Inspired by Stuart Bruce and Tom Watson's use of blogging as way of letting people know what politicians really do, and what we think I've decided to dip my toe in the water.
So, who am I? I'm a Labour councillor, and have represented the Blackheath ward in Lewisham since 1st May 1997. Until December this year I was a backbencher - most recently the chair of the Social Care and Health Select Committee - and since then I've been the Cabinet Member for the Environment.
This means I'm responsible for things like the bins, recycling, parks, street sweeping, sustainability, animal welfare and environmental enforcement.
It's been a big learning curve and there's more to learn, but the role is interesting and the challenges are considerable.
Like most councillor's I'm not able to do it full time, although we are paid now it isn't enough to give up work. So for most of the week I work for a children's charity. I probably won't talk about that here, but I thought I would mention it as background. I have a young family - two boys - who don't get to see as much of me as we would like.
I hope that this blog will be a way of recording some of the things I do, and letting those that find it understand why I think local politics is important. I'll have to think about whether to use it to talk about the other things in life I like doing and I find interesting, we'll see.
I went to a seminar at the GLA about waste management and recycling yesterday evening. I'm still new to this stuff and so found it difficult to make sense of some of what the speakers were saying.
A good example of this is around waste management and the role of recycling. The "corporate" message is "Reduce, Reuse, Reycycle" which seems fine, but all the public messages are around the last part of that message, recycling. I don't have anything against recycling as an individual, indeed I'm pretty committed, but all the professional advice I've received suggests that it's not that important to the environment as a whole and that the focus should be on reducing the amount of waste we all produce. Also the targets that we get as a local authority are all around the tonnage that is recycled, not about the damage that is done to the environment by particular products. So at the moment the focus is on what is heavy (paper, card) and relatively cheap not what might be best for the environment (plastics, batteries).
If the messages seem so mixed to me I wonder whether the general public are going to follow let alone respond to the issues.
On a different note it was my first visit to the building and I really enjoyed it as a space.
We had our Area Meeting the other day. This is an attempt to create a forum in which the local councillors and the wider community can come together to discuss issues of concern and look at ways forward.
In our case we were looking at the redevelopment of the centre of Lewisham - getting rid of a roundabout, changes to the train, bus and DLR station, the creation of a more pedestrian friendly centre. The discussion was mainly positive, and the concerns that people raised were, I felt the right ones - how to make sure that crime was designed out, making sure the design works for the whole of the area and not just the bit around the station, how to keep the open air market viable, and the benefits and dangers of a night-time economy.
My real problem with the design of the evening was that the local councillors were redundant, none of the questions people put were addressed to us, and none of the presentations (other than one from our directly elected mayor, Steve Bullock, and a brief introduction from Gavin Moore) were from politicians. So much for community leadership.
On Wednesday evening the Council accepted a new set of park by-laws, updating the old ones that were introduced in 1980. This was after extensive consultation with our 16 park users groups.
Because I have responsibility for the parks I got to introduce the report and so did a bit of boning up on all of this. It turns out that the Home Office have provided a model set that they expect local councils to use. We then change them to suit our local purpose (but not too much otherwise central government gets upset) and then we send them back to the Office of the Deputy Prime Minister for them to sign off.
Now I thought this was likely to be fairly straight forward, but one of our local papers decided to do a different take on the story. The paper decided that we were kill-joys because the new by-laws prohibit throwing javilins in our parks, and don't allow helicopters to land (unless in an emerency). They also made a slightly more serious point about singing, but even there all we are saying is that if someone complains and you don't stop we reserve the right to throw you out of the park. I responded, but the word was out and I started to receive telephone calls from journalists from LBC and BBC London wanting to know what we were doing. Despite my explanation very few of the journalists let the facts get in the way of their story.
I am now pleased to say that we have adopted the new by-laws, subject to the ODPM signing them off. This does mean that from now on the people of Lewisham will be safe from the odd javelin thrower. It also means that some of the old by-laws will be recinded (carpet beating on our parks will no longer be illegal, nor will racing your whippet!).
Last month Lewisham Council adopted part of the Environmental Protection Act that will allow us to charge supermarkets for taking their trolleys off the street and for the cost of storage. The rules come into force in April.
We can already fine individuals that take the trolleys - £50 since you ask - but frankly that doesn't happen all that much, and really what we are looking to do is to force supermarkets to look after their property. You might have thought with each trolley costing about £80 a pop there would be a financial incentive for them to do so already, but apparently not.
There are some good schemes, but by and large they seem happy to put it down to "natural" wastage. That means that we the public are paying two ways, first when the supermarkets charge us in our food bills for replacing the trolley and second through taxation as the Council picks up the fly tips.
One of the nice surprises when I got the environment portfolio was finding out that the borough had won London in Bloom. This gives us the chance to compete in the city section of the Britain in Bloom, it turns out that we are up against Kensington and Chelsea, Carlisle, Londonderry, Sunderland and Derby, and we'll find out in September who has won.
This evening the officers leading the process and I met with our directly elected Mayor, Steve Bullock, to go through with him what it all means and what we as the politicians can add to the process.
For those that haven't followed what this sort of competition might involve, it is - I've found out - based on five pillars: floral displays, permanent landscaping, sustainable development, local environmental quality and public awareness.
Part of what we are interested in is how we convince the people who live in the borough that we are the sort of borough that wins this competition. (I've had a number of conversations with my friends who when I mention that we won London in Bloom don't believe me.) So now some of our refuse trucks have now been liveried up with a strong image letting people know we are the London in Bloom winners. (As an aside I'd be interested in knowing what anyone from Lewisham thinks of the images we are using.)
I'm also interested in how this adds to the cultural and economic well-being of residents and those that visit the borough. I'm sure that others have exploited this sort of award in sorts of ways and we'll need to learn the lessons.
There will be more on this as we build up to the awards that are in Leeds in September.
As I am sure that every blogger who starts a blog will attest the sight of people commenting (and thank you everyone who has dropped in, and been so nice) is nerve wracking and exhilarating at the same time. fficeffice" />
I've done my share of public meetings, and am used to speaking at Council meetings and the level of nerves I've had about this enterprise is just as much as when doing any of those things. I'm not trying to be controversial, or create "heated debate" at this stage, but being a politician I'm aware that we don't have the highest standing in society, and that might be reflected in how people respond.
Another thing I can't work out yet is whether my attempts at subsections to this blog work - at the moment there are sections on the ward I represent and my Cabinet responsibilities. Will you the reader find them, or should I put them out here with the rest of my thoughts?
When I was talking about this with my partner she immediately said that she would expect to be given a big mention. I'll admit that I was slightly taken aback; I didn't think that it would be helpful for us if I used this as a place where I talked about my family life. But on reflection what I might do is offer a guest spot ("a Council Widow speaks").
I've started telling my colleagues at the Council that I'm blogging and been pleased by the reactions I've had. The leader of the Labour Group has decided that it is worth a press release! The mayor asked if it was going to be similar to the site created by a Liberal Democrat on the Council, however, to be fair to Andrew he does seem to be blogging in a conventional way as well.
Finally I'm slightly worried about whether I'll have enough new content to bring you all back.
Cllr Andrew Brown
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