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I don’t often post about planning applications, mainly – I think – because planning is not one of my areas of interest on the council. I don’t know if this is a consequence of my personal predilections, or that Shaftesbury, as a ward, has relatively few controversial planning applications.

However, one did catch my eye because of the location – 64-66 Lavender Hill, which many may recognise better as Mish Mash. (Or Osmium, if you’re going by Google Streetview!)

The application is for a “change of use of existing bar at lower ground and ground floor levels to offices involving creation of two front lightwells, and introducing two one bedroom flats at basement and ground floor levels to the rear.”

Mish Mash (in both it’s locations on Lavender Hill, although I understand they are technically totally separate venues and businesses) has been a cause of problems and concerns for neighbours, largely associated with noise and disorder at closing time. I suspect many might welcome the change of use.

You can find more information on the council’s planning applications website (which can be flaky). The application reference is 2011/0278.

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I usually highlight licensing applications on here, and despite some quivers of prudishness, I really ought to highlight the current consultation on licensing in Wandsworth.

We are required to have a policy on ‘sex establishments’, things like lap-dancing clubs. The policy should state the areas in which these are considered appropriate.

I will confess my response as a councillor saw my libertarian and authoritarian Conservative streaks clashing! My inner libertarian told me that a blanket ‘no’ policy was bad, is it really right for the council to tell people and businesses what is and isn’t appropriate? Especially when the system means applications can be rejected (or approved) on a case-by-case basis.

The authoritarian in me (on reflection, a bad choice or word given of the connotations) felt it inappropriate to have anything like a sex establishment in ward that was almost totally residential – even Lavender Hill, with all its businesses, is home to hundreds of people who live above those shop fronts.

The authoritarian won. Frankly, there are conversations I can do without having with MiniMe and MiniHer as the grow up and plod along Lavender Hill or Clapham Junction with me! And it’s not as if it deprives people of choice when central London is just a short bus, tube or train ride away for most of the borough.

The libertarian in me will suggest that if you have any views (even if they are that Shaftesbury should be a den of iniquity) you should respond to the council consultation. Comments need to be in by Friday 25 February and can be made (like any other licensing application) by emailing licensing@wandsworth.gov.uk or writing to:

London Borough of Wandsworth,
Environmental Services and Community Safety,
Safety and Licensing Team,
PO Box 47095,
London SW18 9AQ

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Wandsworth’s Trading Standards team have applied for a licence review for Best One on Lavender Hill.

The review application has been made because they believe the current licence conditions are not upholding the licencing objective of protecting children from harm (the council has four licencing objectives, preventing public nuisance, preventing crime and disorder, public safety and the protection of children from harm).

If you have any observation to make you have until 21 February to make it, either by writing to:
Head of Licensing
Licensing Section
London Borough of Wandsworth
PO Box 47095
London
SW18 9AQ

or by emailing licensing@wandsworth.gov.uk

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It’s my turn to host the regular councillor’s surgery tomorrow (Saturday, 22 January). If you want to come along to discuss a council related matter I’ll be in Battersea Library from 10 until 11am. No appointment is necessary.

Of course, it might (and probably will) be more convenient to contact me in a different way. If it is, then my contact page lists all the ways you can reach me.

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The council’s executive committee unanimously approved the decision to revisit the Belleville admissions policy last night. This was a final formal hurdle, since under the council’s executive and scrutiny model the Overview and Scrutiny Committees (OSCs) don’t have formal decision-making powers.

The practice is that the executive committee will rubber stamp the OSC views, recognising the OSCs ability to undertake detailed study, discussion and debate. There was a strange paper (opens a PDF) from the director of children’s services reminding members of their power to accept, reject or insert their own amendment which worried me slightly, but proved irrelevant when the time came.

It does point out that it means the existing criteria will stay until 2013 because of the consultation timetables (not, you might think, that much heed has been given to consultations in the past!) but in fact this is probably a slight win for the ward since several roads within the Shaftesbury ward are closer to Belleville than roads within the proposed first priority area they are now have a better chance of getting places. Of course, roads near the Forthbridge Road site will still miss out – but then they would not have any places in any event!

Now that the formal decision has been taken it’s up to us to make sure that meaningful discussions take place about a more meaningful set of admissions criteria.

