I spoke representing the Lib Dems at a small public meeting hosted by the Public and Commercial Services union (PCS) in Shakespeare Hall yesterday evening. Alongside me was Albert Nugent, Labour Leader of Durham County Council. The Conservatives were invited but failed to send anyone.

In my speech I mentioned my opposition to Academy Schools and particularly those sponsored by the Emmanuel Schools Trust (funded by the Vardys and promoting whacko ideas about evolution).

This elicited a strange response from Albert. He agreed with me. He was also against Academy Schools.

Why strange? Because Durham County Council, led by him, has just decided to proceed with two Academy Schools and are still looking at a third!

No wonder things are going off the rails at County Hall.

The other thing I found out was that the County are in discussion with the Civil Service about using a building at Aykley Heads to deal with ID cards. The building concerned is the detached council block where the County Library Service used to be run from.

Apparently this could attract another 500 workers onto the County Hall site with who-knows-what impact on traffic and parking in local streets.

The thing that annoyed me is that my County Council division includes County Hall, yet no-one in the administration had the courtesy to let me know what was going on so that I could represent the serious and legitimate concerns that residents of North End already have about parking and transport issues.

Yet another cavalier example of how Labour deals with local people.

I had a discussion last week with the Highways Department at County Hall about a number of parking issues and they drew my attention to the fact that the two Land Registry Offices in Durham (Pity Me and Southfield Way) are to merge within the next two years and be housed at the Southfield Way site.

This may have amassive impact on parking in the area as the parking available at Southfield Way is totally inadequate for the number of staff that the office will then have to accommodate.

There are already issues with parking in a number of areas around North End, but unless something serious is done by the Land Registry to control its staff parking, I can see streets in parts of the area being swamped with commmuters cars.

If that happens, then there will have to be some decisive action by the County Council to deal with the problem. Highways are currently reluctant to extend the area of controlled (residents’) parking, but this may be the only course of action - if the problem comes to pass.