Susan van de Ven

I mentioned in an earlier post that I’d attended my first meeting of Cambridgeshire County Council - the annual meeting at which appointments for the coming year are made. 

I didn’t mention that it got rather heated at times, as the ruling Conservatives and opposition Liberal Democrats debated the issue of openness and transparency.  The Lib Dems proposed that the council’s Policy Development Groups be held in public, but were overruled.   Coming in as a new broom, it was an odd discovery that these committees were closed to the public.  The Lib Dems won’t be taking part in the PDGs in their present form.

The Bishop of Huntingdon was there too.  He gave the opening prayer, listened to the debate, and came to the conclusion at the end of the meeting that he ought to carry on praying for politicians.  You can read his account at http://bpdt.wordpress.com/2009/06/25/praying-for-politicians/.

A new non-emergency police telephone was introduced June 15, to accommodate call packages with free local calls:  0345 4564564.   The old number, 0845 4564564, will continue to work until April 2011. 

The emergency number stays the same: 999.

You may be wondering how your new County Councillor is spending her time in these first weeks after the election.  It is a combination of jumping into a fast-running river and taking time to plan ahead.

Locally, I am attending parish council meetings, to get an overview of village concerns, and arranging meetings with all of our school heads to find out what issues I ought to be putting on my radar.  I’ve been in contact with my predecessor in order to take over on-going casework.  

At the County Council, I’m attending training sessions where needed, and requesting senior officer meetings, especially in areas where there are local concerns - I’ve made appointments to see two lead officers in education and social services, and another regarding public transport and rail issues.  I’ve also been in contact with the head of library services.

I’ve attended my first full council meeting, which was the annual appointments meeting.  A leader and chairman were elected, both of which are political appointments made by the ruling Conservative group.  The Council is comprised entirely of political party affiliated members - 42 Conservatives, 23 Liberal Democrats, two Labour and one Green.

The Liberal Democrat group meets once per month to discuss policy issues, and judging by the first meeting these discussions consist of lively debate and consensus decisions.  The job of local representation is straightforward:  stay in touch with local residents, learn what the issues are, and figure out how to solve them.    Getting the best for local people means working together. 

Hoping to keep a balance between the villages and Shire Hall, I’ve joined one County Council committee - Children and Young People’s Services Scrutiny Committee, which covers education and social services.  Locally I will be focussing on individual casework and of course the headline community concerns in our villages.

I’ll be continuing to send out my monthly email newsletter - please contact me if you’d like to be on the distribution list.  Feel free to get in touch any time if you have any queries or concerns, and I will try to point you in the right direction.

The European Elections are now out of the way and we can all get on with Euro-bashing as normal.  Should we? 

Once again it is UKIP who made the news - apart from the BNP, for whom the European Union is a convenient peg on which to hang its bigoted appeal to the disaffected.

It’s UKIP’s distortions and the Conservative’s actions in removing themselves from the right-wing core group of the European parliament to join another yet-to-be-formed far right wing which cause the most concern.

UKIP have said all we need to do is leave the European Union and set up a “simple trade agreement” with it.  Not so simple as that.  Switzerland and Norway know that the cost of trading with EU countries is the adoption of a common set of technical standards dictated by the EU.  There is no hiding behind protectionism and markets remain open.  And we would have no clout in negotiating with the USA and China.

Likewise the movement of people is likely to continue to be dictated by European rules.  We don’t have the power of the United States to become an “awkward squad.”  Earlier this year the Swiss held a referendum on whether to exclude workers from the newer states, as is permitted by European law.  The people decided to continue to let them in.  The upside of us having to abide by Europen laws, even if we have “only” a “simple trade agreement” is that those hundreds of thousands of Brits living in France and Spain wouldn’t have to apply for residence permits or come home.  At least that’s the thought.

And as for money, world markets remain open. We may reject the use of the Euro but money will continue to flow across borders, whatever its colour.  It’s not likely to flow our way very much if we don’t represent a good trading base.

The real difficulty of the “simple trade agreement” is that by isolating ourselves from Europe Britain becomes irrelevant.  We lose persuasive powers in the fight against climate change, our influence on foreign affairs is severely diminished, our fight against international crime and illegal immigration becomes much harder.  We would no longer take part in many cross-Europe research and development projects.  And of course we would entirely lose any influence within Europe to reform European institutions.

And the Conservatives’ move out of the mainstream and away from broad co-operation with major European parties may play well in the Eurosceptic press but damages Europe and diminishes Brtitain’s influence.

With Cambridge Central Library’s long awaited reopening scheduled for September, and with Great Shelford Library also shut due to refurbishment work (we are told until late October), Melbourn Library is the place for anyone wishing to access books and other library materials over the summer.  

The library is situated in a freshly painted aqua blue portacabin adjacent to the entrance of Melbourn Village College in The Moor, off Melbourn High Street.   New volunteers have been coming forward to join the library team and there is a definite buzz about the place with new ideas being put forward - please get in touch if you would like to get involved.  This is a community driven library service for residents in our wide cluster of villages.

 You can either visit the library and select items from its regular stock, or go to the www.cambridgeshire.gov.uk website, clicking on Leisure and then Libraries, where you will be directed to the on-line catalogue.  Browsing and selecting items which are then sent to Melbourn Library for collection is easy - like anything, you just need to get started. 

If you have queries, please visit the Melbourn Library for help from a member of staff - open Monday, Wednesday and Friday from 2:30-4:30, Thursday from 5-7, and Saturday from 10-12.

On June 4th, news was announced that South Cambridgeshire District Council tenants had voted a resounding ‘No’ on the proposal to transfer the council’s housing stock to a new housing association, a move that would have been irreversible.  The news was widely reported in the local media - including the Cambridge News and the BBC - though coverage on the District Council website has been subdued. 

