Worth £10 million today
Has £600 million-plus debts today.
“East Devon has one of the highest rates of excess winter deaths in the South West, official figures show” and stiil community beds close!Disgraceful!
“Around 26% more people died in winter than in summer on average, according to the Office for National Statistics.
Across the rest of the South West, that figure is 18%.
Every year, more people die in winter than in summer – due to colder temperatures, respiratory diseases and outbreaks of flu.
To measure the impact, the ONS compares the number of additional deaths between December and March to the rest of the year.
During the winter of 2016/17, the latest period figures are available, there were approximately 150 excess winter deaths in East Devon.
This meant 26% more people died during winter in East Devon, compared with the yearly average.
This was higher than in the previous year when there were 12% more deaths during winter.
According to the ONS, small population sizes can cause a significant amount of year-on-year variation at a local level.
Across the South West, winter was most deadly for people aged 85 and older.
Out of 3,130 excess winter deaths in the South West, 3,120 were older than 65, and 2,090 older than 85.
Across England and Wales, the rate of excess winter deaths varies from as low as 4% to as high as 51%.
Dr Nick Scriven, president of the Society for Acute Medicine, said that the data raised concerns ‘as to why there is such variation even between areas in a single region’.
He said: “This data must act as a prompt to those in power to look at these trends and recognise that the capacity of the health service is being stretched beyond all measures in winter.
“We have an older, frailer population with increasingly complex medical problems, a lack of funding across health and social care to meet demand, a recruitment crisis and persistently poor performance.”
Provisional data for England and Wales shows that excess winter deaths hit their highest level in more than 40 years during 2017/18.
There were an estimated 50,100 excess winter deaths, 45% higher than the previous year.
Health think tank the King’s Fund said it was concerned that this ‘could be the start of a trend of periodically high winter deaths’.
The Department of Health and Social Care said that the 2017/18 figures ‘were likely the result of a combination of flu and cold weather’.
A spokesman said: “We know flu is difficult to predict – that’s why this year we have a stronger vaccine for over-65s, and have made more vaccines available than ever before.”
https://www.exmouthjournal.co.uk/news/east-devon-winter-deaths-nhs-figures-1-5812512
EDDC HQ contractor’s shares plunge to 6p – in 2014 they were worth 700p!
Perhaps using local companies would have been less risky!
“The crisis surrounding outsourcing firm Interserve intensified on Monday as its shares lost more than 75% of their value, crashing to just 6p, as the government contractor battles to negotiate its second rescue deal this year.
The heavily indebted group, which has thousands of government contracts such as cleaning hospitals and serving school meals, said the rescue plan would mean substantial losses for shareholders as the banks that have lent Interserve more than £600m take control of the company. It hopes to wrap up a deal early next year.
Interserve’s shares plunged to 6p in early trading, giving it a market value of less than £9m. At its peak in 2014, the shares were worth more than 700p….”
https://www.theguardian.com/business/2018/dec/10/interserve-shares-rescue-plan-carillion
Swire’s business pal in more difficulty in United States
As a commentator points out – an article from the Daily Telegraph of 5 December 2018:
“US congressional investigators have launched an inquiry into possible links between British-based companies owned by Russian oligarchs and their relationship with Russia’s intelligence agencies.
The move follows increasing concerns by U.S. congressmen over the extent of Russian meddling in both the U.S. and Europe, with a number of oligarchs with close ties to Russian President Vladimir Putin forming the main focus of the inquiry.
Among the UK-based companies that have aroused the interest of congressional investigators is EN+, the energy company owned by Oleg Deripaska and chaired by Tory peer Lord Barker of Battle.
Mr Deripaska, a close ally of Mr Putin, is already under investigation from congressional committees over allegations, which the oligarch denies, that he was involved in efforts to interfere with the 2016 presidential elections.
Recent documents released by the FBI revealed Mr Deripaska loaned $10 million to Paul Manafort, Donald Trump’s campaign manager, who has been charged with fraud and money-laundering. Mr Deripaska is one of several Russian oligarchs who were hit with U.S. sanctions in April.
Now US investigators say they are interested in apparent links between British-based companies owned by Russian oligarchs and Russian intelligence agencies.
Their interest in EN+ comes after FBI officers identified Evgeny Fokin, who is the company’s Director of International Cooperation, as formerly being the SVR’s declared liaison officer with U.S. intelligence agencies in Washington DC in the mid-1990s.
Apart from being employed by EN+, Mr Fokin, who is said to be a close ally of Mr Deripaska, has previously been employed by Basic Element, another company owned by Mr Deripaska.
“There is particular concern in Congress about the links between Russian businesses owned by oligarchs and the Russian intelligence agencies,” a U.S. official told the Daily Telegraph.
