Charlie's Greenwich

Reflective Learning and the value of Performance Appraisals

2010-10-04T14:03:00.000-07:00

First full evening back at uni - new classroom, new faces, and some new concepts, but mostly building on themes visited in the past. Once all the usual introductions and housekeeping pieces had been dispensed with, it was down to business with reflective thinking, learning styles (Kolb again), their application in the workplace and a brief touch on distributive leadership in groups. The 3* things I took from the evening were:

1. The value of reflection in developing people and ideas

Kolb told me yet again that I'm an Activist (someone who gets stuck into a new project without concerning themselves with the details or potential pitfalls along the way). Reflective behaviours are my weakest learning tools (unusual for a historian?) so I approached this topic warily. However, going through the concepts of Reflexive Thinking - thinking specifically about successes, challenges, objectives and the actions which caused these to come about - and discussing how this could be applied to improve productivity and relationships in the workplace took me back to a thought I'd had the other day about how much of my life at the moment is spent receiving information rather than creating it. It made me think again about how I need to exercise that part of my mind a bit more, and perhaps attempt to sell it a bit more at work. It's certainly something I deploy when trying to get the answer I want from somebody I'm giving advice to.

2. The disputed value of performance appraisals between managers, jobholders, and HR professionals

It popped up as a bit of a salient topic, this, but it is the one that will stay in my mind because of how frequently it crops up at work - from managers, staff and senior managers. When people talk about appraisals, it is almost always shorthand for the document that HR sends out and expects back from each member of staff, rather than what it should be, which is a framework by which managers can measure and shape somebody's performance. One person in the group said that they felt appraisals in their organisation were little more than a paper(less - it was completed online) exercise that bore little relation performance management in the workplace. Another person felt in contrast that their appraisal process was a valuable one, particularly their Personal Development Plan. It was discussed how different staff gained different amounts of good from the process depending upon the attitudes of the manager and the jobholder and how transparently the process tied into reward. It reminded me to make sure I write up the HR Assistant's objectives and achievements for the last quarter, and to check with some other managers, particularly operational managers, at work to see how much they value the appraisal process.

3. The concept of Distributive Leadership

I'm looking into this one as we speak, because it was only mentioned in passing, so I know almost nothing about it. But it sounds from the articles I've picked up that it holds some interesting ideas for organisation development, even if it's contested as to whether it exists, let alone works. The (very) basic thrust appears to be that if you push leadership responsibility down through the organisation, your teams work more effectively together. More on that as I take it in, though.

The only other outcome I feel worth mentioning is the sense of weary deja vu with Harvard referencing (which is coming up in a few weeks). For my undergraduate degree we were allowed to reference in any way we saw fit, as long as it was clear where the source had come from. I feel that the University of Greenwich (and I think it is them this time, rather than the CIPD) places greater emphasis on how the information is presented over and above the merit or use of what is actually said. This disappointed me last year; it disappoints me no less this year. In the University's defence however, there are still people coming into the course who aren't clear on the various academic referencing styles, but again I refer back to my preference at spending time looking at the value of what someone's saying, rather than how they've referenced it.

* I chose 3 points because it focuses my attention on the things that stuck in my mind; each additional point beyond will be harder to follow and less valuable to refer back to.

The best 404 I'll ever see....

2010-05-12T12:45:00.000-07:00

http://www.homeoffice.gov.uk/error404?errorurl=http://imblive:8080/passports-and-immigration/id-cards/

Just googled "National Identity Cards" and the first hit was the link above. That the link returned a 404 error (page cannot be found) has made my week.

The Identity and Passport Service's website has the following announcement on the ID card scheme:

Identity cards

Both Parties that now form the new Government stated in their manifestos that they will cancel Identity Cards and the National Identity Register. We will announce in due course how this will be achieved. Applications can continue to be made for ID cards but we would advise anyone thinking of applying to wait for further announcements.

Until Parliament agrees otherwise, identity cards remain valid and as such can still be used as an identity document and for travel within Europe. We will update you with further information as soon as we have it.

A few thoughts in the light of day

2010-05-07T09:40:00.000-07:00

Well, after all the hype, all the campaigning and the uncertainty, all the delivery and canvassing come rain and shine, we finally got to find out if all our work paid off.

On the one hand, it certainly didn't. Labour's vote was strengthened and they successfully returned all three candidates in Peninsula, with myself, Malcolm and Toks coming into 4th, 5th and 6th places respectively. We've held our ground in Blackheath and Eltham, but lost it in Kidbrooke and Shooters Hill. Most disappointing for the Greenwich team was the result in Charlton - we really hoped that our efforts combined with Labour's apathy there would have paid dividends for us. The biggest disappointment for the Federation was David Gold closely missing out on election as MP for Eltham.

But on the other hand we've obviously struck a chord with a sizable minority of people throughout Greenwich and Woolwich who are not just unhappy with the results of the current regime, but look to us as the ones who have the best policies to make a change for the better. We've also unequivocally established ourselves as the second party on the Peninsula, contrary to Andrew Gilligan's prediction. I'm only sorry that we weren't able to persuade more people to trust us to deliver a council that listens to its residents and cares more about keeping the ward cleaner and safer.

The campaign has been a lively one, with (mostly!) good-natured banter between ourselves, Labour and the Greens (unfortunately I didn't see any Liberals around and about in Peninsula, although I was fortunate to briefly meet Alex Cunliffe at the Friends of the Pleasurance AGM and Alexa Hills when I was seconded to Blackheath Westcombe in the afternoon) - I had no doubt that all of the candidates I met, in spite of our political differences, are well-meaning and genuinely interesting people, and I look forward to seeing them around in the future.

The election count at the David Beckham academy was cold, long and draining. I felt most sorry for the counting staff, who worked in shifts coated, hatted and gloved - at least we were able to nip into the warm for a cuppa every once in awhile! I lasted until just after 3am, when all the walking, talking, driving and telling finally caught up with me.

Looking ahead, it's back to business as usual: holding our councillors (including our new addition in Cllr Miranda Williams) to account, listening and acting on peoples' concerns. I've got a couple of issues that came up that were put on the back burner over the last couple of weeks that will keep me more than busy in the coming weeks and months. It leaves me only to thank the 1,426 people who voted for me - I really appreciate it.

Sitrep for the bank holiday

2010-05-01T14:08:00.000-07:00

Out and about today, it was heartening to see all our work coming together - seeing so many people coming out on their bank holiday to bring all our work for the last few years together. Word on the street is anecdotally encouraging for us, with people of an informed opinion saying that Greenwich Council has been dominated by Labour for too long. Of course there are still a great many of both undecided and disengaged voters who are still wary of political overtures: no doubt events at a national level play their part in this.

To those who may read this blog to find out what Greenwich Conservatives want to do to take the borough forward, our manifesto can be viewed here. I've copied out our 5 headline policy pledges below, because I believe they summarise not just the most important things that need to change in Greenwich, but also how we propose to going about changing them. I believe our policies to be the most detailed and necessary steps that need to be taken urgently to change transform the council into one that we can all be proud of. I hope you do too.

Our 5 Headline Policies (see our manifesto for all our policies in detail)

• First, requiring all senior Council Officers to submit their departmental budgets to an independent, outside auditor to assess how efficiently Greenwich Council has handled your money over the last few years. We intend to reverse Labour’s automatic assumption that the public has an insatiable appetite to be taxed.

• Second, inviting outside contractors to tender via open competition for the business of sweeping our streets. It is a sad fact that Greenwich is often referred to as “one of the dirtiest London Boroughs” – for a Borough often in the centre of our nation’s history (and as a major tourist attraction as a result) this is unacceptable.

