Information on the schedule of bins has just been circulated to councillors in the following statement from the Council

Keeping Green at Christmas

To help residents stay green this Christmas Durham County Council is publishing festive refuse and recycling collection dates.

In the Derwentside, Durham City and Sedgefield areas, there is no change to the collection day.  Bins will still be collected on Monday 28 December, even though it is a Bank Holiday.

In Easington the day is as normal apart from Friday, when collections will change from Friday 25 December to Monday 28 December and from Friday 1 January to Monday 4 January 2010.

In the Chester le Street, Teesdale and Wear Valley areas, collection dates will be the same as usual up to and including Christmas Eve. From Friday 25 December until Wednesday 30 December, bins will be collected one working weekday later than usual, including Monday 28 December even though it s a Bank Holiday.  Bins that would usually be collected on Thursday 31 December will be emptied on Saturday 2 January 2010, and a usual collection on Friday 1 January will move to Monday 4 January 2010.

All collections throughout the county will be back to normal from Monday 4 January 2010.

Residents with any queries should contact their local council office.

Did you know that Rotary Clubs around the world have raised over $700M towards the eradication of poliomyelitis world wide?

 In addition, they are currently raising another $200M as a matched-funding challenge by the Bill Gates Foundation.

 Clubs in County Durham, including my own, Durham Bede Rotary Club, are part of this project and one of them has come up with a clever fund-raising scheme. So …

… do you have an old mobile phone that you wish to dispose of in a beneficial way?

The Barnard Castle Rotary Club has got together with the envirocharities scheme which allows you to dispose of your old mobile phone, and if it has value, to sell it. Envirocharities will give £3 to your charity and you can receive the remaining value or can donate all or part of it to your charity.

So if you have an old mobile phone to get rid of, go to the  www.endpolionow.co.uk web site (or click on the link in the left sidebar) where you can find out how the scheme works. It is amazingly easy to do something that will really make a difference.

Polio is now endemic in only four countries in the world thanks mainly to the efforts of Rotary International.

The County Council has just launched a new area on its web site called ‘My Durham’. It is designed to give information relevant to the house where you live.

So, for instance, you can find out who your local elected representatives are, where your nearest schools are and what day your bins are emptied all by putting in your postcode and house number or name.

Eventually it is hoped to develop it to the point where you can monitor your council tax payments and any other transactions that you have with the council.

At the moment it is still at an early stage of development, but why not try it out and let me know what you think. You can access the site from the main council we page.

Regular readers of this site will be aware of my long-standing campaign to open up the working of the Durham Admission Forum to public scrutiny. Now things have taken a serious turn.

Earlier this year, the Council passed unanimously a Lib Dem motion urging the Forum to open up its meeting to the public.

On 24 September, the Forum met and debated the issue and decided to reject the council’s plea and tyo continue to meet in private.

The minutes of the meeting make interesting reading as on the second page is the statement “Some research has been undertaken to find out how other Admission Forums in the country manage these matters and so far we have not been able to identify any Admission Forum which meets in public.”

This is somewhat strange, as I have just googled the phrase “admission forum public meeting” and within 10 minutes established three authorities, Leeds, Redcar and Cleveland, and Slough, that do indeed have their meetings in public (I stopped looking after I had found these three so I am sure there must be more).

This is unacceptable, and I have now written to the Council to ask for the whole issue to be revisited as the Forum has clearly been materially misled.

If you look at the minutes, you will also see that the members of the Forum were concerned about being intimidated (my word) by meeting in public. I have to say that as they mostly consist of senior professionals in the education sector, I am not much impressed by that argument either.

The issue rumbles on…

I have just received notice that there is to be a significant period of riverbank footpath closures from 14 December through to the end of March so that a number of dangerous trees can be dealt with.

Here is a map of the riverbank footpaths affected.

The notification seems to imply that paths will be closed as and when needed, but I still need to check that out.

[Added the day after the initial posting] I can confirm that closures of particular footpaths will only take place as and when necessary for the work being carried out.

I have just heard (via a press reporter) that the attempt at a Judicial Review of the Admissions Adjudictor’s decision on admissions in Durham City has failed. It seems that the application was refused permissions to go to a full hearing. This will be a great disappointment to many living in the vicinity of Bowburn and Shincliffe.

My reaction is that this just shows how crazy a system we now have for school admissions.

Both Conservative and Labour Governments have spent the last 25 years promoting the idea of ‘choice’ in school admissions, when deep down we all know that there is no such thing and they have been selling a pup. There is only ‘preference’ and when a school is over-subscribed, somebody will lose out.

That might not be so bad if local councillors were then permitted to decide on what they think is best in there area (and suffer the consequence at the ballot box if they get it wrong).

We are, however, in a crazy situation, where a non-democratic unaccountable body (the County Admissions Forum) can take decisions in secret behind closed doors and when elected councillors have the temerity to disagree the Forum gets its way by appealing to someone unconnected with the County.

The least the Government can do now is to require Admissions Forums to meet in public and allow affected parents to make direct in-person representation to them.

But I am not holding my breath…

The next Durham AAP meeting is one of the six monthly ‘big-tent’ Forum meetings and will be held on Wednesday 11 November at County Hall, 6 pm - 8 pm.

The meeting will discuss the proposals that have been emerging from the AAP Board meetings over recent months in the areas of

• Activities for young people

• Development of the city centre

• Increased support for the voluntary sector

• Clean and green environment.

which were the priorities determined by the previous Forum meeting in May.

This is the opportunity for you to have your say on projects and services in the Durham AAP area. We want the whole community to be involved.

If you wish to attend, you should book your place by visiting www.durham.gov.uk/aap or by contacting 0191 301 8718.

The County Council has an active Welfare Rights Team with a good record of obtaining benefits for those who are entitled to them - it had a success rate of 67% at appeal tribunals in 2008-9, for instance.

If you readers to know more, I have a small supply of leaflets entitled (Quick Guide 2009 2010 - A guide to benefit and tax credit rates), so if you would like a copy drop me an e-mail and I will send one on to you.

You may also contact the Welfare Rights Team by e-mail at welfare.rights@durham.gov.uk, by telephone at 0191 370 8787 or by writing to Welfare Rights, Social Inclusion Service, Durham County Council, The Rivergreen Centre, Durham DH1 5TS.

I have also placed this information on the Community Contacts page.

The Rotary Club of Durham Bede is again holding its Annual Charity Concert “Friday Night is Music Night” on Friday 4 December in Elvet Church, Old Elvet (6.45 pm for 7 pm).

Music will be provided by Durham County Wind Band with songs and arias from Val Anderson, Evelyn Mitchell, John Oliver and Accompanist Martin Dack.

Tickets are £7.50 including tea/coffee (students and children £2.50) with proceeds to St Cuthbert’s Hospice and Marie Curie Cancer Care.

Tickets are available from Durham Tourist Office, Stu Cuthbert’s Hospice or Rotarians (e-mail me).

It will, as always, be a very enjoyable and entertaining evening.