“There is concern about the large numbers of former Russian intelligence officers who now hold senior positions in major Russian businesses.
“There are growing suspicions in Congress that the distinction between the Russian state and businesses owned by Putin’s supporters may be on paper only.”
Lord Barker, a former energy minister under David Cameron, provoked criticism from MPs earlier this year after he helped EN+ raise £1 billion on the London Stock Exchange, money that was then used to pay off Russian banks subject to U.S. sanctions.
The claim by FBI officials that Mr Fokin is a former SVR officer would make him the third former Russian intelligence officer to have been identified as working for Mr Deripaska’s business interests.
Valery Pechenkin, another former SVR officer, has been appointed to run Basic Element, while Viktor Boyarkin, a former officer with the same Russian GRU military unit accused of carrying out the Salisbury nerve agent attack in March, has previously worked for Mr Deripaska’s Rusal aluminium conglomerate.
A spokesman for Mr Fokin denied that he had been a member of the SVR, and said Mr Fokin had not been contacted by anyone connected with the U.S. congressional investigation.
A person familiar with the situation told The Telegraph: “Mr Fokin resigned from the Russian Diplomatic Service over twenty years ago to pursue a career in the private sector. He has been with En+ since 2012.”
Both US congressional intelligence committees in the Senate and the House of Representatives have had long-running investigations into every aspect of alleged Russian interference in U.S. elections as well as other organisations.
In October Senator Richard Burr, the chairman of the Senate Intelligence Committee, announced his investigation was looking a new lines of inquiry. Following the outcome of the mid-term elections in November, the Democrat-led House intelligence committee has intensified its inquiry into Russian meddling, with U.S. officials confirming that Mr Deripaska, as well as other oligarchs, remain a particular focus of both investigations.
Mr Deripaska has recently been visiting London to give evidence in a court case involving a £74 million property dispute with former Russian minister Vladimir Chernukhin.”
Two degrees of separation: Paul Manafort and Hugo Swire
Manafort is heavily implicated in the Trump Russia scandal and facing jail:
“To recap some of the crucial plot points in the Paul Manafort story, based on my own reporting and lawsuits filed against him:
1. He owed millions of dollars to Oleg Deripaska, who invested in a fund that Manafort created for buying up assets in Russia and Ukraine.
2. Manafort was so deep in debt to Deripaska that he avoided him when the oligarch came asking for his cash in 2010.
3. When Manafort went to work for the Trump campaign, he suggested giving Deripaska “private briefings,” with the hopes of the Russian forgiving his debts. (All this is obliquely explained in emails obtained by The Atlantic last year.)”
Deripaska is closely linked to Sir Greg Barker – Chairman of Deripaska’s UK company EN+:
“This spring, a British lord with deep ties to the governing Conservative Party and a reputation as a do-gooder environmentalist arrived in Washington on an unlikely mission: to save the business empire of Oleg Deripaska, one of Russia’s most infamous oligarchs.
Mr. Deripaska was in deep trouble. In April, the Trump administration had announced sanctions on oligarchs close to President Vladimir V. Putin, and on their companies, as punishment for Russian interference in the 2016 presidential election and for other hostile acts. A billionaire who controls the world’s second-largest aluminum company, Mr. Deripaska faced possible ruin.
Portrayed as little more than a thug by his critics and suspected by United States officials of having ties to Russian organized crime, Mr. Deripaska, 50, has spent two decades trying to buy respect in the West. London welcomed him; Washington still mostly has not. Successive administrations have limited his ability to travel to the United States.
Even Mr. Putin was unable to resolve the situation when he interceded personally with Presidents George W. Bush and Barack Obama on Mr. Deripaska’s behalf.”
Sir Greg Barker has 50/50 stake in a company with Hugo Swire (Eaglesham Investments:
https://companycheck.co.uk/company/10520733/EAGLESHAM-INVESTMENTS-LIMITED/companies-house-data
The company (currently dormant) describes itself as “investing in “emerging economies”:
https://eastdevonwatch.org/2018/05/30/swire-and-his-investment-in-emerging-economies/
Brazil, China, India and Russia are currently considered the top 4 emerging economies:
https://www.thebalance.com/top-emerging-market-economies-1979085
Tory MP blocks BBC journalist who quoted his exact words about food banks to expose his hypocrisy
“Conservative MP Dominic Raab has blocked a BBC journalist on social media after she repeated his comments about food banks.
The former Brexit Secretary posted a photo in which he posed with food bank volunteers in his Esher and Walton constituency. He wrote: “Thank you to Tesco in Molesey and the Trussell Trust for partnering to encourage customers to generously provide food collections for families in our community, who are struggling at this time of year.”
