DITCHING DATCHET!

In January I lost my car in the floods and the insurance payment hardly covered half of the cost of the replacement. In February, my partner’s house was flooded throughout the ground floor, the floorboards are still raised, it stinks and the dehumidifiers continue to thrum. Since then I have been disgusted by the lack of support from both David Cameron and local councils.

Cameron has refused to claim from the EU Solidarity Fund to improve UK flood defences, he prefers that the UK taxpayer picks up the tab even though the European money (at least £140 million) is ours for the taking. He is also responsible for the massive cuts to the Environment Agency flood prevention work (by a third) and he shows no sign of correcting his mistake, despite warnings of more extreme weather to come in the future.

The Royal Borough of Windsor & Maidenhead leadership have recently refused to contribute to the strengthening of flood defences along the Thames. The riverside residents near Maidenhead town were protected from flooding by the Jubilee channel but downstream, Datchet residents were badly flooded when the Jubilee released the water it could not cope with. The Jubilee was only ever intended to be one of a series of similar flood defences on the Thames and it is sickening that a council should now try to wriggle out of it’s responsibilities, leaving Datchet, Old Windsor, Runnymede and Staines to sink.

Local MPs, Mrs May and Mr Afriye have had little constructive to say on this matter; will they lobby David Cameron and the RBWM, to correct their failures and help their constituents? Unlikely, Mr Afriye is against the benefits of EU membership and Mrs May always tows the party line.

Mrs May and FGM

Finally the Crown prosecution Service has announced that it is bringing a prosecution against 2 men for Female Genital Mutilation. This is an issue that I have worked with and campaigned on for years at www.actiononfgm.com and am relieved that we have now taken this small step to stop this appalling abuse of defenceless children.

However it would be wrong to think that this prosecution is a game changer: Last July I met with Mrs May MP to discuss her role as Home Secretary in ensuring that FGM is prevented in the UK. Her response was to reiterate the advice that can be found in the UK strategy to reduce violence against women and girls. Unfortunately this approach is based on the concept of ‘abandonment;’ ie the main thrust of Government policy is simply to ask people to abandon the abuse!

While there is a important role for community development, counselling and giving health advice, we must not forget that the UN deems FGM as ‘torture,’ it is a an extremely violent crime with a lifelong health and happiness impact and is punishable by up to 14 years in prison. I would say that simply asking people to stop it is not good enough.

There is a need for a proactive response from the Government, particularly the Home Office, to provide funds to bring Police, CPS, Health, Social Services, Education and Charities together to collect the data and evidence. Also to ensure that girls who show signs of being victims or being at risk can be physically examined. Far better to have a sensitive examination by a caring nurse than being attacked with a knife and permanently damaged.

Please go to my website at www.actiononfgm.com and follow the link to my Parliamentary e-petition to demand that MPs debate this proposal. Thank you

Has Adam Afriye done a deal with Nigel Farage?

The Telegraph has reported that Nigel Farage is considering NOT putting up Parliamentary Candidates in constituencies like Windsor, because of the anti-European stance of certain Tory candidates!

Has a back room deal been done? We know that Mr Afriye is not a team player, as shown by the way he handled his fantasy leadership challenge in the Autumn. However, his lack of popularity in the Tory Party may well have pushed him into the arms of UKIP. 

A self made man, Mr Afriye may be, but he still needs people to vote for him in the General Election if he wants to remain an MP. His appallingly handled leadership challenge has upset many people who voted for him last time. There is also a growing disquiet that he hardly ever shows up to community events in Windsor and only then when he is campaigning; similarly he is a stranger in the House of Commons: His apparent failure to consult with or represent his constituency has become so noticeable that many people refer to him as 'Absent Adam.'

Perhaps he will be hoping that UKIP supporters will vote for him in 2015 or will the much ignored Windsor residents stand up for their rights and vote for a change?

 Telegraph Link.

37p or 30 pieces of silver? (The cutting of services in RBWM)

The rush of a hard line Council leadership, in leafy Berkshire, to reduce staff pay, delete jobs or place them in the increasingly unregulated private sector, is reaching fever pitch.