I have just received a flier (Countdown to CO₂penhagen) for a Climate Change Panel Event sponsored by Christian Aid on Wednesday 18 November at Cranmer Hall, South Bailey between 7.30 pm and 9 pm.

The key areas of discussion will depend upon the perceived urgency that will surround the Copenhagen summit, as well as the more fundamental principles that will influence the actions of participants in the whole event.  We also plan to provide ideas for action, as well as the chance to sign up for The Wave (SCC March) in London on 5 December.

Christian Aid is part of the Stop Climate Chaos coalition and, locally, part of the MakePovertyHistory-NorthEast.

Are you supporting the Durham City of Culture Bid - I certainly am.

You can help by registering your support on the County Council web site at the Back The Bid web page.

I have just received a document entitled Consultation on the Development of Travel Schemes and Alternatives to Bus Services across County Durham which looks at a number of issues across the County involving options to help those who currently have difficulty accessing public bus services.

The document asks for reponses to a number of questions and there is a Consultation Questionnaire that goes with it. This refers to a “pre-paid envelopeprovided” which is a tad difficult on the internet! If you want to respond by post, then send yours to Adam Robinson, Passenger Transport, Durham County Council, County Hal, Durham.

The deadline for responses is 3 December 2009.

I have just learnt that a group of parents in the Shincliffe-Bowburn area have started the formal process to seek a judicial review of the decision of the Schools Adjudicator earlier this summer. At this point I do not have any further details.

The County Council has just launched a consultation exercise looking towards the new Local Development Framework (LDF) that will have to be written to replace the existing District Local Plans and the County Structure Plan.

The process has been started with the publication of the Core Strategy Issues Paper on 9 October after which there is a seven week consultation period ending on Friday 27 November 2009.

The County has created an LDF Consultation Portal on its web site. This web page contains a link to the Core Strategy Issues Paper as a series of web pages (yes a pdf-file might have been a lot more convenient for most people, but we get what we are given).

The Portal also has links for individual comments to be registered.

This is a key stage in what will no doubt be a long period during which the new LDF will emerge.

There is more information at the County Council’s LDF web page.

Durham police are holding PACT (Police and Communities Together) meetings aimed at the Neville’s Cross, Crossgate and North End communities.

Meetings are to be held in Room 1B at County Hall between 6 pm and 6.45 pm on Thursday 22 October 2009 and Thursday 26 November.

The meetings will be attended by a representative from your neighbourhood policing team, will be specific to the area and individual neighbourhood priorities will be discussed. All members of the community are welcome.

Followers of the school admissions saga will remember that the Council accepted a Lib Dem motion urging the County School Admissions Forum to meet in public in future and to allow the possibility of representations being made to it in person by interested parties.

I was therefore amazed to hear a statement at the most recent Council meeting by the Cabinet member with responsibility in this area, that the Admissions Forum has snubbed its nose at the unanimous decision of the elected representatives for the County and will continue to meet in secret.

I am appalled that this unrepresentative and unaccountable body can go onto acting in this way, and I intend to continue to campaign for it to be dragged out fully into the public gaze so that it can be made to justify the power that it exercises.

The County Durham & Darlington NHS Foundation Trust is holding a free talk on Stroke Awareness at Darlington Memorial Hospital, Hollyhurst Rd, Darlington, County Durham, on Tuesday 6 October 2009, 5.30 - 7 pm.

Click here for a poster advertising the event.

The County Council now has a scheme for small grants to support projects which contribute to the creative and cultural development of County Durham. Grants may be available up to £500, but there are of course a number of criteria that have to be met.

I have lodged the guidelines here and the application form.

The scheme is running through until 2011 with a series of deadlines for applications through that period.

In the 2009-10 round, there are two deadlines for applications: noon on 30 October and noon on 15 March next year.

I have just placed information contact details about local policing issues on the Community Contacts web page.

The police have web pages for localities in the City which may be accessed from http://www.durham.police.uk/local/north/durham.

The local pages covering the division are:

Neville’s Cross -  www.durham.police.uk/neighbourhood.php?neighbourhood_id=163.

Crossgate and North End - www.durham.police.uk/neighbourhood.php?neighbourhood_id=43.

Did the earth move? Well no, but the Lib Dem Group achieved a small victory in a vote at County Hall on Wednesday.

There has been increasing concern over the impact in Durham City of the Schools Adjudicator’s decision earlier this summer to impose a set of distance-based admissions criteria for county secondary schools.

That problem has not gone away and in spite of a lot of hard work by residents of Shincliffe and Bowburn, it seems like they are stuck with things for the next three years.

In the back of all this has been a mysterious body call the County School Admissions Forum which advises the Council in this area.

The Admissions Forum recommended distance-based rules, but the County Cabinet rejected this in favour of feeder school in the City. All very well, you might think, but then it appears that the Admissions Forum can have a second bite of the cherry by appealing to the Schools Adjudicator (indeed the Forum is virtually expected to do so).

This is bad enough, but the Forum is not required to justify its views in any sort of public arena. It has decided thus far to meet in private and will not allow representations to be made in person by any interested party.

And there is nothing the County Council can do to force it to do otherwise.

It seemed to us that the Admissions Forum has many of the attributes of a sixteenth century Star Chamber, so the Lib Dems put down a motion at Council this week urging the Admissions Forum to both meet in public and to allow personal representations to be made to it.

The small victory is that Labour supported us, although we were clearly warned not to expect it to happen again in the near future (but that won;t stop us trying).

Let’s just hope that the Admissions Forum listens to the democratically elected representatives of the people and changes its practice. Forums in several other parts of the country meet publicly without any problem, so why not in County Durham?

The County Council has just issued a consultation document about its strategy for Bus Information.

The paper is uploaded here: Bus Information Strategy 2006-2011 Consultation Draft.doc

If any reader has views that they would like me to feed into the process, please contact me a.s.a.. in the usual way. I have to feed in responses by 1 October.

A meeting of the North East Regional Grand Committee is to be held in the Town Hall, Middlesbrough on 25th September, 10.30 am - 1.30 pm.

The Regional Grand Committees have been created by Parliament to provide greater democratic scrutiny at a regional level. Each Committee will operate like a miniature version of the House of Commons giving MPs from across the North East region a forum to debate the ‘state of the region’ and put questions to the Regional Minister, Nick Brown, MP.  The debate for this meeting will focus on tackling the recession and the regional economy.

Every MP representing a constituency in the region is entitled to attend and participate in the Committee meetings.  The sitting is open to the press and the public, however the public are not permitted to ask questions.  Unlike Select Committees the Regional Grand Committees will not take evidence from external witnesses or produce a final report.

Anyone wishing to attend is requested to advise Nigel Sayer at tel: 01642 729 031, nigel_sayer@middlesbrough.gov.uk.

The Council will be running a Warm Homes Campaign to raise awareness across the County about the Warm Front grant scheme, which can provide grants for central heating and home insulation measures.