In response, Victoria Derbyshire quoted verbatim previous remarks made by Mr Raab in the run-up to the 2017 general election. She reminded him he had previously blamed the rising reliance on food banks on those who had a “cash flow problem”, insisting they were not “languishing in poverty”.
The journalist soon found herself blocked from following Mr Raab’s Twitter account. Ms Derbyshire tweeted: “I repeated verbatim what Mr Raab said about people who use food banks..”
On Victoria Derbyshire’s 2017 debate show, Mr Raab had said: “I’ve studied the Trussell Trust data. “What they tend to find is the typical user of a food bank is not someone that’s languishing in poverty, it’s someone who has a cash flow problem episodically.”
Food bank charity the Trussell Trust handed out a record 1.3million emergency parcels in 2017, with 41 per cent of recipients putting their need down to delays and changes in their benefits.”
https://inews.co.uk/news/dominic-raab-blocks-victoria-derbyshire-twitter-food-banks/
Pub chain owner denies tweet that Universal Credit allows him to push zero-hours contracts
“Probably not the best PR for a wealthy businessman to be seen publicly boasting about how he is happily using taxpayers’ money to subsidise his staff wages.
So it’s a bit strange to see this tweet from the DWP quoting the MD and owner of pub chain Whiting and Hammond bragging about how so very little he pays his staff that his workers have to rely on Universal Credit to get by. …”
“Pensioner poverty rises as benefits freeze bites”
“Declining home-ownership and rising rents mean that one in six may have to choose between food and heat, warns Joseph Rowntree Foundation.
One in six pensioners is now living in poverty as a result of declining home ownership, soaring rents and the benefits freeze, the Joseph Rowntree Foundation has warned. Pensioner poverty is rising, having fallen steadily for nearly two decades, the charity said. The figures prompt fears that many pensioners will be forced to choose between paying for heating and buying food this winter, as benefits remain frozen below inflation for the third year in a row.
The foundation’s chief executive, Campbell Robb, said: “Pensioner poverty is a problem that we thought had gone away.”
The incidence had halved over 20 years, but began rising again in 2012-13. By 2016-17, 16% of pensioners were living in poverty, rising to 31% among those in social housing and 36% among private renters. Poverty here is “relative poverty” – an income of less than 60% of the median among pensioners, after housing costs.
Robb said: “For middle-aged people who have been struggling over the past few years, who don’t have many savings and don’t own their own home, the prospect of being a pensioner is very challenging.” The “golden age” when people enjoyed rising home-ownership and well-paid work was coming to an end, he added. About 20% of all pensioners rent their home, and the proportion is growing.
The problem is compounded by the benefits freeze, in place since 2016. “As rent goes up faster than housing benefit, pensioners have a huge gap to fill,” Robb said. “This tips people into poverty, and forces them to choose between food and heating.”
Figures published by the Institute for Fiscal Studies this year reveal that relative poverty among pensioners has risen in the past five years, while “absolute poverty” – an income of less than 60% of what the median of the general population was in 2010-11 – has fallen by just 1%. By comparison, absolute pensioner poverty fell by 12% between 2002-03 and 2007-08, and by 3% between 2007-08 and 2011-12.
The foundation called on the government to end the benefits freeze and to build genuinely affordable housing. “These figures are part of a wider increase in poverty across all age-groups,” said Robb. “If we don’t tackle the causes now, we fear that we are going to see poverty – particularly among pensioners – rise even more.”
https://www.theguardian.com/society/2018/dec/09/pensioner-poverty-rises-bnefites-freeze
Fake news on Labour Party being manufactured by secretive group in Scotland funded by Foreign Office
Owl says: the UK becoming more like Russia every day!
“Secret Scottish-based office led infowars attack on Labour and Jeremy Corbyn.
Explosive leaked documents passed to the Sunday Mail reveal the organisation’s Integrity Initiative is funded with £2million of Foreign Office cash and run by military intelligence specialists.
A secret UK Government-funded infowars unit based in Scotland sent out social media posts attacking Jeremy Corbyn and the Labour Party.
On the surface, the cryptically named Institute for Statecraft is a small charity operating from an old Victorian mill in Fife. But explosive leaked documents passed to the Sunday Mail reveal the organisation’s Integrity Initiative is funded with £2million of Foreign Office cash and run by military intelligence specialists.
The “think tank” is supposed to counter Russian online propaganda by forming “clusters” of friendly journalists and “key influencers” throughout Europe who use social media to hit back against disinformation. But our investigation has found worrying evidence the shadowy programme’s official Twitter account has been used to attack Corbyn, the Labour Party and their officials.
One tweet quotes a newspaper article calling Corbyn a “useful idiot”, that goes on to state: “His open visceral anti-Westernism helped the Kremlin cause, as surely as if he had been secretly peddling Westminster tittle-tattle for money.”
