Labour candidates in East Dulwich

[Smiler]

I don't like the school meals thing either.

Also think that the pledge for a place at a local school is meaningless unless the performance of all the local schools is good.

[happyhelen]

I never thought I'd hear people moaning about providing school children with free meals! Whilst in Dulwich there may people who can afford to feed their children healthy meals, this isnt the deal across the board in Southwark, or across the country. Yes, I know it's means tested at the moment but I reckon there are families out there who dont fall into this category but would really benefit from this.

I dont think it can equate to a waste of money when reserach has shown it helps improve childrens s concentration at school etc.

[Loz]

Yes, I know it's means tested at the moment but I reckon there are families out there who dont fall into this category but would really benefit from this.

Then fine, adjust the means testing to be less stringent if that is the case. Frankly, councils giving out stuff to those who can afford it is insanely stupid, especially at the moment.

Labour - Feeding the middle classes for free.

[????]

Oooh feed the voters what we think they want to hear.....

[James Barber]

- Free school meals are already provided for those that can't afford them. Providing them for free to those that can seems very generous.

The promise makes no exceptions so presume Labour plan to provide free school meals for kids in the private schools?

Many of the kids in Southwark primary schools live in other boroughs - will they all get free school meals paid for by Southwark Council tax payers?

(Lib Dem promise to invest even more in schools to improve kids life chances).

- Current policy is to provide a local Primary school place within 1 mile - pram push - for those that want them (some prefer religious schools). So the promise is to not change things?

(Lib Dems promise in our manifest is a GOOD school within 1 mile.)

- The Southwark Council waste contract with Veolia will take recycling from 21% as at end Dec'09 as used by Southwark Labour in literature to 38.6% by 2014 with incentives in place to go beyond that. It also includes food waste by 2015. So the Labour promise is to meet this contract. Cllr Gordon Nardell at the last council meeting stated publicly the contract will be cancelled. Which is it?

(Lib Dem promise is to raise recycling to more than 10 times the best Labour ever achieved 3.6% in 2002)

- Meals on Wheels in Southwark are priced below the London Average. For 7 years they'd had zero price rises. Those that pay for them are on national benefits and pensions.

Why halve the price?

Is the national pension low in the eyes of Southwark Labour and they wish to subsidise it locally via cheaper meals on wheels?

I'd agree it's low but better ways to help pensioners - insulate properties to reduce fuel poverty being one of many.

(Lib Dem promise to keep meals on wheels prices below the London average)

[Oliver Kempton]

Hello everyone

I will answer some questions now but have to run so will leave some for later.

Thanks for your contributions James. I'm sure you'd agree though that having a council policy to achieve something is not the same as actually achieving it. For example:

"Current policy is to provide a local Primary school place within 1 mile"

We've met plenty of parents who haven't been given a school place within 1 mile, and the record number of complaints since last year suggests something isn't right. Actually the Lib Dem council's current policy is to delay the announcement of this year's primary school places until after the election. So families won't know whether things got any better this year until too late to vote on it.

Couple of other answers:

"(Lib Dems promise in our manifest is a GOOD school within 1 mile.)"

Does this mean that parents who don't think their school is good can transfer to another local school within 1 mile? Or are you pledging that all Southwark schools wil be rated good (presumably by Ofsted?).

"Why halve the price? [of Meals on Wheels]"

Because there are a third less users of the service since the price hike. So it's clearly had a negative impact.

James, maybe you could post a link to your manifesto so people can compare? Apologies if you've done this elsewhere and I've missed it.

Very best

Oliver

[candp]

But James, the Lib Dems run the council, which puts you in a bit more of a bind right now. Those 2 commitments you list on recycling and schools sound good but are you delivering them? Ask people on this forum if they can all get a good school within a mile and if their tetra pak is recycled and the answer will be no. It's really irritating Southwark doesn't recycle these when the rest of the country seems to and it might help your hopeless recycling rate.

[Oliver Kempton]

Dear Smiler

My apologies, I missed your earlier post first time round.