• Third, undertaking a complete review of education provision within the borough with a view to increasing the number of schools and ensuring that Greenwich schools rise from the bottom of the league tables in London at GCSE. A Conservative Council would pledge to raise results in this borough to ensure our children have a better opportunity in life.

• Fourth, abolishing Greenwich Time. This weekly propaganda paper paid for by the taxpayers of this borough is a waste of money as it uses public money to push the Labour Council’s point of view down the throats of Greenwich residents. Abolishing Greenwich Time is both cost effective and the right thing to do.

• Fifth, introducing funding for additional town centre police teams in Greenwich and Eltham within our first year. We believe that the Violent and Organised Crime Unit in Woolwich has been a success and would continue to fund that group for the next four years (a pledge the Labour Council has yet to make).
Respecting the judgment of our fellow residents as we seek their mandate for reform, we hereby pledge our names to this “Contract with Greenwich”.

What on Earth: Greenwich Council's (ab)use of employees' personal data

2010-04-26T13:10:00.000-07:00

Just read this article from Dizzy that contains a leaked internal communication from Greenwich Council. The communication states the intention that the Council intends to cross check the payroll records of its employees against any outstanding rent/council tax fine arrears of borough residents and thereby force employees in arrears with the Council to make arrangements to clear their arrears. On the assumption that this is a true and recent development, I submit the following thoughts:

Now on the one hand as a taxpayer it's commendable that the Council is making an effort to secure what it is legally entitled to, and that it could potentially assist those people who fall into the category of being a council employee who lives in the borough who's in arrears from getting into even greater financial difficulty (because it could be assumed that the Council would be chasing them anyway through regular means). It also shows an attempt to get one hand of the organisation working with the other.

BUT, and this is a massive but - what on earth are they thinking? Sanctioning such heavy handed and reputationally distasteful action cannot be in the organisation's best interests. If large powerful private sector companies like Tescos, Barclays or Aviva were found to be cross checking their staff payroll information against customers who were defaulting on their mortgage payments, they would quickly become reputed as underhand, immoral pariahs of the high street. Just because we have no alternative organisation to pay our Council tax to does not mean that the Council waives its responsibility of service and professionalism to its stakeholders - of which its staff are a part. Any modern public servant (of which I would like to think I am one) should know that offering the highest standards of customer service is especially important for that very reason.

From a human resource management perspective too, it's at best a thick skinned and at worst a professionally counterproductive action to take. Maintaining cordial employee relations is something that every good employer should aspire to. This should include fairness across the board in an employer's treatment of its employees, a duty of care of confidentiality and fair use of personal and sensitive information and a professional desire to promote and/or safeguard the organisation's reputation as a good employer.

Whilst the means by which the Council are going about notifying and checking this information is not illegal from a data protection point of view, it is not something I would expect an effective, caring and ethical employer to do. Leaving aside the observation that it is the responsibility of the receivables departments to robustly chase outstanding payments, the Council are effectively treating employees who currently live within the borough differently from those employees who may have moved out of the borough, but are still in arrears or employees with arrears with other local authorities. This I would suggest is sufficient grounds to raise a grievance over unfair treatment and harassment by the employer. And even if this is found not to be the case, the risks to the employer for lost time, money and again reputation through grievances, conciliation costs (ie-compromise agreements), ultimately tribunals and most importantly good employee-employer relations should be sufficiently high that a sensible employer would not contemplate taking such heavy handed action.

The other realistic possibility that this action may cause is increased absenteeism through stress - whether real or contrived, it is quite plausible that the knowledge that your debtor (who also happens to be the giver of bread that your livelihood depends on) intends to fashion an even bigger stick to beat you with (because of course the Council will already chase arrears through its relevant agencies anyway) certainly isn't going to make you feel any better about your financial worries. The best/worst line of the piece in my opinion is "if you have not already have an agreed payment plan with the Council, you can contact us immediately..." It sounds like a Stalinist fig leaf to allow the miscreant the dignity to write their own confession.

In conclusion then, Greenwich Council's action cannot be justified in its stated terms of ensuring it collects its revenue effectively to ensure it can maintain services. The costs incurred from damage to reputation and liabilities from unfair treatment claims and absenteeism, not to mention the time it would take to mediate these problems would be higher in both financial, human and reputational cost than the gains it would bring. And with the tone and approach the letter has taken, nor can they reasonably claim to be acting in their employees best interests.

Comments are welcome.

It's the little things...

2010-04-18T10:54:00.000-07:00

... that make the otherwise largely mundane task of leafleting interesting. The people you come across are always interesting, but it's quite difficult to capture their essence in a photo. This note I saw on Saturday morning on a pot plant on a landing though couldn't fail to cause me pause and bring a smile to my face.

Out and about...

2010-04-13T15:31:00.000-07:00

Today was a day of helping visitors, trying to find elusive colleagues, battling with technology, catching up with friends and latterly pounding the pavements with the east wind and dying rays of the sun swirling around me. This evening covered the "heart" (no irony intended) of East Greenwich, from Christchurch down to Tunnel Avenue.

My most significant experience of the evening was popping into a local hostelry for some quick refreshment on the way to some more leafleting, to realise that the chap stood next to me at the bar was none other than Cllr. Quibell, one of Labour's remaining incumbent candidates for the Peninsula (Council leader Chris Roberts having retreated to Glyndon in Woolwich for fear of losing his seat) and I suppose what you might call my rival. Without being so rude as to give away the substance of the conversation, it's just made me all the more glad that I'm able to get out and put myself forward as somebody who really wants to see a change of culture and attitude in the borough. Most of the time I feel it's privilege enough to be able to hold the council to account, try and make some changes, stand for election and be counted. But when I witness how complacent the people who hold the real power are, it really does stir that little animal inside me that just wants to get up, get out and start making their lives as difficult as possible - if only so that they'll get up and start working for us all and make things just that bit better.

My map gets used! And some other election-y stuff

2010-04-12T15:49:00.000-07:00

Nice to see that my efforts are contributing to local endeavour: Andrew Gambier's handy map of who's who in the impending Peninsula elections uses the boundaries I drew a while bac k for my blog to show the area I aim to represent.

In other news, scaffolding appears on East Greenwich Library just in time for the election season to kick off, despite the (unwritten) claim from Cllr. Fahy that work would be under way two months ago. To be honest I'm just glad the work's finally getting started, though the news that Greenwich Community College will be closing down its part of library is yet another blow to the future of the building. I imagine that unless a significant change in the balance of power occurs in the next couple of months, the library will continue to struggle on until the future of the Heart of East Greenwich project becomes clearer. If I had my way of course... but then words can't make up for actions, can they?

This evening was spent leaflet-/canvassing in the SE3 part of Charlton's ward, where the Conservative team have been listening to and tackling various local concerns - some new, some old - from students using the back gate at BBCS to how late the rugby club parties in the wee hours. The view on the doorstep is always a good weathervane of how people feel generally, and this evening was no exception - now that national coverage of the election is underway, people are generally better informed of the parties' policies at a national level, and this tends to either shape their opinion of local politics, or eclipses it. It means that all the graft we've put in so far can be amplified a thousandfol or dashed to pieces by a well-placed or misjudged comment from either of the two main parties at a national level. At the moment, I've noticed an increase in undecided voters, a slight decrease in those who say they don't vote (I'm afraid I tired of trying to explain the significance of spoiling a ballot many doorsteps ago, but believe me I was quite a fan of registering my disaffection with witty and/or profane comments on my slip back in my more youthful days) and am still waiting to see the election signs appear in the front room windows...

