The past week has not been a good one. Without going into too much detail I
spent three days unable to do anything very much due to illness and for the day
before and two days following partial recovery I was in Bromley caring for
elderly friends who had something like the flu and running out of food. Usually
helpful neighbours were ill too! Despite a 90th birthday being
just around the corner their GP is simply not interested in them. And that in
brief is my excuse for failing to provide any Council meeting reports this week.
While I was almost totally incapacitated I missed six hours of Council meetings
and before I will be able to catch up on them there will likely be another six.
Something has got to go.
The Adult Social Care and Health Scrutiny meeting rarely produces anything of
interest beyond Thamesmead being an unhealthy place to live so the initial
response is to give it a complete miss. ‘Places’ on the other hand is often of
general interest and in dribs and drabs it will be covered, at least in part.
At an unprecedented 230 minutes long it surely must have had something special
going for it.
It began with a
question and answer session about the 3,000 (known) 16 to 24 year olds
in Bexley who are not in education or training. Covid is still to some extent
getting the blame. Six in ten of that age group nationally have never had a job. In Bexley the
16-24 year olds number around 25,000 and 3,000 was said to be 1 in 9. This
dubious arithmetic allows Bexley to claim 11% NEETs and not 12%. However it was
accepted that the numbers were all best guesses so it doesn’t really matter.
Whatever the number is, it is clearly getting worse. What little work there is for young
people in Britain’s failing economy is in warehousing, hospitality, retail and delivery.
Highway Maintenance was next on the Agenda and I wish to place on record that
last Monday I drove from Abbey Wood to Bromley without encountering a single road closure, an
extremely unusual event. However by Thursday there were two sets of temporary
traffic lights, the one in Brampton Road doing nothing but protecting a dozen
cones. Passing by eight times over two days there was never anyone working there
until I saw the lights being removed late on Friday afternoon. No one at Bexley
Council ever bothers to inspect the efficiency or lack thereof, with which road
maintenance is effected. The economy suffers and the costs of disruption mount unnecessarily.
The Highway Manager delivered a slide show and his comments were relatively
few saying almost nothing that has not been reported here before, but maybe
Councillors are forgetful and some are new. He is expecting to get a Government grant of £941,000 within the next month
or so which will have to be spent this financial year. He has planned what to do
with it on the assumption the money will be forthcoming.
‘A’ roads are currently in very slightly poorer condition (DfT ratings) than
they were a year ago but in percentage terms barely measurable. B and C roads
are slightly improved. Each street is walked at least twice each year and 4,403
potholes were filled in the past twelve months. There have been 26 significant
resurfacings (5·8 kilometres) so far this year with another 13 scheduled for before next April.
Councillor Frazer Brooks (Conservative, Blackfen and Lamorbey) commented on FixMyStreets reports so often being dismissed as
not meeting whatever criteria apply and residents get the impression that the
Council doesn’t care. (I regularly receive such comments from aggrieved residents.)
Potholes on roads comprised of a thin layer of asphalt over concrete are never
likely to be fixed because their depth is never likely to exceed the depth criterion.
Councillor Donna Briant (Labour, Slade Green) asked if there was an asphalt
versus slabs policy on footpaths. She personally prefers asphalt. The Highways
Manager said he prefers asphalt too, it’s only half the price, but tries to avoid small patches on
otherwise paved footpaths.
The Cabinet Member said that £14 million would be spent on roads this year,
twice as much as a year ago and residents should be able to see the improvements.
The slide show was to be circulated to Committee Members the day after the
meeting. Members of the public are to be deprived of that information. It is not
in the Agenda although some slides are visible via the webcast. It is supposed
to be a Public Meeting but maybe not completely so.