Colin Taylor - Liberal Democrat Councillor

Work on finding a user for Horton Chapel has been held up. The borough council’s legal staff had to be diverted to deal with two problems created by the county council. First they withdrew support for the Children’s Centre and Day Nursery in Hollymoor Lane. Then they delayed a decision on the future of the Mansion in Nonsuch Park for over 15 months, resulting in a lot of extra work. It is now hoped to invite tenders from interested parties later this year.

Figures quoted at the June meeting of Surrey County Council by the Executive Member for Transport, in reply to a Lib Dem question, show that Epsom & Ewell now has by far the worst pavements in Surrey.

The figures quoted are for BVPI 187 - a government defined measure of quality, higher values being worse. For 2007/2008 they are 92% higher for Epsom & Ewell than the Surrey average - and compared with 2005/2006 they got 68% worse in Epsom & Ewell at the same times as getting 45% better in Surrey as a whole. At 31 Epsom & Ewell’s score for 2007/2008 is almost 4 times worse than the best borough of Runnymede which scored 8.

I don’t think the Conservative administration is starving Epsom & Ewell of resources deliberately, they are simply allocating funds using a formula which takes no account of what local needs actually are.

This week we debated Surrey County Council’s 2007 Community Survey, which reveals that:

• Only 3 in 10 respondents believe that they can influence decisions affecting their local area.
• People who feel able to influence decisions are more likely to be satisfied with the way SCC runs things.
• A quarter would like to be more involved in decisions and another quarter said it depended on the issue.
• Less than 1 in 6 had heard of SCC’s Local Committees.

I pointed out that if we are to do anything effective about publicising Local Committees before next June, we need to take action now.

The Tories on the Executive had agreed to provide residents with information on how they can have a say in the local decision making process. Yet they failed to mention Local Committees, despite the Survey revealing that less than one person in six had heard of them.

I proposed that instead the council should promote the work of Local Committees more effectively.

At one time there were Press Officers promoting Local Committees. Now some Local Committees have had to divert money from their allocations just to advertise the dates and venues for their meetings and take “pot luck” on subsequent press coverage.

Yet Local Committees are the best things this Council does to engage and involve local people. SCC ought to build on success, not strangle it by cutting the numbers of meetings.

I added that the PR department should be publicising the outcomes of the meetings, as well as the dates and venues. Of course the Tories voted through an amendment emasculating the whole motion, though it did take a step forward by mentioning Local Committees in passing.

Ironically, on the very same day, the county’s PR department did issue an excellent Press Release about the Runnymede Local Committee – one with no Lib Dem members.

Ever since 17 street lights failed in Hook Road early in January, I have been chasing Surrey County Council to get them repaired. The problem was identified as a cable failure, necessitating 18 new lamp posts.

Promised completion dates came and went. So at the Local Committee on June 9th I demanded a full explanation of the apparent lack of urgency. It seems that the problem is one of Health & Safety. The danger is to the EDF workers struggling to make the necessary electrical connections in the narrow footways, not just from traffic but more from the tangle of other buried services, especially those for telephones and cable TV.

Surrey Highways said that all but 3 of the 18 new lights had now been connected, but the last three required staff from EDF, BT and Virgin to work together under SCC supervision and this could not be arranged before 7th July.

I pointed out that actually 12 street lights were not working, not just the 3 mentioned and promised to supply a detailed list, which I did later that night.

I have subsequently been told that the other 9 have failed for different reasons and will be dealt with separately. Let’s see what happens.

It was revealed at the June Local Committee that the student flats on the old Lintons Lane School site may not be built after all. It seems that the developer is negotiating with Surrey County Council to move the youth centre, either elsewhere on the site or off the site altogether. It is understood that the aim is to build retirement flats.

This follows on earlier news that the youth centre had been deprived of heating. I pointed out that retaining this important Youth facility is included in the current Local Plan and expressed the hope that it will also be protected in the new one.

Having been advised by SCC Highways that only 5 street lights now remain to be fixed in Hook Road, out of the 12 I reported last week, I went to check this evening - and found no less than 10 still out of action.

They also advised me that they are all due to be working by 7th July. On the other hand, on 10th March they had assured me they would all be working by 31st March.

No harm in hoping, meanwhile I shall be keeping up the pressure.

Today the county council’s planning committee voted 11 to 4 to refuse an application to build a ready-mix mortar plant in the sand quarry at North Park Farm, Godstone. Nothing too unusual there, you might think. Well no, except that the same committee had already considered the same application back in February and approved it!

Or did we? The members had actually voted 6 to 5 for refusal, but the voting was miss-counted and reported as 5 all, whereupon the chairman gave a casting vote in favour. When members objected that a majority had voted against it, on legal advice she ruled that as she had originally not voted, her casting vote was her first vote and now she would give a casting vote in favour.

After this was reported in the national press, the Council took the advice of a QC and decided that the previous decision was not valid.

The refusal was formally proposed and seconded by my Lib Dem colleagues Fiona White and Ian Beardsmore.

As many local people are only too well aware, early in January most of the street lights failed on a long stretch of Hook Road between Lower Court Road and the former St Barnabas’ Church Hall - and also in Hurst Road.

I asked a formal question about this at SCC’s Local Committee in Epsom & Ewell on 10 March and was told they should all be working by the end of March. Although new lamp posts have been erected, only a minority of these have been connected so far. Meanwhile two others beyond the Church Hall have failed. I counted on Monday and found 12 not working in Hook Road alone.

Workmen have been observed from time to time digging up the footway to connect cables, but the whole operation is proceeding at a snail’s pace. Apparently under Margaret Thatcher’s 1989 electricity privatisation legislation, EDF (the French State Electricity Company) have a monopoly on such work. Although they have promised to meet the targets they have been set by the Regulator (Ofgem), they seem in no hurry to complete this work.

I intend asking another formal question at the next Local Committee in June. You need to be an optimist in this job.

A new website was opened yesterday giving a wealth of information about the current review of Maternity & Children’s services at Epsom & St Helier Hospitals. Contents include details of:

• The background to the review;
• The ‘case for change’;
• How the project is being run and who is doing it;
• The latest options for the future of the services;
• How they are engaging with the public;
• Presentations and notes from meetings with stakeholders and staff;
• Agenda and minutes for the review’s Project Board and Project Team;
• Press releases and other breaking news.

Visitors are asked to comment on the options and/or put forward other ideas. It can be accessed at http://review.surreyhealth.nhs.uk/Women&Children’s/

More gypsies have arrived to join those already encamped on Manor Park. They all intend to move on to the Downs for the Derby, but it has emerged today that the authorities there will not allow this before 29 May - Thursday next week.

Meanwhile Surrey Police are monitoring the situation and Epsom & Ewell Council is applying to the courts for powers to move these travellers on if they do not leave as intended.

It seems that the Gypsies managed to force their way onto the field at Manor Park by cutting through a drop-down bollard, recently installed by the Council to allow easier access for the grass cutting contractors, in place of one of the two concrete bollards originally installed to prevent Gypsy incursions. My colleague Cllr Jonathan Lees will be discussing with council officers how best to prevent future problems.