Two local police events in Chiswick and Acton

At last night's Ward Forum meeting the local Southfield police team told us about two events occuring in our area. If you can get to them you will learn about how to avoid crime and potentially get your bike fixed!

Crime Prevention Day
The Safer Neighbourhood Team is hosting next Tuesday (4th Dec), on Acton Green,  between 11am and 4pm, a crime prevention day.

They will be there to give advice to the public on all aspects of crime prevention, and will be happy to discuss any issues that residents might have. Please pass this information on, and encourage anyone who has concerns about crime in the ward to attend.


Exchanging Places - reducing cycle accidents
This is your opportunity to see for yourself how difficult it is for cyclists to be seen from the driving seat of a big truck.

On the 19th of December the Southfield Police Safer Neighbourhoods Team, in conjunction with officers from the MET’s Traffic Division will be hosting an event where cyclists will be invited to sit in the driving seat of a large truck. They will then be able to see for themselves the limited visibility available to drivers of large vehicles and buses.

Southfield Police team

Officers will also be giving cycle safety advice and offering free bicycle security marking.

Ealing Council will be providing two Dr Bike Cycling Instructors who will be offering free cycle maintenance and safer cycling advice.

The event will be held at the junction of Centre Avenue and The Vale W3, between 7am and 11am on Wednesday 19th December.

If you get to either of them please do. If you are not free then do let your neighbours know. Spread the word.

Southfield Ward Forum has Rats!!!

Tonight's Southfield ward forum was lively, especially when we were talking about Ealing Council and its rubbish collection (adjective, not the noun!)

We had a great discussion about rubbish and how the Council and its contractor Enterprise was still failing to do its job correctly. It should collect our household waste, recyclables and sweep our streets efficiently. Instead the figures for the past two months show that it is failing misrably.

For example when I was told things were improving figures showed that in Ealing borough the contractor was doing its job worse in October than September. Hardly improving things. The Liberal Democrats believe that Enterprise should be fined and fined 'large'. They are letting down residents in most parts of the borough, especially Southfield.

Topics raised in this 'rubbish' (noun not an adjective) discussion were:

• One resident after moving some uncleared leaves on Woodstock Road discovered a dead rat. Very nice. Not.

• That a number of residents put our their waste on the wrong day. Ealing Council needs to be better at informing residents about the arrangements for the collection of waste and recyclables, especially those who have recently moved into the area or those who do not read English as their first language.

• The fact that many streets were swept BEFORE the household waste had been collected - leading to lots of extra waste being left on the street.

We had a visitor from ARK Priory Primary school to update us on the new school that is sited where the Priory Community Centre was sited. A number of questions were raised and the following were some of the main points raised:

Priory Community Centre

• When the school is built it will have two classes, each of 30 pupils where being located near to the school is an advantage.
• The company, ARK, are not from a religious nature but one of charity and education. Let's hope so.
• The Head of the school will be selected in the next week or so.
• There will be one teacher and one assistant per class.
• They have made a committment to having after school activities and breakfast clubs.
• When I asked about whether the displaced community groups, who can not get places at any other Acton based facilitiy, they will have the chance to rent the school in the evenings for a not-for-profit price. Quite right!

We then had the local police team who as usual gave a lot of great crime advice...

Gary Busuttil with the local police team

• Do not leave the curtains open with all the presents around the Christmas tree available. Again easy for a villain to spot possible homes with lots of presents to steal
• If you get a present at Xmas, make sure you tear up the wrappers as some criminals will notice the cardboard box for a plasma TV and then potentially break in and streal the said item.

If you want to know details of the next ward forum meeting please tweet me at @CllrGaryMalcolm or email me at southfield@ealinglibdems.org.uk

Next Southfield Ward Forum meeting is on Thur 29th Nov...

The Southfield ward forum is a chance for residents to ask their three local councillors questions and a meeting where Council officers and the local police team discuss local issues.

The Forum also has an annual budget of around £40,000 and funds local projects that improve the area like adding new lighting, improving plagrounds and parks as well as installing cycling facilities to encourage more people to cycle.

Scout Hut, Rugby Road

The meeting takes place at the Scout Hut, Rugby Road, Chiswick. W4 1AT, this Thursday (29th November) from 7.30pm.

The venue will be open from 7.15pm so please feel free to come a little early. There will be any of the documents that relate to the meeting so you do not need to print our any paperwork.

On the agenda for this meeting are the following items:

• A chance for residents to raise Council related matters
• Ark Priory Primary Academy (formally the Priory Community Centre) - presentation
• Southfield Neighbourhood Police Team - where you can ask the police questions
• Southfield Road Shopping Parade Consultation results
• Southfield ward budget - where you can make suggestions of where the Council should spend some of its money
• Discussion on the Council's Waste & recycling collection and Street cleaning

All are invited so please turn up. If you have any questions about the meeting please email me at gary.malcolm@ealing.gov.uk

Hope to see you on Thursday.

PS If you want to read some facts about Southfield ward click here

Hospital Demo at Ten Downing Street

Earlier today there was a aniti hospital closure demonstation on Whitehall before over 50,000 petition signatures were handed into 10 Downing Street.

I was there with Liberal Democrat Councillors Nigel Bakhai and Andrew Steed and Gary Busuttil from Southfield who has been very active in this campaign.

Gary Busuttil with a large number of petitions

No member of the Conservative party was present so does this mean that they are for closing Ealing and other local hospitals?