Grants apply to homeowners and private sector tenants who are in receipt of a qualifying benefit or disability premium renting from a private landlord (excludes tenants from Registered Social Landlords).

The Warm Front grant recently increased to £3,500 to install new gas central heating and £6,000 for oil fired heating where the property is off the gas network.

Where the homeowner does not qualify for the Warm Front grant and is aged over 60 they may still be eligible for a £300 rebate where central heating is not installed or inoperable.

The council has produced promotional material which should be available from Council buildings, but if any resident wants more information, please do e-mail me and I will try to help. you can e-mail the council direct on energysmart@durham.gov.uk.

Information is also available from the Warm Front web site.

For the uninitiated BSF stands for “Building Schools for the Future”, which is a government flagship scheme to rebuild or refurbish all secondary schools in England (over a long period stretching well into the next decade).

The Academies are a parallel programme devised under the mistaken idea that new buildings linked with taking control away from the local council will somehow improve education. It won’t - all the evidence is that school success is linked to strong and effective school leadership by the headteacher - there are plenty of examples of Academies that have not preformed well.

So how are these linked?

Well, in County Durham the Labour government appears to have threatened that unless rapid progress is made with the three Academies at Belmont, Consett and Stanley, the BSF programme across the rest of the County will be delayed.

Out of this has come a rushed process to identify suitable sites for these three schemes.

The Belmont scheme raised the possibility of using parish council community land (without any consultation with the parish council). Of course everyone got up in arms in protest and the obvious solution of rebuilding on the Belmont School site was the option the was eventually agreed.

But the parish council land should never have been in the frame, and this is the first example of how to upset people as much as possible by rushing at things instead of taking a more measured approach.

The Stanley proposal seems to have caused few ripples locally, but the Consett proposal is the second one demonstrating the County Council’s extraordinary ability to upset the maximum number of people.

In Consett, the County Cabinet decided that their preferred site was a greenfield site currently used by Consett FC, Consett Rugby Club and is a major local recreation area.

The local people in Consett said, hang on - wait a minute, we have a large brownfield site, a legacy of the old steel works, which we would all prefer so that we can keep our green recreation space. Indeed a petition of over 1100 names was presented to the Council saying so.

This week, on 18 August, the County Overview and Scrutiny Management Board discussed a call-in proposal to review the Cabinet decision, but the call-in was defeated by 10 votes to 9. The people of Consett are still fuming and may well vent their anger at the ballot box when next they have the chance.

So how does this fit with BSF? At this meeting, the Director of Children’s Services made great play of how the council was under pressure from government for a speedy decision on identifying the preferred Academy sites so that they could then enter into the contracts to move forward on BSF in the south west of the County and at Framwellgate Moor.

So you can imagine my amazement when I got home to see in the Northern Echo that morning an announcement that the Council had already signed contracts with an outfit called Inspired Spaces to take the next steps on the BSF programme. The Director had several times referred to signing contracts with Inspired Spaces when explaining to the Committee the pressure the council was under to come to a speedy decision.

Later, my sources told me that, following the announcement of the contracts (via a press release issued by the council), the council had been asked exactly which “44 secondary and special schools” were due to be rebuilt or upgraded. Astoundingly no-one at County Hall was able to say which they are.

I guess they do know as it, will be in the contract, but it does show what a confused state the county has got its secondary school policy into.

It has certainly got a lot of concerned residents extremely angry over decisions being made where the overwhelming views of local people expressed in through so-called consultation processes are routinely ignored.

I just received the following message by e-mail:

“You may be aware that  Durham’s City of Culture brand was launched this week.

“We are holding an exclusive exhibition at the Empty shop a community art space in Durham used by North East artists (address: 1 Framwellgate Bridge, DH1 4SJ).

“The shop will be open to the North East public for six days from (11am-5pm). We have a blank wall which we are asking people to sign to back the bid.

“We would like to invite you to come along to the exhibition to see what Durham’s City of Culture 2013 bid will look like and have the opportunity to pledge your support and feedback on the bid.

“If you could pass this email onto anyone else you feel relevant it would be much appreciated.”

This is taking place all this week until Saturday 22 August.

The Loft in North Road has decided to distinguish itself again this time by running a promotion where customers can pay £10 and drink as much as they like.

With everyone concerned about excessive drunkenness and binge drinking, this sort of activiy is only going to make things worse.

No doubt the proprietor of The Loft will claim that they never serve anyone who is drunk, but why then do we get the problems on our streets later?

In my opinion this sort of promotion is totally irresponsible and will lead to all sorts of public nuisance. In fact prevention of public nuisance is one of the governments licensing objectives, so it would be very interesting to see what the County Licensing Committee made of a complaint by a resident who lives nearby The Loft on this basis. [The Labour government’s laws prevent me as the local councillor making a complaint myself - it has to be someone who lives ‘in the vicinity’ of the premises concerned.]

Interestingly, just after the photograph above was taken, someone came out of The Loft and took the banner inside. For some reason they didn’t want to talk about the issue.

Following a local consultation exercise a new parking control zone is to be proposed for an area across the boundary between Neville’s Cross and Framwellgate Moor county council divisions.

There have been household street votes which have mostly been in favour but those few streets that voted against are being excluded form the proposals.

The areas concerned in the Neville’s Cross division are Aykley Green, Aykley Court, Aykley Vale and Dunholme Close. The households at Aykley Heads Farm voted against. The other streets are in Framwellgate Moor.

Boste Crescent and Old Dryburn Way are geographically within the perimeter of the zone, but because they have not yet been adopted by the Council, are excluded from the proposals.

The next step  is for the proposals to be published in the press after which there will be a period for formal objections. If there are objections, then they will go to the County Highway Committee which will take the final decision.

Other streets in North End were not involved in this exercise, although I and the other Lib Dem Councillor Grenville Holland did do an informal survey of the area not so long ago. The results of this were generally positive and the Highways people at County Hall have agreed to start work on draft proposals for this area later this financial year.

The first Board Meeting of Durham Area Action Partnership (DAAP)  is taking place on Monday 3 August between 6pm and 8 pm at Bearpark Community Centre, Institute Terrace, Bearpark, Durham DH7 7AG.

The meeting is open to the public as observers, but if you would like to attend, please contact Lyn Cummings on 0191 301 8536 or Lynn.Cummings@durham.gov.uk

The members of the Board have been selected and are:

Elected Members Section: Councillors Rev Crooks, David Freeman, Ken Holroyd, Amanda Hopgood, Nigel Martin (Vice Chair), Carols Wood and John Lightley (Shincliffe Parish Council).

Partners Section: Mr Ron Batty (Business Sector), Stuart Errington (Fire & Rescue Service), Mr Glynn Hall (Housing and Durham County Council), Ms Paulina Lubacz (Durham University), Mr Iain Miller (PCT), Mrs Julie Taylor (CVS) and Ch. Insp. Colin Williamson (Durham Constabulary).

Public Representatives Section: Mr Patrick Conway, Revd Robert Lawrence, Mrs Colleen Peters, Ms Marie-Thérèse Pinder, Mr Ben Robertson, Mr Stuart Thompson and Mr Stuart Walton.

