Recycling (or not) with Northern Rail

28 February 2010

Earlier this year, I noticed a number of the following posters appearing on Northern Rail trains. I am strongly in favour of recycling, but they seem to have the wrong end of the stick.

Recycling is just as much about reuse as it is about reprocessing materials and making something new. Leaving newspapers on the train (especially copies of Metro) is a perfect example of recycling in action. If everybody took their own copy of the Metro home to recycle, then they’d need to print twice as many.

Of course, at the end of the day, all the day’s newspapers should be recycled. However, I have never seen a recycling point (for newspapers, cans, bottles, or anything for that matter) on board a Northern Rail train, or at a Northern Rail station in West Yorkshire.

To that end, I have written Northern Rail the following letter:

Dear Northern Rail,

I am writing regarding the recycling poster that has appeared recently on your trains around West Yorkshire. It states:

“Please recycle your newspaper. Leaving it behind is littering.”

As a keen supporter of recycling, I am glad to see that you are taking the issue seriously.

The poster encourages people to recycle newspapers that they have been reading on the train, many of which will be the free papers provided in your stations.

Could you let me know what facilities are available for recycling on board your trains and at your stations?

Also, do your cleaners recycle items (eg. newspapers, cans, bottles) found on board trains when cleaning them?

I would challenge your assertion that leaving a newspaper on the train is littering. I almost never pick up a copy of Metro from the piles available at your stations, but regularly pick one up that has been left on the train. If everybody took home their own copy of the Metro, then you’d have to print twice as many, which isn’t very green.

My suggestion for addressing this issue would be that you provide areas in each train carriage, and at each station, where people can leave their newspapers. This chould be a shelf clearly marked “Leave your newspaper here”. It should not be a bin, the idea being that other people could pick up a newspaper from the shelf to read, then replace it when they’ve finished. At the end of the day, your cleaners could clear the shelf straight into a paper recycling bin. This would encourage both reuse and recycling of the newspapers, which is surely better all round.

I look forward to hearing what you think.

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Labour letting down our teenagers on sex education

19 February 2010

This week’s shocking U-turn by the Labour Government, to allow religious schools to put their own slant on sex and relationship education, will let down thousands of teenagers (and younger children) across the country. Ed Balls’ amendment to the Children, Schools and Families Bill will almost certainly lead to state-funded religious schools teaching that contraception is immoral and that having a gay relationship is wrong.

At the Liberal Democrats Spring Conference last year, I summated the Calderdale motion on faith schools. I made the point that someone growing up lgbt in a religious school will have a much harder time when teachers are allowed to say that a relationship with someone of the same sex is wrong. Also, some religions are against contraception. With 21st Century Britain having such a high teenage pregnancy rate, and many developing countries struggling with overpopulation, I believe that such a position is indefensible.

Speaking on the amendment was an interesting experience as I had to persuade a couple of thousand Liberal Democrats to vote against Vince Cable, who had spoken against our amendment. The end result was - as it so often is - a compromise. The resulting Liberal Democrat policy is that faith schools can continue to exist, but must demonstrate the diversity of their intake, ie. not just fill up with children of one religion. I believe very strongly that growing up with people who are of different religions, races, and sexualities, is essential to overcome prejudice, which is caused by the fear of the unknown.

The Accord Coalition, made up of people from many religions and none, has strongly criticised Ed Balls’ amendment, drawing parallels with the infamous Section 28. It is shocking that a Labour Government, who scrapped Section 28 and introduced civil partnerships, is taking such a backward step on lgbt issues. Equally worrying is the fact that youngsters across the country may not be properly taught about contraception, potentially leading to STDs and hundreds of unwanted pregnancies. Whilst I respect the right of any religion to have its own views, children in state-funded schools need to be taught the basic facts of life in an unbiased way.