One of the things that has impressed me throughout is the maturity of approach of the Forthbridge Road residents, who were perfectly happy to accept the need for places to be given to children from around Belleville, just not happy with the total exclusion of children near Forthbridge Road. Similarly, my suspicion is that Belleville recognises the inequity of soaking up all the places in a school without any concession to its neighbourhood. The challenge will be finding the right balance and coming up with a model that is flexible enough to respond to the inevitable changes in behaviour that will result.

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It’s an odd, but strangely liberating, experience to have broken rank and spoken out against the council.

Last night was the first time I’ve ever ‘rebelled’ by speaking (but not voting, as I’m not a committee member) against the proposed admissions policy for Belleville School.

Of course, that doesn’t mean that I, or any councillor, usually agrees 100% with what their party or group or administration says or does. It means that we are all coalitions, even when it’s just one party in the coalition. We all have different views on different things, but our views have enough in common that we can work together on the shared ground and operate a system of give and take on those issues over which we disagree. But the consequence is a constant cognitive dissonance, and while it’s usually fairly insignificant and easily overlooked, sometimes it gets so large something has to give.

And so it happened over the Forthbridge Road site and the proposed admissions policy for Belleville – something had to give and thus three ward councillors (two who are in the council’s cabinet) found themselves in committee room 123 arguing against their own council’s plans.

I won’t beat around the bush; I’m really pleased about the way last night went.

There was a packed public gallery and I think it was a great example of how democracy can work well. The Education and Children’s Services Overview and Scrutiny Committee heard first from Ian Hamilton, who was representing Forthbridge Road residents in opposing the plans. Then from the chairman of governors at Belleville who was also opposing the plans. Then from Guy Senior and myself spoke, again, opposing the plans. When the committee started formal discussions Jonathan Cook (who is a member) moved an amendment requiring the council to re-think and he too spoke in opposition to the plans.

I suppose there is an argument that if everyone is unhappy then the plans are, at least, balanced. And the chairman did remind the committee that, having heard from some of the people who oppose the policy they should also consider the people who supported it (he might also have pointed out that they need to consider the others who oppose it they didn’t hear from, like the Taybridge Road residents who were excluded from the priority zone).

But when it came to a vote Jonathan’s amendment (seconded by the Labour spokesman, Andy Gibbons) was supported 6-4. In other words, the council will have to re-think its plans. Thank-you to Cllrs Andy Gibbons and Wendy Speck, parent governors Dympna Kelly and Jon Cox and Diocesan representative John Russell. And most of all thank-you to all the parents and residents who turned up to show their opposition.

Technically the committee’s ‘decision’ is only a recommendation to the executive to act a certain way. Technically, the executive can choose to ignore that recommendation, but the practice is that the executive committee recognises that debate takes place at the committees and will follow this recommendation. I certainly hope that practice will be followed here.

It will be too late to do anything about the first lot of admissions to the Forthbridge Road site (and the objectors I spoke to recognise this; indeed, I was impressed at how practical they were when discussing how to balance the needs of Belleville parents with the desires of Forthbridge Road residents) so the first lot will be admitted based on distance from the Belleville main site. But it does mean that there will be a lot of time for discussion and drafting to get the new admission scheme right. I don’t think anyone believes everyone will be totally satisfied, but I think we all know we can do a lot better than a scheme that no-one really liked.

And I hope it goes without saying that Jonathan, Guy and I will be closely following what happens!

I’ll make no apology for reflecting on this personally, it has been a remarkably novel experience for me. I started by referring to the cognitive dissonance, that small tension caused by the difference between my belief and opinion and the broader programme to which I signed up as a Conservative candidate, then as a Conservative group councillor. It is hard to describe the feeling of freedom that comes with removing that tension, but it’s easy to see the attraction. And while I’ve no intention of becoming a serial rebel, I can see why for some people the threat of sanction (be it sacking or removal of the whip, and I’m sure there are those who think it should happen to me) is not a deterrent.
But most of all the episode has reinforced my faith in democracy.

I’d lost count of the number of times I spoke to somebody in the days leading up to the meeting for them to say, “there’s no point in objecting, the council has made up its mind.” For them it was quite clear that the council had weighed the views of Shaftesbury residents against the demands of Belleville parents (and potential parents) and decided firmly in favour of the latter. The council was obviously getting it wrong, but was an unstoppable juggernaut.

I’ve always been clear in my view that the council is not perfect, like any person or organisation it can make mistakes; what is important is that it can spot and rectify those mistakes. Last night, I was proud that the council proved it isn’t an unstoppable juggernaut, it is a mature and responsive organisation – it might not get things right first time, but it’s prepared to listen to make sure it’s gets there in the end.