Royal Borough of Windsor & Maidenhead staff have been told that there will be no wage increases for all but some of the lowest paid. Many people, who are already earning much less than the National average, wil get absolutely nothing. The reality of this is that in real terms, wages will drop and the living standards of the people who work and provide essential services for us, local residents, will also continue to drop.

All this, so the average Council Tax (band D) payment can go down by 37p per week. None of us like paying tax but I doubt if these ‘real terms’ pay cuts are the best way to provide essential services like home care for the elderly. Many of us would prefer to pay the 37p and have good services, provided by quality staff.

2 weeks ago RBWM staff found out about 31 more council job deletions by chancing upon a lengthy press release on the council’s website! Clearly the Council Leadership’s strong points are not communications, good manners nor team building. The staff should have been the first to know. Far from improving public services, these cuts will place an additional burden on existing hard working staff, who are already trying to absorb extra workloads resulting from previous cuts. There comes a point when cuts actually mean reduced or inferior services. Is that what local residents really want? No, we don’t!

Lastly, local businesses will also continue to suffer as the 1500 RBWM employees tighten their belts even further. Lower wages for such a large group of local residents will  mean that there is less money to spend in local shops and businesses, destroying the local economy still further.

George Osbourn is resigning as Chancellor! Great News!

Great news, yesterday George Osbourn said that he planned to increase the minimum wage to £7: Only the Low Pay Commission has the power to do this so George must be planning to resign from the Chancellorship and apply to work for the Low Pay Commission!

(However, I am not sure that he has the qualifications for the LPC job as he has never shown an interest in the cost of living before!)

Secondly, the one big thing he promised to do 4 years ago was to reduce the national debt which was just under £70 billion at the time. Now it is over £200 billion because George struggled to get the economy going by not having any plan except 'cuts'. Cuts, of course, did little but strangle the economy and throw people out of work. Now that the rest of the world is climbing out of recession, it is thankfully dragging the UK along with it.

On the 15th of January 2014, George voted AGAINST the Labour motion to raise the minimum wage. Then just 24 hours later he changed his mind and announced this empty promise. What is he up to? Well empty headline grabbing of course! Oh dear, the Tories are on the run.

LABOUR wants to see a LIVING WAGE not just a minimum one and will tackle the crisis of the massive gap between rich and poor.

Labour Campaign for Human Rights

Not long to Christmas but last Tuesday evening, in a committee room at Westminster, People crowded in to listen to some of the most knowledgeable (and opinionated) people in the UK on the subject of national security and personal freedom. The Editor of the Guardian,Alan Rusbridger, Jimmy Wales, founder of Wikipedia and former GCHQ Director Sir David Omand each spoke to us, then we had nearly an hour of questions and more discussion. I will leave it to Alan Rusbridger to tell you what was said......................

http://www.theguardian.com/world/2013/dec/17/alan-rusbridger-jimmy-wales-ex-gchq-chief-debate-spying-live

Our NHS

The NHS. free at the point of access, is central to our beliefs and way of life in Britain: It is one of the most cost effective health services in the world, not just in Europe. The people who tell you otherwise are not being honest.

Change is a way of life for all of us but we do not need private companies syphoning off our tax payments in order to pay shareholders. The whole point of the NHS is to deliver the best service we can, with the available funds from taxation. My NHS career experience has shown me that the NHS can work well with 3rd sector groups and charities because they share similar ethics; auctioning off health services to multi national companies is opening the door to the unbearable burden of shareholder dividends and corporate tax avoidance. The purpose of all private companies is to make a profit for shareholders/owners not to benefit the tax payer.

Competition between health providers is bad for your health. When you access care and treatment you should expect that the nurses and doctors treat you as a whole person not just an ‘illness’ or ‘injury.’ Unfortunately the commercial interests of private Companies means they have little inclination to share health information with other rival health services resulting in a ‘silo’ system. You also have the issue of your private health information being the property of a commercial company.

Do not be persuaded by the temptation of ‘private investment’ in public services: It is an illusion - think about the water companies which were privatised on the pretence of getting investment for new sewers and pipes - now Thames Water tell us that they have to raise prices to repair the Victorian sewers - a job they they promised to do 20 years ago!

While the Condems speed towards complete privatisation of the NHS, nurses are leaving the profession in droves as their professional ethics and ideals are undermined by supermarket style management.

Our NHS is better than that - but we will have to fight for it!