supporters in your neighbourhood   * Elect co-ordinator/s   * Agree campaign plan   * PR Splash!

Goal 2 Write & adopt a school FAIRTRADE policy which includes:   * School supports the F/T Group   * F/T is part of the School Development Plan   * F/T products used wherever possible: tea, coffee, sugar, biscuits in staff room & meetings; ingredients in cookery lessons;  F/T products in vending machines; F/T sports balls;  explore using F/T cotton for school uniforms.   * F/T products in school meals   * F/T features in lessons & whole school projects   * Special activities in F/T Fortnight   Signed by the:   Governors   Staff   Student Council   Parents

Goal 3 Promote, use & sell F/T products:    * Monitor use & sales of F/T goods in terms of range of products and value of sales   * Encourage local retailers to sell F/T products   * Encourage local businesses, churches and voluntary groups to use F/T

Goal 4 Whole school learns about Fairtrade through:    * At least three curriculum areas & in lessons for at least two year groups  * FAIRTRADE to feature in three school-wide activities such as: Assembly;  school play;  newsletter;  website. 

Goal 5 Promote action in school and the community with   * Three whole school activities per year   * One activity in the community   (one during F/T Fortnight)

Final thought: "Should we have a choice if that choice causes poverty, hunger, illness and even death?"

Monday 17th September

Mitchell Memorial Youth Theatre  -  50th Anniversary publicity launched

Clearly there are those in the area, it would seem, who are unaware of this gem of a theatre, built in memory of Reginald Mitchell, the local-born designer of the world-famous Battle of Britain fighter plane, the Spitfire. The local daily paper, The Sentinel, today published a letter, prominently boxed, with large picture of a spitfire and inset of Mitchell, that asserted: "As Reginald Mitchell was a child of North Staffordshire, and as no monument to his endeavour and brilliance as an aircraft designer exists..." How strange, when we have a theatre no less, about to celebrate the 50th anniversary of its opening by Group Captain Douglas Bader on 28th October 1957! Diagonally across the road, by the side of the Potteries Museum & Art Gallery is a statue of Reginald Mitchell and inside the Museum is a Spitfire and well presented exhibition of his achievements.

The whole of October is devoted to a celebration of 50 years of the "Mitch" as the theatre is affectionately known by many. During the four weeks of special performances of music, dance, drama and variety, hundreds of young people along with less young people will share the joy of artistic performance, with we hope, hundreds of ethusiastic theatre-goers.

8,000 attractively produced 12page A5 publicity programmes are being distributed throughout the City listing the impressive range of performances scheduled for the anniversary, the culmination of which will be the launch of the 50th Anniversary DVD on the evening of Sunday 28th October, the theatre's precise annivesary date.

This archive picture shows the construction of the unique tilting auditorium floor. 

 

Saturday 15th September 2007

Brindley Ford Village Fete

Thanks to a lot of planning by the hard-working Brindley Ford Residents' Association committee members, the Methodist Church was packed with well-stocked fund-raising stalls this afternoon. It was opened by Cllr Ann James, just before the appointed hour of 3pm because numerous would-be purchasers were restively chomping at the bit to spend their money. The cake stall particularly had brisk sales but sales of tea and biscuits could have been better. Mind you, I did my best! 

The plant stall looked most professional and very inviting. All the plants had been potted up from the Margaret Hodgkin's garden. All unsold toys will soon be the joy of children at a Romanian ophanage and the remaining bric a brac will be offered at a car boot in the near future.

R.A. secretary, Margaret Hodgkins said: "It was a shame more people didn't come along. Every household had been informed of the event via the Association's newsletter. We also put up notices on lamp posts, at the bus stop and in the Post Office. We even had a notice in the local daily, The Sentinel."

By 4pm the stalls were being packed up but during that hour a total of £290 had been raised. 

Thursday 13th September 2007

Fairtrade Conference at site of Battle of Orgreave           

The first national conference for Fairtrade Local Councils was held today at the shiny new glass building that is home to Rotherham's Innovation Technology Centre, part of the emerging commercial estate on the site of the famous Orgreave battleground where miners regularly faced police in battle gear during the '80s coal miners' strike. Huge earth moving machinery was completing rolling flat surfaces for new structures, symbolically snuffing out the struggle between the powerful and the powerless, a theme threading through today's deliberations, albeit not too explicitly political...of course. We politley applauded John Healey MP, Minister of State, Communities and Local Government after his keynote address in which he vaguely mentioned the benefit of bi-lateral trade agreements between the EU and individual African and Caribbean nations. The price those nations are expected to pay in order to gain acess to European markets is set to be pretty high!  

Attending were a 100 or so councillors and council officers (predominantly working in procurement or agenda 21 departments) from Fairtrade towns and towns working towards Fairtrade town status, overwhlemingly in the north of England but with brave hearts from Motherwell, north of the border, Cirencester and the London Borough of Watham Forest. Amidst the throng was Bruce Crowther, (pictured left) the man who sparked off the Fairtrade town movement at Garstang with their unilateral declaration in 2000 (what way to mark the millennium!) as ever, busy listening, busy encouraging. Bruce is now the Fairtrade Foundation's part-time Fairtrade Towns' co-ordinator.

