A criminal investigation into water companies in England has uncovered suspected widespread illegal sewage discharges from treatment plants, the Environment Agency has revealed.

Remember “The tories just voted against an amendment to stop water companies dumping raw sewage into rivers” (Including Simon Jupp and Neil Parish) – Owl

www.theguardian.com 

The investigation into more than 2,200 water treatment plants run by all 10 water companies is examining whether the firms breached legal regulations about when and how frequently they are allowed to release raw sewage into waterways.

The EA said an initial examination of hundreds of documents from the water firms “confirmed that there may have been widespread and serious non-compliance with the relevant regulations”.

Breaching the legal regulations amounts to illegal dumping of raw sewage, and criminal penalties apply. Last year, Southern Water was fined a record £90m for illegally discharging billions of litres of raw sewage into coastal waters off Hampshire and Kent. The company argued in court that the discharges had not been deliberate, and said it was committed to transformation, transparency and cultural change.

The revelations came as members of the public, NGOs and charities rejected as too little and too late government plans to cut the scale of raw sewage discharges into rivers and seas.

Targets drawn up by government and put out to consultation include a requirement for water companies to reduce the frequency of discharges to bathing waters by 70% by 2035, or significantly reduce harmful pathogens they contain, for example by using ultraviolet radiation.

By 2040, 160,000 discharges of raw sewage through storm overflows into all waters should be eliminated, and by 2050 ministers are promising to eliminate approximately 320,000 discharges, about 80% of the total, into all waters.

The latest Environment Agency figures recorded the scale of raw sewage discharges from the 15,000 storm overflows in England in 2021 as 372,533 discharges for a combined total of more than 2.7m hours. In 2020, there were more than 400,000 sewage discharges, totalling more than 3m hours.

The majority, 55.2%, of the 18,268 people who responded to the consultation via 38 Degrees, a campaign group that regularly helps the public respond to government consultations, disagreed with the timescale and scope of the government’s targets. Questioned further, 83.9% said the timeframes being proposed by the government were much too long.

Matt Richards, campaign manager at 38 Degrees said: “The conclusion we can draw from this is that, regardless of people’s stated views of the proposed targets, the overwhelming majority want the government to move much quicker than they are currently proposing.”

Christine Colvin, of the Rivers Trust, said: “We think this plan gives us too little, too late. We need to see a broader scope that includes clear milestones for government as well as water companies, and much more urgency and ambition. We want to have healthy rivers fit for people and wildlife within the decade, not by 2050.”

Any release of raw sewage into rivers and coastal waters through storm overflows is supposed to take place only after exceptional weather and according to conditions in the permits issued by the EA.

Fish Legal, in its response to the consultation, also rejected the timeline and ministers’ proposed approach. It said the ambition to cut discharges into bathing waters was “extremely limited”.

The legal group also condemned the entire approach of the reduction plan. It said: “There appears to be an assumption running though this consultation that most storm overflows only happen due to excessive rainfall … The Environment Agency, as a regulator, also appear to have been working on that assumption … Our members and the public therefore do not share the Environment Agency’s confidence.

“The Environment Agency has previously taken a passive approach to regulating these discharges, relying on the water companies to collect and even analyse the relevant data. If nothing else, the current major investigation into water companies’ permit compliance is a tacit admission that operator self-monitoring and self-reporting – a situation whereby the water companies oversee their own works and report their own permit compliance – has not worked.”

A report by the environmental audit committee in January found that rivers were being subjected to a chemical cocktail of sewage, agricultural waste and plastic pollution.

A champagne bottle signed by Boris Johnson was auctioned off at a charity event “as a souvenir of partygate”.

Tories really are in a class of their own! – Owl

Chiara Giordano www.independent.co.uk

Food critic Jay Rayner tweeted an image showing a description of the bottle from what appeared to be the page of an auction catalogue.

Beneath the title “Bottle of champagne signed by Prime Minister Boris Johnson”, the description read: “A bottle of champagne signed by Boris. Hugely valuable as a souvenir of partygate and the exemplary behaviour and morality of our dear leader! Donated by: Oliver Dowden”.

Sharing the image on Twitter on Friday morning, Mr Rayner wrote: “Perhaps you thought the Conservative party took partygate seriously.

“Last night a champagne bottle signed by @BorisJohnson was donated to a charity event in Hertfordshire by local MP and Tory party chairman @OliverDowden. Read the description.”

Mr Dowden, who has been the MP for Hertsmere since 2015 and co-chairman of the Conservative Party since 2021, confirmed he donated the item – but had no knowledge of the description.

The MP’s spokesperson said: “This item was donated in good faith several months ago for a local charity auction.

“Oliver Dowden had no prior knowledge of the description and this is obviously not his view.”

The Metropolitan Police on Thursday announced the number of fines handed out to government staff for law-breaking parties held during the Covid-19 pandemic had doubled to more than 100.

Scotland Yard said last month that 50 referrals had been made to the criminal records office for fixed penalty notice (FPN) fines over parties in Downing Street and Whitehall when the country was under strict social-distancing rules.

In an update, the Met said its Operation Hillman team had now recommended 100 fines. The force said its investigation, into 12 separate events, remained ongoing.

Number 10 said Boris Johnson had not been issued with another fine, after he was punished last month over his rule-breaking birthday party in June 2020.

Cutting civil service jobs is an old chestnut that plays well with the right wing.

Owl looks at three consequences of this proposed solution to the cost of living crisis that has emerged in place of an emergency budget from the Stoke-on-Trent awayday.

Depriving 91,000 (one in five) civil servants of their jobs, as we teeter on the brink of recession, seems a perverse way of dealing with the short term impact of the  cost of living crisis. It surely can only make matters worse.

The civil service has been increased to deal with Brexit. Reducing it  size will  inevitably reduce the services the government can deliver.  With 38 new bills announced in the Queen’s speech, what is the government now going to stop doing? Boris Johnson’s administration consistently falls short on delivery eg issuing visas to Ukrainian refugees. Its record on the value for money of contracting work out cronies isn’t too good either.

Civil service jobs are (or were until the cabinet went on its awayday brainstorming session) considered by the government to be so prestigious that a key part of the Levelling Up programme envisages moving 22,000 of them out of London. The recent Bloomberg analysis points this up as one of the consistent failings of Boris Johnson to meet his own levelling up targets. Only a couple of days ago Michael Gove gave us his views that arithmetical targets were not a thing of beauty.

Swing voters in Tiverton & Honiton have said that they will not vote for the Conservatives until the “lying buffoon” Boris Johnson has quit, boosting the Liberal Democrats’ hopes in an impending by-election.

[Neil’s comeback story continues across the press under various headlines eg. “Tractor pull the other one! Porn MP is eyeing up a comeback” www.thelondoneconomic.com]

Chris Smyth www.thetimes.co.uk 

A focus group for Times Radio found that voters in the Devon constituency who supported the Tories in the last election were swinging towards the Lib Dems as they lost faith in the prime minister.