There's a full week of canvassing and leafleting ahead (and fitting in a splendiferous uni assignment somewhere in the middle). I'm looking forward to finding out what the people of Greenwich make of us, and whether our work of the last few years (qv. GCs's website, our blogs and the local commentariat) will permit them to reward us with the opportunity to inject some energy into the council's work and really crack on with transforming the Borough's offer.

The Word According to Labour: David Cameron is like Gene Hunt

2010-04-03T02:19:00.000-07:00

The Labour Party's grassroots-inspired choice for putting down David Cameron is to be comparing the Tory leader to Gene Hunt, according to the Telegraph.

Sir Humphrey might have called it a "brave" choice - to make a comparison to a popular TV character may not get the response that Labour are looking for. Cf. the Dave the Chameleon campaign, which rather had the opposite public response to the one intended.

Update, 18.30: No further explanation needed.

Is online retail the future?

2010-03-01T15:22:00.000-08:00

Just motivated myself to do some (albeit limited) reading for one of my assignments and came across this article: www.emeraldinsight.com/10.1108/09564230110694820. It provides a good counter to the argument that all non-food retail will end up taking place online, largely because of the paradox that the main reasons for choosing to be an online retailer (low startup and running costs, infinite scalability, less reliance on human beings) go against the requirements of successfully growing and maintaining competitive advantage (because you need to continue offering an acceptable or better level of customer service as your business grows, which requires more quality staff).

My counter to that would be that it's still more efficient to house all your staff and stock in call centres and warehouses and take payment before shipping the item than it is to pay rent on a load of stores where people can walk in and nick stuff and the customer experience can vary hugely... but there.

Of course that's just one element of a retailer's context, (my next stop is supermarkets and whether my specialist retailer actually offers better standards of CS than supermarkets... I don't think it does) but I thought the article's argument was an interesting one.

And with that. I'm going to watch CSI NY now methinks.

I've never voted Labour before, but...

2010-02-17T14:31:00.000-08:00

My quick, dirty and critically faulty contribution to ConservativeHome's mylabourposters campaign. Check out the website for the best examples.

"Love Clean Streets" goes live

2010-02-15T13:30:00.000-08:00

Nigel Tyrell of LoveLewisham has recently launched LoveCleanStreets, a " site (that) allows you to review and submit environmental issues and have your local authority deal with it, and then let you know how they got on." - basically an index of the bad and the ugly in and around London, and how quick (and effective) the Council have been at making it good.

I'm genuinely looking forward to see how Cleansweep respond to this challenge.

What's going on with that?

2010-02-09T10:47:00.000-08:00

As usual I've been remiss in my posting (though certainly not through lack of things to say and do). Tonight I would like to quickly and simply draw attention to the various groups of people rightly upset by the poorly advertised (whilst I was aware that major works would be taking place, I didn't know the full details til reading the Phantom's article last week) and (in my personal opinion) ill conceived decision to close the Blackwall Tunnel to southbound traffic from Sunday to Friday for the forseeable future.

The facebook protest group and Blackwall Tunnel Special Report blog (recognise the style sheets on it ;-) ?) articulate the case against TfL's decision succinctly, so I shan't reinvent the wheel here, but merely highlight the (sadly unreferenced) statistic that "this closure and lack of contraflow is not acceptable by 92% of local residence and tunnel users" and note that the tidal flow operated without public protest or "catastrophic fire" from 1978 to 2006, so why would reinstating a contraflow in off-peak times for a couple more years be more risky than back in 2006?

Perhaps I'm missing something glaringly obvious here, and I'm by no means a civil planning expert or someone with an army of surveyors and accident statistics at my disposal, but in my ignorance I feel the decision made here doesn't feel right.

Watch the space.

Do you like absorbing the politically banale? I do

2010-01-21T13:04:00.001-08:00

Maybe this is for a rare hybrid of a person who a) has an unhealthier than perhaps is normal interest in politics (I'm thinking geek more than activist here) and b) a longing for the return to good old voyeuristic banale reality television as it was before producers started engineering conflict at every turn.

Eyespymp is billed as the successor to an anonymous Whitehall tweeter (executive paralysis does wonders for civil service creativity I'm sure) who was game was blown by James Kirkup in the Telegraph a little while ago.

I feel like I shouldn't enjoy it, but I do. I wonder if they had a Greenwich version what they would see? "Easton walks across road for bacon sarnie before returning to move some more paper around the Museum". Still can't be any less surprising than the thought of Eric Pickles munching doughnuts in the lift...

Well done Charlton :-)

2010-01-19T14:40:00.000-08:00

Now don't get me wrong - I will happily admit to knowing very little about association football (I'm more of an RFU man), but since I happened to be down in Charlton delivering leaflets earlier this evening (Peninsula's boundaries stretch along the railway down past the flyover beyond Anchor and Hope Lane. Even though it's a different post code and I'm not permitted to park there, apparently I'm still allowed to put myself forward to represent there! The joys of ward boundaries.. but I digress) I had a chance to see the fans making their way to the game.

It's a warming sight, and one that takes me back to the odd occasions when I went to watch Norwich play at Carrow Road (back in the period when we were falling fast out of what was then the Barclays Premiership, we nearly always lost :-( ) - seeing groups of friends and families getting together to share a common cause.

I'm going to end this before I get accused of being oversentimental, but mainly I just wanted to say well done to Charlton on their win. :-)

Surveilling the surveillance

2009-12-22T10:43:00.000-08:00

Returning from my Christmas shopping travels in Norwich yesterday, I passed a GATSO speed camera on Ipswich Road (the one by City College if you know it). Last few times I was in Norwich, it had been put out of use by local hooligans/vandals/vigilantes/heroes (depending on your viewpoint - my personal view is that mobile police speed controls are fairer and more effective at reducing casualties on the road, and that speed is just one of many variables affecting road safety. But I digress). Now it has been reinstated - but what caught my attention was a yellow sign on the base of the camera, stating that the camera was subject to "24hr CCTV surveillance" - the surveillance has its own surveillance!

Strange times indeed. But I wonder: just who or what's watching the camera that's watching the camera?

Viral marketing done properly...

2009-12-14T12:47:00.001-08:00

This Australian TV advert has been pulled from the airwaves and removed from Toyota's website. Yet the fact it's made news in the papers shows the power of viral marketing. Is all publicity good publicity?

And sorry for the lack of posting recently - the usual story of work, illness and assignments I'm afraid. Hopefully normal service shall be resumed by the new year.

Three cheers for Baroness Warsi...

2009-11-30T11:54:00.000-08:00

I think she might just be bang on the mark...

Respect to her for engaging with someone who'd already lost the argument by throwing eggs. How old are those guys, 12?

The Green Cut

2009-11-25T06:49:00.000-08:00

Nick Robinson voices his reservations about how effective a budget cut equivalent to the savings of 10% of Government's carbon emissions would be.

I'm in favour of reducing energy consumption (consumption in general, really), particularly in a business sense because it would usually indicate greater efficiency as well as an attempt to minimise the impact we place on the world around us. The problem with the idea (and Nick's analysis) is that a question needs to be asked: who will calculate the savings of a 10% carbon emissions cut?

If the answer is external consultants, be they auditors, quantity surveyors, or whoever, they will cost money and need information from within the organisation. There are also not many organisations big enough to audit government organisations. Those that are exist primarily (and sometimes solely) to service the needs of large organisations - are the findings of these organisations potentially compromised by their proximity to those they serve?

If the answer is that civil servants themselves will provide information on what they can save, it would naive to think that the Sir Humphries (or Ervin Burrells if that's more your thing) in the corridors of power won't be thinking up ways to massage the figures, sorry, "mitigate the survey impact". The only way round that seems to be suggesting the sorts of savings that can be made, in which case why worry to ask in the first place?

