Fiona Pilkington – restore the funding, remove the bureaucracy

It’s interesting, isn’t it, that the more exposure a tragic story receives, the more concerned the national politicians become?  As the tear-jerking details of Fiona Pilkington’s treatment at the hands of a local group of mindless yobs emerge daily from the inquest into death alongside her daughter in a burning car, so the indignation expressed by Government becomes ever more vociferous.

So why does this Government consistently underfund preventative services as if the issue were of no importance?  He said in an interview with the BBC that:

“It is the police’s job, along with the local authority and social services and housing and all the rest of it, to ensure that people are not driven to the kind of despair Fiona Pilkington was driven to.”

Why are local councils – County, Unitary, District and Borough – left reeling every year by savage Government funding cuts which curtail the services they can provide? Many local authorities have long since abandoned discretionary services and are struggling to provide decent statutory services, such as education, social care and road maintenance. Perhaps if the £2000 per household the Government takes off us every year in taxation to run 791 quangoes were given back to local government, the services of which Mr Johnson speaks could be provided.

It goes without saying that if our public authorities – social services, police, health and so on – didn’t have to provide and fund armies of staff to deal with Government regulation, monitoring and bureaucracy, maybe we could get back to having appropriate numbers of front line officers to prevent this kind of appalling event happening again.

Jaycee Lee Dugard – an open and shut case?

News bulletins today seems to be focussing on Philip and Nancy Garrido, the couple accused of abducting Jaycee Lee Dugard as a sex slave.

I understand the principle of “innocent until proven guilty”, but the evidence here does seem to be overwhelming, not to mention easy to prove, since Kaycee has two daughters which she alleges were fathered by Phillip Garrido.

Is it right, when the weight of evidence is so great, that victims must be forced by their tormentors to relive every detail of their nightmare in a court of law?

Stop this divisive nonsense

The August recess is nearly over at County Hall, and member panels are busy with appeals from parents whose applications for home to school transport have been refused.

But one dilemma sticks in my mind. Children who attend their local Baptist Church, and have been accepted into an Anglican secondary school, are being refused transport assistance.

Their forms have been duly signed by the head of their local church, the Pastor. But because the school demonination is not the same as that of the Church, their application doesn’t fit KCC’s policy.

I’m sure I’m over simplifying it, but what do Baptists and Anglicans have in common? I thought they both practised Christianity – both worshipped Christ? Failing that, tell me where the Baptist secondary schools are in Kent?

Oh – there aren’t any? Then change the policy and stop this divisive nonsense.

Borough Market – well worth a visit

It’s always difficult to find new and exciting things to do with the kids during the summer holidays.  Cries of “Are we nearly there yet?” or “I’m bored Dad!” seem to punctuate most days, and it’s a constant challenge to find new and different things to do.

On Friday we looked through the recipe books and chose our evening meal, then the girls wrote out the shopping list and I drove them up to Borough Market at London Bridge to buy ingredients.

Borough Market has stood on its present site for around 250 years, and nowadays opens for wholesale trader between 2am and 8am six nights a week – but not Saturdays.  It’s also open to the public on Thursdays, Fridays and Saturdays, offering a massive number of stalls selling everything from flowers, fruit, meat, vegetables, wine, bread, and most of the stall holders offer ‘tasters’, so you really won’t need much lunch before you wander round!

The range of produce is out of this world; ostrich and kangaroo steaks share space with exotic fish and seafood.  Unusual fruit and vegetables suggest some really great ideas for dishes, and there are even specialist stalls for both olive oil and chillies!

Borough Market is well worth a visit, and there are several great restaurants right on its doorstep, so when the market’s closed you can still enjoy the ambience!

if they’re not meant to be here, why release them?

Idly flicking through the Freeview television channels this morning, I came across a programme called something like “UK Border Patrol”. It was yet another ’shaky hand-held camera’ type reality documentary.

The series follows the exploits of UK Customs and Immigration officers as they execute their duties at Britain’s sea ports,aiports and on city streets. A recurrent story running throught this particular episode was a swoop by officers at Stratford Station in London’s docklands.

One by one, the team stopped and questioned people going in or out of the station. Searching for evidence of overstayed leave, non-existent visas or fraudulent identity, the team slowly detained then arrested those whose stories didn’t add up.

By the end of the programme, HM Customs and Immigration had charged and loaded no less than seven alleged illegal immigrants into their van, who were then taken to a police station, questioned further and, in this case, all seven were charged.

As a summing up at the end of the programme, viewers were told that the seven men had been charged then relesed on bail pending their court appearance. We were also told that not one of the seven had turned up for their court appearance, and police were now trying to “locate their whereabouts”.

What a total waste of time, money and effort. A five year old would know that once released they’ll just abscond. If they’re not meant to be in this country, why release them once they’re caught?