A message from the UK Government-funded organisation promotes an article that states: “Unlike Galloway (former MP George Galloway) Corbyn does not scream conspiracy, he implies it,” while another added: “It’s time for the Corbyn left to confront its Putin problem.”
A further message refers to an “alleged British Corbyn supporter” who “wants to vote for Putin”.
It is not just the Labour leader who has been on the receiving end of online attacks. His strategy and communications director Seumas Milne was also targeted.
The Integrity Initiative, whose base at Gateside Mill is near Auchtermuchty, retweeted a newspaper report that said: “Milne is not a spy – that would be beneath him. “But what he has done, wittingly or unwittingly, is work with the Kremlin agenda.”
Another retweet promoted a journalist who said: “Just as he supports the Russian bombardment of Syria, Seumas Milne supported the Russian slaughter of Afghanistan, which resulted in more than a million deaths.”
The Integrity Initiative has been accused of supporting Ukrainian politicians who oppose Putin – even when they also have suspected far-right links.
Further leaked documents appear to show a Twitter campaign that resulted in a Spanish politician believed to be friendly to the Kremlin being denied a job. The organisation’s “Spanish cluster” swung into action on hearing that Pedro Banos was to be appointed director of the national security department.
The papers detail how the Integrity Initiative alerted “key influencers” around Europe who launched an online campaign against the politician.
In the wake of the leaks, which also detail Government grant applications, the Foreign Office have been forced to confirm they provided massive funding to the Integrity Initiative.
In response to a parliamentary question, Europe Minister Alan Duncan said: “In financial year 2017-18, the FCO funded the Institute for Statecraft’s Integrity Initiative £296,500. “This financial year, the FCO are funding a further £1,961,000. Both have been funded through grant agreements.”
Politicians and academics have reacted with fury to news a covert Government-funded unit had been attacking the official opposition in Parliament.
Labour MSP Neil Findlay said: “It would appear that we have a charity registered in Scotland and overseen by the Office of the Scottish Charity Regulator that is funded by the UK Government and is spewing out political attacks on UK politicians, the Labour Party and the Labour movement. “Such clear political attacks and propaganda shouldn’t be coming from any charity. We need to know why the Foreign Office have been funding it.”
David Miller, a professor of political sociology in the School for Policy Studies at the University of Bristol, added: “It’s extraordinary that the Foreign Office would be funding a Scottish charity to counter Russian propaganda which ends up attacking Her Majesty’s opposition and soft-pedalling far-right politicians in the Ukraine.
“People have a right to know how the Government are spending their money, and the views being promoted in their name.”
Source: Scottish Daily Record
Good job EDDC’s HQ is almost finished … and let’s hope it is perfect … !
“Cabinet Office mandarins are believed to have sounded out Interserve’s rivals about the possibility of taking on some of the outsourcer’s work.
The cleaning and building company is heading for a debt-for-equity swap with its lenders as it creaks under debts of £650m. The swap could wipe out shareholders.
Interserve is a significant government supplier, with long-term deals for schools, hospitals and motorways. Jon Trickett, Labour’s shadow minister for the Cabinet Office, last night called for a temporary ban on the company bidding for public contracts — “until they have proved they are financially stable and there is no risk to the taxpayer”.
Interserve said: “The fundamentals of the business are strong and the board is focused on ensuring Interserve has the right financial structure to support its future success.”
Source: Sunday Times
Another NHS campaigner speaks out
Roseanne Edwards, who is fighting to “Keep Our Horton General” in Oxfordshire writes:
“From our fellow campaigners who are fighting as hard as we are for their local hospital. It is a copy of what is being done to services in Oxfordshire. It is happening all over England.
The background their hospital is set against is the same politically inspired NHS reorganisation we are all victims of.
“Following the 2010 election which returned a Coalition Government of Conservatives and Liberal Democrats, the Department of Health was too busy with the torturous passage through the House of Commons and Lords of the Health and Social Care Bill, which became the Health and Social Care Act 2012, and took their eye off the ball, neglecting to commission training places in Universities for Doctors, nurses physiotherapists and other valuable and essential health professionals.
This resulted in a national shortage which we are seeing today, in A&E surgeons, paediatricians, nurses and other staff.
The outcome may have been intentional. Michael Portillo speaking on the BBC Parliament channel following the election, said that the Conservatives kept quiet about their intentions for the health service because they knew that if their plans became known, they would not be elected.
The intended change was to the fundamental foundation of what used to be the National Health Service, the Secretary of State’s duty to provide, which was removed and a system of contracting services out to tender to enable more profit making companies to siphon off the NHS revenue put in place with competition law operational.