Visible from the conference venue is one of only three remaining glass-making "cones" in the country in the heart of the small village of Catcliffe. Centrally placed in the cone, at ground level, was the furnace, the heat of which was controlled by opening/closing the shutters at the base of the structure. Built in 1740 as one of three, it continued in production until circa 1901. An interesting fact included on the very useful heritage interpretation sign at the site is that 900 square metres of glass were supplied to the nearby Wentworth Estate in 1755 at a cost of £5.15s.0d! 

The cone, in effect a vast chimney which enclosed a glass-making furnance, housed prisioners of war during the First War and during the Great Strike of 1926 it served as a canteen.  

Monday 10th September 2007

LONGNOR: in the Peak District

I have spent much of a rare day's leave from Council duties in the sunny Peak District today, centred on the delightful village of Longnor.

Curiously, a recent feature on the village in the monthly glossy LOCAL LIFE which circulates in the Leek & moorlands area, made no mention of St Batholemew's, the parish church at the centre of the village. The present church building was completed in 1780; in the nave is displayed the royal coat of arms for George 1.

 

 

At the opposite, eastern side of the nave is a splendid marble sculpture, representing St Bertram, who by tradition brought Christianity to the wild Moorlands in the 8th Century. 

There are surprises in the churchyard. If the accuracy of records can be trusted, there is an 112 year-old man buried there, only 50 yards from where he was born.

Mind you, during the intervening 112 years William Billinge got around quite a bit! Not only that, he was exceedingly fortunate in his travels. Born in 1679, "At the age of 23 he enlisted into His Majesty's Service." He was with the British forces that took Gibraltar in 1704, then with the Duke of Marlborough at the battle of Ramillies in 1706 and at both of the Scottish Rebellions, in 1715 and 1745! 

Sunday 9th September 2007

Wirksworth Festival

For more than a decade now, a major annual treat around my birthday has been the Wirksworth Trail which launches the Wirksworth Festival. In addition to the delights and challenges of the vast cornucopia of exhibits - ceramics, paintings, photography, sculpture, glass, wood and textiles - displayed at 65 venues around the town in whole houses, workshops, people's front rooms, buildings in the process of being refurbished, there is the priceless pleasure of being awash with the happy blend of brick and stone in tiny cottages or grander double fronted houses, in terraces or more rarely alone.   

Expectation rose as the afternoon progressed at the market square in the centre of town as groupings of  music lovers gathered ready for the Gig on the Roof, 4pm till late.  

Wirksworth, of course is home to Dennis O'Connor, the sculptor responsible for the steel sculpture at Etruria opposite The Sentinel building.

 

Thursday 6th September

Welcome to Spin-on-Trent  

HEAD OF PUBLIC RELATIONS & COMMUNICATIONS  Circa £75k

The City Council's advertisement for a new head of PR appeared on the back page of the mediaguardian supplement of Monday's Guardian newspaper. Dominated by the Jodrell Bank-type telescope image against the star-studded nightsky effect, the advertisement proclaimed the job to be "a huge role requiring someone with big vision."  Job hunters with a big vision attracted by a huge role were invited to visit: www.tribalresourcing.com/stoke 

There, they would find the picture (left) of the original Victoria Hall theatre with its modern addition, labelled Stoke Council house!

Tribal recruitment agency's pictorial misrepresentation continues with written inaccuracies. The reader with a big vision is wrongly told that: "Stoke-on-Trent is unique in having adopted the Mayor with Chief Executive Officer form of executive arrangements." In fact, the 2002 City-wide referendum led to the establishment of the Elected Mayor and Council Manager Executive system!

Continuing, Tribal state that the new head of PR will: report to the Assistant Chief Executive and to work closely with the Council Manager, Elected Mayor and leading Members to ensure a ‘one Council approach'.

Just in case our eagle-eyed reader with the big vision missed the authoritarian impatience with the democratic approach embedded in the message to relate only to "leading Members" to ensure a "one  Council approach" the message is reinforced:

"Leaks will never be completely stopped but dissenting voices can be drowned out by sheer weight of positive comment. "

Presumably the accuracy of the positive comment is secondary to the sheer weight of drowning dissent! Welcome to Spin-on-Trent.

Wednesday 5th September 2007

SUPPORTING REMPLOY

You could be forgiven for thinking that we have just endured ten years of Tory government given the amount of privatisation for profit that Blair has led and that devastating policy is being continued by prime minister Gordon Brown. The lastest target for destruction is REMPLOY, a nationwide network of 83 factories providing real, meaningful employment for people with disabilities.

And remember, any one of us able-bodied people could without warning become disabled through accident or the onset of a disabling illness.