The public representatives were selected following written applications and interviews done over several days in early July.

Following appeals against the proposed feeder-schools admissions criteria for Durham Johnston, the Schools Adjudicator issued his findings today.

In brief the Adjudicator decided that having feeder schools based criteria for one school was unfair and that it was unfair suddenly to change to such criteria when families made choices of primary schools before they could have known that feeder schools might be used in the future.

The Adjudicator has used his powers to direct that there be a uniform system of admissions criteria across the County for the next three years. These will be (direct quote from the Adjudicator’s opinion):

1.         Children in public care

2.         Medical Reasons

            Pupils with very exceptional medical factors directly related to school placement

3.         Family Links

            Pupils who have a brother or sister already attending the school who is expected to be on roll at the school at the time of admission

4.         Applicants to their nearest School

            Those children who have applied for a place at the nearest school to their home address measured by the shortest walking route

5.         All other applicants

Tie-breaker

                        Where the school is oversubscribed within any of the above categories the following tiebreakers will be applied:

            (a)       For those children who have applied for a place at the nearest school to their home address (category 4), priority will be given to those who would otherwise have to travel the furthest distance to the next nearest school¹

            (b)       For other children (category 5), priority will be given to those children who live nearest to the school applied for

            In the unlikely event of the school being oversubscribed within categories 1, 2 or 3 tiebreaker (b) will apply.

            Footnote¹:  ‘School’ means any Local Authority maintained secondary school or a DCSF maintained Academy in County Durham.  Distance will be measured by the shortest walking route. Those parents who live in County Durham and have children in year 6 in primary schools maintained by Durham County Council will be told which school is nearest to their home address according to the official measuring system.  The same information will be provided for any other applicant on request.

———————————————————————————–

I have always thought that a one-size-fits-all system across a geographically diverse county must be basically unfair to some communities. Differences in geography are bound to impact on the way things work in practice.

The stated objective of the tie-break for criterion 4 was to make the system fairer to those who apply but live at a distance from their preferred school. The irony is that for Durham Johnston I believe that everyone for whom DJ is their closest school will actually get in (i.e. those in Neville’s Cross, Langley Moor, most if not all of Elvet and parts of Meadowfield and Brandon) because the total of these will not over-subscribe the school.

So the tie-break that is most likely to operate will be pure distance from the school for those further out in Shincliffe and Bowburn. Indeed a cursory look at the map leads me to believe that many other areas will be closer.

As the crow flies, places like Bearpark, Newton Hall, Framwellgate Moor and Pity Me are closer to Crossgate Moor than Shincliffe and Bowburn. [This all needs a health warning as the crucial distance is shortest walking route not direct line, but the differences appear significant.] 

If the priorities change as I think they will, then we may well see a steady change in the communities that Durham Johnston serves as the sibling link connections to the further out places disappear over time.

But this will not only have an effect on families, it could also affect the intakes of other schools such as Deerness.

Change is always hard, but was this level of change really what the County Council wanted?

One other annoyance is the fact that a County Council body supported the appeal against the County Council’s own proposal for feeder schools.

This was the Admissions Forum; a mysterious group that is supposed to represent the local authority, schools and parents, which meets in private (it has refused to meet in public and it has refused to allow representations to be made in person to it on these immensely important issues) and publishes its minutes several months after its meetings. Up to now it has had only a single parent on it who would be easily outvoted by the rest (not that we get to know whether there have been any votes or who voted for what).

What a mess!

 ——————————————————————-

The full opinion can be viewed here in the Schools Adjudicator’s decision file.

The Council is in the process of publishing the allowances and expenses for all councillors for the 2008-09 financial year.

The list for Durham County Council is published on the following web page:

http://www.durham.gov.uk/PDFApproved/CouncillorsAllowances0809.pdf

The details of my personal allowances and expenses for both the County Council and for my membership of the former Durham City Council is set out in a web page on this site - simply click on the link in the left column here.

For the sake of transparency I have included some comments on the detail of my expenses claims. If anyone wishes more detail I am happy to provide it.

One final comment. There have been some highly inaccurate comments in the letters column of the local press alleging that Councillor Carol Woods (Lib Dem PPC for Durham City) had claimed £30K last year in expenses/allowances while Deputy Leader of Durham City Council.

The actual figure was £13,871 being the combination of £5,571 in Basic Allowance and £8,300 in Special Responsibility Allowance for being Deputy Leader with nil claims for both travelling and subsistence expenses. [In normal parlance the word ‘allowance’ would be ’salary’, but council-speak is a mystery unto itself.]

I hope those peddling a gross error will now have the good grace to apologise.

If I were being charitable I would say that they had overheard a conversation and misheard ‘thirteen’ as ‘thirty’; nevertheless they had a duty to check the facts before sounding off shock-horror in the press!

I have just received the following flier that Community groups may be interested in.

     £50 Grant  

Do you run a community group?

Are you interested in arranging fun activities to celebrate the European Day of Languages on 26^th September?

If so, and you would like a chance to win a £50 grant towards event costs, please read on……………

To encourage our communities to take part in European Day of Language celebrations, Europe Direct North East, which is hosted by Durham County Council, is offering groups a chance to win one of ten £50 grants.

What are we looking for?

Community activities, with a European language or cultural theme, to take place on or around the 26^th September. For example you could organise:

·     European language taster sessions so that people can learn e.g. French, German, Spanish, Hungarian, Polish, etc.

·     Projects that raise awareness about other European cultures, e.g. demonstrate or learn songs or dance from another European country; or display or make traditional dress from another European country.

·     A party that brings together members of the community, some of whom originated in other European countries, e.g. Poland

How to apply

Please contact us as soon as possible for an application form or further information. Telephone: 0191 383 3448 or Email: europe.direct@durham.gov.uk

Deadline – we must receive your completed application form by

5 p.m. Friday 24^th July 2009

Given the national mood over MPs expenses which seemed to be encouraging many voters to give all of the three main parties a good kicking, I was relieved and heartened by the Lib Dem showing in the North East.

We held off the UKIP challenge to retain the third seat for Fiona hall, who has been an excellent and respected MEP over the past five years doing some leading EU-wide work on environmental and climate change issues as well as working hard for the North East.

The vote across County Durham was counted at the Abbey Sports Centre yesterday evening with the following result:

So the Lib Dems were confirmed as the leading opposition party across County Durham.

There was no separate count for the City constituency area as happened last time because of local government re-organisation, but at the voter verification on Thursday evening we estimate that we took around a third of the City vote about half as much again as the Labour vote. It was difficult to be very accurate as the votes were verified face down and so we had to rely on impressions of marks coming through the back of the ballot papers!

Government’s management of data is a hot topic at the moment. That’s why Lib Dems were concerned when we noticed that Durham County Council’s entry in the register appeared not to have been updated since its change of status to a unitary council.

Worse still, Durham County Council’s Electoral Registration Officer did not seem to be registered under the Data Protection Act – but was in the middle of running a European Election.