Some said that they would never vote for the party until it had a different leader despite a lukewarm reception for Labour’s Sir Keir Starmer, who was described as bland.

The findings will boost Lib Dem hopes of overturning a 24,239 Tory majority in a by-election prompted by the resignation of Neil Parish, the MP who was caught watching pornography in the Commons.

While the voters were not enthused by Sir Ed Davey — with one describing him as the “British version of Biden, been around forever but known for not doing anything” — their hesitation about voting for his party has largely evaporated.

One voter, Andrew, who is retired, said that he had “begun to really not respect Boris. He’ll say anything and does very little to deliver”. Lucinda, a charity worker, said: “A lot of people have lost trust in Boris and the Conservatives — it’s just a bit of a mockery.”

James Johnson, Theresa May’s former pollster who ran the focus group for Kekst CNC, likened the issue of Downing Street parties to the Iraq war for Tony Blair, or Nick Clegg’s broken pledge on university tuition fees, in causing a permanent loss of trust.

The voters described the prime minister variously as a “lying buffoon”, “just an idiot”, a “selfish greedy man”, and a “self-promoting arsehole” and told him: “Do the right thing, resign, we don’t want to be led by a clown.”

They dismissed Johnson’s argument that he had got the “big calls right” as “smoke and mirrors”, describing him as an opportunist.

Four of the six voters opted for Starmer over Johnson, despite a lack of enthusiasm for the Labour leader. Starmer was described as “weak”, “boring” and “a bit like Theresa May”, although some voters contrasted his lack of charisma positively with “bombastic, buffoonish Boris”.

Almost all the voters described the cost-of-living crisis as the main issue in the forthcoming by-election, with some also mentioning GP appointments and local issues such as pot holes and new development. James Johnson argued that this meant “the issue agenda is stacked heavily in the Lib Dems’ favour”, adding: “the Lib Dems are seen as a ‘credible’ party, ‘the lesser of evils’ and a ‘happy medium’ to vote for. There was no mention of tuition fees.”

Read the full conversation by clicking on this tweet:

 

New: What’s happening in Tory heartlands in the South? We ran a @kekstcnc @timesradio focus group of swing voters in Tiverton & Honiton who voted Conservative in 2019.

None would vote Tory in the upcoming by-election, and all bar one said they will vote for the Lib Dems. (1/12)

— James Johnson (@jamesjohnson252) May 12, 2022

‘Porn MP’ Neil Parish threatens to stand for re-election against Tory candidate

“I’ve got some sort of quite powerful backers within the farming community… If I stood, it wouldn’t be a problem in raising the money. The farming community realised how I fought their corner.”

Noon update according to Politico Newsletter: He’ll decide whether to stand on the eve of nominations closing! (Just to upset Tory High Command – Owl)

Will Taylor www.lbc.co.uk

“Porn MP” Neil Parish is weighing up standing for re-election and running against the Conservative Party candidate.

The politician resigned after he was caught watching porn twice in the House of Commons.

The ex-Tory MP became the focus of both outrage and ridicule when it emerged he had brazenly watched it in the chamber, causing female colleagues to complain.

Mr Parish later said he had accidentally viewed it in the first instance, while searching for tractors on his phone, before later accessing it deliberately.

He resigned his seat in Tiverton and Honiton in South West England after initially looking like he would try to fight on, and admitted he was a “f***ing idiot”.

But he is now considering running as an independent in the upcoming by-election triggered by his own resignation, pitting himself against any Tory candidate who stands.

“It is an option for me and one that I could consider,” he told the Telegraph.

“The only thing that may well stop me is the fact that my local party, my local activists, my local councillors, are friends. I don’t know if I want to do that to them.

“Some of the hierarchy of my own party, I suppose I wouldn’t have the same problem with doing it. At the moment, I’m taking soundings.”

He went on: “I’ve got some sort of quite powerful backers within the farming community… If I stood, it wouldn’t be a problem in raising the money. The farming community realised how I fought their corner.”

Mr Parish resigned after admitting his “moment of madness”, saying he was “not proud of what I was doing”.

He was reported as telling his wife he was sorry she “married a f***ing idiot”.

Mr Parish denied watching the porn in a way that he hoped others would see it, and added: “I make a full apology. A total full apology. It was not my intention to intimidate.”

The former chair of the Commons environment committee, who is passionate about rural issues, has said he will decide before nominations for the by-election close.

First elected in 2010, he won the Tiverton and Honiton seat in the 2019 general election with 35,893 votes, a 60% share and 24,239 votes ahead of his closest rival in the constituency, a Labour nominee.

Mini-referendums that allow homeowners in England to loosen planning rules and build bigger and taller extensions may do nothing to increase the supply of affordable housing, campaigners have said.

Better to take more notice of the Neighbourhood Plan process – Owl

Robert Booth www.theguardian.com 

“Street votes” have been included in the levelling up and regeneration bill as part of what the housing secretary, Michael Gove, has described as a way to boost democratic involvement in homebuilding.

But the countryside charity CPRE said the policy would allow homeowners to simply have more space and increase the value of their properties, making it harder still for first-time buyers to get on the property ladder.

“We don’t think it will provide any more affordable homes, [it] will make existing homes in urban areas less affordable, and there are no guarantees it will lead to more homes overall,” said Paul Miners, the group’s policy director.

The local votes are part of a new package of planning reforms unveiled after ministers scrapped an earlier attempt to allow property developers to build new estates without having to repeatedly apply for planning consent.

Officials said the votes would grant residents the right to allow the development or replacement of properties on their street within design rules and national policies. Development would only go ahead if the proposal is endorsed by a “supermajority” of residents at referendum.

“It has the scope to be very divisive in terms of neighbours,” said Peter Rainier, principal director of planning at law firm DMH Stallard.

The bill also includes a new requirement for community votes if a council wants to change a street name. Last year, Swanage town council in Dorset tried to change a street name from Darkie Lane but a public consultation found most residents wanted to keep it.

Successive governments have struggled to boost housebuilding to tackle the affordability crisis in the face of vociferous local opposition to greenfield development and rural sprawl.

The 2020 attempt to free up construction led to a backlash in the Conservative heartlands, and backbench MPs including Theresa May called the approach “ill-conceived”. The government is playing down the likelihood that it will hit a manifesto target of building 300,000 new homes a year by the mid-2020s.

Gove said on Wednesday: “Arithmetic is important but so is beauty, so is belonging, so is democracy, and so is making sure that we are building communities.

“People, when it comes to housing development, should be partners. We are going to do everything we can in order to ensure that more of the right homes are built in the right way in the right places. I think it is critically important that even as we seek to improve housing supply you also seek to build communities that people love and are proud of.”

