Monday 21 September 2009

Highway reports Lambridge

The latest Highway reports for the area were released this morning and show quite a bit of disturbance in the area over the next few weeks.

To see how you may be affected follow the link HERE

Wednesday 16 September 2009

Road closed – Park and Ride open

Bath & North East Somerset Council will be opening all three Park and Ride sites this weekend - including Sunday - during the crane removal at SouthGate, taking place from Friday 18th September until Monday 21st September 2009 and requiring the closure of Dorchester Street.

This is the second and final phase of removing the most southerly cranes from SouthGate, an exciting milestone for the project. Bath & North East Somerset Council must close Dorchester Street in the interests of public safety. To reduce the impact on traffic congestion on Sunday the Council is opening the Park and Rides as a one-off.

All the Bath Park & Rides will be open on Sunday 20th September from 9.30am to 6.00pm. The charge for the day is £2.00 return. People can find out more by visiting:

http://www.bathnes.gov.uk/transportandstreets/Parking/parkandride

Because of the complexity of the dismantling and need to use a mobile 500 tonne crane to undertake the operation a temporary road closure on Dorchester Street is required. Bus services using SouthGate bus station will still be operational. First Bus will have an inspector on site dedicated to providing information to the travelling public regarding the changes to the bus services.

The temporary road closure extends from from 2000hrs on Friday 18th September to 0600hrs on Monday 21st September 2009.

Tuesday 15 September 2009

We have two planning applications to bring to your attention this week the first one is at 1 Otago Terrace Larkhall and is for the Change of use of ground floor from consulting and treatment rooms (Use Class D1) to self contained flat (Use Class C3)

If you want to view this application or make a comment then please follow the Link HERE.

The second application is for the erection of an extension to school to provide additional office accommodation at St Saviours Junior School.

If you want to view this application or make a comment then follow the link HERE

Keep safe this winter

From September 29 - October 2 Bath & North East Somerset Council will be carrying out free electric blanket testing across the area.

Appointments for Bath residents area available but booking an appointment is essential.

If you use an electric blanket, or know friends, relatives or neighbours who use one, book in for a test at Bath Fire Station on October 1st.

To book an appointment call Kellie on 01225 396759.

Other local organisations that offer services to local residents to help them keep safe, healthy and active will also be at the sessions.

These include Avon Fire and Rescue Service, who will promote free home fire safety checks and smoke alarms, Age Concern, Wiltshire Farm Foods and Care and Repair. Staff from the Council’s Sport and Active Leisure and Community Development teams will also be there with information about activities in local areas.

Department for Transport will look to support Sat Nav scheme

The Department for Transport will be sending a representative to the next meeting of the South West Regional Freight Forum, following Bath MP Don Foster’s request that they support a local pilot scheme which will see local authorities provide appropriate routes to Sat Nav companies.

In reply to Don’s letter, sent on the 12th August, Paul Clark MP the Parliamentary Undersecretary of State for Transport states that the work undertaken “sounds potentially very promising”.

Lib Dems in Bath have been backing calls for more appropriate routes for traffic, especially HGVs, and encouraged Bath & North East Somerset Council to start sending a representative to the Freight Forum. Now the DfT will be represented at the meetings and will “consider what support [they] can provide.”

Bath MP Don said, “I am pleased that the Department for Transport are showing a keen interest in this project. I have highlighted a number of areas in Bath where HGVs are using totally inappropriate routes and getting these routes removed from Sat Nav maps will be a big step to helping resolve the problem.

‘Tackling the Fiscal Crisis: A recovery plan for the UK’

Liberal Democrat Shadow Chancellor, Vince Cable launched a pamphlet today published by the independent think tank Reform setting out proposals for tackling the fiscal crisis.

In this pamphlet, he argues that there should be no “ring fenced” areas of spending and that all existing spending should be justified.

He claims that the situation is very probably more serious than the Government’s proposals for a fiscal tightening of 6.4% of GDP over eight years suggest. He argues that a fiscal consolidation of 8% of GDP over five years is more realistic, with the emphasis on controlling public spending, not higher taxes.

Nine specific areas of potential savings are identified as a start to a radical programme of reform. The main proposals are:

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Zero growth overall for public sector pay (saving £2.4bn a year), a 25% reduction in the total pay bill of staff earning over £100,000 and a salary freeze and end of bonuses for the civil service (saving £200m a year)
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Tapering the family element of the tax credit – saving £1.35bn
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A radical review of public sector pensions with the view to moving to higher employee contributions and later retirement ages. There is currently a £28bn subsidy to unfunded schemes
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Scrapping several major IT systems including the ID card scheme (£5bn over 10 years), Contactpoint (£200m over five years), the NHS IT scheme (£250m over the next five years) and the proposed ‘super database’ (£6bn)
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Curbing ‘industrial policy’, including scrapping Regional Development Agencies (£2.3bn annually) and ECGD subsidies (£100m annually) and reducing (by at least half) the Train to Gain and Skills Councils budgets (£990m together a year)
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Reforming the National Health Service, by reducing the centralisation and over-administration - starting by scrapping Strategic Health Authorities (£200m a year) – by strengthening commissioning and with ‘supply side reform’ - in particular tariff reform could save around £2bn a year
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Curbing the centralisation in education, by cutting national strategies and scrapping quangos – saving around £600m a year
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Reducing the amount of waste in the defence procurement process, including scrapping the Eurofighter and Tranche 3 (£5bn over 6 years), the A400M (total cost £22bn), Nimrod MRA4, the Defence Training Review contract (£13bn over 25 years) and the Trident submarine successor (£70bn over 25 years)
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Examining possible future public sector asset sales, including some aspects of the Highways Agency (land value of £80bn) and intangibles such as spectrum, landing rights and emissions trading

Commenting, Vince Cable said:

“The time for generalities is over.

“Instead, we need serious proposals for cutting public spending and tackling the UK’s budget deficit.

“The priority is to move the economy out of recession but there is also a need to restore fiscal credibility and to allow Government to focus its resources where are they are most needed.

“We need to debate when, how and where the cuts will come.

“Undoubtedly more are required to meet the exacting fiscal disciplines but asking the British public for their vote at the next election means being upfront from the outset about what Government should and should not be spending its money on.”

Friday 4 September 2009

Yet more Fly tipping


And if the fly-tip in the car park was not enough Raine found the next bin along the way had exactly the same problem. A nice Council sticker and the fly-tip still there. We have asked for this to be removed as well.

Fly Tipping in Car Park



Quill Harvey-Cantrell was dismayed to see the latest fly-tip at the bin in the New Oriel Hall car park. He was even more dismayed to see the Council sticker on the top advising people they could be fined for fly tipping.

"Why go all the way to put a sticker on the bin and not take away the rubbish!!! I have asked the Council to remove this fly-tip"