Town Centre inspection tour

Together with out Town Centre Manager, Town Clerk, other councillors and reps from the County Council, we had a tour of the town centre yesterday creating a list of faults to fix.

Minor faults but faults none the less such as bent cycle parking racks, rubbish bins in need of painting and additional unnecessary signs.

No solutions yet but this is the first step to our Town Centre improvements.

Traffic problems

Hands up if you think we would be better off if we removed all (non pedestrian controlled) traffic lights in the town?

You are not alone, a recent town visit by Highways Officers found a number of problems with the lights in town and many of these will be fixed.

The lights at Morrison’s still amaze everyone that uses them and we are aiming to have these and other transport issues dealt with.

Hopefully we will become a cycle friendly town one day so at least the congestion will be down a bit!

Legal Problems facing the Council

According to the papers, NALC (The National Association of Local Councils) has advised the town council that the referendum is illegal and misleading!

The email I have is confidential so I cannot disclose the details but I read the newspaper with interest and could not find much in the story to fault!

I am fighting this in many meetings and outside of the chamber alongside the residents and I look forward to being able to give you all the details in due course.

Councillor Owen seems un-moved by what NALC may or may not have said ;) and is ploughing on regardless. Full Council is on Monday 26th when the issues will be bought up.

Pat Kingsnorth, our town clerk put this item on the agenda and it appears that Councillor Owen attempted to have it taken off but there was not enough time so we do get to discuss our legal position.

It would have been a dark day in local politics if one councillor had have been able to silence possible legal problems to win his argument.

Setting the Question

On the 5th June I attended the Policy and Finance Committee. Amongst the normal issues, the agenda had a small mention of Pages Field.

The issue of setting the Page Field referendum question came up. We were aware that the questions was to be set by the three committee chairs which are all members of the Liberal Democrat party and could be seen as slightly biased.

Cllr Paul Record suggested that we should have Conservative and Labour representation in the group. Cllr Goodchild (Grovebury Ward's Lib Dem Town Councillor) who was chairing the meeting stated that as the Conservatives has voted against the referendum, he couldn't see why we should be involved in setting the question!

I pointed out that when his Lib Dem group decided to apply for planning permission in the first place, as the majority of Council members voted in favour, it became a "council decision" and one we must all suffer as members of the council. Therefore the fact that a referendum will take place makes it a town issue and not a party issue so in the interests of democracy, all parties should be represented.

After some thought, he agreed to this and it was decided to allow the other group leaders to be involved in setting the question. So now Peter Rawcliffe (Cons) and Maurice Blackman (Lab) are to play their part. Although with 3/5 of the group coloured yellow I wonder what the results will be....

Where have I been?

Sorry for the delay everyone, I have written my notes but have not put a thing up on the blog for May yet. I will do this soon and backdate it to show May's dates.

The carnival is coming along nicely. My role has not been particularly great as the Town Council's Representative to date but I hope to be of use a lot on the day.

I am waiting for a reply to a question I have raised with the council officers over the state of the refuse bins in Pages Park and Field after a resident contacted me with pictures showing them overflowing.

I have also been contacted by a resident regarding the lack of flags flown around the town supporting England. Apparently there is some kind of football game happening at the moment.

Okay, I say that jokingly and supporting our nation's efforts in a world wide sporting event is a great thing but I fear once the football is over this so called patriotism will once again fade away and many people will go back to their old ways. Maybe 2006 will be the year of pride for your home country, heritage and community.