It is clear that the once-radical Labour Party have given up any hope of improving things for lgbt youngsters. The Tories have always been hopeless, so it is now left to the Liberal Democrats – with our promise of full marriage between any two consenting adults regardless of gender, and our sensible policies on faith schools – to carry the lgbt flame.

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Youth in Hebden Bridge – not all bad news!

7 February 2010

The young people of Hebden Bridge have not had the best of press recently. This week, The Times published an article alleging (without statistics) that the town has one of the highest suicide rates in England. This follows a previous article in the Independent on Sunday, and a general perception amongst certain sections of the population that youngsters in the town spend most of their evenings drinking and taking drugs, leading to dependency, social meltdown, and eventually death.

Whilst there certainly are young people drinking and taking drugs in Hebden, in my experience it’s not much worse than anywhere else. The smell of grass on the town’s streets – and I don’t mean the freshly mown variety – is no worse than in suburban Cheshire where I lived before moving here.

However, there is a bit of a problem with things to do for under-18s. There is very little provision in terms of live music, as the local live music club (Trades Club) has a policy of not hosting performances by young rock bands or DJs, and not allowing under 18s to Friday or Saturday night gigs. There is not really anywhere for young people to go with lighting and shelter. There is a youth club one night a week but that’s not for everybody. We do have an excellent cinema but on the surface of things that’s about it.

It’s important to say that the drugs issue is not being ignored, with Calderdale MBC working together with other organisations like Lifeline Calderdale / Step 2 to help address these issues.

Back to young people, though. Just before I was elected 18 months ago, the Town Council set up a Young People’s Working Party. One of the campaigning Focus leaflets for my election (see pic) focused on the issue of youth provision and I was pleased that Hebden Royd were doing something about it. Unfortunately that incarnation of the working party didn’t really get anywhere. However, in late 2009, things started moving again. The indomitable Lesley Jones resurrected the working party and we held a small meeting with Calderdale MBC Youth Workers and a few other organisations providing young people’s services.

One of the ideas that was raised was that of auditing youth provision in Hebden Royd, and getting everyone together for a big youth day on Calder Holmes Park later in the year. The second meeting was held this week, and I was expecting the same small bunch of people. I was surprised and extremely pleased when the committee room filled up… and people kept arriving. People were literally sharing chairs and sitting on other items of furniture. Not only were there representatives of loads of local organisations, as well as Hebden Royd Town Councillors and Calderdale MBC Youth Workers, but around a dozen young people as well. I wish I’d had my camera to take a photo for the press release!

Lesley somehow managed to keep the meeting on track and we heard from the young folk there as well as the adults. They raised issues like a lack of access to gigs and sports, as well as a general lack of things to do and places to hang out. A separate steering committee – led by the young people – has been set up to plan the event in Calder Holmes Park, and will invite anyone and everyone working with young people in the area, from skateboarders to the woodcraft folk, to be a part of it. The main working party will continue to review and hopefully move forward other youth provision.

One of the groups represented at the meeting was Project X, a social enterprise recently formed to work with young people in the Upper Calder Valley. On Friday, they held a fund-raising gig at the Trades Club (no under 18s allowed!) featuring local North-African band Maghribibeat. I went along and had a great time. The main band were good but they were followed, unexpectedly, by Recorded Filth, a group of local youngsters who were much more interesting. Their performance ranged from performance poetry through rap (in both English and French) to R’n'B/soul, including a stunning version of Bring It On Home to Me. And where else but Hebden Bridge would a group encore with a comic rap about Necrophilia?!

It was a great night, and goes to show that local youngsters do much more than just hang round on street corners smoking and drinking. I am hopeful that, with the involvement of local young people, Hebden Royd Town Council can help improve youth provision in the area and hopefully prevent future generations from going off the rails.

Edit 16 February 2010: Anthony Rae has dug out some official suicide statistics for the area which do not support the sensationalist headline in The Times, although it must be stressed that the figures are so low that drawing any kind of serious conclusion is impossible. Also, they presumably don’t include any deaths due to accidental drug or alcohol overdoses.