Martin Barkley says that the Care Closer to Home model of service provision will be sustainable. This is government propaganda. What does sustainable mean? The funding for the health service is a matter of choice. Government chooses to fund it or not. This government and the Coalition, chose not to. Even when ‘Care Closer to Home’ is put in place and Dewsbury Hospital downgraded, completely as planned for spring 2017, the government could choose to reduce funding still further.
This is exactly what is happening with the mandatory and secretive Sustainability and Transformation Plan (STP) agenda, being worked up by the Councils, CCGs and Trusts, in West Yorkshire footprint number 5. The West Yorkshire STP has to save money as part of West Yorkshire’s share of the £22billion ‘efficiency savings.’
There is NO EVIDENCE to show that the cuts to hospital provision and services at home, are less expensive than inpatient stays. The pilots in Torbay were inconclusive. In fact they may prove to be more expensive. The expenditure of the National Health Service model as it had been and the treatment it carried out, was consistently found by OECD studies to be the most cost effective in the developed world, treating everyone according to need. This was the case even including the increased costs and associated difficulties caused by the marketised Foundation Trust system.
(The CCG CEP) Dr Kelly outlines what he describes as a “whole system change” in the NHS. What the describes, is chopping the services into tiny bits and letting private profit making companies provide the cheaper, less complex services, such as the dermatology he mentioned http://www.priderm.co.uk and the opticians on the high street. This denies revenue to the Hospital Trust, destabilising it. A new contract announced after the public meeting for Musculo- Skeletal services has gone toprivate company ConnectHealth:
http://www.connecthealth.co.uk
redirecting even more revenue away from the Trust:
https://www.northkirkleesccg.nhs.uk/news/patients-shape-musculoskeletal-service./.
The ‘Right Care ‘ initiative mentioned is an import from the US. What does ‘redesigning therapies’ mean? The Right Care programme, is looking at money. Is this the first step to withdrawing what was once available?
The Royal College of Surgeons has criticised the policy of withdrawing treatments now evaluated as procedures of limited clinical effectiveness (PoLCE) or procedures of limited clinical value (PoLCV). There is no national list of these, as CCGs are free to choose which ones to fund and which to not. The Royal College of Surgeons states that the growing list is “extremely detrimental to patients across the NHS, removing equality of access to treatment, creating postcode lotteries, lowering the standard of care provided in the NHS and potentially reducing the quality of life for some patients.”
Following the fragmentation described here, the architects of the STPlans want an Accountable Care Organisation (ACO) to put it back together, with the private sector cocooned and shareholding, in the provider structure.
Dr Kelly speaks of the Hospital Avoidance Team, going into hospitals to facilitate early discharge. What we have learned since the public meeting is that there is a postcode lottery with regard to what is on offer following a hospital stay and hospital nurses and other staff have to know where you live, because North Kirklees patients can not have what Wakefield patients get.”
Privatisation – another big company seeks rescue – the one building EDDC HQ!
Owl says: Has the message still not got through? Privatise, give your directors MASSIVE salaries and bonuses, look after your shareholders. Then, when it all goes belly-up either (a) get the government (ie us) to bail you out or (b) let your government clients (ie us) go to the wall!
“Interserve: Major government contractor ‘seeks second rescue deal’
One of the UK’s largest providers of public services is seeking a rescue deal as it struggles with £500m of debt, according to the Financial Times.
Interserve, which works in prisons, schools, hospitals and on the roads, said it might look for new investment or sell off part of the business.
Workers at the Foreign Office and the NHS are among Interserve’s tens of thousands of UK employees.
The government said it supported the company’s long-term recovery plan.
The Financial Times reported that the company was looking for a deal to refinance its debt which would mean lenders taking a significant loss while public shareholders would be “virtually wiped out”.
Its share price dropped to a 30-year low last month.
Despite lucrative contracts in the Middle East and its wide range of work in the UK, the company has continued to lose money since March, when it agreed an earlier rescue deal.
Its troubles have been blamed on cancellations and delays in its construction contracts as well as struggling waste-to-energy projects in Derby and Glasgow.
Interserve claims its prospects are improving, and says it will increase profits this year.
What does Interserve do?
From its origins in dredging and construction, the company has diversified into wide range of services, such as health care and catering, for clients in government and industry.
At King George Hospital in east London, for instance, Interserve has a £35 million contract for for cleaning, security, meals, waste management and maintenance.
Its infrastructure projects include improving the M5 Junction 6 near Bristol, refurbishing the Rotherham Interchange bus station in Yorkshire, and upgrading sewers and water pipes for Northumbrian Water.
But Interserve is also the largest provider of probation services in England and Wales, supervising about 40,000 “medium-low risk offenders” for the Ministry of Justice.
In a statement, Interserve said: “The fundamentals of the business are strong and the board is focused on ensuring Interserve has the right financial structure to support its future success.”
The company said its options included bringing “new capital into the business and progressing the disposal of non-core businesses “.