Hofstede's National Culture Research and Handy's Cultures

2009-11-23T13:14:00.000-08:00

We covered organisation culture this evening. How cultures are made, the different types, how culture can (or can't) be changed, the kind of cultures people prefer and the ones they don't.

Geert Hofstede (I'm going to resist the urge to stick a "van" in there at exam time, it couldn't be more Dutch) conducted research in 1980 in the form of employee surveys across the international divisions of IBM to find out what cultural differences could be identified across the organisation. The four variables were:

Long Power Distance - Short Power Distance (how different are subordinates from their immediate superiors)
Individualism - Collectivism (how likely are employees likely to put collective interests before their own)
High Uncertainty Avoidance - Low Uncertainty Avoidance (how comfortable is a culture with taking on the unknown)
Masculine - Femine (How agressive, target driven and activist is a culture contrasted with its empathetic, responsible and measured characteristics)

Of course this is a hugely Western liberal capitalist classification of culture, and the quantifiable results are only applicable to IBM, not the rest of the world. Also, the world has changed hugely since 1980 (fax, internet, low cost air travel, satellite communication) so you could question whether discriminating culture as "nations" is a valid excercise when an organisation's workforce could be scattered all over the globe and 6 months later have changed completely again. It also ignores resource and political legacies and the different objectives a global organisation might have in different countries. But apparently it's a test that has endured the test of time.

We covered the Pluralist/Elitist/Unitary/Radical/Marxist descriptions of power - it's Mr Gardner's AS Level politics and Sheffield's POL103 all over again!

The other nugget I prised from the seam of this evening's lecture was Handy's four cultural descriptions of organisations, viz:

Role-based: Forms! Tick boxes! Policies! If the idea of any of those gives you a wet dream, that's you.
Power-based: The Cult of Personality (like the song) Charisma and domination prevail in the hands of a few.
People-based: People get together and act out of mutual self interest
Task-based: You get the job done, all else is peripheral.

Memories of Detroit

2009-11-22T17:16:00.000-08:00

If our public finances feel a bit dire over here at the moment, spare a thought for the Motor City. The Times reports that "unburied bodies tell the tale... of a city in despair" - having used up the county budget for state-sponsored burials back in June, Detroit is unable to afford to bury unclaimed corpses. Meanwhile, the city budget faces a $300 million budget shortfall and cannot afford to run services such as schools and refuse collection.

(Above: the Book Cadillac before renovation and the centre of metro Detroit)

Detroit is a city that has fascinated me for a number of years now: the cliche of the dark side of the American Dream, of affluence, confidence and splendour tarnished by decay, social and political crisis and a perennially uncertain future. Buildings like the Book Cadillac hotel before it was refurbished, Michigan Central Station and the theatre they turned into a car park are icons of Detroit's past and present.

Lots has been written on Detroit elsewhere so I won't spend too much time reinventing the wheel, but instead draw on my experiences from when I visited Detroit two years ago. The Michigan State Legislature was experiencing political deadlock over passing its annual budget - all operations of the state were under threat of paralysis with public servants going unpaid and cash to pay for services unavailable. The local press was running a story about two senior police officers on trial for selling cocaine from the evidence room or something similar - it's difficult to be precise, a quick look back over Detroit's corruption cases in the last 2 years shows that these reports are quite common, with allegations of corruption going right through to the top of the City's administrations. (does this sound like another American city we know in fiction?)

The people I spoke to on my way through the rust belt in Pennsylvania and Michigan told me I was mad to want to visit Detroit, that it was polluted and falling apart physically and socially, that I would have my car stolen and would probably be shot. I have to say my experience was somewhat different - the people I spoke to there were friendly Americans in much the same way as they were in the rest of the country. Certainly there were miles of derelict factories, empty plots where houses once stood and what was left standing was in many cases going the same way, but then I saw that in Chicago and Cleveland too. The roads were choked with traffic - lots of old American classics and 18 wheeler semis trashing the heavily potholed asphalt of the freeways. But there were also gleaming factories in the suburbs, and rejuvanated plazas in the centre of the city where the offices like the Renaissance centre dominated the skyline, but nestled in next to some fantastic deco architecture from the 20s and 30s and some striking modern architecture from the 50s and 60s.

(Above: Thunderbirds architecture meets art deco, and the front entrance of Detroit's police headquarters)

I got the feeling back then even before the banking crisis was fully understood that America was living on borrowed time, and Michigan more than most: the local press was discussing Congress' new "restrictive" low emissions laws that would signal the end to the SUVs coming out of Michigan, Kansas and Kentucky. Michigan's economy was still hugely dependent on buoyant motor sales, and it was being reported that price reduction deals to buy new cars were actually outpricing the second hand market. Since I visited, unemployment has soared to 28%, Chrysler is now a foreign-owned and government subsidised company as is GM (if you count the Canadian government as "foreign", which I would imagine most Americans would).

I hope Detroit can reinvent itself. It was one of the most fascinating places I visited on my trip across the US and deserves to become a great city again.

So now we have a President...

2009-11-20T13:24:00.001-08:00

Did today feel any different to you? Me either.

Back to Band of Brothers in HD.

Charlie has a go at TV critiquing (fails?)...

2009-11-15T15:49:00.000-08:00

I've had a bit of an iPlayer festival this evening, beginning with Russell Howard's Good News. The content is largely a matter of taste, with mixed reviews on the interweb; personally I like the upbeat and slightly childish angle Howard puts on things. I also like the production team's choice of soundtrack - I discovered this evening after much aggravated searching that the opening credits are scored to Kasabian's "Faste Fuse". Incidentally, the album it's from, West Ryder Pauper Lunatic Asylum is very good and worth a listen if you're so inclined.

Next was a serving of Malcolm Tucker profanity and healthy dollop of cynicism in The Thick of it. The Opposition are sniffing round DoSAC, much to Terri's interest and Tucker's bridled digust. I can't quite get used to Roger Allam as Peter Mannion after his role as SuperMac in Ashes to Ashes ( - but that's probably unique to me since The Thick of it didn't register on my radar until after season 2 of Ashes to Ashes). Anyway it all plays out as expected - the Opposition are hamstrung by SpAd problems of their own in the form of "Blue Stu" (I think that's what they mockingly called him... it's a bit too late in the day to recall accurately) and everybody sort of wins through at the expense of (mostly the Minister's) truth, honesty and dignity.

Finally, the first episode of series 14 of Top Gear. In short, Eric Bana was entertaining, German limo test was dull apart from the usual overworn jokes about the Stig and the Romanian Road Trip was interesting in parts (Ceaucescu's palace, rural Romania and the post Communist legacy) but also came across as overworn, and overstaged - particularly the dacia sandero gags, which after 5 minutes became tedious beyond further remark. Hope next week's a return to usual broadcasting.

The BBC seems to be hitting the mark on several fronts for good entertainment at the moment (including it's drama series Garrow's Law, which besides what I've already mentioned plus Olivia Poulet is another attractor for my beady eye atm)- and even the stuff I would call pointless drivel seems to attract lots of praise from viewers and critics alike. I'm inclined to believe that it does well to please such a wide audience. I'm happy to leave the debates about the remit and size of the BBC (and its paypackets) aside for the time being whilst I have something to cheap to do on the long winter evenings...

When pictures tell so many words...

2009-11-04T13:27:00.001-08:00

A little over a year ago, the Greenwich Phantom ran a piece on the uncertain future of East Greenwich library. The Heart of East Greenwich project was struggling ahead, placing the future of the listed building in doubt.