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Hebden Royd Budget 2010/11

27 January 2010

Hebden Royd Town Hall

Last week Hebden Royd Town Council agreed the budget for 2010/11, which is almost entirely funded by council tax payers in our area. The budget agreed is a total of £277,100, up from £255,600 in 2009/10. Taking into account our bank balance at the end of the financial year, and the grant of £8,941 from Calderdale MBC, the cost to a council tax payer in a band D property is estimated to be £58.64 over the whole year, a 0.7% increase on last year.

All the Lib Dem councillors supported this budget, and I personally am extremely happy with the final figures that were put together. Many Labour councillors also supported it, although a few – predictably – wanted a larger raise. Neither of the independent councillors were present at the meeting.

I have campaigned in the past for low council tax increases, and keeping the increase to less than 1% without any cuts is a great achievement. The country is only just emerging from the recession, and many people are struggling to pay bills, so a raise of much more than this would be hard to justify.

So what do the council tax payers of Hebden Royd get for their hard earned cash?

The biggest spend outside of staff salaries is the £60,000 allocation for grants for community groups, a £5,000 increase from last year. These grants are extremely popular and enable many groups in the area to complete small projects. £25,000 has been allocated for environmental projects, and £10,000 for Christmas lights – although a large chunk of this will be taken up simply storing and putting up/taking down the lights we already have. £10,500 will go towards celebrations of the 500th Anniversary of Hebden Bridge this year, and £3,000 for the associated twinning events, as residents of both Saint-Pol-sur-Ternoise (France) and Warstein (Germany) are visiting over the course of the year. The £30,000 we already have allocated for resurfacing the unadopted Central Street will remain, although we are struggling to get the help required from Calderdale MBC to see this one through. To balance the spend across the council area, £9,500 has been allocated for Mytholmroyd Memorial Gardens.

Finally – and as chair of the committee in question I am particularly pleased – we have increased the allotments budget to £7,500, in order to support three prospective projects across Mytholmroyd and Hebden Bridge which will hopefully be coming to fruition in 2010 and 2011. There is a real desire for new allotments in the area, not least because the majority of our houses don’t have gardens, and I’m hopeful that we will finally manage to get some more plots available. Allotments are one of the few things for which Town and Parish Councils are actually responsible. The lack of them is something we can’t blame on Calderdale MBC!

In the past, the budget has been decided at a somewhat acrimonious meeting of full council. This year, each committee made a recommendation for their own budget, and the Strategy & Review committee pulled together all of the recommendations, made a few tweaks, and produced a recommended budget for full council to approve. This worked extremely well, and enabled both Lib Dem and Labour councillors to have their say. However, the debate approving the budget at full council was rather short. I personally would have liked a longer debate with perhaps the chair of each committee outlining their plans rather than just waving through the recommendations. It worked out well in the end, though.

One final note – again this year, no one from the local media turned up to the budget meeting. Perhaps the discussion on how to spend over a quarter of a million pounds of tax payers money wasn’t of any interest to them?

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Spotted in Salford

17 January 2010

On a walk through Salford this morning I spotted my first David Cameron election poster, most pleasingly daubed with an alternative slogan underneath. It was a nice surprise as although the Tories aren’t exactly popular in Salford, it’s hardly a bastion of Liberal Democracy either. Good to see that, despite the myriad of parodies of this poster appearing online, old fashioned graffiti is still around.

I was only passing through central Salford to get to a friend’s flat, but I was amazed at the variety of interesting buildings to be found there, in various states of repair. I just had to keep taking photos and have posted the most interesting below. For anyone interested in architecture, I can certainly recommend a visit to Salford, particularly Chapel Street, and preferably with a copy of the SE Lancashire Pevsner to hand.