Social housing landlords said any reforms should boost the delivery of affordable homes. Kate Henderson, the chief executive of the National Housing Federation, said planning changes should “deliver the number and type of affordable homes the country desperately needs”, citing 4.2 million people in need of social housing in England.

Gove’s predecessor as housing secretary, Robert Jenrick, said on Tuesday that the government would miss its manifesto target “by a country mile” and it could be years before the output hits even 250,000 a year again. He said: “We have to get those homes built because we are letting down hundreds of thousands of our fellow citizens. People are homeless today because we are failing to build those houses.”

On “street votes”, May warned parliament of “unintended consequences”. She said: “I can well imagine a situation in which somebody persuades their neighbours in a street to agree to the sort of development that might enhance the value of their houses but which actually has a negative impact on the wider community and wider neighbourhood.”

Street votes were proposed last year by the Policy Exchange thinktank, with the backing of several architects and planners associated with Prince Charles who have advocated for the “densification” of urban areas, in part to reduce pressure to build on open fields.

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The thinktank said: “Residents of a street should be able to agree by a high majority on new strict rules for designs to make better use of their plots. A street of suburban bungalows, for example, could agree on the right to create Georgian-style terraces. In many cases, an adopted ‘street plan’ would greatly increase the value of residents’ homes, giving them strong reasons to agree on it.”

It suggested redevelopment of listed and pre-1918 properties should be prohibited.

Downing Street is the most fined address in the country for Covid breaches, according to the Telegraph headlines.

Seven occasions when Boris Johnson denied No 10 broke Covid rules

 Here are the moments Johnson denied rules were broken.

1 December – House of Commons

After the Mirror’s first story broke about Christmas parties in Downing Street:

“What I can tell the right hon and learned gentleman is that all guidance was followed completely in No 10.”

2 December – Sky News

Asked why he would not explain his account of the allegations, Johnson said:

“Because I have told you and what I want to repeat … that the guidance is there and I am very, very keen that people understand this.”

7 December – BBC News

When asked about Downing Street Parties in December, the prime minister said:

“All the guidelines were observed.”

8 December – House of Commons

After the Allegra Stratton video is released by ITV News:

“I apologise for the impression that has been given that staff in Downing Street take this less than seriously. I am sickened myself and furious about that, but I repeat what I have said to him: I have been repeatedly assured that the rules were not broken. I repeat that I have been repeatedly assured since these allegations emerged that there was no party and that no Covid rules were broken.”

8 December – Downing Street press conference

Asked why he had not extended the No10 inquiry:

“ … all the evidence I can see, people in this building have stayed within the rules … if that turns out not to be the case … and people wish to bring allegations to my attention or to the police … then of course there will be proper sanctions …”

Johnson giving a Downing Street press conference

13 December – Sky News

Asked again about Downing Street parties:

“I can tell you once again that I certainly broke no rules … all that is being looked into.”

20 December – BBC News

After the Guardian reveals pictures of people, including the prime minister, at No 10 drinks in the garden on 15 May 2020

“Those were people at work, talking about work. I have said what I have to say about that.”

“We’ll do everything we can but it’s no kind of success simply to hit a target if the homes that are built are shoddy, in the wrong place, don’t have the infrastructure required and are not contributing to beautiful communities.

“Ultimately, when you’re building a new dwelling, you’re not simply trying to hit a statistical target. I’m certainly not.” – Michael Gove

When is a target not a target? – Owl

Kevin Schofield www.huffingtonpost.co.uk 

Downing Street has said the government remains committed to building 300,000 new homes a year, despite Michael Gove suggesting the target had been ditched.

The pledge was contained in the Tory manifesto in the run-up to the 2019 general election.

It said: “Since 2010 there has been a considerable increase in homebuilding. We have delivered a million homes in the last five years in England: last year, we delivered the highest number of homes for almost 30 years.

“But it still isn’t enough. That is why we will continue our progress towards our target of 300,000 homes a year by the mid-2020s.”

Appearing on Radio 4′s Today programme this morning, the levelling up secretary was asked if the government would hit its target.

He said: “We’ll do everything we can but it’s no kind of success simply to hit a target if the homes that are built are shoddy, in the wrong place, don’t have the infrastructure required and are not contributing to beautiful communities.

“Ultimately, when you’re building a new dwelling, you’re not simply trying to hit a statistical target. I’m certainly not.”

Pressed on whether the government was still committed to its manifesto pledge, Gove said: “We are not bound – I am not bound – by one criterion alone when it comes to development. Arithmetic is important, but so is beauty, so is belonging, so is democracy.”

But Downing Street later said the government remained committed to its target.

“Our target to deliver 300,000-a-year is central to our levelling up mission,” the prime minister’s spokesperson said.

“We’re certainly making progress towards that target. We are at 244,000-a-year currently.

“Some of the measures in this bill are designed to remove some of the barriers that can gum up planning applications and cause more resistance amongst local communities.”

Michael Spicer gives his comments on the bizarre “Magic Sauce” interview.

Click here to view.

The prime minister promised to supercharge Britain by reducing regional inequalities. Two years on, an exclusive analysis by Bloomberg News shows things are going backwards.

Joe Mayes, Andre Tartar, Demetrios Pogkas www.bloomberg.com (Extract)

In 2019, Boris Johnson led the Conservative Party to a resounding general election win, pledging to revive large parts of the UK left behind during the era of globalization that made London one of the world’s richest cities.

Johnson’s rise was driven by his successful campaign to pull Britain out of the European Union. The so-called “levelling up” agenda was designed to turn that into tangible benefits by 2030, especially for the working class Brexit voters who abandoned the opposition Labour party to hand Johnson his party’s biggest majority since the 1980s.

More than two years on, in a period dominated by the coronavirus pandemic, most of the places that lagged behind London and the South East of England when Johnson came to power have seen little sign of better times. In fact, as a new Bloomberg News analysis shows, they’re more likely to be falling further behind.

To understand how levelling up is progressing, we analyzed 12 key socioeconomic metrics across every one of the UK’s 650 parliamentary constituencies to measure whether the gap has changed—one way or another—since 2019.

The data we used are based on priorities outlined in the government’s official levelling up policy paper and were compiled in consultation with Bloomberg Economics. Where data at the constituency level was unavailable, we used data for higher-level geographies and matched them to the relevant parliamentary seats.

Our analysis shows that the salary gap is widening in nine out of 10 constituencies, that home affordability is getting worse nearly everywhere, and that public spending per head has fallen behind the capital in every region of England.

Only on a few metrics has the gap narrowed for much of the UK—including life expectancy and the share of people receiving Universal Credit benefits—and in both those cases it’s because the situation in London and the South East has worsened. As a result of Covid-19 the death rate is up and more people are claiming welfare benefits. This is not the kind of levelling up Boris Johnson was looking for…..