This comes in contrast to a vigorous and prolonged campaign by the Council to promote transfer.  One resident commented today, “The Council even printed t-shirts for staff with the name of the new housing association on it, when we hadn’t even voted for it yet.”

Upwards of £800,000 of our money has been spent on this ‘consultation exercise.’   Fifteen councillors have signed a motion of No Confidence in the Council’s leadership, which will be debated on Thursday June 18th at an Extraordinary Meeting of Council. 

For Cllr Sebastian Kindersley’s clear and insightful account of events, click here.

Cambridgeshire County Council Election 

Thank you to the many residents who have wished me well, or given time to deliver leaflets and knock on doors on my behalf, in the County Council election campaign.  It has been a true team effort - so very many thanks to all! 

With a successful result, the focus now turns to getting to work as a new County Councillor for our seven villages.   There will be lots to learn and I intend to be a hard-working new broom.

The result

Susan van de Ven: 1717

Conservative: 1347

Green: 227

Labour: 155

While good news had been hoped for last month - paperwork was underway to sign on a new tenant for Shepreth shop (including the post office) - that has now fallen through, and the premises are still on the market.  We hope that in spite of inevitable closure on June 5th, this will be temporary.  It is understood from the estate agents that new expressions of interest have been made.

Meanwhile, elderly and vulnerable residents face the difficulty of having to venture beyond their usual easy access to the shop and post office for daily services.

The Post Office is recruiting for a new subpostmaster/mistress, and does not intend to look for new premises.  This means that they are happy for the normal shop premises to continue, and this is good news for potential new tenants.  If you are interested, please visit the Post Office webpage where details for the Shepreth vacancy are listed.   The website had neglected to update a deadline of April 17, 2009 for expressions of interest.  Susan has asked for that date to be changed and the Post Office human resources team have said they would give July 6 as a new date - and intend in principle to keep looking until a new subpostmaster is found. 

Susan has written to First Capital Connect to inquire whether the rail operator would allow basic rail tickets to be sold in village shops where there is no village station master presence - an idea proposed by Railfuture, the regional rail user group, on a visit to Meldreth Station last month.  This would of course benefit village shops and rail users alike. 

The Estate Agents managing the letting of the premises are Redmayne, Arnold and Harris, based in Cambridge and available on Tel 01223 323130.

While these are hard times, the shop premises are ideally located.  Shepreth is a small village but has much traffic passing through, and the potential is there for a new lease of life for this important village service.  There is a wonderful feel to the place, which is at the heart of the community, and no doubt any new shopkeeper would have a good foundation to build on.

A range of rail-user issues have been highlighted this past year, culminating in the successful campaign to protect opening hours at Meldreth Station Booking Office.   

Local concerns include rising ticket fares and the absence of a meaningful student ‘discount’ fare for college bound students needing to commute into Cambridge, inadequate ticket machines at all three stations, and car parking problems - whether unused pay and display systems at Meldreth and Shepreth or nuisance street parking in residential areas.  A host of other points were raised at the public meeting with First Capital Connect’s Managing Director in Meldreth on March 3rd, and a good inventory of concerns is now on the record.

Approximately 125 people attended the public meeting, and 1,069 signed a petition to keep Meldreth Booking Office open.  It is clear that those who added their voices to the campaign represent a wide cluster of villages, and depend upon Foxton, Shepreth and Meldreth Stations to get to work or school.

If you would be interested in joining a rail user group that would endeavour to campaign at the local and national level for protected and improved service from our three stations, please send an email susanvandeven@yahoo.co.uk.   You don’t need to commit to attending any meetings;  names on a list will be our starting point.   If you feel you could offer some time to help run the group, please indicated this in your email.  Ideas and advice always welcome.

Ahead of a visit to Ely Cathedral where he spoke about his recent book on the economic crisis, The Storm, Vince Cable met with Lib Dem candidates standing in the upcoming local elections.  Characterisitically, he had thought-provoking things to say in response to current economic and political concerns.  Some of the issues discussed:

Affordable housing shortage and homelessness:  We have countless empty homes (many of them designated as shared-ownership on new development sites, others private) and councils must be allowed to make these available to people in serious need of shelter.  The web of rules and regulations governing every step of housing standard and allocation are, ironically, often an impediment to putting people into homes.

Young people and the recession:  Under the veneer of a comparatively affluent part of the country, the effects of the economic recession are making themselves felt in many households.  Very soon a huge number of young adults will finish college and university and will find themselves unable to get a job.  

Proportional representation:  This must be part of a package of sweeping reforms to our parliamentary and electoral system.  There is a danger that if the Labour government introduces a referendum on proportional representation, public anger against the sitting government will translate into ‘No’ as a form of symbolic protest.   It is important to stay focussed on considering the fairness of a system of proportional representation, which among other things would do away with the phenomenon of safe seats.

Public services and hard choices:  Whoever takes power in the next general election, there will be huge cuts in public services.  Now is the time to make hard choices about cutting unwanted and unnecessary expenditure.  As a result of the banking bailout the government is deeply in debt and it’s time to challenge major expenditures like ID cards and Trident.  Local councillors must think ahead.

No political party is above criticism:  Vince Cable commented that ‘no political party is above criticism.’  At the end of the day governments are run by groups of people, and any new grouping of ’independents’ will inevitably evolve into a formal political organisation. No one has all the answers and it is beneficial to work as a part of a group where ideas are challenged and shared.  It seems to me that we must create the best political parties we can. I find that locally and nationally, the Lib Dems continue to listen, discuss and respond at ground level.