Former Police Station

Independent Chapel, with modern buildings looming overhead

Salford Education Offices

Salford Cathedral (RC)

Salford Matrix Club - some parts of Salford still living up to the stereotype

Church of St. Philip and Manchester & Salford Savings Bank

Salford Lads' Club, opened by Baden-Powell and immortalised by the famous photo of The Smiths standing in its doorway

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Expenses and attendance

13 January 2010

A certain “they’re only in it for themselves” attitude seems to infuse many people’s attitudes to politicians these days. A few months after being elected as a councillor, I went on a trip – at my own expense – to Hebden Bridge’s twin town of Saint-Pol-sur-Ternoise. A friend’s immediate reaction when I mentioned that I was going was to ask if it was a council-funded jolly. In fact it cost me £75.

To set the record straight, the only Hebden Royd Town Councillor who receives an allowance is the mayor, with the deputy mayor also receiving some limited expenses. Additionally, the council occasionally pays for some councillors to attend training courses.

Just to make it completely clear, I have added a page to this website detailing what I have and (more frequently) have not received as a councillor, including a list of trips attended as a councillor at my own expense.

I have also added details of my council attendance. This is a somewhat thornier issue for town councillors! I am sad to say that I have never seen all eighteen Hebden Royd Town Councillors present in the council chamber at the same time. Councillor attendance records are published in the Town Talk newsletter, available from the council website. My own attendance is pretty good, although I didn’t quite manage 100% last year (2009) due to a holiday and meetings clashing with other things. Still, 21 out of 23 meetings is not bad. Congratulations to Cllr. Lesley Jones (Lib Dem) and Cllr. Dave Young (Labour) who both managed 100% attendance. At my suggestion, the latest figures list full council and committee attendance separately.

It is interesting to see that committee attendance ranges from 0 (two councillors) to 22 meetings (Cllr. Robin Dixon). Full council attendance also ranges from 2 to 11. Two meetings a year is the minimum attendance necessary to stay on the council as, by law, if a councillor does not attend for six months then he or she is automatically thrown off. Even though we’re all volunteers on Hebden Royd, in my opinion anyone with such a poor attendance record should consider very seriously whether they are adequately representing the people who voted for them. Of course, if some councillors attend no committee meetings, the net result is that the rest of us have to attend more.

What about Calderdale councillors? Some councils, for example nearby Kirklees, publish very comprehensive details of who is paid how much for doing what. Unfortunately Calderdale’s equivalent page is much less impressive and, importantly, doesn’t name names. For any given councillor, it is extremely hard to work out how much they have received. I am a strong believer in open democracy, and find it quite shocking that this information is not readily available on Calderdale’s website. If anyone else has better luck looking for it then please let me know!

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2010: A great year for Hebden Bridge

5 January 2010

Chris at the bridge

As 2010 begins, I am looking forward to a great year for Hebden Bridge for many reasons, but two in particular, both of which involve Hebden Royd Town Council.

Firstly, it is the 500th anniversary of the bridge from which the town takes its name. Well, approximately. The bridge was built in c.1510, so we’re having our celebrations this year. It replaced an earlier wooden bridge and has been repaired several times since. If you’re visiting, look out for three carved stones which mark the repairs. The Victorians raised the parapet (an early example of health and safety?) but apart from that it has remained largely unchanged.

Hebden Royd Town Council convened a working party, which has subsequently morphed into a committee comprising Councillors, including myself, and many other key people from the town. We are working to improve the bridge’s environment, including reducing the size of some of the self-seeded trees in the river, improvements to Old Gate, and flags and banners – very sensitively designed – to be installed for a limited period later in the year.

Of course, many local people and organisations are organising events this year. Either special events to commemorate the anniversary, or regular annual events with a special 2010 theme. The committee has done its best to co-ordinate events so that, for example, a children’s choir doesn’t try to sing from the bridge at the same time as a civil war re-enactment takes place. The calendar is kept up-to-date at the Hebden Bridge 500 website. Hebden Royd Town Council is organising several events itself, notably those involving the visitors from our twin towns of St. Pol (France) and Warstein (Germany), as well as a special commemoration event on 20 June which will be… Well, let’s just say it will certainly involve a surprise or two.