Interserve’s difficulties follow the collapse of Carillion in January 2018, which put thousands of jobs at risk and cost taxpayers £148m.
Government reassures over Interserve
Following that, the government launched a pilot of “living wills” for contractors, so that critical services can be taken over in the event of a crisis. Interserve is one of five suppliers taking part.
A Cabinet Office spokesperson said: “We monitor the financial health of all of our strategic suppliers, including Interserve, and have regular discussions with the company’s management. The company successfully raised new debt facilities earlier this year, and we fully support them in their long term recovery plan.”
Swire continues to plot … but for whom? and why?
Daily Express article today – heck that fence must be pretty uncomfortable!
“Under the terms of the deal Mrs May agreed with the EU that the UK will automatically fall into a ‘backstop’ EU customs union should the Government fail to agree a new trading relationship with Brussels during the transition period. The transition period is currently set at 21 months, though Mrs May has hinted it could be extended. Should the UK enter a customs union with Brussels it would struggle to sign comprehensive trade deals with third parties, and will still have to obey a significant proportion of EU legislation.
Tory loyalists Sir Hugo Swire and Richard Graham have tabled the amendment, which would give MPs a vote on whether the UK joins the customs union backstop or extends the transition period if a new trading relationship with the EU can’t be agreed.
It also requires the Government to push for “further assurances from the EU that the backstop would only be a temporary arrangement”.
Should the UK enter a customs union the amendment requires the Government to make plans to exit within a year.
Nikki da Costa, formerly the Prime Minister’s director of legislative affairs, suggested Ministers could be behind the move.
He told the Daily Mail: “I know a Government amendment when I see one”.
“The fight against fast food continues …” but … but …
Cranbrook Town Council wants to block a kebab van from selling food in The town:
https://www.midweekherald.co.uk/news/the-fight-against-fast-food-continues-cranbrook-councillors-object-to-kebab-van-s-seven-days-a-week-trading-bid-1-5807445
Cranbrook has only a pub for eating out, which sells a mix of what is crudely called “healthy food” and junk food:
https://www.cranberry-farm.co.uk/our-food/?menu=513118
Cranbrook is installing outdoor barbecues at its “country park” where no doubt junk food will be cooked:
https://www.midweekherald.co.uk/news/plans-for-outdoor-barbecues-to-be-installed-in-cranbrook-before-easter-2019-but-council-is-looking-to-share-the-cost-1-5810127
Is it fair to try to stop the van? A poll says 58% want it.
EDDC liberalised street trading rules to encourage more street trading.
Confusing!
Ottery Community Hospital – a campaigner speaks on council in-fighting
Text of address to Ottery Town Council by Philip Algar, a long-term campaigner for the Ottery hospital, including its in-patient beds:
“OSMTC 29th NOVEMBER 2018
As an interested member of the public, I have attended almost all the town council meetings over the last few years. During that time, I have seen the councillors confront many issues, some trivial and some serious. However, I have not seen a collective, note the word “collective”, and timely public effort by the council as a whole to support those of us who have been campaigning to save the Ottery hospital. I can think of nothing that is more important to the local people than having access to a well-located modern greatly-valued hospital and this, surely, justifies your collective support. Why has such support been missing?
Whenever the subject of the hospital’s future has been included on the town council agenda, the main speaker, often the only speaker, has been one councillor, who, quite correctly, has said that she does not speak for the council but for a group of which she is a leading member.
As recently as last August, I asked the council to adopt an official and supportive role but nothing happened and, as far as I know, my suggestion that the hospital should become a community asset, which was rejected by EDDC, was not challenged by this council, even although such status has, I am told, been granted to other hospitals. I had suggested in advance that it might be wise to devise a response in anticipation of a negative decision.
All this is why I shall no longer be attending your meetings which will be good news for many of you. Furthermore, the well-intentioned and hard-working unofficial groups have failed to make much progress with the official bodies and, apparently, admit this. That said, it would be helpful if they were more communicative with the public.
Given this lamentable situation, it was hardly surprising that three councillors, backed by a county councillor, suggested setting up a semi-official working group to solve the crisis. Three councillors voted in favour and six, according to the draft minutes of the meeting, abstained.
I was astonished to learn that, allegedly, some councillors construed this as a defeat for the trio. That is breathtaking and worthy of Private Eye. If this is true, it also exposes a level of ignorance that calls into question the competence of those involved. If it is not true, I withdraw this comment immediately.
Now, despite an objective explanation from Dr. Margaret Hall, explaining that, effectively, NHS groups, apparently, will only discuss matters with official groups or those under the aegis of the council, you still chose to organise this meeting, at an unusual time when so many residents are at work. I note the comments that this meeting was planned as councillors were attending a finance meeting. The claim by the abstainers, that they did not have sufficient information, has already been undermined by Dr. Hall’s contribution so why have another meeting?
