Weekly Update From Councillor Guy Lambert

Considering ways to make concrete road blocks look beautiful

I didn’t unterview the new MD candidates for Coalo I interviewed them (see previous update). Two hims and a her. We went for the her and pleased to hear she’s accepted. It was a bit weird interviewing face to face in social distance land but it worked Ok because we had a big room, one to a table with our own hand sanitiser.

Sunday was Brentford market day and very busy and fun it was. Being a nice day always helps but there’s a good selection of stalls with more variety than in the early days. My favourite vets were in attendance, in the form of Doctor Bike.

The elephant was still lacking a paw so I came on My Little Pony. I asked Dr Brian if I should be worried by the wobble on the handlebars. “Oh Yes” he said and proceeded to tighten something that I didn’t even know was there to be tightened. Wobble gone and I was able to ride with confidence again.

On Monday evening we had an update for all council members on various topical matters. This included the Borough Recovery plan which comes to cabinet next week. A short presentation on the Hounslow website is well worth a look. The economy related numbers are really worrying.

We also had a briefing on the COVID impact and current status. The graph is scary though of course it is most unlikely we really have more cases than in April – we are testing a lot more people. But it is very clear that we still have a big problem, though at present we’re somewhat saved by only 8% of the cases being in the over 60s.

Finally we were briefed on the working group that has started work on race equality.

On Tuesday morning I saddled up My Little Pony and headed off towards Westminster. I had a face to face ‘Smart Class’ on transport, which turned out to be a mixture of presentations from suppliers and from authorities who have made innovative interventions in transport. Lots of food for thought if nothing immediate. I was very taken with the product, mainly because they showed a video of young schoolkids jumping up and down and lighting things up – great fun! It was interesting transport wise, because it was a dull and drizzly day but in reality it was pure pleasure cycling into the centre, except a few places, mainly in Kensington, where it got scary with traffic.

Back for another interview, this time on Teams, for a new director of Lampton Development and Investment – ie the property bit. We lost our lead person some time ago and we now want to up the pace both on building new homes and on buying second-hand ones. A very good interim candidate – hope he joins.

Then an update on the emerging plans to redevelop Charlton House and surrounding areas. There has been really intensive engagement with the existing residents and businesses and I was impressed by the way this has been done. This will continue in a fixed base in one of the shops there. We hear that most people are OK with redevelopment – they are aware of the inadequacies of the current buildings but they like the sense of community, so we’re mindful to look at keeping that together as far as possible. The residents will be balloted shortly and if they approve the council will proceed to work up a design and seek planning permission.

Wednesday is my long awaited Flu jab at my doctor’s surgery in Chiswick. I wheel the elephant to the bike place to have his new paw fitted. It’s a heftier paw than the one it replaces, which I’m more than happy about. Colin Chapman – the founder of Lotus and one of my heroes when I was very young - had the mantra ‘add lightness’. In the world of bikes, where there is an obsession with lightness, I say ‘Add heftiness’. I am a regular customer at the docs and it all takes about 30 seconds. Nurse observes that I’m too young for the Shingles jab and we agree it’s nice to be too young for something for a change.

I do my usual sniff around Chiswick – High Road is busy with the roadworks and also because some charmer has parked his hefty (that word again) 4x4 next to parked cars thus blocking the road. But he has his hazard warning lights on so that’s OK then. Not a busy time and the rest of Chiswick is quiet on the road, busy on the pavement. I take the scenic route home and stop to take a look at the Dukes Hollow Nature Reserve. I’ve passed this 1000 times but this is the first time I’ve actually stopped. I can confirm that it contains Nature.

In the afternoon our fortnightly update on the various traffic schemes. In most cases the initial furore has died down but the controversy about road closures in central Chiswick is still very active and we have a long chat about that. We will be monitoring this closely as time goes on and engaging with local people and businesses in a more programmed way.

The other one that is hotter than a fire in my mailbox is Swyncombe Avenue, which has been heavily affected by displaced traffic from the Low Traffic Neighbourhood in Ealing to its North. We have a meeting on Friday where I’m hoping we can come up with a solution. Good to see that our blocks in Whitestile etc are now provided with plants but I’d still like their aesthetics to be improved.

Then a quick trustees meeting for Hounslow Community FoodBox. One of our lovely volunteers has died in tragic circumstances and we want to find a way of marking his passing, and to learn any lessons about wellbeing for our volunteers.

In the evening a Labour Party branch meeting – lively as always and a speaker born in Boston Mass but now in London gives us some insights into American politics and the potential (lawd help us) re-election of Trump, or the Orange Caligula as one of my acquaintances calls him. The bookies have Biden as about 2/1 on and Trump about 2/1 against but punters make the odds and they are usually wrong ☹.

This morning I am attending a Zoominar about fly tipping. Some interesting stuff, especially from Keep Britain Tidy and it’s nice to see them citing Hounslow in their presentation – about ‘welcome packs’ for new residents and businesses and ‘values-based communication’ which they are working on with us, together with 3 other English councils. We do have a professional fly tipping problem in Hounslow and one of the things people are unaware of (here and elsewhere) is that if you pay someone to take your waste and they dump it illegally you can be fined yourself. But our main problem is small domestic (and small business) flytips and there’s less discussion about that. The man from Buckinghamshire says 50% of their flytips are imported from other areas – we have relatively few of those.

I had two complaints last week – one that it was too long, the other that I need to learn about paragraphs. I’m (very) trying.

Cllr Guy Lambert

October 15, 2020