With the Heart of East Greenwich project stalled, I wondered what had become of our library. Last week I met with Terry Wheeler from the Friends of East Greenwich library to find out what had changed in a year. The pictures below describe the library's general condition better than I can:

Terry said that a lot of the leaking was put down to the lead being stolen from the roof - he didn't know if the council had replaced it - and poor drain maintenance under the building that had caused the floors to become saturated and rotted the parquet floors. These have been removed and the library has been recarpeted, but a lot of water still seems to be getting in.

Parts of the building are derelict, including a flat above the front of the library that has been condemned. The physical library itself occupies about 1/4 of the building space, another 1/3 or so appears to be used by Greenwich Community College, while the remainder is derelict. It also has a basement area, though if the ground floor suffers from water seepage, then goodness knows what the areas below ground are like! The boiler has also been broken in the library for more than a week - perhaps by now it's been fixed?

It's a crying shame. I think this is a sad example of a place being neglected in anticipation of a new replacement library, but since that's all stalled now, they're basically stuck with a building that's got into such a poor state of repair that it's going to take a lot of investment to put it right. They've also put it into a spiral whereby the opening hours reduce, the book selection shrinks, so fewer people visit, so they can't justify keeping it open, so they reduce the opening hours... and so on.

Terry said the council had estimated putting the library back into good repair at £2.3 million. It's going to need a lot of work, but I think if you put the flat back into action and thought cleverly about the use of space, it would not just be of service to the community, but begin to start paying for itself - particularly as Terry tells me the new "heart of East Greenwich library" isn't even phase one of the development, it's going to be somewhere along phase two or three. I must confess that I have my doubts as to whether it will ever happen, and even if it does, surely Carnegie's donation to the borough should stay open for the enjoyment of the borough?

More details to follow.

Open vs closed questioning

2009-10-30T17:32:00.000-07:00

One of the skills that I took away with me from my two days of sequential training (it's a CIPD term for a training away day, I don't know why they call them that) was a concious appreciation of open, closed and probing questions. It's not something I think about at all in day to day conversation - fortunately almost all the people I encounter are easy enough to talk to and if they're not, I can make my excuses and take my conversation elsewhere!

But listening this evening to Jeremy Paxman and Jonathan Ross interviewing politicians and celebrities respectively this evening on the television (well, the iPlayer anyway), it made me think about how you can steer conversation the way you would like it to go by framing your questions carefully and having follow up questions primed to ensure that the answers you get are either informative or entertaining, depending on what you're aiming to achieve.

I suppose I'm lucky in never having had to really think much about how to control conversation other than to be aware of when I'm talking too much, when I've interrupted and when I've repeated something I've told someone already - I hope I'm sensitive enough to realise when I should speak, and when I should listen (even if I don't always do as I should ;-) ).

Happy Halloween

2009-10-30T01:59:00.000-07:00

This is the best spoof of the Conservatives since Dave the Chameleon - as one commenter over on Tom Harris' blog suggests, is Tony Blair the bat on the wall and Gordon the floor of the cave?

Update: Of course, the Prime Minister doesn't need any photoshopping to look creepy.

Update: Red Rag's repost:

For your viewing pleasure: pictures of the NMM/ONRC/Park in autumn colours...

2009-10-29T15:54:00.000-07:00

Do your bit to mock the foolish...

2009-10-27T11:46:00.000-07:00

http://www.slapnickgriffin.co.uk/

Goodbye summer time, greetings GMT

2009-10-26T11:02:00.000-07:00

My body clock's all over the place today - it feels late when really it isn't! All of my gadgets seemed to have set themselves to go back one hour, apart from my phone which meant a nice early start for me this morning!

It's played havoc with international (telephone) interview timings too - because Europe, America and Australasia all pick slightly different times to adjust their daylight saving, it's created a couple of inconvenient surprises (and headaches!) at work.

It also means (because my commute is shorter than most) that I'm now joined up to the "go to work, dark; come home from work, dark" club. :-(

On the bright side, I'll be looking forward to crisp frosty mornings, bonfire night and perhaps even a little seasonal goodwill. Speaking of which, delivery for November's inTouch begins soon!

Financial ratios

2009-10-21T15:10:00.000-07:00

Mmmmmmmmm! Sounds good doesn't it? This evening was spent partly getting to grips with various profitability, liquidity and investment ratios, partly forgetting what I was talking about half way through a presentation. Repetition, big wavy arm gestures and a moderate amount of verbal incontinence do not great speechmaking make. Still, at least it's out of the way now!

Turns out that accountants have ratios to measure all sorts of things about a business - from how good they are in days at paying debtors and receiving from creditors, to whether a company's swimming up to its eyballs in debt, or shifting stock faster than my brother shifts beer. All this information can be used to compare performance with other companies.

My dad tells me that in a small business he prefers to use common sense to work out if things are going right - a quick look at your balance sheet and P&L is enough to give you a feel for if life is good, or if you're in a bad place. (Couldn't resist)

(Un)ethical retailers

2009-10-20T15:50:00.000-07:00

After my comments touching on working conditions in places less affluent than ours, I've just happened upon this article in the Times. Not so surprised by big American companies like Levis and Walmart, and perhaps not even so surprised that brands like Primark who might be more susceptible to negative publicity.. but I am surprised that John Lewis* and Sainsbury's, bastions of the middle class, don't appear to be taking supply working conditions seriously. Perhaps that says more about how the average consumer's (and the media's, and my) prejudices sit firmly with low cost brands, at the expense of looking at every brand.

* Waitrose is reputedly very up on offering "fair" prices to their food suppliers, which again leads me to think that "corporate responsibility" is almost entirely a device to boost sales. Of course, I'm not so naive to think that this couldn't be a primary motive, or that all companies operate the same way, or self righteous enough to say that it's a bad thing, but it does demonstrate quite neatly that if consumers don't care where the goods come from, the supplier almost certainly won't!

Leaders, or managers?

2009-10-19T13:57:00.000-07:00

This evening's class at uni focused on leadership and management, the different types, whether the two terms were distinct, and how. Models of leadership, how leaders excercise authority, different schools of thought on leaders and managers perform their roles.

One model that stuck in my mind was apparently quite an outmoded one, that of Burns' and Bass' transactional and transformational management. In the first, managers believe that employees are self-interested and basically come to work for their week's wages and the only motivating factor is management's big stick. Reward is derived through getting paid. The second is a more enlightened view that managers lead by example and motivate their staff to greater productivity using a range of reward techniques.

No doubt the second one has more relevance in an HR context, and a modern working environment, but I couldn't help thinking about the kinds of models of management that are practiced in the developing world... I wonder if HR even exists there? And if it does, what sort of improvement of conditions are seen as rewards?

Then there's Kurt Lewin's autocratic, laissez faire and democratic leaders. That got me thinking about politicians and which qualities are more desirable in the political world and which are more desirable in the business world. It also helped me evaluate where I hold strengths (getting stuff done, I concluded) and where I probably need to be mindful of improvement (taking time to get others' opinions, worry more about what people think, eg). The main difficulty is giving yourself an honest assessment - I'm sure my own perception of myself isn't quite what others would think.

So many different models and schools to take on... I need to really sit down and remember some of these! Talking about them here while it's fresh in my mind helps though.