(This graphic summary says it all. But note that the “hot spots” in the southwest are not in the peninsula but to the east: in places like Bristol, Bath, Gloucester & Swindon. Each hexagon represents a constituency.)

….The UK Treasury has been reluctant to dedicate large new pots of money to the levelling-up cause, citing the need to repair the public finances post-Covid. The roughly 12 billion pounds of funding announced so far amounts to about 3% of total government departmental spending in the 2019 fiscal year. Haldane argues this shouldn’t be a particularly limiting factor because tilting more of existing government budgets away from London and the South East will spur levelling up alone.

And the public money that has been dedicated to levelling up hasn’t always gone to the areas that need it most. Of the 100 most deprived areas in England, only 38% of councils won at least some of the Levelling Up Fund money they requested, 34% didn’t participate at all and 28% had all their bids rejected, BBC Panorama reported this week…..

There is a lot more to read in the full article, all illustrated by more graphics and an interactive table where you can search results for your own constituency. – Owl

“Getting Cranbrook done!” The New Guard deals with a legacy issue.

(Just think Simon how this money could have been spent instead on reducing car park charges. Maybe you could winge about it in the next Tory leaflet.) – Owl

Anita Merritt www.devonlive.com

A major milestone has been reached in the continued development of Cranbrook after the go-ahead was given for funding of up to £5.5m for a town centre. Planning permission has also been granted for a supermarket, high street shops with apartments above, a town square and a children’s day nursery

East Devon District Council has announced it has approved the funding for the acquisition of town centre land in Cranbrook. It sits alongside current plans to provide space for shops and community facilities including a children’s centre, youth centre, library, town council offices, health and wellbeing hub, a leisure centre and a skatepark.

Work on the supermarket and nursery is due to be completed by summer next year, followed soon after by the high street shops, apartments, town square and children’s day nursery. The investment is funded by the Exeter and East Devon Enterprise Zone from borrowing against future ring-fenced business rate income.

By securing the land, the council says it can make sure that the new town centre will be able to grow and develop over time, including providing workspace to meet the needs of a growing population.

The Council has also agreed the process for delivering the £40m Cranbrook Local Infrastructure Fund. The fund will ensure that critical infrastructure, such as schools and transport improvements, can be delivered in step with new homes as the town expands to a population of around 20,000 people.

Cranbrook town centre supermarket (Image: EDDC)

Cllr Dan Ledger, East Devon District Council’s portfolio holder for strategic development and chair of Cranbrook Strategic Delivery Board, said: “This is a monumental moment for the town where the ‘coming soon’ notion actually becomes a reality over the next few months. Through partnership working across all levels of local authority and with the consortium of developers, Cranbrook will now finally have its much-needed centre.

“I couldn’t be happier for the residents.”

Cranbrook town centre plans (Image: EDDC)

Agreement on the details underpinning the facilities for the town has been coordinated by the Cranbrook Strategic Delivery Board. The Board is a partnership of Councillors from Cranbrook Town Council, East Devon District Council and Devon County Council who all played an important role agreeing the way forward with the developer consortium (Cranbrook New Community partners in conjunction with Henry Davidson Developments).

Cllr Les Bayliss, chairman of Cranbrook Town Council, said: “This long awaited news will undoubtedly bring significant benefits to the community. For example, being able to shop locally I believe will have a positive impact on the people that live in and around Cranbrook. Not to mention the benefits locally to the environment, economy and the potential of local employment opportunities”.

Pinewood Studios say they are in talks with former Tory MP Neil Parish over his script for a new Carry On film.

Gerontius www.newsbiscuit.com

Rank Organisation say they have already signed a deal with Parish and filming for the comic caper should get underway later this year at the Buckinghamshire studios.

The film – titled Carry On Ploughing – is set in the farming community of mid Devon and centres around a young hapless farming lad played by Jim Dale trying to woo the barmaid from the local village pub. Dale tries to impress the barmaid (played by Barbara Windsor) with his ploughing skills and his massive seed planter. But the barmaid’s mother has misgivings about Dale and what he intends doing with his enormous dibber, and has barred the farming lad from the local pub.

Carry On regulars Sid James, Kenneth Williams and Charles Hawtrey are all said to be on board with the new film and say it is one of the most laughable and implausible scripts they have encountered in Carry On history.

James said he had appeared in nearly 20 Carry On films but the plot for this script was the most ridiculous yet.

Former Tory MP Ann Widdicombe was initially pencilled in to be Windsor’s battle-axe mother, but having met her during rehearsals Rank say she would be better suited to the new Hammer House of Horrors movie set for next year.

Parish said he had been working on the Carry On script while serving as a sitting MP and had even researched farming practices on his mobile phone while still at work. The former Tiverton and Honiton MP added that he had been so keen to get the Rank script ready for filming, he had even visited websites while sitting on the front bench in the House of Commons.

A publicist for Rank welcomed having Parish on board and looked forward to working with him on this and future projects. ‘Neil is Rank through and through,’ he said. ’We think he will fit in nicely with his new stablemates.’

[Central Casting is looking for a replacement for Neil in the long running Whitehall farce, due to end no later than January 2025. Conformity is essential. Lib Dems have other ideas. – Owl]

A Conservative MP is under fire after claiming there is no “massive use” for food banks in Britain, and suggesting people use them because they are unable to cook or budget “properly”.

Ashley Cowburn http://www.independent.co.uk 

The MP for Ashfield Lee Anderson made the remarks – labelled “condescending” by unions – as ministers face intense criticism over support available to the most vulnerable amid a cost of living crisis, with soaring energy bills and levels of inflation at a 30-year high.

Earlier, cabinet minister Michael Gove provoked anger as he defended the government’s approach, ruled out demands for an emergency budget, and suggested people “calm down” over the lack of extra financial support before the autumn Budget.

During a Commons debate on the Queen’s Speech, Mr Anderson invited MPs to visit a food bank in his constituency to witness a “brilliant scheme” whereby those in receipt of food parcels have to “register for a budgeting and cooking course”.

“We show them how to cook cheap and nutritious meals on a budget – we can make a meal for about 30p a day – and this is cooking from scratch,” he added.

But when pressed by a Labour MP whether it should be necessary to have food banks in 21st century Britain, Mr Anderson replied: “I’ll invite you personally to come to Ashfield, look at our food bank, how it works.

“I think you’ll see first-hand there’s not this massive use for food banks in this country. We’ve got generation after generation who cannot cook properly, they can’t cook a meal from scratch, they cannot budget.”

Addressing MPs, he added: “The challenge is there – come. You’re sat there with glazed expressions on your faces, looking at me like I’ve landed from a different planet. Come to a real food bank that’s making a real difference to people’s lives.”