New schools could be built in theory, but this requires a number of things, not least a suitable site. I think extra classes in current schools are more likely. I would hope to increase the number of places at the more popular schools, although again this depends on other factors such as space - even if all families wanted to send their children to Heber School for example, it wouldn't be practical or desirable to create all the extra capacity at Heber. Unfortunately we won't know which schools are the most popular until after the election as the council has decided to delay the results until after election day.

On the finance side, the ?12 million is for school classrooms. Schools that take on more pupils will of course get extra funding to allow them to pay teachers as the amount of money schools get is partly dependent on number of pupils.

If you have concerns about a specific school, please let me know either on a PM or at [email protected] so I can follow up.

Very best

Oliver

[Oliver Kempton]

-- moved topic --

[Administrator]

It is a bit of a tough call but I have decided to move this to the Drawing Room because it is the place for local election discussions.

[James Barber]

Hi Oliver,

I think your mean ?12m from central government lottery (Lewisham receive ?0 but has 543 reception kids without classes).

Potential requirement for another ?2.1m that Southwark will need to find.

[willow]

People get really het up about tetra pak recycling but it really won't make a massive difference to the recycling rate seeing as they currently make up about 3% of the waste stream. Plus is it really worth a seperate collection? Southwark currently recycle a wider range of materials than most other councils. I've said it before and I'll say it again, low recycling rate is due to low participation, the fact that it's a highly urbanised borough (less green / garden waste) with the majority of people living in flats and it has a massive population turnover. Southwark was always going to be onto a loser. All the tetrapak and plastic bag recycling in the world won't make a difference.

[Oliver Kempton]

Hello Willow,

Tetra pak recycling will make a difference, but is of course only part of the solution. Greenwich's rate is 42.09% and Ealing is 35.09% (Southwark is 20.89%) so it is possible for London boroughs to do a lot better. All the figures are here if anyone is interested: http://www.defra.gov.uk/evidence/statistics/environment/wastats/archive/mwb200809a.xls

James, I do mean ?12 million, my apologies. I've changed this now. Are you able to share your manifesto so we can compare?

Very best

Oliver

[willow]

Oliver

I'm not sure Greenwich and Ealing are comparable as they're not inner London Boroughs with different socio-economic factors. Comparing Southwark with similar boroughs in terms of number of residents living in flats, high levels of turnover, deprivation etc, then Southwark really doesn't look that terrible:

Lewisham - 22%

Lambeth - 25%

Hackney - 22%

Tower Hamlets - 13%

[Huguenot]

Well that's a good point Oliver, I don't think James is being entirely fair if he just pokes at your vision without revealing his own....

[Loz]

Also, there are no tetrapak recycling facilities in the UK - it all has to be shipped to Scandinavia. The carbon footprint must make the whole exercise of rather dubious environmental value.

That's not to say recycling rates in Southwark could not improve dramatically. Though apart from food and tetrapaks, I'm not sure how much more our household could recycle. We barely have a quarter of a bin load a week now.

[Huguenot]

All good points Loz.

I think tetra packs are a red herring too.

I'm not sure the vision needs to make currently recycling houses to recycle more - I think there's a need to persuade non-recycling areas like battery chicken farms modern high density housing to be more recycling friendly.

[Siduhe]

I very much agree with Willow and (at the risk of repeating myself from another thread), there are two things that have been demonstrated to make a big difference to recycling rates:

a) commingled kerbside recycling (i.e. put all your recyclables into a single box rather than having to separate as currently) and b) requiring kitchen waste to be collected separately from household waste).

a) is coming very soon as I understand it from the nice lady at Veolia who stopped by a few days ago to ask about our recycling habits and b) will very likely come in when the new MBT and facility at the Old Kent Road is opened up. Even if kitchen waste recycling isn't compulsory, it will give Southwark a way to do it cheaply (and potentially generate money from the energy sent back to the grid - depending on the technology they use).

So recycling rates are likely to go up (maybe dramatically) in the near future because of existing initiatives - it just takes time to get things like planning permission and facilities in place. Not saying we couldn't do more(especially for flats and estates) and I have no connection to any political party, but it isn't going to be Tetra-pak recycling that does it. It's going to be the stuff put into place about 2 years ago now.