Kent’s businesses – well placed to survive the recession

Early start today – I had to be at Eastwell Manor in Ashford for a breakfast meeting with the Kent Invicta Chamber of Commerce. Their Chief Executive Jo James is a valued member of my “Backing Kent Business” campaign steering group, and she organised this morning’s event in order that I could hear at first hand from Jo’s members about the issues that really mattered to them.

For my part, I admitted that if KCC is to have the ‘new relationship with business’ which both Paul Carter, the Leader and I have espoused in Kent’s Regeneration Framework, we have to admit that in the past, we could have done better.

Payment of invoices came up in the discussion – one of our promises is the reduce the time taken for KCC to pay from thirty days to twenty. Before the campaign we were paying just 44% of invoices in twenty days, and I was pleased to say that since the BKB campaign launched six months ago we’ve grown this to 78% of invoices.

Bureaucracy was mentioned of course, and its obstructive effect on business. I was also amazed to hear that the cost of a construction project commissioned directly by KCC was far less than the cost of a similar project commissioned under a Government PFI scheme.

I heard about a work placement scheme which took in an aspiring young law student, and found them a ‘relevant’ work placement – clearing a canal!

With every one of these meetings, I hear more stories of bureacracy and box ticking, more issues to resolve. But I also come away with a real sense that Kent’s businesses are well placed to survive the recession and emerge at the forefront of our economy.

Dover – what a special place

Exactly one hundred years ago Louis Bleriot set off from Sangatte for the half hour flight to Dover.  Unlike yesterday – which was an excellent day for flying – the weather conditions were not good, and the Bleriot XI aircraft had no compass.  Against the odds (Bleriot had burned his foot on the aircraft’s exhaust the previous day) he navigated towards Dover by eye, finally landing in Dover and crushing his landing gear.  But the flight, just over thirty five minutes, carried him into the history books and won him a £1000 prize offered for the first crossing by the Daily Mail.

On Saturday I went down to Dover for the Bleriot celebrations.  The Bleriot Memorial has been re-landscaped and looked wonderful in the morning sun, as scores of local dignitaries celebrated the centenary event alongside M.Bleriot’s grandson.

Amidst the carnival atmosphere throughout the town, the arrival of a celebration flight in replica aircraft, the flypasts by Hurricane and Spitfire planes and Sea King helicopter, it struck me that Dover and Bleriot have some striking similarities.  Dedication, passion, the will to succeed – all are common traits which underpin extraordinary achievement.

For thousands of visitors to the celebrations yesterday, Dover should now become a location of choice.  I’m honoured to be Chairman of the Dover Pride regeneration partnership, which brings together partners from a whole range of agencies to ensure that Dover fulfils its promise.   We now need to make sure that the same dedication, passion and commitment shown by a lone Frenchman a century ago spurs us on to acknowledge what a special place Dover really is.

Well done Chloe Smith

The recriminations have started – Barry Sheerman and Charles Clarke join a queue of MPs ready to tear into Gordon Brown as Labour faced their most humiliating defeat for years.

The Norwich by election saw a Labour majority of 5000 washed away by a passionate campaign by local Conservative candidate Chloe Smith, who achieved a winning majority of 7000.

Of some amusement was Ben Bradshaw MP, interviewed by pundits during television coverage of the election He was making the point that the Conservative’s win was not that impressive, as their swing of six per cent was less than that of Labour under similar circumstances.

He was gently reminded that he had been misinformed – the majority was not six percent, but sixteen…

Well done Chloe Smith!

Icelandic deposits – pot calling the kettle black?

I see from this week’s Kent Messenger (“MPs add to criticism of £50m banking ‘failures’”, p36) that an all-party Select Committee of MPs chaired by Dr Phyllis Starkey has criticised local authorities, including Kent County Council for their handling of Icelandic bank investments and the oft-quoted £50m caught up in Glitnir, Landsbaanki and Heritable when the Icelandic economy crashed.

Predictably, Liberal Democrat and Labour leaders Trudy Dean and Les Christie have enthusiastically joined in the criticism, with Les stating that “…councils ought to have done better and handled things differently.” and Trudy calling for KCC to “offer the [public] apology we have not yet had.”.

Many will recall the catastrophic LibLab coalition at Kent County Council in the late 1990s which led to unaffordable rates of council tax, a mire of bureaucracy, reduced council services and ironically, a squandering of KCC’s financial reserves from £55m down to just £5m – coincidentally, a loss of £50m.

The difference being that most of our £50m will be refunded.

Sometimes more brickbats than bouquets

I visited the Social Care Expo at Kent County Showground yesterday, where I spoke to around forty social care businesses over tea and coffee.

As part of KCC’s ‘new relationship with business’ I’m travelling around Kent, meeting with different business sectors to find out what we need to do to help bring our economy out of the doldrums.

It’s not easy – we need total honesty in these conversations, and sometimes there are more brickbats than bouquets.

But it’s crucial that the County Council knows where it needs to improve if we’re truly going to play our part in the recovery of our businesses.