According to the Trussell Trust – the largest network of food bank providers in the UK — the main drivers of food bank use are problems with the benefits system, challenging life experiences, ill-health, or lack of informal or formal support.

Between April 2021 and March 2022, food banks in the organisation’s network distributed more than 2.1 million emergency food parcels – a 14 per cent increase compared to same period in 2019-20.

Sumi Rabindrakumar, head of policy at the Trussell Trust, told The Independent: “Research from the Trussell Trust and other independent organisations is clear – that food bank need in the UK is about lack of income, not food.

“Cooking from scratch won’t help families keep the lights on or put food on the table, if they don’t have enough money in their pockets.”

They added: “Our research shows that people at food banks had on average just £57 a week to live on after housing costs, and no amount of budget management or cooking classes will make this stretch to cover council tax, energy bills, food and all the other essentials we all need to get by.

“That’s why we’re urgently calling on the government to bring benefits in line with the true cost of living and – in the longer term – to introduce a commitment in the benefits system to ensure everyone can afford the essentials we all need to survive.”

Following Mr Anderson’s comments, the SNP’s Joanna Cherry hit back in the Commons, saying: “All of us have food banks in our constituencies, we don’t really need to visit his because we’re perfectly well aware of the requirement for them.

“The requirement for them is not that people don’t know how to cook, but because we have poverty in this country at a scale in this country that should shame his government”.

Wendy Chamberlain, the Liberal Democrats’ welfare spokesperson, said Mr Anderson should apologise for the “shameful” remarks, which were an “insult to millions of hard-working people”.

Karen Buck MP, Labour’s shadow work and pensions minister, said: “In the world where people actually live we now hear daily stories of families going without food and others unable to turn their ovens on in fear of rising energy bills.

“The idea that the problem is cooking skills and not 12 years of government decisions that are pushing people into extreme poverty is beyond belief. Out of touch doesn’t even cover it.”

The row follows confusion over Boris Johnson’s promise on Tuesday that more help would be revealed in “the days to come”, before the Treasury ruled out further short-term financial measures, including an emergency budget.

Mr Gove told BBC Breakfast: “The prime minister was making the point we are constantly looking at ideas to relieve the pressure on people facing incredibly tough times – but that doesn’t amount to an emergency budget.”

The minister added: “It’s example of some commentators trying to take a statement that is commonsensical, turning it into – capital letters – a big news story, when the Treasury quite rightly say, ‘calm down’.”

The levelling up minister also claimed Labour and Lib Dems have no “whizz bang ideas” to address the cost of living crisis – despite rejecting their call for a windfall tax on oil and gas company profits.

A prominent Torbay councillor bullied a council officer and ran “roughshod” over council rules in a Zoom meeting, in scenes reminscient of the notorious ‘Jackie Weaver’ incident at another council.

Joe Ives, local democracy reporter www.radioexe.co.uk 

An investigation into how Hazel Foster (Conservatives, St Marychurch) chaired a new housing review panel meeting has concluded she brought the council into disrepute.

It also found she used her position to bring about an advantage for herself and other Conservatives.

But Cllr Foster believes that council procedures are at fault.

The judgments against her were made at a marathon four-hour standards hearing of Torbay Council on Tuesday [10 May], which considered an independent report into Cllr Foster’s actions at the council’s first meeting of a new housing crisis review panel last September. 

Following an administrative mix-up, the make-up of the housing panel was top heavy with Conservatives, which didn’t reflect the political situation at the council overall. Torbay is run by a coalition of Lib Dems and independents.

Instead the panel mistakenly was listed as comprising three Liberal Democrats, two independents and seven Conservative councillors. 

Committee chair Cllr Foster, who is married to the area’s MP Kevin Foster, refused to accept a change that would have seen it balanced more in line with the overall council.

But some Tory councillors, including Mrs Foster, felt that changing the membership with the Zoom meeting underway was an unfair attempt to move the goalposts after the selection process had finished, and limit Conservative involvement. 

That led to a fierce hour-long debate over panel membership that became so aggravated a council clerk became visibly distressed and left the meeting. Ignoring please from fellow councillors and senior officers, Mrs Foster repeatedly attempted to pass a vote on the membership of the council that had been printed on the original meeting report.

The council’s chief executive Anne-Marie Bond, a lawyer by training, was eventually drafted into the online meeting to advise. 

The meeting eventually went ahead without the panel’s membership being agreed.

However by this stage, the discussion of the Bay’s housing crisis proved a footnote to the bitter argument preceeding it. 

Following the meeting, six councillors – five Liberal Democrats and one Independent – complained, along with the council’s director of place Kevin Mowat, sparking an investigation.

Unlike other public Torbay Council meetings held over Zoom at the time, and despite requests by the Local Democracy Reporting Service, the video has yet to be published.  

Councillors on the standards committee agreed with the independent investigation’s findings that Cllr Foster bullied the officer and that she had ploughed on despite clear signs that her actions had caused upset. 

The officer in question told the investigator she felt bullied and pressured to take on actions that were beyond her remit.

Cllr Foster said: “I’m really really saddened by the clerks’ comments,” and that she holds the officer “in the highest regard.”

She said that initially she had not known the clerk was upset and that, later, when she did realise this, she did not know the reasons why.

Mrs Foster said she felt it was her duty as chair of the panel to continue with the meeting and get the vote on its membership “out the way” regardless.  

After becoming upset, the clerk had turned off her Zoom camera. Cllr Foster told the hearing that this did not indicate to her that something was wrong.

She explained: “As you know during these Zoom meetings there can be many occasions when a screen would go blank. Had somebody come to the door? Had she left the kettle on? There can be many reasons why.”

Councillor Judith Mills (Churston with Galmpton, Independent) pointed out that by this stage several councillors had commented on the clerk’s distress.

Cllr Foster believed the clerk’s behaviour could be because of personal reasons unrelated to the meeting. 

Th at was rejected by the independent investigator, hwo said: “The clerk clearly stated that she was distressed and in difficulty.

“I don’t see how anybody would have not been aware of that.”

Councillor Jermaine Atiya-Alla (Lib Dems, Ellacombe) criticised Cllr Foster, saying: “You did not show any emotional empathy at that time.” 

Cllr Foster countered that she was wronged too. “No empathy was shown to me,” she said.

The scrutiny committee agreed that Cllr Foster had not acted respectfully to other councillors and officers.

The independent investigator said he had watched the “invaluable” Zoom recording of the meeting “many times” and concluded that there were many instances where Cllr Foster had shown disrespect.

He said: “It appeared to me that Cllr Foster didn’t want to hear what anybody had to say.

“Her line was always ‘let’s move to the vote’…there didn’t appear to be any respect for what anybody said, whether it be fellow members or experienced officers in the room.”