In other news, Saturday yielded a productive run round the Tunnel Avenue/Woolwich Road/Blackwall Lane triangle, the heart of which is looking like it needs some love at the moment (or at least the gasworking holes to be filled in). It's deceptive how large the area in that small looking triangle is - if and when work is (started &) completed on the "Heart of East Greenwich" project, I'd imagine it will be of real benefit to the people living there. In the meantime, wasteland rules - although if I had a say, I'd like to see the site made safe and at least used for something in the meantime - open space, allotments, car park space, whatever. I'm sure there are pros and cons to each land use, and probably reasons why it can't be done overnight, but I don't accept that the cost of putting the land to some use would be unjustified - it would even take some of the bitter taste out of the developers' name for the site.

View Larger Map

What a wonderful day! Shame to be in the office...

2009-10-15T06:51:00.000-07:00

Uni last night threw some more financial language my way - straight line depreciation, activity based costing, fixed/current assets, current/deferred liabilities, all good stuff. Now I've just got to sit down and try to remember some of it and use it to effect!

Leafleting tonight deferred to the weekend - I'm looking forward to finishing this round, though before you know it, it'll be time to send out November's inTouch (presumably with Jack Frost for company, brrr!)

My two favourites: GT and CS

2009-10-14T06:42:00.000-07:00

Taking a quick break from my lunchtime emails and plate of toast swimming in hot butter (mmm), I noticed GT's special feature on Cleansweep's "Sweeping Success" since taking on 250 local people out of work to help. This is undoubtedly great news - as I've said before, seeing investment (albeit "old" money already agreed to some time ago and marketed as "new") in essential front line services is something I hope everyone can get behind - but it doesn't address the problem of the culture of working to rule at the expense of actually keeping the borough clean and tidy. There are a number of constructive ways this can be addressed - performance related pay, customer feedback (ie us), or even just a gentle reminder from supervisors that even if you are unable to remove something (I'm thinking of the flytipping along the railway embankments along Troughton Road) then report it to somebody who can follow up with the landowners and get it sorted.

And on the subject of Greenwich Time, a check on the online edition provoked an idea. Greenwich Conservatives are committed to abolishing GT, thereby sparing everybody a regular dose of propaganda and saving local people £3 million a year, but until the day comes where we are able to realise this, could the Council show some commitment to sustainability and affordability by giving residents the opportunity to subscribe to the online version and stop receiving dead trees through their doors? All thoughts are welcome...

4 phone calls, 3 call centre operatives, 2 polite "asks" on the street, 1 manager, 1 meeting and 10 weeks later: Cleansweep Remove a Shopping Trolley

2009-10-12T15:59:00.000-07:00

Today the saga of the dumped shopping trolley came to an end. I can't remember exactly when I first noticed somebody had parked up a trolley in the shrubbery of the Park Row carpark, but I know it was warm and sunny. The pictures I took at about the time I called the council contact centre up the first time were taken on 30 July.

To cut a long story short, the second time I followed up with the contact centre and they told me the job had been marked complete, I thought it might be a misunderstanding of the location. The third time I followed up with them I must have sounded sufficiently vexed for them to put me through to a manager at the Council, who to his credit did his best to move things along (and got the brushwood in the top two photos cleared up the next afternoon) but admitted to me that Cleansweep didn't really care about keeping the streets of Greenwich clean, as long as they completed their job detail.

I asked one of the Cleansweep guys in the street if they wouldn't mind going 10 yards down the road. "No problem mate". I thanked him very much. Next day? Nothing done. A second call to the manager got me a face to face meeting - and who should have happened to be in the area leaning on their brooms? (at least until they spotted the manager) A second "ask" managed to move some dumped refuse sacks.

A fortnight later, the nights are drawing in and I notice this afternoon that it's finally gone. The beer cans and deadwood's still there, but if it takes the best part of the summer to move a shopping trolley, I think I'll put my faith in the forces of nature to rust and rot them away before Cleansweep do anything with them.

On a less sarcastic note, I've learnt a few lessons from this. I'll pick who I contact at the council carefully, and keep calling until the job's done. It's frustrating, but I imagine this sort of thing is a regular experience for the residents of the Borough: you need to be a real pain in the backside to get anything done. It's absurd.

When I temped at a housing association, every job undertaken by the maintenence crews was the subject of customer feedback by tenants and local residents - the association could monitor the performance of the crews by matching the job number to the feedback and take appropriate actions if problems recurred. It required cards, an excel spreadsheet and an administrator to operate - not a tricky system to organise. When will we as residents be allowed to give our feedback to the Council?

If you go out in the carpark today, you're sure of a big surprise...

2009-10-08T06:52:00.000-07:00

Cleansweep are about. I wonder if they'll clear up the shopping trolley and empty beer cans I've asked them to remove on no less than 6 occasions?

Finance for eejits... like me!

2009-10-07T13:40:00.000-07:00

First evening of Managing Information Resources at uni... it's good how much new information I seem to be getting exposed to, as well as getting some clarity and development on the stuff I already knew. Our assignment's going to test our ability to analyse statistics - my first idea was to prove whether or not abolishing retirement ages significantly affects an organisation's costs - through sickness, pensions, life assurance, and so on. My hypothesis would say it probably won't. I'll see what work thinks to the idea! We had something of a crash course in budgets: the difference between fixed and variable costs, turnover v income, zero point and historic budgeting and the difference between budgets and forecasts. It's all fairly basic stuff (for now), but really useful.

Just returned from the supermarket - don't tell anyone, but shopping at 10pm is a beautiful experience. Everything's self service, all the shelves are filled and the streets are calm. Not even the rain put me off filling up (no queues) and making use of that rare thing in London, a free air hose. Probably ought to grab my tea and hit the sack - got another evening of leafleting tomorrow!

Service resumed.. but for how long?

2009-10-07T06:30:00.001-07:00

Once again, there's been lots to say, and not much time to say it. I think I'll take the approach of posting little and often, then maybe I'll get more said and done! But I shan't make promises I can't easily keep..

Did some leafleting in Charlton last night - perhaps the last weekday of this year, given how dark and miserable it's getting! Had a few surprised faces at the window - no doubt wondering who's lurking around in their front garden on a windy autumn evening. Peninsula's leaflets are well on way to being delivered for this month - but there won't be much time for rest before the next one goes out!

Having an ongoing ding dong with the council over rubbish in the Park Row car park - it's really becoming a joke now. Will Cleansweep be moved to do their job? More on that later.

I've also just began my MA course at Greenwich uni. Two evenings a week (for 3 years! all being well), it's starting off with a year of leadership and management courses. It looks like it should be enjoyable, because whilst I don't always agree with most of the theories of business management, it is at least relatively new stuff that I can get my teeth into and hopefully be well motivated to complete my assignments (ahem).

Customer service, a la NHS

2009-08-04T13:54:00.000-07:00

For all the talk in the last 2 or 3 years about the NHS being overrun by administrators and KPIs, it seems that however much the standard of care has improved under recent governments, even the apparently much enlarged bureaucracy can't seem to manage to provide decent patient service. And before I get proper started, no it's not the fault of doctors and nurses, it's probably down to a whole number of complex factors that I probably don't understand. I'm not wanting to judge, merely to observe.

To explain, a colleague at work explained that her (serious) complaint written to the Queen Elizabeth Hospital received a quick-fire acknowledgement that a reply could be expected in the next 25 weeks.

25 weeks. That's almost 6 months! Have they really got many complaints to deal with? Or are they just trying to lower the expectations of everybody so that if they manage to address the problem within, say, 8 weeks, people are more likely to be impressed? Sounds like the risk managers and loss mitigators need some lessons in customer service.

Perhaps I'm making a fuss in my ignorance - perhaps it is seen as a fair length of time to conduct a full investigation, suggest whether an apology is in order and act upon it. But if satisfaction isn't delivered, then how long would it take to escalate a complaint? I would imagine most people would be too fed up to bother 6 months down the road apart from the odd hero and the vexatatious litigants.

