Carrick Sports and Recreation Centre

Down to the Carrick Sports Hall for a committee meeting last night. Like many committees in Cornwall it's composed of a number of very dedicated, but elderly people. Without their efforts the Sports Hall, or Hendra Hall as some call it, would have fallen into disrepair long ago. They spend most of their energy fundraising and applying for grants to keep the building going. Carrick send two Councillors along, myself and John Dyer to assist. Mr Dyer, having been there a lot longer than me has done a great deal for them, over the years. But what will happen with the new Unitary? With 80 to 130 Councillors no one will have time to go along to sports halls and village halls like this. There's a real risk that these places will slip off the new Councils radar and fall into disrepair, or worse still be seen as an asset and sold off.

I've today written to the Town Clerk to see if the City Council can take over this building, or play some role in securing it for the future.

Development

The Government says we have to build 6000 more houses in Truro. That's 12,000 to 15,000 new people adding to our existing population of just under 20,000, with no extra money for infrastructure. Anyone who was in Truro on Monday, when minor roadworks on Morlaix Avenue brought the traffic to a standstill for miles around, will wonder how the City is going to cope with all these extra people.

So I was interested to be invited up to Penair School by Persimmon Homes, who are hoping to build 450 houses at Tolgarick, which is out by Arch Hill. They were putting on a presentation to a class of 15 year olds. It was a good day, and although the developers wanted to focus on what the estate would look like, they allowed me to put the development plan into a wider context, asking did we want these new houses at all, could Truro cope with the extra population and would the development ever become a community, somewhere one would want to live.

It will be interesting to see the final report on the consultation exercise. I believe most people have responded by saying they don't want any development at all, and I wonder how that will appear in the planning application. Another interesting point is that the young people had no idea that this major change was occurring in their city. It's important to include them in the debate, because they will be the people living and working here in 20 years time. Changes made now affect them, more than most. So well done to Persimmon and the staff and Penair for organising Monday's workshop.

Hey Ma - Its Now 5 Years In Iraq

Mayor Making at City Council last night. Congratulations to new Mayor Sue Callen and Deputy Mayor Ros Cox. I gave a little speech which seemed to go down quite well.

Afterwards I was speaking to the Mayor of Wadebridge. He is, quite rightly, very proud of his son, who is serving out in Afghanistan. I agreed with him, that our soldiers out there, and in Iraq, are doing heroic work. But I had to ask, is the price in dead and maimed young men a price worth paying. An organisation called Help for Heroes has put out a shocking video which shows the dreadful reality of war. I thank god that I don't have to get up each day and do what those boys do, and I hope it turns out to be worth the price we're paying. I suspect it's not.

Railway Club

Congratulations to the Railway Club for winning the Darts League. A bit of good news in whats been a very difficult period for them. I was at a meeting on affordable housing at the club a week, or so, ago. When it finished I looked in at the bar to say hello, and had a pint forced on me. Come down to the Britannia, it's the last but one darts match, win this and we've won the league, they said. Well the Britannia is the nearest pub to me, so it's a lift home and I can slide away after ten minutes. I don't know much about darts, but it looked to be high quality stuff. The Railway Club won, but the guys from the Brit, who had won the league for the last five years in a row, took it in tremendous spirit. One of their players, 'Shorty' it said on the back of his shirt, was probably the best player there, but was beaten by one of the clubs young lads, said to me 'that's the best game I've had all season, I loved it'. Such sportsmanship. Those guys showed how a game should be played. Well done lads.

The celebrations went on long into the night, and I had some trouble explaining to my wife how I'd got home long after midnight, when I'd supposedly gone to a meeting on affordable housing!

Porthtowan

Interesting one at Planning last night. Someone has already got permission to build three houses on the beach at Porthtowan, subject to a condition that a slope condition survey be carried out. I don't know how they got permission in the first place, but now we're just dealing with a condition preventing them building, until everyone is happy that they won't undermine the slope above the development, which could lead to the slope collapsing and bringing the houses above it down. Basically everything is built on a mixture of sand and shale, what somebody called mobile and slightly less mobile material. Despite four expert opinions, one of which Carrick paid for, saying that it was almost certainly safe, Councillors couldn't quite see it and rejected the application. No doubt it will go to appeal.

An Resek Hellys

The amount of personal stuff on this blog has occasionally been commented on. Kindly folk have said it has a touch of Bridget Jones, less kindly, that's you Cowley Street, have said that Rob has grasped that no one reads these blogs, so he doesn't waste time working out clever things to say, he just tells us what he did yesterday. What I did yesterday was An Resek Hellys, a 10 mile race from Helston. It's a great run, through the streets of Helston, famous for the Flora Dance, out onto the Penrose estate to Looe beach, across the beach and along the coastal path to Gunwalloe and then up to Culdrose and home. Afterwards we went to an old pub on the Lizard and sat outside in the spring sunshine, rerunning the race over a pint or two of Betty Stoggs. Bliss. For those who are really interested, I'm just a couple of pounds off having lost three stone, the runnings going well and I was pleased with my time. Now off to Truro City Council for a meeting.