Cllr Atiya-Alla argued that Mrs Foster had shown “ a complete lack of respect” to the clerk and other members.  “To me, it seems like you just didn’t care about what anyone else had to say…and you were running roughshod on the rules.”

Foster admitted she was rushing the vote at points but this was because she felt it was very important to move the meeting along.

As reported by the local democracy reporting service in September last year, the meeting had echoes of the infamous ‘Jackie Weaver’ incident at Handforth Parish Council.

Both Torbay council’s scrutiny committee and the independent report found that the episode and its subsequent media coverage brought the council into disrepute. 

Cllr Foster said that the excerpt from an article presented in the report did not represent the full write-up.

The independent investigator disagreed, saying:“ I don’t think it is at all misleading. It is a very poignant point that the article highlights.” He also pointed to the fact that a link to the full article was included in his report.

Cllr Foster said her actions did not harm the reputation of the council. “I believe that when residents here in Torbay – or anywhere – go to the vote they do expect their councillor to stand up to what they feel is correct and the right thing to do”, she argued.

“On this occasion, I was following the agenda and felt that was the right thing to do.”

Cllr Foster denied seeking advantage by forcing through a Conservative majority on the housing review panel and that she had not known proportionality was required.

“I strongly reject this assumption”, she continued. “I find that it is a completely a matter of opinion. [There] is no factual evidence.”

She said the claims were “a slur” on her character and that as no formal decisions were made by the panel, there was no advantage to be gained by a  Tory majority.

The independent investigator rejected that, noting the panel would have had influence and so it would have been advantageous to Cllr Foster for the panel to be disproportionately made up of Conservatives.

The complainants had initially suggested that Cllr Foster had attempted to compromise the impartiality of those who work for, or on behalf of the council and that she had wasted the resources of the council.

In the end, the scrutiny committee and the independent investigator agreed she had not.

Nevertheless, the scrutiny committee did find that Cllr Foster’s breaches of the code of conduct elsewhere required significant sanctions. 

Cllr Foster was told that she must carry out ‘acceptable behaviour training,’ and that she write an apology letter to the clerk affected by her behaviour, the head of governance and the council’s director of place.

She must also make an unequivocal apology for her conduct at a meeting of the full council on Thursday 21 July.

The committee said the leader of the council, Steve Darling (Lib Dems, Barton with Watcombe) should be “recommended to consider” suspending Cllr Foster from her post as the council’s domestic abuse and sexual violence champion until her acceptable behaviour training is completed.

It was also decided that the committee would recommend to the leader of the Conservative group, David Thomas (Preston), that Cllr Foster should be suspended from the committees she serves on, and from outside bodies at which she represents the council. 

However Cllr Foster will be allowed to carry on as a councillor representing St Marychurch.

Speaking after the meeting, Cllr Foster accepted she had made mistakes although wasn’t entirely in agreement with the hearing’s findings.

 “I’m disappointed it’s come to this”, she said.

“I see it was all about a procedure that had failed prior to the meeting that put me in that unfortunate position that I was asked to tell five councillors [the extra Tory members] that they couldn’t be on that committee.

“I felt that was unfortunate that the procedure had left me in that position.”

She said she hoped the council would make changes to the way meetings are conducted so no one else would be placed in a similar position to her in the future.

She disagreed with the standards committee’s finding that she had used her position as committee chair for her own advantage.

Regarding the clerk who was upset, she said: “I completely apologise. I have a lot of respect for her. She’s an excellent officer and I will completely apologise for my actions or anything I said that made her feel that she was upset and had to leave the meeting.”

Cllr Foster said she will abide by the sanctions decided upon by the scrutiny committee. 

Separately, Conservative group leader councillor David Thomas faces a hearing into allegations regarding his own behaviour at the same meeting.

An independent report has concluded that he broke the council’s code of conduct twice, in attempting to use his position improperly to secure an advantage or disadvantage and bringing his office or the council into disrepute.

Cllr Thomas’ hearing will be held this Friday.

“Our rivers are in a poor state, bird and other species numbers are in serious decline, poor air quality threatens the health of many, and our seas and sea floor are not managed sustainably.”

www.impartialreporter.com 

Toxic air that harms health, and water pollution from sewage and farming must be tackled as urgent priorities, the new environmental watchdog has warned.

Overfishing and damage to sea floors from trawling, loss of natural habitats, and degraded soils must also be urgently dealt with by the Government, the Office for Environmental Protection (OEP) urges in its first report.

OEP chairwoman Dame Glenys Stacey said that, despite ambition by the Government, the environment is in a “precarious” state and suffering worrying and persistent declines in air and water quality, species and habitats.

The report calls for the Government to make a comprehensive “stocktake” of the state of the natural world, set out ambitious legal targets and coherent action, and to make the environment a priority across all departments.

Addressing the crisis in England’s air, water, landscapes and seas should have the same level of cross-government support and urgency as climate efforts to cut greenhouse gas emissions to net zero, it urges.

The OEP is also calling on the Government to reverse the decline in funding for monitoring the state of the environment over the last decade – but does not call for more resources overall to tackling the environmental crisis.

The watchdog was set up as part of the post-Brexit regime for managing England’s environment, with a role for monitoring progress on reversing harm to the natural world and acting as a regulator on green laws.

Its first monitoring report on the Government’s 25 Year Environment Plan, announced in 2018, warns that, while the plans for the natural world are ambitious, progress on delivering them has been too slow.

It warns of “tipping points” where slow, persistent declines in nature become catastrophic – such as setting fishing limits above scientific advice, which can lead to fish stock crashes, and the continued damage to the seabed, which destroys the marine ecosystem.

Failing to prioritise these issues and address them before the tipping points are reached will make it much harder to reverse the declines, Dame Glenys said.

And she said: “The 25 Year Environment Plan was an ambitious attempt to confront the challenges facing the environment, yet we continue to see worrying and persistent trends of environmental decline.

“Our rivers are in a poor state, bird and other species numbers are in serious decline, poor air quality threatens the health of many, and our seas and sea floor are not managed sustainably.”

Turning the situation around will not be easy, she acknowledged, but urged the Government to set a clear and ambitious vision for the environment which is prioritised across all departments.

“All of us have an inarguable dependency on the environment, and its precarious state should be a matter of concern for all of Government and a national priority,” she warned.

A decade ago the Conservative Government said it wanted to leave the natural world in England in a better state for future generations than it found it, and in 2018 produced the 25 Year Environment Plan with dozens of measures across 10 areas from clean air and water to waste, wildlife and landscapes.

Last year it also passed the Environment Act, which will allow for setting new targets in areas including curbing air pollution, and is set to produce a new Environmental Improvement Plan (EIP) under the Act next year.

The OEP report highlights a series of areas which it thinks the Government should prioritise and take immediate action on, including cutting air pollutants that cause tens of thousands of early deaths a year.