Record visitors at the ROG

2009-07-29T10:20:00.000-07:00

Pleased to report that the Museum attracted 16,000 visitors in one day just at the Royal Observatory last weekend - the previous record being somewhere nearer 10,000 mark I think. Whilst the majority of people come to stand on the meridian line, the International Year of Astronomy, new planetarium shows and the Harrison/Flamsteed exhibitions all draw the crowds when conditions are right. Credit to the Gallery staff who manage to keep things running when there's that many people coming through what is decidedly not a large area!

Update: The exact recorded figure was 16,308. Total visitor figures across all the sites last week were up 23% from this time last year.

Music for the evening

2009-07-27T06:30:00.000-07:00

Over the past couple of weeks there've been a number of occasions where I have been separated from my computer, and consequently my music collection (although I have a small mp3 player on my phone, an ipod it is not), so I thought I'd give this new-fangled program I'd heard about called Spotify - and it's actually rather good. Its interface is simple enough for my parents to figure out how to install and use it, and the selection of songs you can play on it is good and getting wider all the time (I found it quite useful for searching for "Cars" by Gary Numan - isn't it so frustrating when you have a song in your head but can't place the track?).

Of course, once upon a time I had the time and interest to be up with these sorts of things, but sadly I reckon I'm probably talking about something that everybody already knows about. No worry, the news today tells me that Spotify have just launched an app for the iPhone. So maybe that's news to you?

A thought on "local" banking for local businesses

2009-07-26T14:25:00.000-07:00

On the drive back to Greenwich this evening, I was listening to a programme on Radio 4 (it happens occasionally when I fancy a change from Pendulum and Feeder) about how you might go about setting up your own bank. It raised a number of interesting challenges and ideas about conventional (and unconventional) banking and the ways in which various bright sparks have reacted to the banking crisis.

I shan't discuss the full ins and outs of it, but one item that cropped up was Essex County Council's scheme to offer temporary support to local small businesses (in conjunction with Santander) in the form of overdraft facilities and loans. The representative from the council explained that local businesses needed cash to support themselves through the recession, the council had a considerable amount of cash raised through day to day business and that safeguarding local businesses was a priority (I guess their logic goes something along the lines of "less business=fewer jobs= fewer employees= less revenue for us"), so the idea of creating access to cash where normal banks were unwilling was put into action.

It sounded like a simple and effective way of ensuring that small, strong local businesses stay open through the recession. 87% of Greenwich's businesses employ fewer than 10 people, so you would assume that helping these small local enterprises would be a priority for the council to ensure that local businesses can survive until the recession is over.

On the contrary, a quick visit to the Greenwich Council Business page greets me with the headline: "Planning for emergencies: Is your workplace ready for an emergency? Find out how planning could help minimise the risk of disruption." Within this article is a great number of noble words on how to draw up strategies for your business should civil disorder or those pesky terrorists get in the way of trading in the normal way, but unfortunately it doesn't have any guidance on what to do if you wake up one morning and find your customers have gone. Or if your bank is sending you vaguely threatening correspondence demanding all of its money back in full within a short period of time. (Or, oddly enough, what to do if your workforce is struck down with pandemic flu).

Having said that, it seems that an action plan "concentrating on the "must do" rather than "nice to do" activities of your business" may help avert you from catastrophe. But ONLY if you test your plan, as it sagely notes that "An untested emergency plan is A RECIPE FOR DISASTER!!!" (...I might have taken some artistic licence with the caps).

I think the point that I'm attempting to make with this gentle ribbing is that is likely to take more than doling out common sense to reduce the risk of business failure when times are hard. It takes swift and decisive action and a commitment to ensuring that all available action can be taken to try and encourage small businesses to flourish. I hope that if I ever get the chance offer that assistance on the council that I am able to offer more than just words.

Just a quick one...

2009-07-21T06:29:00.001-07:00

Once again, my apologies for the lack of posting, I promise I'm doing my best to research some meaty topics for presentation and discussion. Work and home seem to be doing their best to conspire against me at the moment... still, at least things are busy!

In the meantime, I'll just briefly mention a couple of things. The first is AM Gareth Bacon's residents' survey of the Olympics in Greenwich. I shall be very interested to see the results of the survey and find out what people think - though in my (small) experience of conducting surveys it will likely only be those with the strongest opinions who will respond. For my part, as I might have already mentioned a while ago, I support holding the Equestrian events in Greenwich Park - with the caveat that care and detailed planning ensure that disruption throughout the Games is minimised.

On the other hand, I do recongnise a lot of the concerns of those who strongly oppose the park events (and to a seemingly lesser extent the shooting events on Woolwich common). It's just that having balanced the positives against the negatives, it is my considered opinion that the benefits of raising the profile of the borough, bringing new faces into the area and being able to show the world the beauty of our heritage outweigh concerns about legacies, congestion and so on.

For a full rundown of the arguments for and against, I recommend the following:

Seb Coe puts the case for the events in this article.

Nogoe2012 provides detailed opinion on why the events should not be held in the park here.

Secondly, the use of public transport in Greenwich, or rather the surveying of it. The Council are currently running a poll on their website which aims to find out more about peoples' transport habits in the borough. Thing is, the third party polling software they're using doesn't seem to be displaying the results very helpfully. Which is quite amusing given how easy it is to set up free polls on tools like Blogger and Facebook, or even just embedding a freeware tool onto your own website. I wonder how much of our money a year the council pays Vovici? To be charitable I'm sure it's a minor glitch, but does it really make financial sense to outsource such small widgets?

We apologise for the interruption...

2009-07-03T06:39:00.000-07:00

Events have conspired against me these last 3 weeks or so to prevent me from posting - work, festivals and latterly illness.

Doc reckons "I might have swine flu, but probably not, but take some Tamiflu anyway". I have to say I was recovering quite nicely til I took the medicine - now it's made me feel sick, although apparently that will pass. In the meantime that means no going out, no work, no seeing people for the next 5 days. Brilliant.

Ghurka's Inn

2009-06-13T17:06:00.000-07:00

I've just had a thoroughly pleasant afternoon spent with friends walking up to Blackheath through Greenwich Park, through the circus/fair thingy on the Heath up to the Railway Tavern for a roof terrace pint and then taxi back to Greenwich for a curry.

Ghurka's Inn has estabished itself as my favorite local curry house, out of a strong playing field of contenders both in Greenwich and up the hill (it's a good excuse to eat lots of curry! Yummy like). The menu caters for regular Indian curry tastes, but also adds a distinct Nepalese dimension - at an affordable price and with eat in and takeaway service that is of a high standard. Apparently the business is moving from strength to strength, particularly since the Greenwich Phantom reviewed the restaurant. It's great to hear that local independent businesses are doing well in spite of the recession, and that good food and pleasant service count for more in customer's preference than a prime location or brand recognition. A bonus is there's no loud/cheesy music, just the quiet buzz of the crowd tucking into their meals.

I shan't dwell too much on the details of my meal (since the Phantom continues to review the local eating houses in a more scientific manner than my rumbly belly could manage), but the Momo was a refreshing take on vegetable dumplings - they were pebble-sized balls of battered spcied vegetables with a tangy curry sauce; my butter chicken was splendid as always and the rice and naans cooked just right.

All in all, a good evening was had by all!

Armed Police raid on the Trafalgar Estate...

2009-06-11T15:03:00.001-07:00

I've never seen anything like this... there are roughly 40 odd police, including 15 plainclothed and 10 armed police in body armour doing a systematic raid on Aylmer, Gifford and possibly the other blocs on the Trafalgar Estate. There are some people in handcuffs, a guy up on the gallery with his hands on his head and police officers knocking door to door. Some are carrying submachine guns, others look more regular. They're telling passers-by to get past quickly.

