Last week, I went to the awards evening for the latest group of young people from Salford to successfully complete the 12-week course that the Fire Service offer with the Prince’s Trust.
You can read more about the work that the Prince’s Trust do with Greater Manchester Fire & Rescue Service here, but I would just like to pay tribute to the young people who have completed this course and indeed previous courses. Many come from difficult backgrounds, and most needed help to ensure that they fulfil their full potential, and it is inspiring to hear their stories and how the Prince’s Trust course has helped them to raise their sights. A truly worthwhile project, and one that as a member of the Fire Authority I am proud to support.
I understand that this afternoon, GMITA wil be discussing a paper on Sunday service rail provision, including a proposal to reintroduce Sunday services on the Walkden line from next May.
I sincerely hope that they approve this proposal which will be a huge boost for local residents in Walkden, Swinton and the surrounding areas. I firmly believe that there will be a demand for this service and I hope that, at the very least, GMITA take a “suck it and see” approach and give the go-ahead for a limited period.
Fingers crossed…
You may have read in the Manchester Evening News that Greater Manchester is set to get an equivalent of the “Oyster” smartcard scheme available in London. It’s a cute piece of Government spin but don’t expect a smartcard scheme any time soon.
The Government has pledged £2.2m towards the implementation of the scheme. In London, the initial contract (subsequently torn up) was for a minimum of £100m, and that was at 1998 prices. Years later, the scheme is still not available on most National Rail routes, and although I do possess an Oyster card, if I want to visit my friends in Chingford or New Eltham I have to buy a paper travelcard even now.
Although Greater Manchester is smaller, it is also much more complex, with a myriad of small bus companies, unlike London’s franchise system. The idea that £2.2m would even come close to implementing such a scheme is ludicrous – local residents will rightly see this as nothing more than a pre-election gimmick designed not to improve public transport but to grab headlines.
Smart ticketing has my full support, but let’s see a workable proposal first, rather than an inadequate bribe.
David Ottewell has an interesting post on his blog about the future of the Integrated Transport Authority. It’s a complicated situation and David puts the options on the table as succinctly as I’ve seen so far, so I hope he won’t mind me repeating parts of his post here:
AGMA, the umbrella body representing the 10 councils in the city-region, wants to assume power over economic development, housing, planning and transport. There is a problem, though. Put simply, no one can agree what to do about transport. There is already a GM-wide body with power in this field: the Greater Manchester Integrated Transport Authority (GMITA). Three basic options have been drawn up.
- ‘A’ options are roughly the status quo. Keep GMITA as a sort of add-on to the new ’super-AGMA’.
- ‘B’ options involve keeping GMITA, but giving the 10 council leaders a much greater role in how it is run.
- ‘C’ options would scrap GMITA and put the council leaders (plus perhaps some other councillors) in direct charge.
When this came to Salford City Council, I had no hesitation in voting for Option A.
We have already seen what happens when we allow Sir Richard Leese and his merry band of Labour Council leaders to take charge of transport policy – we had the ludicrous congestion-charging proposal together with a Transport Innovation Fund package that was of little benefit to local residents in Salford.
The last thing we need is to go down that road again.
It was a great pleasure to accept an invitation this lunchtime to speak to students at St Bede’s College in Manchester. I was asked to go along by Matthew who is a St Bede’s student and lives in Walkden.
We had a really interesting discussion covering a range of topics and it was great to meet another set of young people who are politically aware and interested.
I spent a fascinating couple of hours at lunchtime today observing the Fire Service, Police and Ambulance Service conduct a CBRN (chemical, biologicial, radiation, nuclear) mock exercise at Castle Irwell student village.
One can only hope that the equipment they use is never needed in a real-life emergency, but we live in a volatile world and it is reassuring to know that we have the equipment, capability and trained professionals to deal with such a situation should one arise.
I’m very grateful to the Fire Service for inviting the Fire Authority Councillors and the ward Councillors for Irwell Riverside down to view the exercise and explain what was going on.
I note that Gordon Brown’s announcement yesterday of a fire sale of assets to pay down some of the horrendous deficit that Labour have built up (funny how they never use the word “privatisation”) includes talk of “encouraging local authorities to dispose of surplus assets”. Most pressingly, there has been mention of “local authority owned airports” like Manchester Airports Group.
Now, I’m open to a debate about the future of MAG. It is flourishing in local authority hands but there may well be a time that the prudent decision is to sell it. However, the idea that it should be sold off to help pay for this Labour Government’s financial incompetence is unthinkable.
Any decision about the future of Manchester Airports Group should be made by local people in Greater Manchester, and with the interests of Greater Manchester in mind, and hope that our ten AGMA Council leaders will stamp on the Government’s ridiculous suggestion immediately.
There’s an interesting piece in today’s Manchester Evening News about the value of Conservative Party Conference to Greater Manchester – bringing in an estimated £16m of business.
It’s easy to forget that the income brought in does not just stay in Manchester City Centre but benefits Salford as well. Many Salford people will have worked at the Conference venues – it was great to meet local catering students from Pendleton College who were working in the kitchens at the Conference – and of course hundreds of delegates were actually staying in Salford for the course of the Conference. Indeed I lost count of the number of friends and acquaintances staying in Salford hotels – including (I understand) such notables as David Jones MP and his staff. I do hope they had a pleasant stay.
It is an unfortunate symptom of the world we live in that the road closures and the “ring of steel” are necessary, but I hope that most people recognise the benefit that such major events bring to the region. It’s great news for the local economy that the Labour Conference was here last year and again next year, and that the Conservative Conference will return to Manchester in 2011.
A Resilient Nation – Conservative National Security Green Paper
It was very timely, then, that today I had the opportunity to visit Manchester Airport, including a detailed look at their security operation and a briefing on the new full-body imaging which is being trialled in Terminal 2.
It was a fascinating visit and I’m very grateful to Emma and Caroline at Manchester Airports Group for their time. Myself and my colleague Janet Clowes (Wythenshawe & Sale East) raised a number of important issues including transport links to Worsley & Eccles South, each of which are probably worth their own article on this website.
(The picture is me with the full-body scanner – the briefing was fascinating but I’m not sure whether the imaging pose is more Rocky Horror or Macarena!)