Tackling water pollution in rivers, lakes and streams from treated sewage and agricultural run-off from livestock and arable farms should also be a priority.

England’s seas need urgent action to halt overfishing, which affects around a third of stocks in UK waters, and to prevent the damage caused by fishing gear trawled over the seabed which removes the plant and animal life living there.

On land, loss of habitat caused by intensification of agriculture and urbanisation must be tackled, as well as erosion and degraded soils, which causes flooding, releases carbon and puts costs on farming.

The report calls on the Government to understand the drivers of environmental decline, create a vision to tackle the crisis, set ambitious targets, implement coherent strategy and policy, ensure good governance and monitoring, assessment and reporting on progress.

Environment minister Rebecca Pow said: “We welcome this report, which acknowledges that our Environment Act gives us new tools to make a real difference to our environment, putting it at the heart of government and transitioning us to a sustainable future with nature on the road to recovery during this decade.

“Six months on from the Act gaining royal assent, we are currently consulting on legally binding environmental targets which include a world-leading target to halt species decline by 2030.

“We have launched a consultation to deliver the largest programme in history to tackle storm sewage discharges and we have taken action to transform the way that we deal with waste.”

Overdoses on the “Magic Sauce” and uses American and Scouse accents in bizarre interview

“There will also be a new duty on the government to set “levelling up missions” and report on whether they have been accomplished. The law to make everything better for everyone will work by placing a statutory obligation on the government to explain how things are getting better.

Johnson is reduced to these inanities because the most powerful faction among his MPs will not, as a point of ideological principle, countenance anything that seriously interferes with the accrual of wealth and privilege to those who already have them. Levelling up has hit the same obstacle that derailed David Cameron’s “big society” agenda. That too was conceived as a way to rehabilitate unhappy parts of the country without recourse to any of the explicit financial redistribution that Thatcherite Tories despise as socialism.”

From: Inane and Orwellian: a Queen’s speech to improve the life of Boris Johnson 

Rafael Behr www.theguardian.com 

Dinan Way link plans could be set for £18m Levelling Up boost.

How many times have we been here before?

How much effort is expended on making these “bids”? – Owl

Dan Wilkins www.exmouthjournal.co.uk

Plans to extend a major Exmouth link road to connect with the A376 could be set for an £18million ‘levelling up’ boost. 

Devon County Council and East Devon District Council could bid for nearly £75million of government funding, among which is £18million earmarked to be spent on the completion of the Dinan Way link extension. 

Currently traffic from Dinan Way has to use unsuitable residential roads to access the A376. The bid includes improved pedestrian and cycle connections to the Exe Estuary multi-use trail and has the potential to improve bus journey times to Exeter. The wider bid includes other walking and cycling improvements focusing on the regeneration of the town centre. 

The county council’s cabinet is being recommended to approve a package of five schemes to be put forward for cash from the government’s Levelling-Up Fund and to make a contribution of more than £6 million towards the work. 

If successful, £20million would be invested in the completion of Dinan Way, with both Devon County Council and East Devon District Council committing to provide £1million each. 

Also benefitting from the £75million would be plans for a second railway at Okehampton, a new slip road at Lee Mill and an enhanced cycle route between Newton Abbot and Torbay. 

Devon’s Cabinet Member for climate change, environment and transport, Andrea Davis, said: “Throughout the pandemic, the county council has been working in close partnership with the district councils to support the most vulnerable people in our community. 

“This new bid demonstrates the Team Devon partnership now working to support economic recovery and growth in close collaboration with our MPs. These schemes will also reduce carbon emissions, improve air quality, cut congestion and improve the safety, security and overall experience of transport users. 

“This is the second round of bidding for Levelling-Up cash. We didn’t do as well as we wanted in the first round and I hope the Government will look more favourably on these ambitious proposals. 

“Just last month the University of Exeter published a report calling for the Government to prioritise the South West in its levelling-up efforts.  

“Devon is a beautiful place but it’s not just seaside holidays and cream teas. Four of our eight districts are among the UK’s worst 25 low wage ‘hotspots’ and too many of our youngsters don’t go on to university or vocational training which will enable them to get the better-paid jobs. 

“We’ve got an ambitious Team Devon proposal for devolution which would enable us to tackle some of these structural problems in the longer term but these five bids would be a real start in helping us to boost our economic growth and fight climate change by providing real alternatives to our reliance on our cars.” 

The cabinet meeting will take place at County Hall, Exeter, on Wednesday, May 11, at 10.30am

Boris Johnson has been accused of abandoning British families to a life of poverty, after his legislative programme for the coming year contained no new measures to deal with the cost of living crisis.

Andrew Woodcock www.independent.co.uk

One think tank described the package set out in the Queen’s Speech as “cosmetic surgery for an economy facing a heart attack”.

Labour leader Sir Keir Starmer also denounced it as “a thin address, bereft of ideas or purpose” delivered by a government “whose time has passed”.

Mr Johnson told MPs that measures including a Levelling Up and Regeneration Bill to enable councils to boost renewal of run-down towns and a Brexit Freedoms Bill empowering ministers to scrap remaining EU rules would help get Britain “back on track” after the Covid pandemic.

But he continued to reject demands for an emergency budget to help households who are being forced to choose between heating and eating.

He also gave a strong signal that he has lined up with chancellor Rishi Sunak in resisting further financial support before the autumn budget, telling MPs: “However great our compassion and ingenuity, we cannot simply spend our way out of this problem.”

Any help for households beyond the £22bn already announced would have to be balanced against the need to keep public finances “on a sustainable footing”, he warned.

Meanwhile, the Treasury was quick to scotch any suggestion of an imminent extension of support, saying that further fiscal measures would have to wait until after the next review of the energy price cap in September.

Senior ministers, including the PM and Mr Sunak, were on Tuesday evening assessing proposals from cabinet colleagues for money-saving measures that can be achieved without cost to the government, such as doubling the gap between MOT tests or increasing the ratio of children to carers in pre-school nurseries. Mr Johnson said the outcome would be announced in the coming days.

But the Child Poverty Action Group said government support was “a far cry” from the help needed by families facing inflation forecast to top 10 per cent this year and energy bills expected to leap by a further £1,000 in the autumn.

CPAG chief executive Alison Garnham said Mr Johnson’s package of 38 bills offered “no short-term comfort for parents struggling to feed their kids in the face of rocketing prices, and no long-term vision for ending child poverty”.

She warned: “Promises on levelling up and education will go unmet while families don’t have enough money to live on – and abandoning 4 million children to a life in poverty won’t be much of a legacy either.”

Responding to a Queen’s Speech, delivered for the first time by the Prince of Wales, Sir Keir said that the contents of the government’s agenda failed to respond to the pressing challenges of the current moment.