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The council, sadly, seems determined to plough ahead with its almost universally unpopular scheme to expand Belleville School into Shaftesbury while denying Shaftesbury children the right to attend. I say universally unpopular because it seems the latest proposals are disliked by pretty much everyone, even if for different reasons. So while I will object to the fact that nearby children are incredibly unlikely to ever get a place, Belleville governors will object because they are losing flexibility in admissions policy. And while it’s incredibly hard for someone like me to admit it – I’m a member of the council’s controlling group and on the executive – the council has got this wrong.

It’s perhaps understandable to see how the council got to this position. Lots of people want to get their children into Belleville, so those that can afford it move near the school, but many are still disappointed. The council, therefore, looked at expanding the Belleville site with a £6.72m development scheme. Unfortunately this proposal was unpopular with the parents. The consultation was extended twice and, ultimately, the idea dropped in favour of giving the Forthbridge Road site to Belleville. This consultation was not a model of good communication. The consultation focused on the area around Belleville, with only a few roads around Forthbridge Road included and no reference to the admission policy. Despite this there was a huge proportion of objections, over 450 from the 500 representations received.

Nevertheless the council ploughed on, this time consulting on the idea of priority zones to address the genuine concern about children near the Forthbridge Road site not being able to get in. Bizarrely, however, admission was still based on distance from Belleville, even when the places were at Forthbridge Road – so in practice it meant the child in Forthbridge Road was still at the back of the queue when it came to getting into that school.

Again, the response to the council’s proposal was not positive. But the council came up with a brilliant idea. Why not, they must have thought, create another priority zone a mile away from Forthbridge Road, while still basing admission on distance from the Belleville Road site. While we’re at it, why don’t we refuse to extend the current priority zone to roads a hundred yards away because they aren’t on the same “interconnected grid of streets.”

If you were deliberately trying to invent a scheme that was bad for Shaftesbury residents, it would be hard to come up with something better than the council has for this.

It’s a fundamentally flawed scheme. The council is addressing problems in their arbitrary ‘planning areas’ (the argument being there’s a problem in the planning area that contains Belleville, but cross the road into the planning area Forthbridge Road is in and all is well) but not thinking at all about basic human nature.

A parent will always want to do what’s best for their child. If they can afford it, they will move near a good school. They will not consider Wandsworth Council’s education planning areas.

So we will continue to feed the demand. We already have three priority zones. What next, who will have to suffer for zones four and five? Or six and seven? Are we to have a handful of super-schools in the borough, growing ever larger and expanding by taking over small sites here and there? Or is Shaftesbury going to be the only ward that will suffer? It’s short-sighted, and doesn’t solve the problem – in fact I’d bet it would get worse as parents move and stay near Belleville to get subsequent children in.

But my real objection is that it’s just plain wrong.

Do we really want to say to a parent living next to a school, listening to the noise from the playground, seeing the traffic dropping off and collecting children each day, that their child can’t attend because someone living a mile away had a better claim? I cannot see the justice in it. The counter-argument is that it’s just the same a living next door to a private school or a faith school. But it isn’t the same, this isn’t a private or a faith school: it’s a secular, non-selective state school, funded from our taxes.

The council’s current proposals will be discussed at the Education and Children’s Services Overview and Scrutiny Committee on Wednesday (it’s a public meeting, so if you want to go along it starts at 7:30pm and takes place in the Town Hall). I’m intending to go along and voice my objections, as it my ward colleague Guy Senior. Our other ward colleague, Jonathan Cook, is a committee member and will also be speaking out against the plans.

I’ll be calling for the council to re-think. Given that the plans have such little support and are so fundamentally flawed I can only hope the committee will listen.

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I’m aware that the blog (and my online life in general) has taken something of a knock recently. I’m not above blaming little children for this; having another child has eaten into the time I spent on it. But what better way to get back into the swing of things with the death and decay of trees in the ward?

The council is about to remove 13 trees from various sites in the ward (detailed below). The Shaftesbury Park Estate certainly seems something of a tree graveyard, and two are being removed from close to my home (one of which I was quite fond of, having rescued it from being a misshapen young sapling).

All the sites will be replanted, but, unfortunately not until the next tree planting season – so they will remain empty for around a year.