This, presumably, is an effort to overturn the initial decision on the creation of a working group. The agenda also raises the possibility of supporting a decision that has already been agreed after a vote of three to nil, and which has now been explained by Dr. Hall. I find the possibility that organising a meeting to consider reversing the democratically-taken decision to be a truly ludicrous waste of time and totally unnecessary.
Those who were penalised by the decision to remove inpatient beds and now face the prospect that the hospital may not even become a hub, deserve much more from their councillors.”
End: 29.11.18
Swire and Rudd – a marriage made in …
Multiple sightings of our esteemed MP lurking in the background – almost seeming to try to duck out of shot – of early TV news items featuring Amber Rudd spouting today’s riff on Brexit.
Swire has already been described as “a state sanctioned dissident” and Rudd is known to be quite prepared to do May’s dirty work:
https://eastdevonwatch.org/2018/12/07/swire-state-sanctioned-dissident/
So, are they dirty working today WITH May or AGAINST her?
Be careful Mrs May – keeping your friends close but your enemies even closer has its failings. And Owl thinks he has never forgiven you for ousting him from his “job” at the Foreign Office, cosying up to the sheiks of the Saudi Arabian peninsula and his favourite islands, The Maldives. Which he still does but in the very much less prestigious ‘job” of Chairman of the Conservative Middle East Council.
“Laybys in Cranbrook are being used by lorry drivers to ‘entertain’ women”
Owl LOVES the comment from the DCC officer: ““I know this is not a popular thing to suggest, but the people who bought the houses bought them in full knowledge of the layby” but Owl thinks they expected the LORRIES to be laid by, not ladies being laid by lorry drivers!
“Two laybys that lorry drivers are using to ‘entertain’ female companions will be closed.
The laybys, right in the middle of Cranbrook, are also being used a public toilet, for boy racers to congregate and play loud music and swear, and the proximity to houses mean that lorry drivers can see into homes from their cabs.
Unanimous agreement was given by councillors to close the laybys and for Devon County Council’s Highways officers to come up with a solution.
Cllr Ray Bloxham, who brought the proposal to Friday’s East Devon Highways and Traffic Orders Committee, said that the laybys used to be in a rural location but now are right in the middle of Cranbrook, and homes are now located immediately adjacent to the laybys.
He said: “The two laybys in question are now principally used by HGVs for overnight parking as a free car park. This results in considerable disturbance to adjacent households and there have been a series of complaints about noise disturbance especially overnight from refrigerated units and from engines being started and left running during the early hours. There have been ancillary complaints about anti-social behaviour by drivers using the hedgerow as a toilet and other unpleasant behaviours.
“The complaints by local residents have been referred to both Environmental Health at East Devon District Council and to Highways, and the only solution that was put forward and supported by highways department was to close the laybys.”
He added that there was organised lorry parking less than a mile away in Clyst Honiton, but there is a fee for it, so they prefer to park for free.
A resident of Roman Way, which is just 15m away over a hedge from the layby, said that they are facing anti-social behaviour ‘night and day’.
She said: “There are privacy issues as from their cabs, they can see into our residences, while the anti-social behaviour is disturbing out sleep. One lorry driver ‘entertained’ a female companion in his cab overnight and she left at 5.30am in the morning – this is the kind of behaviour we want to end.
“Some of the drivers urinate and use the hedge as a toilet, and they leave litter there which attracts vermin, and at night you get boy racers there and they play music and swear loudly.
“It is a real nuisance and causes health risks to us and our children. It doesn’t support the healthy town concept and for us as residents, the issues are very real. If you lived in our home and had this every day and night, you would realise the issues that we are facing at the moment.”
Mike Jones, Senior Devon County Council Traffic Officer, said that the laybys were on the road so lorry drivers do have a place to stop. He added that the road is a diversion route for the A30 and the road does need marshalling facilities and laybys are a useful thing to have, before saying: “I know this is not a popular thing to suggest, but the people who bought the houses bought them in full knowledge of the layby.”
But Cllr Richard Scott said that was an inappropriate argument to make, as it would be the same as saying if you bought a house next to a field, then it could never be built on. He said that if that argument was used, then Cranbrook itself would never have been built.
Cllr Phil Twiss said that he fully supported the laybys being closed to vehicles, but said that as a cyclist who used the road, those laybys are a handy little refuge to stop and have a drink or check tyres. He said: “I agree that we should close them, but officers need to go away and come up with a practical solution.”