With the economy stalling and prices soaring upwards, the Labour leader said the UK was “staring down the barrel of something we haven’t seen in decades – a stagflation crisis”.

And he denounced ministers’ “inertia” in the face of Labour demands for an emergency budget and a windfall tax on the excess profits of energy companies.

“We need a government of the moment with ideas that meet the aspirations of the British public,” Mr Starmer told MPs. But he said that the Johnson administration was “too out of touch to meet the challenges of the moment, too tired to grasp the opportunities of the future … Their time has passed.”

The Queen’s Speech package included controversial plans to scrap the Human Rights Act, to ban gay conversion therapy while allowing the practice to continue for transgender people and to allow the use of gene-editing to “precision breed” animals and plants.

It set out measures to protect army veterans from prosecution for alleged crimes committed during the Northern Irish Troubles.

But there was no place for the Employment Bill to enhance rights at work, which was promised as long ago as the Queen’s Speech of 2019, or for promised animal welfare legislation to ban the import of fur and foie gras.

TUC general secretary Frances O’Grady said that mooted protections from pregnancy discrimination and rights to flexible working and fair tipping risked being “ditched for good”.

“Bad bosses up and down the country will be celebrating,” she said.

Anti-poverty charity Oxfam branded the failure to prioritise the rights of workers in precarious and low-paid jobs “a dereliction of duty”.

Liberal Democrat leader Sir Ed Davey said that the absence of an Employment Bill meant that family carers would once again miss out on the week’s unpaid leave first promised to them in 2019.

Mr Johnson’s repeated failure to deliver on the pledge was “insulting and woefully shortsighted”, said Sir Ed.

Care England chief executive Martin Green said that the failure to set out plans for much-needed reform of adult social care left a “bitter taste” for the sector.

Dr George Dibb, head of the IPPR think tank’s Centre for Economic Justice, said it “beggared belief” that the government’s programme contained such limited action in response to Bank of England warnings of a shrinking economy over the coming 18 months.

Describing the package as “cosmetic surgery for an economy facing a heart attack”, he said: “This crisis calls for a major restructuring of the UK economy to drive higher wages, productivity, innovation, investment, and faster decarbonisation.

“But the main brake on the economy in the short-term is shrinking household budgets as a consequence of the failure to tackle the cost-of-living crisis. Today’s Queen’s Speech contains almost nothing for families who are struggling to make ends meet.”

There are calls for an inquiry into why problems with the hospital system in the south west are “so much worse” than the rest of the country.

BBC News www.bbc.co.uk

Last week a Gloucestershire NHS Trust chief executive revealed she was driven to hospital by her husband, fearing an ambulance would take too long.

Patients in ambulances are waiting up to 14 hours to be handed over to hospital staff.

Local agencies say they are determined to overcome the challenges together.

Many put the delays down to hospitals being unable to discharge patients quickly enough.

South Western Ambulance Service currently has the longest wait times in England, with category-two calls, which include strokes and chest pains, taking nearly two hours on average to reach patients last month.

The target is 18 minutes.

And last week there was an average of 20 ambulances waiting outside the Gloucestershire Royal Hospital at any one time.

Carole Jarman said her friend was on the floor for 15 hours and waited a total of 27 hours before an ambulance arrived

Carole Jarman, 61, from Stroud, told BBC Radio Gloucestershire that her 89-year-old friend waited 27 hours for an ambulance last month after she had a fall.

Ms Jarman said it was “an awful experience”.

Cathie Cooper said she waited 10 minutes to even get through to a call handler when requesting an ambulance while she was having an asthma attack.

Unison’s South Western Ambulance lead for Gloucestershire, Shane Clark, said he now wants a central government inquiry.

“It would be really interesting to have a public inquiry to understand why the south west seems to be worse, why are we having this grassroots social care issue that doesn’t seem to be happening elsewhere,” he said.

Unison’s Shane Clark said while ambulances still queue in other areas of the country, the wait times are not as long as in the south west

Mr Clark, who is from Gloucester, has worked for the ambulance service for more than 15 years.

He said while crews are providing the best standard of care they can for their patients, beds need to be available when they arrive at hospital.

He added that he was concerned about the capacity of community hospitals in Gloucestershire.

Deborah Lee, chief executive of Gloucestershire Hospitals NHS Trust, has been praised by many on Twitter for her honesty

Posting on Twitter last week, Ms Lee said her husband had “bundled her into his car”, after she had showed the signs of a stroke because he had heard her “lamenting ambulance delays”.

She was clear to point out that the issues with ambulance waits were not at the “front door of hospitals” but at the back.

According to the NHS trust that runs them, Gloucestershire’s two main hospitals regularly have more than 200 patients medically fit to be discharged, but they are unable to move them out and hospital bosses have admitted they are struggling with the high numbers of patients.

Some of the issues contributing to the delay in discharging people include a reduction in the numbers of beds in community hospitals, difficulties in getting GP appointments, meaning more people are turning up at A&E, and how long it takes to organise adult social care in the community.

The BBC is not responsible for the content of external sites.View original tweet on Twitter

Adult social care is overseen by the county council so that people who are well enough can going back to their own homes, but with short-term support.

For those who need a longer term plan, the council works with other health partners, which might mean moving patients into care homes.

Executive director of Adult Social Care and Public Health at Gloucestershire County Council, Sarah Scott, said it is a “complex situation”.

“We are working really really hard on this [problem] and if it was simple, we would have solved it by now,” she said.

Executive director of Adult Social Care and Public Health at Gloucestershire County Council, Sarah Scott, said there are no easy answers to the problems faced

“It is easy to think well there are 200 people in the hospital, lets put them all in a care bed, but actually not all of them need a care bed.

“We know only half of them need some adult social care support, so an even smaller proportion of that 100 will actually need a care home bed.”

She added that one of the issues is a shortage of staff in the sector.

Charity Crossroads said hospitals have to be careful as they can be responsible for a “dereliction of duty” for discharging patients too early.

Jamie Webb, a registered manager at Crossroads Care – which helps people return home after being in hospital – said the sector is struggling.

“The community-based care is vastly under staffed, that’s having a knock-on effect for the hospitals in order for them to be able to discharge because there just isn’t the staffing levels to be able to increase those packages of care,” he said.

Local agencies say they are determined to overcome the challenges together with the aim of keeping communities safe

Mr Webb said that results in many people coming to him that have not fully recovered, with them ultimately ending up back into hospital.

The acting chief executive of Gloucestershire Hospitals, Professor Mark Pietroni, said: “We are committed to getting the safe discharge process right for everyone involved and work closely with health and social care colleagues, patients and their families to ensure that people can be discharged safely to the right environment for their onward care.”

Gloucestershire Health and Care Trust, for community hospitals, added in statement that it is “working tirelessly” with the NHS and local authority partners to improve flow between services in hospitals, community clinics and within people’s own homes.