There are no police cars in sight, and I didn't realise anything was up until the local dogs started making a racket.

Now they're going through the wheely bins - what might they find there?

I wonder what this is in aid of? Is it a targetted drugs raid, or a general clampdown? The officers have entered more than one property. One flat has just ejected around 10 armour clad officers.

More to follow...

Update 00:15: Apparently it's part of Operation Blunt 2, a Londonwide initiative to reduce gang and knife crime. The BBC ran a story this afternoon and the Newshopper have their take on raids in Bromley, Bexley and Lewisham this morning.

I don't know how successful the raids in Greenwich were, but they certainly didn't look like they were out to win the hearts and minds of the local community. Still, if it scares potentially wayward kids as much as it scares me, maybe it could do some good.

The votes are in...

2009-06-04T16:29:00.001-07:00

So, it's Friday: the votes from the European parliament elections have been cast, a cabinet minister has resigned and more are rumoured to follow.

I found it heartening that people in the street and on the doorsteps were generally interested to know what the voting response had been like. Unfortunately, with the vagueries of postal voting, not even the polling stations could guess. One of the staff at a station I visited reckoned there had been approximately 200 people visit throughout the day - this is thought to be a slightly lower figure than other european elections, and considerably lower than a general (this was at about 7pm and there were still people showing). Anti-party feeling was still in evidence from people across the political spectrum: UKIP seems to be the main benefactor from voter anger in all parties, but particularly the Conservatives (unsurprisingly).

I was surprised that I was not able to find a slate for Libertas on my ballot paper. Perhaps I didn't look closely enough, but as somebody who makes a concerted effort to read all of the options before voting (if only to laugh at Scargill and the BNP), I find it quite disconcerting that I don't recall seeing them as a option.

On the cabinet resignations issue (pitched tentatively in case Ofblog is paying attention...), I am surprised and pleased that James Purnell was the first member of cabinet to finally, truthfully and honestly lay his cards on the table. For those who aren't versed in the conventions of Westminster, cabinet ministers are not permitted to speak out against the government (aberrations like Clare Short aside). Convention has it that a minister tends his or her resignation in order to protest on point of principle and voice their opposition to the government of the day from the back benches.

This principled and unambiguous practice has seemed to have become muddied in the modern political world, with reshuffles, briefings, hollow shows of support, weasel words and pointed silences standing in place of real action. Purnell has done the honourable thing, and exposed the Emporer's nakedness. One of my organisation's own masters, Andy Burnham of the DCMS, is rumoured to a next possible resignation.

These are certainly strange and fascinating times in which we live.

News in Brief...

2009-06-02T14:45:00.000-07:00

In a roundup of the last week's events, there sadly isn't a great deal I can offer. This is due large part to having caught a bad cold (or man flu as my colleagues would call it) and spent the week laid up at my parents in sunny Norfolk. And when I wasn't tucked into my duvet watching the short-lived noughties sci fi TV series Firefly, (a real gem if you like Westerns), I was busy writing my work-based project for my "Certificate in Personnel Practice".

I've never been a strong one for slick, well presented essays bound in all manner of plasticy goodness and sprinkled with tasteful excel pie charts. I'd rather spend 36 hours pulling something together that resembles the handiwork of an incontinent spider and allow the rest of my life for more exciting things like getting a cold. Nevertheless, I'm happy with my effort. Let's hope it's good enough for the CIPD.

This evening I've just returned from a delivery session up in Blackheath Westcombe ward - basically the local action teams help each other raise their profile within their areas since it makes the task of seeing everyone in Greenwich much easier. Thursday looks set to be a busy day of encouraging anyone I can find to get out and vote in the European elections. Turnout is expected to be extremely low, with antipathy over MPs expenses running high.

To anybody reading this, I would ask you to please go to the polling station and mark your ballot, even if only to spoil it in protest. When you think of the sacrifices people made to earn us all the right to vote, it seems sad that people opt to not vote at all.

Street "Furniture"

2009-05-22T06:46:00.000-07:00

A brief stroll behind Traflagar Road the other night revealed that a (new?) trend of outdoor furnishing appears to be coming to Greenwich. To be truthful, the wardrobe and table had moved on by yesterday, although the bed and mattress on Caradoc St were still about the last time I looked.

Giving blood in Greenwich

2009-05-20T06:39:00.000-07:00

I'm off to have a pint drawn out of me this evening over at the Forum@Greenwich. There seems to be lots of conditions and caveats that rule out giving blood, but fortunately I meet all of them at the moment. If nothing else it's an opportunity for a free drink and some biscuits and whatever blood type you are, you will save somebody's life through giving up 40 minutes of your time.

The next sessions in the area are:

Mobile unit, 55 Bugsby's Way: Thursday 2 July, Friday 14 August from 1.30pm - 4.30pm and 5.30pm - 8.00pm.

The Forum session tonight runs from 5.30pm - 8.00pm. To find the session, you have to go around the side of the main church building and go into what looks to be an old sports hall - it took me a little while to find it!

Hopefully I'll be able to put up forthcoming dates of sessions in the ward on here, but if not or to find out more information about where and when to give blood in your area, visit: http://www.blood.co.uk/SessionSearcher/search.aspx

The beginning

2009-05-18T13:29:00.000-07:00

Hello world.

Before I burst into what I hope becomes a regular series of posts on "Charlie's Greenwich", I thought I would begin my explaining a little bit about who I am, why I've established this blog, lay out the themes that I hope to discuss in the time that follows and ultimately what I hope to achieve from making regular posts to my blog.

Who am I?

As you should already have seen, I'm Charlie. I'm a resident of Greenwich, an HR Administrator at the National Maritime Museum and one of three members of the Greenwich Conservative "Action Team" for Peninsula ward. In no particular order of priority, these 3 facts about me will shape the content of this commentary, since all are significant interests of mine and all have shaped and will continue to shape my view of Greenwich. I hope that in the coming weeks this blog will tell those who are interested a bit more about my values, local interests and aspirations.

Why am I blogging?

I am a regular reader of several blogs, some political, some not. I've tried to blog in the past for my own fulfillment, but haven't been able to keep up regular posting. One of the blogs I regularly read is the highly readable Charlton Average, an explicitly local blog that has recently commented on the quality of local engagement from Greenwich's councillors. My friend and colleague James Garry also began his own Charlton blog last week. I have to confess it was the combination of these two things have brought blogging back onto my own agenda, and whilst I shan't pretend to be able match the quality of Mr Average (or meet the Ofblog standards on local issues ;-) ) or the verbal dexterity of Mr Garry, I do hope that by establishing my own blog that I can join the debate on Greenwich's local issues. I also hope to be able to go beyond the cockpit of local politics and talk more broadly about my life in Greenwich, particularly the bits I like most about it.

What am I going to talk about?

I haven't been able to decide on exactly what I will and won't talk about yet, and perhaps it better I don't. Broadly however, I would like to be able to focus my comment within the following areas:

-What's going on in my ward
-What's going on in the borough
-What's happening at the Museum
-Comment that will hopefully generate discussion with others on the future of Greenwich and how we as residents and employees in the borough want it to look
-Putting my angle on interesting news of the day

What do I hope to achieve?

I can't promise to balance the focus of my content in any way, or even to keep it up as regularly as I and others would like. What I would like to concentrate on is engaging with local people, finding out what matters to them, and how I and my colleagues in Peninsula and the borough as a whole can help to make Greenwich an even better place to live.

Wish me luck!