A bit of further research showed that most of the District Councils are still registered, though they ceased to exist two months ago – and they are still registered to handle election data!The worst aspect of all, from my point of view, is the lack of answers from County Hall.

They have neither told us when or whether the county has submitted an application for the Electoral Registration Officer, nor when the Information Commissioner was notified of the county’s change of status and all the resulting extra types of data it is handling.

When we asked if this meant that the county had not carried out these responsibilities we got the impression that they weren’t sure.

The sooner they make an announcement about the position the better. Everyone in the county has a right to know if their data is being handled in compliance with the law.

Some good news - I have just had a telephone call from a Journal reporter to say that Banks Developments Ltd have issued a press release saying that they are withdrawing their planning application to develop Mount Oswald.

Banks say that they are going away to consider their options for the site, but given that they have again been sent away with a flea in their ear, maybe we can hope that this is the last we hear of them on this issue for the foreseeable future.

But we should not be complacent!

So many thanks to everyone who has contributed over the past two or more years to the campaign against developing Mount Oswald - a small celebration might be in order.

“The Age of Stupid” is a film about climate change and will be shown at the new Durham Johnston School this Friday (22 May) at 3.45 pm and again at Clayport Library at 7.30 pm. There is a small charge for admissions.

There have been rumours going round that the University may be intending to increase its student numbers with a corresponding impact on housing and rented accommodation in the City.

I am pleased to say that, after an exchange of e-mails between the Crossgate Partneship and the Vice Chancellor,  this will not happen in the near future.

The VC said the following:

“I don’t know who stated undergraduate intake would be increased by 250 next year because this is wrong.  Indeed, even if we wanted to increase numbers we would not be able to because the Government has cut all additional numbers.  There is a need for fewer, not more, multi-occupancy houses in Durham.

“I hope I have clarified University strategy.  We are not intending to increase undergraduate numbers in Durham City, and we have gradually reduced numbers over the past five years.  You will also notice that we have been very successful in bringing our students back into College and University properties which is why there are so many empty houses around Durham with estate agent signs.  Indeed, estate agents are writing to me complaining that their business is being undermined, showing our strategy is successful.  What is now needed is for the residents who inappropriately converted their houses into multi-occupancy properties to return them to family houses.  This will require the landlords working with the local Council and I would strongly support any such initiatives.  There are already too many multi-occupancy houses in Durham and it is a shame that so many were converted on ill-informed notions of student numbers. 

“I hope this helps and reassures you.  Anything you can do to work with the Council and landlords to prevent further conversion of private houses into multi-occupancy housing (I see some are still proposed in Whinney Hill) would be helpful.  The University supports this. … Anything you can do to work with the Council and landlords to prevent further conversion of private houses into multi-occupancy housing (I see some are still proposed in Whinney Hill) would be helpful.  The University supports this.

This is pretty definitive stuff and supports the view of most residents that we need to stop the conversion of family homes into student lettings.

The former City Council refused planning permission for a number of these conversions but was often overturned on appeal.

Let us hope that the County Council continue to oppose this trend and can hold the line against the continued loss of city-centre family housing.

The first AAP Forum for Durham City was held last week at County Hall and decided two things - the name of the AAP (it will be the highly original “Durham Area Action Partnership” [DAAP]) and the strategic priorities for DAAP in its first year.

The voting on the priorities was as follows:

Altogether it was a very good meeting and was well oversubscribed. There will be a follow-uo event for those who could not be accommodated, but I do not know the details of that as yet.

The other good thing was the presence of a good number of new faces, so it was not just ‘the usual suspects’.

We have Euro elections on 4 June, so I have created a separate page with information about key dates and forms for getting on the electoral register or asking for a postal or proxy vote.

A link to the page “Elections and Voting” is at the left or you can click here: Elections and Voting.

It is now more than six months since the latest Banks planning application for Mount Oswald went in and residents are starting to ask why it has not yet gone to committee for decision.

I have just spoken to the planners who tell me that they have made it clear to Banks that their proposals could not be recommended to Committee for approval as they stand. On the other hand, because Banks have an agreement with the planners to extend the normal decision-making period, they can still try to amend their proposals to try to make them more acceptable.

This surely should not go on much longer and a time surely has to come soon when this is decided one way or another.

If you want to see progress on the application, you can see the current state of things on the City Planning Application Details web site .

I have spoken to a number of people who are concerned about possible university expansion onto Mount Oswald. The University lodged a letter of objection making it clear that they have no interest in having more student residences built there.

Cabinet finally made a decision this morning on the admissions criteria for Durham Johnston. The relevant part of the resolution is as follows:

————————————–

Shincliffe CE (Controlled) Primary, Brandon Community Primary, Durham St Margaret’s CE Primary, Bowburn Junior, Langley Moor Primary, Neville’s Cross Primary, Browney Primary and Durham Johnston School.

A scheme of admission to Durham Johnston School based on the schools named in this section being described as feeder schools for the purposes of admission to Durham Johnston such scheme to give priority of admission to children in public care, medical reasons, sibling links where the place of residence continues to be within seven miles of Durham Johnston, thereafter admission by prior attendance at one of the above feeder schools at time of application.

Tie breaker: being determined by distance from feeder school to pupil home address.

The scheme described above shall be introduced with affect from September 2010 admissions to Durham Johnston for a trial period of not less than 3 years.

————————————–

This certainly satisfies the Shincliffe and Bowburn campaigners, but it brings about exactly the problem I raised in earlier posts.

The problem is the tie-breaker, and those proposing this method have not done their homework on how priorities will change under the stated rule. Here are two examples:

Family A live at the far end of Brandon just over a mile from Brandon Junior School and have a child at that school.

Family B live in Farewell Hall about 2 miles from both Neville’s Cross and St Margaret’s Primary Schools (and further from any other school in the list) and have a child at one of them.

In the recent past, the child in Family A did not normally get in to Durham Johnston as Deerness was their closest school, but Family B were assured of a place.

Under the new rules, if push comes to shove, Family A get precedence over Family B even though Family B are a long way away from any other school.

Indeed, some quick measurements on the internet show a similar risk that priority could be given to some families in Coxhoe who have not gone to Durham Johnston in recent times (if they send their children to Bowburn Primary.

Equally, there are families in North End for whom Durham Johnston is literally around the corner, who have their children at Neville’s Cross Primary who will also find themselves liable to be trumped for a place in the same way.

So what’s to do now? The next step is that the proposals must be formally published by the Council (probably around 1 May) after which there is a period when parents may appeal to the Schools Adjudicator.

It is open to families who think this solution is wrong to make such an appeal. It is only parents and guardians who can do this - more information can be found at the Schools Adjudicator web site: www.schoolsadjudicator.gov.uk

I am very happy to help anyone wishing to get involved in the process.

A couple of other comments. Firstly this outcome shows just how not to do things. A solution to a problem has been cobbled together behind closed doors without proper research into what the likely outcomes will be.