Treliske

Almost a month without blogging. Not that I've been idle, but well even minor Councillors have private lives and mines been a bit trickier than usual of late. I'll start off with a nice easy post. In the past I've mocked Treliske Hospital, posting amusing videos I'd found on YouTube, which seemed to upset them. All I can say in my defence is that they are a bit of an easy target, and the videos were funny. Well on Sunday my son was playing football, against Falmouth. He's a goalie and well known for his bravery in the tackles. Not something he gets from his father! On Sunday the inevitable happened and he ended up in Treliske, with a suspected broken ankle. The staff were brilliant. Helpful, fast, efficient and caring, really all a fretting mother could ask for (father wasn't there, of course, but was ensconced in a warm country pub, oblivious to the drama). Things moved so quickly, the x-rays got back to the ward before the patient did!

So thank you Treliske. I'll still post any videos I find, but as you probably muttered to yourselves before, the world needs Doctors and Nurses more than it needs Councillors and I know my place.

Modern Conservatives and evil firemen

At full Council on Tuesday a Conservative Portfolio Holder said, in the course of recommending a Cabinet decision on housing, that he sees nothing wrong with landowners in rural districts building a few houses for their immediate family. Wooly thinking that caused surprised looks amongst the members of the Planning Committee, who didn't know about this apparent change of policy! To be fair to the Tories, it was one of their more experienced members who got up and reminded the Portfolio Holder of the 1991 Chanel 4 documentary 'Concrete and Cream Teas', which gave Planners in Cornwall a good slapping for an unwritten policy of allowing locals to build what they wanted, but coming down hard on incomers.

Shame that the same experienced Member later got up and described the Fireman's Union as 'evil' and when invited to withdraw the remark, accepted that it might be a bit strong, but refused to withdraw it. Have the Conservatives changed in the last 30 years? Not as far as I can see.

Three Types of Councillor

City Council last night. I've blogged before on the change to our electoral cycle caused by the Unitary, which means that we won't have an election until 2013. Seems the Cornish MP's and some people on the Unitary have had second thoughts, and now want our elections to coincide with the Unitary next year. I don't really mind, having fought, and won, elections last year and the year before. I'm going to be at a bit of a loose end this May and will be ready for action next year. But it's the way they've gone about it that's annoying the Council. There has been no consultation whatsoever, and we get to read about the plan in the West Briton, same as everyone else. So we're writing saying we want to continue until our full term would end, in 2011, at least. It would be best if our elections were separate from the Unitary elections. We'd get lost in theirs and a separate election two years after, gives the electorate a chance to have their say on issues that crop up meantime, and maintains our separate identity.

The best quote of the night though, was from an Independent Councillor. 'There's three types of Councillor. There's drivers, there's passengers, and there's handbrakes!' Very true.

Budget Setting

Set the budget for the year ahead last night. A surprisingly entertaining meeting, the bottom line being that we kept the Council Tax increase to 2.5%. There was some controversy and disscussion over a proposed one off grant of £100,000 to the Hall for Cornwall. A Conservative Member objected strongly, saying that if people want to go to the theatre they should pay for it themselves, and not be subsidised. It was demonstrated that the Hall brings a great many people into Truro, bringing many benefits to shops, bars etc. In the end only 3 Councillors voted against the grant.

We also gave ourselves a rise, which in my case amounts to £45 a year. Snouts in the trough or what! We tried to oppose raising the mileage allowance for larger engine cars to 55.8p per mile, but only 8 of us voted against it, so it passed. Easy for me to take a stand on that one, I walk to the Council and have never claimed any car allowances.

Yes We Can - Barack Obama Music Video

Can't see my speech to the Planning Committee being set to music! But this is how to do it, this is public speaking.

Ankh-Morpork

A good Valentines day, in that I hit the 'lost two stone' goal, although nothing romantic occured, perhaps because I went of to Taunton for my Young and Talented (and slightly lighter) Councillor course. As usual we saw some very interesting things, that will slowly leak out here as my own initiatives for Truro, and met some interesting people . We visited Wincanton, which was described as 'a market town without a market, twinned with somewhere that doesn't exist'. It being twinned with Ankh-Morpork, a city in the Disc World series and boasts the Ankh-Morpork Post Office and Consulate, something that could be a tacky souveneir shop but is actually brilliant, mainly because the people running it love what they're doing. Find them at http://www.discworldemporium.com/ .

But the most interesting thing about Wincanton is that they seem to have managed to keep the locally owned shops, and fought off the chain stores. Something we in Truro have struggled with. This seems to be down to the local member, Cllr Tim Carroll, having made himself a planning expert, he even reads Planning News!, which enables him to deal with officers and developers from a strong position. Not sure I want to suscribe to that myself, but it has been becoming obvious to me that its not enough to have a feeling that a developement is wrong, you have to be able to demonstrate it using the planning system. I wonder if Trafalgar Stores stocks Planning News?