The trees, and reasons, are:

  1. Outside 33-35 Amies Street – tree is 60% dead
  2. Outside 8 Ashbury Road – tree is 80% dead
  3. Ashley Cresent, opposite 20 Queenstown Road – tree has dead bark and root decaying fungus
  4. Outside 128 Dunston Road – three has dead back and root decaying fungus
  5. Outside 165 Elsley Road – tree is unstable and 60% dead
  6. Outside 189 Elsley Road – tree is 60% dead
  7. Outside 71-73 Eversleigh Road – tree is dead and has a heartwood decaying fungus
  8. Outside 48 Grayshott Road – tree is unstable and has root and trunk decaying fungus
  9. Outside 19 Holden Road – tree is 50% dead
  10. Outside 20-22 Kingsley Street – tree is dead
  11. Outside 2-4 Morrison Street – tree is dead
  12. Outside 39 Sabine Road – tree has extensive trunk decay
  13. Opposite 53 Sabine Road – tree is 60% dead

If you know of any other trees in the ward that need attention, or any empty tree bases that need filling, let me know.

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View Grit bin locations in a larger map

The response to my mapping of grit bins last week has fascinated me. Of course, the overwhelming majority of people totally ignored it, but some appreciated it and it was rather flattering to be picked up by the LGIU, and even more so to have been highlighted by the webmaster of Lichfield (who is a real pioneer of open data).

But more interesting was the negative response. I cannot deny the bins are located in the north of the borough. And a few people immediately realised why: it’s because a few weeks ago, when the locations were chosen we all got together in a smoky room (we used artificial smoke, so as not to break the smoking ban) and decided that we’d totally ignore poor old Tooting. Then we guffawed, well, most of us did, some went for the muah-ha-ha-ha evil laugh.

Actually, it wasn’t like that at all (although thank-you to Paul Clarke for the inspiration in his insightful post on the snow and ice in Croydon). Instead it was an operational decision. If you know the area you’ll also realise that there is a strong correlation between the how steep the roads are and how many bins there are.

What particularly interested me is that, as far as I can tell, no-one made the accusation that there was some anti-Tooting (or anti-Labour) bias until I’d made the map. Several even used my map to prove their point, because if we were allowing politics to decide the location the first thing a Conservative council executive member would do is create and publicise a map to highlight the point!

There is inequality in the location of bins because there is inequality of terrain. Only if the borough were perfectly flat would perfectly even distribution make sense. That’s not to say the current distribution is perfect because nothing is, and the lessons from this winter’s placement will be learned and used when choosing placement for next winter. But even with that inequality, even with the imperfection that comes from constantly learning, I’d argue what we’ve got is massively better from the only way to get equality: having no bins so everyone got precisely nothing.

What conclusions can we draw? A very clear one is that people respond to data depending on how it’s presented. The grit bin locations had been well publicised, but drew little attention until put into a map on my website. I know for a fact that my website gets far far less traffic than the council website, but for some reason the map had greater traction than the list.

A second conclusion is that when presented with data, people will draw their own conclusions. To me it was quite clear that the major factor in location choice were steep roads, to others there was a socio-economic or political motivation (there are so many bins in my ward that if it were an indicator of power I’d be something like a local government demi-God rather than mundanely just representing a ward with a hill in it) and I’m sure there are all sorts of other interpretations you can draw.

But the third is that it can provoke the discussion and debate. The challenge is creating a culture in which we can use that constructively, recognising that there is no such thing as a perfect solution, recognising that not everyone gets what they want and also recognising that there’s a difference between policy and operations. On things like this, we want to get it right, providing the data on what we are doing and how we are doing it gives everything the chance to help us do just that.

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Queenstown Food and Wine, a corner shop on Queenstown Road, have applied for an increase in their current licensed hours.

The application is for off-sales from 0700 to 0200 seven days a week. While this is earlier than many nearby licensed premises (for example Inigo, around the corner on Wandsworth Road in Lambeth) local residents may be concerned by an application in an area that has a record of anti-social behaviour problems.

Representations on the application can be made until 24 December, and to be considered by the licensing committee they need to relate to the four licensing objectives:

  • The prevention of crime and disorder
  • The prevention of public nuisance
  • Public safety
  • The protection of children from harm

The council’s licensing pages provide more information.

If you wish to make an observation you can do so by writing to:
Head of Licensing
Licensing Section
London Borough of Wandsworth
PO Box 47095
London
SW18 9AQ

or by emailing licensing@wandsworth.gov.uk