Centre, Stoke-on-Trent City Councillors Ted Own and right Reg Booth at today's campaign meeting at the threatened Newcastle-under-Lyme Remploy factory.

Why should we force disabled people to suffer diminishing self-esteem and loss of financial independence by throwing them into mainstream employment, that experience shows, time and time again, refers, rebuffs, rejects people with a disability?

REMPLOY factories were established by the post-war Attlee Labour government which faced the gigantic task of economic reconstruction but embraced the task within a pioneering welfare system that prioritised people over profit. The deceit of the mantra of modernisation of the current era of so-called Labour government shouldn't kid anyone that the nation's finances would be one jot better with the closure of the network of REMPLOY factories.

Instead of wanting to close them, the government should sack the current REMPLOY board of directors and put people in place who will develop and expand the social and economic value of the network.

What can we do? If you live near a threatened REMPLOY factory, let them know you support their campaign and offer your services. If you are a Councillor (if not, contact one or more) make sure your Council procurement officer is sourcing from REMPLOY. Thirdly, make sure you tell your MP that you expect her or him to be pressing the government to support the development of Remploy NOT its demise.  

Tuesday 4th September 2007

HERITAGE OPEN DAYS  -  NATIONAL LAUNCH AT BURLEIGH POTTERY, MIDDLEPORT, STOKE-ON-TRENT.

Between 6th & 9th September, over 3,000 buildings and places across England will be open to the public, free of charge. Welcoming the guests, City Council Elected Mayor, Mark Meredith, emphasised the City Council's support for Burleigh Pottery, rescued from receivership and certain extinction by Rosemary & William Dorling in 1999. Council conservation officers engaged the interest and financial support of English Heritage to enable essential repairs to roofs and windows, the factory's one surviving bottle oven and the extensive wharf alongside the Trent & Mersey canal.                                                              "Our investment has enabled us to host the Antiques Road Show at Burleigh (to be screened later this month on BBCtv) and to allow the factory to continue to move forward with confidence." Mayor Meredith introduced Margaret Hodge MP, Minister for Culture, Creative Industries and Tourism, whose task it was to officially launch the Heritage Open Days. Early in her speech, she must have endeared herself to the locals amongst the guests with an appropriate quotation from the Potteries' celebrated novelist, Arnold Bennett, extolling the indispensable virtues of the teapot!  Simon Thurley, Chief Executive of English Heritage, outlined the breadth of English Heritage's involvement, stressing that EH's largest ever grant - £4.3m - has gone to Chatterley Whitfield so that the buildings of the significant colliery can be preserved and a use found for the site. 

 

 

 

 

     

 

Following the buffet lunch, supplied and served by The Leopard Hotel in "The Old Town Hall" (the name given to the upstairs room above the factory shop at Burleigh) various groups were given guided tours of the factory and then at 2.30pm a number of guests clambered aboard a vintage open-topped double decker bound for a guided tour of Burslem town centre to be concluded with cream tea at the Leopard Hotel. 

Monday 3rd September 2007

STAFFORDSHIRE UNIVERSITY AIMING FOR FAIRTRADE STATUS

The Stoke-on-Trent FAIRTRADE Group's bi-monthly meeting this evening welcomed Staffs Uni Student Union officials Andrea D'Arcy and Sophie Kettell as well as David Leese, manager of the Fenton Co-Op shop.  

As well as planning Fairtrade activities, members are also involved with eco issues in one way or another and details for the Climate Change: World Development & You day-long exhibition and evening debate at the Stoke Film Theatre, College Road, Stoke on Monday 1st October. The evening debate starts at 7pm. An added attraction is that admission and parking are free!

Sunday 2nd September 2007

FESTIVAL FAIRTRADE FAYRE

Festival conjures august literary figures sharing insights of their own writing or that of other authors, as at Hay and Cheltenham, or exciting programmes of music such as Aldeburgh and Buxton, or a vast range of arts from stand-up to standard as well as cutting edge fringe, as Brighton and Edinburgh. Hanley Festival, on the other hand is more akin to the traditional village fete, with charity stalls advertising and appealing, public bodies proclaiming their services and, of course, the inevitable, array of fast food sales. (Why is a Council-organised event condoning unhealthy eating?)

The Co-operative's FAIRTRADE stand attracted a continuous flow of people tasting the Co-op's own brand Fairtrade chocolate and cake, and taking away freebie Fairtrade cotton shopping bags, Fairtrade bananas and Fairtrade tea-bags.  

Carnival conjures colourful costumes, dancing and parading, the traditional English variant being Maypole dancing and Morris dancers; notably absent in Hanley Park today was music, colour and movement lighting up the event. What little music and movement there was, was largely confined to the fairground equipment, tucked away in the corner of the site.

The City Council is about to consider a draft Festivals Strategy. If approved, today's event will disappear. I hope the draft strategy will provoke a rigorous debate about exactly what we want to achieve through a festival and how much we are prepared to invest in the project. Today's event is a painful illustration of severe under-investment.