The other exciting event which is happening this year is the transfer of the town hall in Hebden Bridge from Calderdale Council’s ownership to a local community-based organisation formed to take over its management. Prior to 1974, the town hall was owned by Hebden Royd Urban District council. It then passed into Calderdale’s hands, and has been allowed to slowly deteriorate ever since. Hebden Royd Town Council is the main tenant, with offices as well as regular use of the council chamber and meeting rooms. However, several surrounding parishes also meet there, Calderdale have some offices, there is a small business in an attic room, and Hebden Bridge Youth Theatre/Light Opera use the upstairs hall at the back.

There were two applications for the asset transfer process – Hebden Bridge Community Association applied to take over the whole site, and the Youth Theatre/Light Opera put in their own bid for the rear part only. Fortunately the community application won through, and is one of the first asset transfers of this type to be approved in the country. I know the trustees will work hard with all existing tenants in their exciting plans to refurbish the existing building, and ultimately expansion into the neighbouring car park. As part of this, an Audit of Internal Architectural Historical Characteristics [PDF] was carried out of all the nooks and crannies of the place. It’s a fascinating read for architecture fanatics like myself. Spot the reference to the wonderful first floor Victorian gents which has survived.

Hebden Royd Town Council recently became a member of the community association – a little on the late side, I felt, but better late than never. I have personally been a member since the association was launched.

So, to summarise, it’s a great year to visit, and for two of the town’s best known landmarks. Come and see what’s happening – although probably best wait until all the snow and ice has melted first!

Edit 8 January 2010: Removed an incorrect statement about HRTC paying rent to the Community Association for use of the building. Janet Battye has pointed out that as part of the asset transfer, Calderdale Council have agreed to pay the rent due for parish councils.

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No elected mayor for Calderdale – the least worst option

20 December 2009

Calderdale council decided this week to say no to an elected mayor for the borough. When consulted, Hebden Royd Town Council also supported the view that a leader elected by the council was the lesser of two evils. I spoke in favour of that option, and would like to explain why.

Firstly, neither of the options is particularly attractive as they both put a large amount of power in the hands of one person, but central government is forcing us to choose one or the other.

However, many people have spoken out in favour of an elected mayor, saying that it is (i) democratic and (ii) what the people of Calderdale want. I would like to explain why I disagree with both of those points.

Would an elected mayor be more democratic? Well, superficially yes, giving every voter in Calderdale the opportunity to choose who runs the borough sounds more democratic. However, for me, democracy is about both representation and accountability. An elected mayor delivers representation, but once elected, there is no way of holding him or her accountable to the wishes of the people. Essentially, he or she would have carte blanche to do whatever they like for their period of office. On the other hand, a leader elected by the council can be removed by the council, so they can’t go out of control without facing up to the consequences.

But shouldn’t we ask the people of Calderdale what they think? Of course – and the council has done exactly that, in a consultation that I believe was flawed. I’ve dug my copy of the document out of the recycling (see picture) and although it gives a reasonably balanced picture of the two options, there is no kind of questionnaire that could be analysed statistically. All responses had to be written in the responder’s own words. No boxes to tick at all. However, the council somehow analysed the responses into six rather arbitrary categories. For example, the distinction between “option 1 – indirectly elected leader” and “opposed to an elected mayor” is rather subtle, since they essentially amount to the same thing. What does come across clearly, though, is that only 47% of people were in favour of an elected mayor on a turnout of approximately 1% of the borough’s households. That is clearly not a ringing endorsement.

At Hebden Royd, myself and others – including Labour councillors – expressed frustration at the imposition of this situation by the New Labour government. So much for local people making their own decisions. But, given that we have to opt for one of the choices, going with a leader elected by the council is clearly the least worst option.

