There’s been talk for quite some time, as part of the plans for regenerating central Swindon, of replacing the Oasis Centre and possibly relocating it. The Adver seems to be ahead of everyone else and have already moved the Oasis to West Swindon. The Link Centre versus the Oasis Centre — could you tell the difference?
As always, Swindon Mela today was a great day out. Undoubtedly, it’s one of the best community events in Swindon’s social calendar.
It’s nice to see that, at last, on appeal one of judge Douglas Field’s notorious lenient sentences has been overturned and a criminal gaoled. In a judgement that the people of Swindon have become familiar with, Mr Field allowed someone with a very long and ignoble history to walk away from court with a suspended sentence described as a ‘final chance’. With 38 previous convictions for over 130 offences, the time for chance should be thoroughly in the past.
Yesterday’s announcement of plans to electrify the railway line between London and South Wales is, in principle, good news for those that travel on the route. When completed, journey times should be less, and the cost of running the trains should be less and they should be cleaner and more reliable. All that is just a consequence of the technology. But much of the rest that has been claimed for the plan will depend on political decisions.
Whether there will be more seats depends on whether the government allows the railways to buy electric trains with more seats than on the old diesel ones. Whether the lower running costs will turn into lower fares depends on how much the government charges First Great Western or its successors for the privilege of running the railway. The current government has, almost without exception, given rail franchises to the highest bidder with little regard to the quality of service to be provided. And then there’s the scope for budget overruns that are endemic whenever politicians and civil servants get involved in contracts and procurement projects.
With at least two general elections between now and the planned completion of the electrification, the chances that it will be derailed by political interference must be high.
Today, the Adver has published no less than thirteen articles on its website related to Swine ’flu, including one story from yesterday that it has published twice more. Only nine articles on other topics were published. Their desperation to put a porcine spin on any story they can is summed up by one headline.
Weather, not flu keeps town quiet
If a rainy day in Malmesbury isn’t enough of a non-story for you, how about one reporting business-as-usual for the ambulance service?
We are not being swamped with calls relating to swine flu. We are experiencing high calls but not relating to swine flu.
The rainy day story quotes one woman as saying.
There is certainly no panic
If the Adver gets its way, it won’t remain that way for much longer.
It’s disappointing, but not surprising, that the vote at last night’s council meeting to oppose the Eastern Development Area proposals ended up dividing along party lines. It seems that the local red nest are totally ignorant of what their party’s mismanagement of the economy and distortion of the housing market has done, as illustrated by the comments of Mr Grant.
This plan will deliver much needed affordable housing to Swindon. We should be trying to make sure that the development is eco-friendly and includes green technology — we should back this development for the future of Swindon.
At the moment, just about the only building going on in Swindon’s northern and southern development areas is the construction of so-called affordable housing. And if you look at the prices of those ‘affordable’ houses, you’ll notice that most are more expensive than the equivalent allegedly unaffordable houses in other parts of Swindon. Forcing developers to make 30% of any large development ‘affordable’ just forces the average price of housing up without solving the underlying problem.
If you want to make housing affordable, the only way to do it is to ensure that supply exceeds demand. The recent collapse in the economy has done more to bring that about than market distorting government rules on affordable housing ever will.
The naïvety of the Swindon Community Safety Partnership continues to amaze. This week the Partnership’s leader, Mr Palusinki, is claiming that invisible marking of property reduces burglary by over 85%.
Effective property marking has reduced burglaries in other areas by up to 85 percent. Goods are less attractive to thieves if they can be easily identified.
Mr Palusinki is guilty of believing the manufacturer’s advertising material. The evidence on which those claims are based is weak.
An area containing approximately 500 homes was identified as being suitable for a pilot test to allow Police to assess the effectiveness of forensic property marking which is based on the principles of human DNA…. Within the ‘hot-spot’, 95% of the properties used the forensic marking ‘kits’, which included a large number of repeat victims, to mark their property. Signage, posters and window stickers were then used to deter criminals from operating in the area as well as significant media coverage…. The pilot was a huge success, with an incredible 85% reduction in domestic burglary, 60% reduction in theft from vehicles, and 50% reduction in theft of vehicles.