Secondly, Durham Johnston is not the only oversubscribed school in County Durham. Now that the council has come up with a solution for the difficult Durham Johnston problem, it may be reasonable for parents wanting a place at those schools to ask whether the uniform system across the rest of County Durham is really appropriate to them also.

Residents around the area North End will know that every working day there are vehicles parked along the north side of Whitesmocks from close to the A167 down to the start of Fieldhouse Lane. This is causing difficulties for drivers and especially near the bend coming from North Enditself.

I have been shown a draft proposal to introduce double yellow lines down the length of Whitesmocks to deal with this problem. I am minded to agree to this, but would welcome any comments.

At this stage the proposal is at an early stage, and if it were to progress would have to go through the normal leagl processes where it would be advertised and any formal objectioons considered.

So if you want to know more about this or have an input at this stage, please get in touch as soon as possible.

Things at County Hall seem to be getting even more bizarre.

After a long staring contest earlier this year, Labour agreed to a small improvement to the system of call-in. This can happen when Cabinet takes a decision, but a group of non-cabinet members wants to have the matter reviewed before it is finally implemented.

In the old council, you had to persuade the Chair of Scrutiny (Labour) to agree or a Chair and Vice Chair 0f a scrutiny subcommittee (at least one Labour if not both) to support it. In practice that meant they had a veto and it was effectively impossible to get a call-in going.

In the new council any five members of a scrutiny committee can ask for a call-in and while the Chair of Scrutiny (still Labour) can veto it he has to stand up in public and justify why he has done so.

So far so good.

At the end of March, Cabinet agreed to build a new primary school in Esh Winning (something everyone supports) but they chose to build it on a green field site in the centre of the village against the wishes of the vast majority of people who responded to the local consultation, including the existing school management and governors.

So we decided that, since cabinet members had not visited either of the proposed sites and were going against the professional advice of the school management, the matter ought to be reviewed and we asked for a call-in.

At this point there is a procedural problem as the Chair of Scrutiny,  Councillor Joe Armstrong, had sent a letter to Cabinet in complete support of building on the green field site.So in our call-in request, we pointed out that Joe might be seen to have fettered his discretion, and asked that his Deputy make the decision on whether or not to accept the call-in.

All well and good, and the call in debate is to take place next Thursday (16 April) at 10.30 am at County Hall.

Now here comes the bizarre bit. Attached to the agenda papers for the meeting is a statement from the Council Monitoring Officer (chief legal advisor), that members of the Committee who have expressed a prior view on the issue can speak but must not vote, and consequentially that the members who asked for the call-in must also have a pre-determined view and so also should not vote.

This is utterly barmy. Scrutiny is not one of the quasi-judicial committees (like Planning or Licensing), so why cannot we argue on behalf of our constituents and vote on what we believe.

Surely that was what we were elected to do.

A letter from Council Leader Simon Henig came round yesterday informing us that debate at County hall is to be constrained further.

Ever since the Cabinet system came into being (around 2000), members of Durham County Council have always had the opportunity to put questions or make a case on issues at Cabinet meetings.

Now we are being told that if we want to ask questions we have to ask permission in advance and say why we have an interest. This is another old-Labour reaction to being pressed to justify in public what they are doing.

It might not matter so much if the process of Scrutiny at County Hall was more robust, but with Labour members dominating the Chairs and Vice Chairs of Scrutiny (they have 13 out of 14 places, with the last place being allocated to a member of the smallest group on the Council) and key decisions being pre-approved by the Labour Group before they go to Cabinet, no wonder they are trying to avoid debating the real issues.

The Agenda for the County Cabinet meeting on 15 April (in Durham Town Hall, starts 9.30 am) has been published and the report on school admissions criteria is still the same as it was at the previous meeting when the matter was deferred.

So the question is whether there will be enough behind the scenes pressure on the Cabinet to change things or whether Cabinet is prepared to go against the Director of Children’s Services.

My earlier post on this issue referred to the speech made by a Shincliffe resident. She also submitted a paper to Cabinet which I have been able to obtain and which can be seen here.

Her preferred option is an interesting mixture of preference to people for whom the preferred school is closest together with feeder schools.

The key issue is, of course, how to do a tie-break. Some people have been promoting ‘distance from the feeder school’ as the tie-break, but after hearing representations form local residents, I have come to the conclusion that this introduces all sorts of anomalies. So at this point my tie-breaker would be straightforward distance from the school.

LATE CLARIFICATION: I have been asked by a reader to make it clear that the Shincliffe resident was  speaking on behalf of an action group of 10 parents from Shincliffe, High Shincliffe, Bowburn and Parkhill.

Also the Appendix in the paper “does not represent a ‘preferred’ option, but an option that we hoped that Cabinet might engage with as it attempts to work with the proposals being submitted to cabinet, and yet also enable them to honour the commitments they made to our communities in 2005.”

The Cabinet has decided to go out to ‘meet the people around the County every other month.

The first meeting is in Durham Town Hall on Wednesday 15 April starting at 9.30 am when there will be a half hour slot for ‘questions from the public’.

Questions need to be in a week in advance and can be e-mailed to cabinetquestions@durham.gov.uk.

As reported in an earlier post the issue of school admissions criteria went to the County Council Cabinet yesterday where the recommendation was to adopt a single system across the county using a rather complicated hybrid distance rule.

There has clearly been a lot of pressure behind the scenes, however. Following a strong and well-argued verbal case put by a resident of Shincliffe, supported by myself and Labour councillors from that side of the City, the issue was deferred to the next Cabinet meeting on 15 April (which will be held in Durham Town Hall starting with public questions at 9.30 am with the meeting proper starting at 10 am).

The argument in favour of a one-size-fits-all approach does not stand up in a county as geographically diverse at Durham. It is surely obvious that an approach that fits the needs of one area may, simply by virtue of the geography of the settlements involved, work to the disadvantage of the needs of another area. But the officers, and I have to say quite a number of Labour councillors, refuse to accept the logic of this argument.

Nonetheless, there must now be a fighting chance that a system of feeder schools will be set up in parts of the Durham City area, something that the vast majority of the representations from local people hereabouts have said they want.

But, just as last year, this whole issue is being taken down to the wire (15 April is the legal deadline for agreeing the 2010 admissions criteria), which shows that the system used for debating admissions at County Hall is flawed.

Admittedly, the government did not help by insisting that a new county-wide consultation took place late late year, but the way in which the final proposals emerged, with no real debate in public until the last minute is liable to undermine public trust in the process.

All these matters are supposed to be discussed by a body called the Admissions Forum which has always refused to meet in public and has never adequately justified the views it takes.

As I said again yesterday, the Forum has more in common with a Star Chamber than what we should expect in the 21^st century. One positive thing to come out of yesterday was a promise by the Director of Children’s Services that this situation will be reviewed. I hope the decision will be to open things up to proper public scrutiny and then we might hope to get decisions made that are intellectually sound and fit for purpose.