As many of you know the Accident & Emergency and maternity wards of a number of local hospitals including Ealing and Charing Cross, are due to close if plans by the North West NHS come to pass.

Today we held a demonstration before the petitions were handed into 10 Downing Street.

Myself and Councillor Nigel Bakhai at the rally

Although the final decision as to which hospitals will be downgraded, the current plan does not give us much hope. This will mean longer times to travel whilst ill to get to the nearest A&E ward, of if visiting a relative you would need to travel a lot further.

It is disgrace that so many views of residents in Ealing and West London might be ignored. Any government minister must see the volume (and weight) of the petitions and stop these downgrades to our hopsitals which will just mean more people will suffer.

Councillor Andrew Steed at the rally

See some of the other related posts on hospital downgrades....

• Say No to Hopsital X-factor
• Liberal Democrats submit views on local hospitals

Gary Busuttil and Councillor Andrew
 Steed queuing to get  into downing Street

Movember - 15 days gone...

Since I said I would shave off my beard and grow a moustache to raise money for charity as part of Movember, I have so far raised £150.

Not bad but I am hoping to get a total of £500. This is a picture of me earlier today...

Day 15

The second picture is when I started the journey of turning myself into a moustachio muskateer.

I have been joined in my gorwing antics by five or six colleagues at work and hopefully we can raise a lot of money and awareness for men’s health, specifically prostate cancer and testicular cancer.

Check out my initial post when I started Movember (the new name for November).

Day 0

All donations are welcomed however small via the Movember website. Check out this link. Anything you donate will be appreciated greatly.

46 per cent of MPs back third runway at Heathrow

I read today of the Ipsos Mori survey commissioned by the Evening Standard detailing that a majoity of both the Labour party and the Conservatives support expansion of Heathrow.

Crazy. The facts show that there is no no need to expand Heathrow as it is not running at full capacity. The arguments that the country is in a bad finanial situation is totally disingenuous, as an expansion can hardly be done overnight anyhow.

Me at an anti-Heathrow expansion rally

Quite rightly it points out that the Liberal Democrats are vehemently opposed to expanding Heathrow.

Check out the Evening Standard article and make up for yourself if you live in Ealing who you trust on the Heathrow issue.

Some interesting facts about Southfield

The Greater London Assembly has produced some data into the profiles of each ward around London. Here is some of the information relating to Southfield ward which covers some of Acton and Chiswick...

2002 2012
Population 12,800 13,550
Children (aged 0-15) 1,950      2,600
Working Age (16-64) 9,550            9,550
Older People (Aged 65+)  1,300 1,350

Outside Turnham Green station

Population breakdown (2011)
Male 50%
Male Children 20%
Male Working Age 71%
Male Older People 9%
Female 50%
Female Children 1400 19%
Female Working Age 70%
Female Older People 11%

Number of Dwellings                                6,171
Unauthorised Absence in All Schools      1%
Mean house price                                    £645,171

Household breakdown (2011)
Couple household with dependent children 17%
Couple household without dependent children 30%
Lone parent household 8%
One person household 37%
Other multi person household 8%

Councillor Andrew Steed on Southfield Rec

Claimants breakdown (2011)
Rate of incapacity benefit claimants 2.9%
Rate of income support claimants                    2.9%
Rate of Jobseekers' claimants 3.1%


Employment by Industry (2011)
Retail, Wholesale & Motor Trades 26.2%
Education 9.2%
Health 4.2%
Arts, entertainment & recreation 3.5%
Accomodation & food services 5%
Construction 4.5%
Manufacturing 8%
Professional Scientific & technical 14.7%
Information & communication 8.1%
Business Administration & support 10.5%
Transport & Storage (incl. Postal) 3.2%
Financial & Insurance 1.2%
Property 1.6%

Ealing Liberal Democrats Slam Tory Walkout

Ealing Conservatives faced fierce criticism after five of their Councillors walked out of a crucial Planning Committee meeting earlier this week. The walkout meant that the Planning committee with seven Labour Councillors were able to vote through a controversial planning application.

The Planning Committee members, made up of cross party representatives, were due to discuss a controversial planning application sited in North Acton. The application was refused by a previous committee in August but brought back to the committee by officers for reconsideration.

Liberal Democrat Councillor Nigel Bakhai voted against the development – but with no other opposition, the application went through.

Councillor Nigel Bakhai

After the meeting, I spoke with Councillor Nigel Bakhai and he said: “It was absolutely disgraceful for no less than five Tory Councillors to leave the meeting before this crucial application was discussed. I objected to the application because it doesn’t include enough affordable housing – only 20 units out of 151. It is also a poor design, and made up of a series of multiple storey tall buildings – which is over-development for this area."

Because of the Conservative's disappearance Labour-run Ealing Council were able to vote through their controversial plans.

This shows a complete lack of care for the borough as a whole and our finances – but unfortunately we have come to expect this from the Conservatives in Ealing.

They are not an effective or credible opposition to the reckless Labour administration, and they clearly have no sense of responsibility. Ealing deserves better.

Movember: I have gone clean shaven to help raise money for prostate and testicular cancer

As many of you know I have had a beard for a quite some time but as you know we are now in Movember (not November) where some (brave) men go clean shaven and grow a moustache to raise money to reduce prostate and testicular cancer. I have taken the plunge.

I am looking to raise £500 this month and hopefully you have a spare tenner or more that you might like to donate to the cause. Here is the link to make kind donations.

Pre shave

Post shave

More information can be found on the Movember website.

On the site I will post updates as my clean shaven face becomes more moustachio.