[Oliver Kempton]

Hello all

I think there's a slight danger that the tetra pak thing gets taken slightly out of proportion, it's an example of where an improvement could be made - it won't massively boost recycling on its own.

Siduhe, you're right that recycling should go up anyway, partly for the reasons you've outlined but also partly due to growing awareness of the importance of recycling. But we've set an ambitious target (to double the rate), so we'll have to do more.

Actually, I think the biggest thing will be to improve collection facilities in areas whey they are currently poor, such as certain flats on Lordship Lane and elsewhere. In terms of council housing - since Southwark's housing department was abolished in 2006, housing has deteriorated to 'failing' according to inspectors - it's now the worst council housing in inner London. There's a lot of work to be done improving council housing; if boosting recycling rates can be considered alongside that that then so much the better.

Best wishes

Oliver

[Siduhe]

Oliver Kempton Wrote:

-------------------------------------------------------

> Siduhe, you're right that recycling should go up

> anyway, partly for the reasons you've outlined but

> also partly due to growing awareness of the

> importance of recycling. But we've set an

> ambitious target (to double the rate), so we'll

> have to do more.

>

Agree we can always do more. But, if I understand what Veolia said correctly, the existing plan is to double the rate to above 40% over 4-5 years and that is what the new facilities are designed to do - so your "doubling the rate" plan is already in place. Or is it that you are going to bring the rate up to 40% more quickly than the current plan?

It's a particular area of interest for me so would be good to understand genuinely what you are going to do over and above what is already in place.

[The Minkey]

For a while, in the 90'sd, Lambeth residents were able to recycle textiles. If there's a use that can be made of old clothes, pillows, duvets etc, stuff that isn't good enough for the charity shop, then perhaps this could be considered?

A household in my street have two wheelie bins into which everything goes, apart from their paperwork which they burn in the garden. So how do we encourage those people, who are already able to recycle but don't, to participate?

[Peckhamgatecrasher]

There is a textile recycle bin outside the Mind charity shop at the Goose Green roundabout.

[James Barber]

Hi Oliver,

The Veolia contract delivers your manifest pledge. But Cllr Gordon Nardell stated quite clearly one of the first acts of a Labour adminsitration would be to cancel the Veolia contract.

Can you confirm you'll double recycling by changing nothing and keep the existing Veolia contract OR do you have a master plan that cancels the Veolia contract and clear plans to double recycling?

The doubling of recycling rate.

Is that based on the recycling rate when your elected which will be 24% or another figure from the past?

[Oliver Kempton]

Hello all

On the recycling rate. We have taken the latest available annual recycling figures for Southwark (the 2008/9 figure of 20.89%) and pledged to double it (i.e. 42%).

As is pointed out earlier, the council?s waste contract with Veolia should take recycling from the current rate to 38.6% by 2014. Our plan is to push it higher than this.

I?ve managed to get a look at the Lib Dem Southwark manifesto. On recycling it says the Lib Dems will increase recycling to ?more than 38%.?

James said earlier ?So the Labour promise is to meet this contract.?, but actually as you can see from these figures, the Lib Dem promise is to meet the contract, ours is to push on and achieve a higher rate (42%).

It?s ambitious, but I believe that it?s important and worth prioritising. Things we might do to help achieve this include better provision in blocks of flats, bringing food recycling online before 2015 (current plan), and increased promotion of the importance of recycling and items that can be recycled (e.g. textiles, thanks for pointing out the location of facilities for this Peckhamgatecrasher).

I think it?s also worth looking at Southwark?s recycling record over the past few years. I?ve attached a graph to this post that shows the change in recycling rate in Southwark, compared with the national average and with the Lib Dem?s 2006 pledge on recycling. Not only does it show that the council is nowhere near the 30% target that the Lib Dem?s pledged in 2006, but also that the gap between Southwark?s recycling rate and the national average has widened since 2007.

I hope this gives a bit more clarity on our position and the council's current recycling record. Please say if there are any further questions or suggestions.

James, any luck on uploading / posting a link to your manifesto?

Very best

Oliver

[????]

God it's like a chat down the pub with GB all %ages and targets and numbers...how about a bit of bleedin' vision.

20.89%, for a waste target!!!!.... just say 21% FFS