So in reality, it wasn’t the marking of property that caused the reduction in burglaries, it was the publicity that accompanied it that had the effect.
Mr Palusinki, it seems, is an advertiser’s dream customer.
It’s refreshing to see that Swindon Borough Council’s licensing committee has had the sense to ignore, for the moment, its officers’ recommendation to ban street traders from much of Swindon town centre. It has postponed making a decision because, without more detail about the regeneration which putting street traders out of business is meant to support, the case wasn’t well made. I suspect that even with more detail, the case for removing street traders wouldn’t be obvious. We already know much about the New Swindon Company’s plans for degenerating regenerating the town centre. Even in some of the grander plans that have now failed, there was nothing that would justify removing the street traders from the existing pedestrianised area. There’s also nothing in the council’s own licensing policy that would justify such a move.
Unfortunately for the street traders, there’s not much cause for celebration, as the European Union has plans to make their lives more difficult too. The proposal for removing street traders contained this little EU gem.*
the EU Services Directive takes effect before the 2010 season and seems to decree that consents (which are not renewable) cannot be preferentially offered to incumbent traders but must instead be opened up to competition (randomly chosen from those meeting the standard, not determined by a bidding process).
So even if the council’s decision is put off indefinitely — rather like the town centre regeneration — the existing street traders may lose their pitches in an EU instigated lottery anyway.
Anyone remember the ‘principle of subsidiarity’?
*A few words of caution: in a quick search of the EU’s directives I couldn’t find this directive. I am, perhaps, putting too much trust in Swindon Borough Council’s Head of Licensing.
It seems that Swindon Borough Council are unaware that we’re in the midst of an economic recession. Six months after they forced several street traders to move, the council’s licensing committee is at it again, this time with more draconian measures. They now propose to exclude all street traders from the main pedestrianised streets in the town centre (Canal Walk, The Parade, Regent Street, Regent Circus, Edgeware Road and Bridge Street). This will displace street traders that have only just moved following the committee’s last attempt at stifling street trading.
So, not content with there already being many empty shops in the town centre, the council now wants to get rid of street traders too. Under the proposals, street trading will be allowed in very few town centre streets. Farmers and continental markets will be allowed in Wharf Green (it seems that the council likes those); fast food stalls will be exiled to the site of the post office at Fleming Way. The only good news for street traders is that the fees the council charges them will be decreased. Given how little trade some of the permitted streets will allow, that’s no comfort to the street traders.
This commercial vindictiveness is, supposedly, to help regenerate the town centre.
This proposal relates to the 2010 Promise 35 that we will take all necessary steps to secure the regeneration of the town centre.
As the proposals are backed by the New Swindon Company — the quango whose only tangible contribution to the town centre’s regeneration has been demolition — it’s no surprise that the proposals are totally illogical. If the town centre was thriving and the street traders were in some way dragging it down, perhaps there would be some sense to it. But it is not, and will not be for some years yet. To claim that removing street traders contributes to the regeneration of the town centre is like claiming that sanding down a few rust spots would allow a broken-down car to pass an MOT.
Swindon’s blue nest councillors should be ashamed of the authoritarian leanings that this policy displays.
It must be hard being a large retailer. You put lots of effort into cultivating an ‘environmentally friendly’ image, replacing plastic carrier bags with paper ones that proclaim their virtues, only to find that these marketing efforts are ineffective with your customers.
Now, you might think that if — as the person stood in front of me yesterday in a cashiers’ queue was — you’re buying clothes made entirely of synthetic fibres, clothes that have been transported at least half way round the globe, then the least of your environmental concerns should be the material of the carrier bag into which your purchase is being placed. Not to the aforementioned customer ahead of me in the queue. She looked at the cashier packing her polyester paradise into a brown paper bag and said “Paper? Oh well. Why not waste another tree?” For a style-conscious cheap-fashion junkie, only plastic bags for plastic clothing will do, I suppose.