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In London with Nick Clegg

14 December 2009

Chris Sawer with Hilary Myers and Nick Clegg

Last week a group of us from Calder Valley went on a day trip to London to The Wave climate change protest. It involved getting the first train out of Hebden Bridge in the morning, and the last train back in the evening, but was a great trip for several reasons.

Firstly, the train down was organised by the Co-op, and apart from being very cheap, was full of others going to the protest so there were balloons galore, plenty of banter, and leafleters for every environmental campaign going wandering up and down the train. Not to mention some great musicians.

Secondly, we arrived at the protest at the same time as Nick Clegg, and we grabbed the chance of a quick chat with him about the campaign in Calder Valley. It was great to meet up with Lib Dems from all over the country to hear Nick’s speech, along with those of Susan Kramer and Simon Hughes. I recognised many faces from conference, and chatted to some new people too.

It was extremely important that we put pressure on the government ahead of the Copenhagen summit to make it clear that if we don’t do something drastic about CO2 emissions pretty soon, it will be too late for millions of people around the world – most of them in the poorest countries – who will die as a result of flooding, crop failures, or wars caused by the mass migration that will result.

In the light of recent speculation about e-mails at the University of East Anglia, it was also important to have a big demonstration to be shown on the news, and keep people informed that global warming is real, and that we must do something about it. It is clear that the overwhelming scientific consensus backs the hypothesis that the planet is heating up because of the greenhouse gases, principally CO2, that mankind is pumping into the atmosphere at ever increasing rates. There are a few sceptics, of course – critical thinking is essential for good science to be separated from bad – but pretty much everyone who has actually studied in a related area has come to the same view.

One analogy I heard and rather liked is that you’re about to get on a plane, and suddenly the pilot and an aeronautic engineer come running out and tell everybody not to get on board as the plane is too dangerous to fly. A vet and a dentist stroll to the front, announce that everything’s ok, and get on board. Who would you trust?

The march itself passed off well, although it was a bit slow getting started so it was more-or-less dark by the time we actually got to parliament. It was hard to get an idea of how many people were there, but estimates ranged from 20,000 to 40,000 which is not bad for a cold December day. I had my home-made Calder Valley Lib Dem placard, which attracted comment from a number of people.

One week on, I think Ed Miliband is doing a reasonable job in Copenhagen. Not as good as Simon Hughes would do, of course, but not too bad considering. I just hope he is able to persuade the other industrialised countries that it is our responsibility to lead on this issue. I know that China are building huge numbers of coal-fired power stations, but they’re only following our example. We led the industrial revolution in this country. Now it’s time for us to lead the green revolution too.

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Why start this blog?

13 December 2009

I moved to Hebden Bridge exactly two years ago today. When I moved, I would never have predicted that I’d be elected to the Town Council in less than a year, become chair of the local branch of Liberal Democrats, and campaign organiser for our Parliamentary candidate.

One of the things that frustrates me most about the Town Council is how little the community know and appreciate about what we do. All the councillors are volunteers, and (apart from the mayor) receive no allowances. Most of us give up lots of evenings to attend meetings and events, occasionally at our own expense. The media don’t seem interested – the local newspaper print our press releases more or less verbatim, and the local news website report what we do occasionally, but I have never seen a journalist at any of our meetings, not even the budget meeting where we decide how much council tax to collect from residents. Our annual  turnover is around a quarter of a million pounds, hardly small change.

I have done my best to keep in touch with my own ward through Focus leaflets (which I’ve paid for), but they are expensive, slow to deliver, and only cover a small part of the council area. I’m hoping this blog will provide more information on what we do on a vaguely regular basis to whoever is interested. I’ll also comment on national issues that catch my eye, or that I have some involvement with.

Assuming that I follow my plan to publish articles once a week or so, and don’t just give up in boredom, I will begin to publicise the blog in early 2010. Readers’ comments are welcome!

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