You may have read overnight that Greencycle, the company that collects household recycling, has just gone into administration. The company, which was contracted for this service across four of the seven county districts, ran into problems as the credit crunch hit the market for waste paper etc..

I have just had a note from the council to say that they are using their own staff to try to maintain a service over the next few days while a more permanent solution is worked out, hopefully by the end of next week.

In the meantime, residents are advised “to still leave their materials out for collection and we will get to them”.

I will report further when I know more.

With a new county council due to start on 1 April, the Boundary Commission started a process of reviewing both the number of councillors the authority should have together with the wards.

We heard a couple of weeks ago that the Boundary Commission is ‘minded’ to agree to the number of councillors remaining at 126 and that is has started on the process of looking at ward boundaries.

This is a public process, and anyone can put in views to the Commission. More information can be found at their web site: www.boundarycommittee.org.uk The deadline for doing so is 8 June 2009.

Readers should be aware that a law is going through parliament that would result in any changes being implemented at the next ‘normal’ local election date for the council, which in our case is May 2013.

The promised decision on school admissions criteria has been delayed a week due to pressure of business, but it is due to come to Cabinet next Thursday (26 March).

The report may be viewed at School Admission Arrangements September 2010 and Beyond on the Council’s web site.

The report recommends that for secondary admissions the order of preference is:

1. Children in public care,
2. Medical reasons,
3. Family link, and finally
4. Distance.

Here the ‘distance’ criterion is the following strange device:

(a) For those children who have applied for a place at the nearest school to their home address, priority will be given to those who would otherwise have to travel the furthest distance to the next nearest school.

(b) For other children, priority will be given to those children who live nearest to the school applied for.

How this will apply to Durham Johnston remains to be seen, but it seems clear that this will certainly disadvantage those villages to the east of Durham which have generally sent children to the school.

The report for Thursday says that 60% of responses to the consultation favoured a system of feeder schools, something that most of the schools around Durham supported, so one has to ask what the consultation was worth if it ignores the majority view of schools, governors and parents.

But then this report is the result of deliberations within the Admissions Forum, which appears to act like a star chamber meeting in private and not allowing interested individuals to go and speak their piece.

Other councils make this a public forum, but of course in Labour-run County Durham these sorts of things do not seem to matter.

I would not be surprised if the whole things goes to appeal again this year.

The Launch Event for the Durham City AAP will be held in County Hall on Thursday 7^th May 2009 between 5.30 pm and 8 pm.

There will be registration, refreshments and an ‘information market place’ between 5.30 and 6 followed by presentations and discussions.

The event in open to all, but the council would like people to pre-register their attendance to help plan the format.

You can register by ringing county hall on 0191 301 8898 or by e-mail to lstephenson@durhamcity.gov.uk or by writing to Lee Stephenson, Durham City Council, 17 Claypath, Durham DH1 1RH

You need to provide the information contained in this file:  AAP registration details

Public Members of the AAP

This meeting is the first of the six-monthly open forum events, but in between there will an AAP board that will develop the business of the AAP.

The board will have 21 members: 7 elected (6 County Councillors + 1 Parish Councillor), 7 stakeholder partner members (police, fire, health, business, housing, voluntary sector, county council) and 7 ‘public members’.

Anyone resident in the AAP area will be able to apply to be a public member, and those who do will be chosen on the basis of their ability and experience to contribute to debate on the issues affecting the area. There will be a public advertisement for these positions in a few weeks time.

Obviously, anyone who thinks they might like such a position should make every effort to attend the launch event.

My personal view is that are definitely not interested in recruiting the ‘usual suspects’, but we should be keen to ensure that the wider voice of the community is heard. I am particularly keen that young people get involved, so if there are any young people who have things to contribute and want to get involved please do so.

If anyone wishes to kno0w more about all this, I would be pleased  to discuss things on a one-to-one basis.

The Durham City AAP area

The area to be covered by the Durham City AAP is:

The county council divisions of Framwellgate Moor (Bear Park, Framwellgate Moor and Witton Gilbert parishes), Newton Hall, Neville’s Cross,  Elvet, Gilesgate and Belmont (including Belmont parish council) and Sherburn (Pittington, West Rainton, Sherburn Village and Sherburn Hill parishes);

Together with Shincliffe Parish.

At the final full council meeting of the old County Council, the Labour Group forced through some grossly undemocratic changes to the constitution of the new council which comes into being on 1 April.

To be blunt they have put in a crude device to strangle democratic debate in the council chamber.

First they have put on a time limit of just two and a half hours for the length of a council meeting, and secondly there will be only a 30 minute period within that time to debate motions that individual members put on the agenda.

In practical terms this would probably mean there was only time for one motion to be debated at a council meeting.

The current Cabinet and Scrutiny model for councils makes it extremely hard for opposition groups to get their ideas and policies into the debate.

About the only way we have is to put down motions for debate at meetings of the full council. These crude guillotines are there to stop us putting our own ideas forward and restrict them being called to account.

As far as we are aware, there is only one other council in the country that has a time limit for motions - Birmingham - and theirs is 60 minutes.

If you think this is as undemocratic and dictatorial as we do, please write to the Leader of the Council, Councillor Simon Henig, and tell him so as strongly as possible - and copy me in please.

The long saga of school admissions criteris gets to the decision stage later this month.

The issue is to be decided at a meeting of the County Cabinet on Thursday 19 March, presumably on the recommendation of the Admissions Forum.

Unfortunately the Admissions forum refuses to meet in public (there is nothing to stop it meeting in the open - some Councils do this), so we will not know its view until the papers for the Cabinet meeting are published which will be about a week before it meets.

The 2009-10 Council tax rates in Nevilles Cross (and the other unparished areas in the City) will be as follows:

Band A    £997.89

Band B  £1,164.21

Band C  £1330.52

Band D  £1496.84

Band E  £1,829.47

Band F  £2,162.10

Band G  £2494.73

Band H  £2993.68

Do not order a compost bin from the recyclenow website, as advertised in the leaflet which has just been distributed by the County Council.

On 5th Feb Cabinet agreed to reduce the price of these bins via subsidy to £8. The website and phone number advertised currently charge £17 for a bin.

The leaflet should not have been distributed before changing these prices and I have spoken with the Portfolio Member about this. Additionally it appears that the national company WRAP which provides funding streams for Compost Bins and promoting such things is pulling funding for Local Authorities with little notice.

Fortunately the vast majority of household are getting garden waste collections in our area after discussions I held earlier this year with officers. Maps can be found here of the areas to be covered:

nigelmartin.mycouncillor.org.uk/local-green-waste-recycling-areas/

Last Friday (27 Feb) was the day the County Council set the council tax for 2009-10 and the ruling Labour group failed to keep its promise made in the application to become a single unitary authority in spite of a vigorous attempt by the Lib Dem Group to keep them to their word.

In the application, there was a clear statement that, because of the savings from merging the 8 councils,  council tax levels would be taken down to the lowest across the County. That is currently Easington District (the highest is Derwentside with Durham City in between).

But, although tax levels have been equalised across the County,  Labour pushed through an average increase of 2.9%, which is a massive 4.75% rise for Easington.