The East Devon HATOC unanimously agreed that the two laybys, located on opposite sides of the highway alongside the B3174 at Cranbrook, approximately 100m west of Parsons Lane, be closed to vehicular use, either by the introduction of a Traffic Regulation Order, or a different solution that the highways department could identify which meant moving the kerb line.”
https://www.devonlive.com/news/devon-news/laybys-cranbrook-being-used-lorry-2303961
“Children in charge of the council for a day at takeover event”
Owl was under the impression that children have been in charge of EDDC for some considerable time …
“Year 6 children from Exeter Road Community Primary School were among the region’s schools to take part in a takeover day at the East Devon District Council Offices – getting a sense of life in local government, making decisions which impact on people’s everyday lives
In a mock council meeting, the children put on their best acting performances as they pretended to be adults in professions from butcher through to builder and debated what to do with a new plot of land. …”
https://www.exmouthjournal.co.uk/news/children-east-devon-takeover-1-5810494
“Developers Have Used A Legal Loophole To Dodge Building 10,000 Affordable Homes”
“Developers have dodged providing more than 10,000 affordable homes due to the government’s failure to close a loophole in the law, HuffPost UK can reveal.
Using ‘permitted development rights’, builders have sidestepped their duty to provide affordable homes when they convert non-residential buildings like office blocks.
The rules were designed to speed up the planning process, as they allow developers to transform a property without having to apply for town halls’ planning permission – something which could see council chiefs demand social housing as part of planning conditions.
Housing charity Shelter handed an analysis to HuffPost which shows that 10,340 affordable homes have been lost over the last three years in England as a result.
Polly Neate, chief executive, said: “With hundreds of thousands of people homeless today, it’s obvious that we need as many social homes as we can get. But despite this, the government is now considering new plans that could supercharge a social housing get out clause for developers.
“Developers shouldn’t have a license to dodge social housing when so many are without a home they can afford. Instead of creating a social housing black hole, the government should halt these plans and bring down the cost of land to build the social homes we need.”
The government says the rules simplify the planning process, but for every 10 homes built using the conversion rules, three affordable homes have been lost.
As the housing crisis deepens, ministers are now considering a new plan which could allow developers to further exploit the rules.
Using the same legal mechanism, developers may be able to demolish and replace commercial buildings.
Labour’s shadow housing secretary, John Healey said the government must act.
“We can’t make housing more affordable if we don’t build more affordable homes, but Conservative ministers are letting developers cash in without making any contribution to the community,” he said.
We can’t make housing more affordable if we don’t build more affordable homes Labour shadow housing minister, John Healey
“These changes have given developers a free hand to dodge their duty to build homes that are affordable to local people.”
A spokeswoman for the Ministry of Housing, Communities and Local Government underlined that more than 32,000 homes had been provided using permitted development rights.
“We’re committed to speeding up the planning system to help deliver the homes the country needs,” she said.
“By introducing additional permitted development rules we’re providing flexibility, reducing bureaucracy and making the most effective use of existing buildings.
“Our £9bn affordable homes programme is set to deliver 250,000 affordable homes by March 2022 and we’re scrapping councils’ borrowing caps, setting them free to build a new generation of council housing.”
“Motability firm boss quits after news of £2.2m bonus”
Owl says: Bet May and her cronies HATE the National Audit Office!
“The boss of the business that leases cars to people with disabilities on behalf of the Motability charity is stepping down after it emerged he is set to receive a £2.2m bonus on top of his seven-figure salary.
Mike Betts, the chief executive of Motability Operations, came under fire earlier this year after MPs called his annual £1.7m pay package “totally unacceptable”.
A report by the government spending watchdog, the National Audit Office (NAO), published on Friday says as well as his “generous” remuneration, Betts is in line for a previously undisclosed performance bonus worth about £2.2m.
Following the report, Motability Operations announced that Betts would stand down from his position by May 2020, while the group’s chairman, Neil Johnson, would retire in April 2019.
In a statement, Motability Operations said: “After 16 years in the business, Motability Operations chief executive Mike Betts and the board of Motability Operations Group plc have agreed that, following the implementation of actions agreed as an outcome of the NAO review, and working to help the new chairman settle in, a suitable successor will be found, and Mike will step down from the board, no later than May 2020.
“The board is clear that recommendations made by the NAO will benefit from Mr Betts’ experience and skills to see them through.”
The Motability scheme enables disabled people to lease adapted cars using their enhanced mobility disability benefits – either disability living allowance or its successor, the personal independence payment. It currently helps about 614,000 people, many of whom would otherwise struggle to afford a vehicle.
The NAO is critical of the performance plan put in place for Betts and his fellow directors in 2008, saying that the targets meant to incentivise “excellent performance” were set at levels below what the company was achieving when the scheme was introduced.
The targets were “easily exceeded” and in the first seven years of the plan, five executive directors received “generous” remuneration of £15.3m in total, a near fourfold increase for what the NAO suggests was unexceptional performance. …”