On behalf of the Lib Dem Group I moved an amendment which would have delivered on that promise and would have seen an average decrease across the County of 1.7%. This would have been funded initially using some so-called ‘earmarked reserves’ (which were not actually earmarked for anything in particular), with the intention of using the future savings to rebuild them over the next three years.

This was clearly affordable, but our proposals were voted down by the Labour group supported by almost all the Conservatives and Independents.

So the result is an increase across the County similar to the average across England at a time when massive savings should be starting to flow in, when council house tenants are being clobbered by rent rises over 6%, and when the rest of the local economy is really hurting with the credit crunch.

It is clear that the only party trying to make things better for the people of County Durham is the Liberal Democrats - we are certainly the only party at County Hall providing any opposition to Labour.

Mill Hill Lane, which runs from Windmill Hill, by the University Business School to the A167 almost opposite Park House Lane, currently has a ‘no cycling’ designation, although many people want to cycle into town that way.

So, following a number of requests from local residents, it was agreed last October to upgrade the lane to cycle use. Work is due to start this week (Wednesday 25 Feb) and is expected to take about 5 days.

This involves widening the path and putting in lights along the unlit stretch from the access to the New Merroaks Estate to the A167.

Care will be taken to preserve existing hedgerows, and we have been assured that the surface to be used (fibredec, the same as the cycle tracks near Newton Hall and on Durham Riverbanks) will provide an informal look while being a more even and hard wearing surface. Grass should grow through the summer and give it a’green’ look.

The County Council is to extend green compostable waste recycling across most of County Durham from 1 April 2009.

For the first time, most houses in the Neville’s Cross division will be given this service.

Unfortunately not all houses will be covered because there are insufficient bins to go round, so the target areas have been decided in relation to likely usage (so that most terraced properties have been excluded at this stage), and ‘fit’ with collection rounds.

I have created a web page with maps showing the areas covered - see “Local Green Waste Recycling Areas” on the top left of this site.

The County Council has given a commitment to increase the coverage to all properties that can benefit ‘in due course’.

A flier just came my way announcing a public meeting next week entitled “Faith and Finance - What does faith say to the current financial crisis?” [Unfortunately the flier is too large to upload here.]

The meeting is at 7.30 pm on Monday 2 February in Leech Hall, St John’s College, South Bailey. The speakers are Professor Geoff Moore (Durham Business School) and Professor Habib Ahmed of the University Department of Government and International Affairs; the Chair is Dr David Wilkinson.

All are welcome and refreshements will be provided.

Following all the debate last autumn over new admissions criteria for secondary schools, things went very quiet - but this time the County Council is not to blame for the delay in announcing their policy.

Just as the period for that consultation closed,  the Government announced that all education authorities had to do a full public consultation on all admissions. That resulted in a new process having to be started and this ends on 11 February.

If you have already made representations in the earlier exercise, then they will be taken into consideration, but if you have anything new to say, or have views on admissions outwith the secondary sector, you still have time to do so.

The relevant documents can be found on the County web site at :County Council School Admissions Consultation.

As many will know, plans are afoot to give the Market Square in Durham a make-over, and a (somewhat controversial - see earlier posting)  consultation process is under way.

To give the public an opportunity to respond, there is an exhibition in the Town Hall on Friday and Saturday next.

The exhibition will be open 10 am - 7 pm on Friday 30 January and 10 am - 6 pm on Saturday 31 January.

I hope everyone interested will take the opporunity to see what is actually being considered.

The flyer advertising the exhibition can be found here: Market Square Leaflet

Cabinet at County Hall agreed the next steps with the Area Action Partnerships (AAPs) on Thursday last.

Each of the 14 AAPs will meet six-monthly with an open forum event which anyone can attend and contribute to.

They will also have a 21-member Management Board that will meet monthly and will make the real decisions.

The Management Board will have 21 members, seven will be elected councillors (usually six from the County Council and one from parish/town councils in the area - but the balance may have more parish members if there are fewer than six county members available) and seven will be from ‘partners’ (police, fire, health, voluntary sector etc.). The final seven will be members of the public chosen by a method still to be fully specified.

In the debate about this, I and other Lib Dems have been pointing out the need to ensure that the public members especially have a sensible geographical spread, include a wide range of interests (young people must have a voice, for instance), and should definitely not be the ‘usual suspects’ or just recycled district councillors who are losing their seats on 1 April when the District formally disappear.

When it was suggested that this last group should not be part of the public membership, we got a flat ‘no’ from the Labour portfolio holder looking after the AAPs, from which you can draw your own conclusions, no doubt!

The other key aspect is that these AAPs should be about ‘Action’ and there will be a budget of around £150K for each AAP to invest in local projects. The intention is that the other key word in their title ‘Partnership’ will also be meaningful with the expectation that AAP projects will unlock matching funding from other bodies for such projects.

I am all in favour of local control over local action, so I really do hope the AAPs  turn out to be effective bodies and not just talking shops, but I expect that they will almost certainly have to evolve over time to be a success. Consensus must have a chance; if they just end up as a forum for party politicalargument they will have failed.

Finally, it has been agreed that the Durham City AAP will consist of the County Divisions of Belmont, Elvet, Framwellgate Moor, Gilesgate, Newton Hall, Neville’s Cross and Sherburn together with the parish of Shincliffe.

If anyone in those areas would be interested in becoming a public member of the AAP, please contact me and I would be more than pleased to talk through what might be involved.

The period for public consultation on the role and organisation of the AAPs finished yesterday and a report is to go to the County Cabinet on Thursday 22 January with recommendations, although it has been agreed that Overview and Scrutiny will have a first go at the report beforehand.

A verbal report was given at this morning’s O & S Management Committee, and the questions from some of the members were quite revealing.

There has been a big debate at County on the geography of the individual AAPs and as thing stand they vary in size from the whole of Easington District (12 County Divisions) at one extreme to Waerdale (a large area but a single Division) at the other.

My perception is that some of the Easington councillors are now starting to realise that one AAP covering such a large population may well cause tensions between those representing the major settlementsacross the area. I hope I am wrong, but I would not be surprised if the boundaries have to be redrawn in a couple of years time to respond better to local requirements.

During the icy spell before Christmas, just about every councillor across the County was bombarded by complaints about the treacherous state of the icy footpaths in town centres and residential streets alike.

Quite clearly there is no joined-up policy on what should be done, so, supported by fellow Lib Dem Councillor Ben Ord from Spennymoor, I wrote to the Chair of the Overview and Scrutiny Committee to ask for the issue to be looked at properly.

This came up at a meeting of the O & S Management Committee this morning, and I am pleased to say that a working group is to be set up to look at the issue to come up with a policy that can be operated across the County, deals with key areas and the most vulnerable, and is of course affordable.

It is clearly not possible to grit every footpath in every street, so there will have to be priorities set.

Because of all the competing issues, this piece of work cannot be done overnight, but the aim is to have a proper policy in place for next winter.