Celebrating Three Years of Not Being a Vegetable

Brentford West councillor Guy Lambert reports back

Brentford West councillor Guy Lambert

October 10, 2025

Well, a week in Italy makes it seem a long time ago where I pick up the threads. I was actually quite busy on the Thursday and Friday after I wrote the last masterpiece.

Another FoodBox trustee interview on Thursday afternoon and in the evening I had been persuaded by friends from Chiswick to turn out for a fund-raiser for Ruth Cadbury. I tend to avoid these events in the Indian Gymkhana. I have never much liked catered dinners with a set menu but it has to be said at Indian Gymkhana rubber chicken is not on the menu. The main issue for me is that generally I can't communicate because there is so much racket for deaf old gits to hear.

Actually this one was less noisy for some reason - slightly less people than I'm used to there but it seems more decorous. I was on a Chiswick table, and I knew most of the people from canvassing and other party activities, so a bit of nostalgia for that as of course I am now a leper. But nice to see some old friends - former councillor Bob Whatley and the organiser who definitely did organise me when it was necessary, for my first election campaign in that heady by-election in 2015. Plus my old friend from those days, Naima who was a stalwart campaigner and a lovely friend. She has been ill for some time and she tells me she still is, but is cheerful and always good fun and a lovely companion.

Speech was from Hilary Benn. Last time I saw Hilary was at a wedding, whilst I was still married and living in Chiswick. We had a Polish cleaner who helped around our house, and the same Isabella also helped Hilary and his family. It was her who was getting married. I was busy working but my wife, our neighbour and Mrs Benn went. I got a distress call in the evening: drive up to the Greek restaurant by Acton Town station and give us a lift home. But that plan was rapidly out of the window because I was force-fed Vodka as soon as I intended and there was an abundance of the Polish version of craic on offer. Hilary turned up a bit later. He was still a Secretary of State then - I think Environment - and I believe teetotal. He did not wish to dance or have fun, but Isabella is very persuasive and he ended up on the dance floor with the rest of us. Goes without saying, I left my car there and the me, my wife and neighbour waddled home down the Norh Circular. I digress but here is Hilary with Ruth. He is not, as far as I know, praying, despite appearance. He is a humble and dedicated man and I think that is modesty.

On Friday I had a call from Paul Keane: could I meet him for an event at his short term gym right next to where I live. I went there at 6pm and it turned out he had a presentation to parents, members and supporters about what he was doing to ensure (I hope) he and his team can continue their good work, so fabulous for our town. They have cooked up a plan to create a modest building on their site in Ferry Quays to provide a training area and changing rooms. This will be a significant boon for the 3000 local rowers, scullers, kayakers etc who they service and they are hoping to succeed in winning £310K funding from the Thriving Communities capital fund, for which they have applied.

This will be a start for facilities in humble Brentford to rival the 7 or 8 private rowing clubs mainly I think on council owned land in Chiswick, plus the new one the council has pledged £2500K to provide.

Later Paul and his team hope to build a proper rowing club on their site.

Of course, you will remember the Ferry Quays developer were obliged to build this 25 years ago. But they never did and the council didn't push it, for reasons lost in the fog of time. I will continue to campaign for this, because our town and its residents so need it.

On Saturday I should have had my surgery at the library, but I was distracted by holiday dreams and forgot it. Probably nobody came but if they did I can only apologise.

In the middle of Saturday night I was off to Gatwick and for once it all went smoothly. Sitting across the aisle from me was this young woman. As you can see, she had a furry friend with her and she cuddled it in her nervous moments. It's a dead ringer for Gary, the bear my daughter had, named after the person who had been in a hospital bed before her and left a name tab stuck to the bed.

I was going to the heel of Italy, to a room overlooking the fishing harbour in this old town.

Whilst waiting for my taxi back to the airport I noticed this novel approach to what we used to call PE. The boys ran up this fairly major road, accompanied by teacher on his bike. Then they all turned around and went down the road. They did at least 3 laps of this whilst I was watching.

I was back in Heavenford on Saturday afternoon and decided to have a Chinese takeaway to clean my palate of the foreign muck I had had to eat for the previous week.

On Monday I was due a flu vaccination and when I got to the pharmacist, they suggested a COVID one as well, even though I thought I was too young to qualify for one. I had a bit of a cold so had taken a Paracetamol or 3. If I develop autism as they apparently do in the USA, don't blame my mother.

On Tuesday I made it into the Digital Dock - often a challenge! - and met a local mum who is working on ideas to provide classes etc for children in Brentford. She is a mine of ideas and we had a lively debate about it. I agreed to see how I thought we could work up her ideas into something that could be delivered, which will be tricky. Obviously, Donald Trump could fix 7 of those type of issues this week but I am not quite so talented.

I met another couple of women who were lurking in the Digital Dock. They had obviously noticed that I needed some assistance in developing intelligence, which is fair comment. They also wanted some publicity for free training in AI which sounds an excellent idea.

As you can see you can book a short session in the Digital Dock on Tuesdays and Thursdays, something that I will take a serious look at. I downloaded various AI apps but have been scared to get to know them so this seems sensible if a bit daunting, but they assured me they don't bite.

Quite why we spent half a million (I'm guessing) providing learning rooms in the library specifically to provide adult education but have provided virtually no classes, and are now providing (or hosting trainers) in the Digital Dock is one of those decisions that are beyond my tiny brain. Perhaps that is a good reason to augment it with a bit of AI.

On the subject of the library, I had a message from local legend Margaret Thomas -someone who cares a lot about Brentford and its library. She told me that Kathleen Samad (I hope I have the name right!) retired last week after over 30 years in the library service. Margaret is a great fan, and Kathleen has been running the Brentford library reading group. Happy retirement - well deserved!

On Tuesday evening I was down at the children’s centre which adjoins Green Dragon School. I wanted to explore further the 'migration' of pupils in and out of Hounslow. We actually have quite a good population of children but too many of them are going out of borough for schools. There was one slide in the presentation I didn't understand so using a bit of AI I talked to some of the officials who were running the session. The blobs on this map are local pupils and where they live, who are leaving the borough for school. We actually do OK with secondary schools where we take a lot more in from Ealing than we send to them. But this map shows all the secondary school pupils who leave the borough, and I was surprised to see a lot of them from Brentford north of the A4 going to Ealing. We have a number of new secondary schools near Brentford - Green for Boys, Nishkam, Bolder - but a lot are going North, as you can see. We talked about this, and she observed that Nishkam and Bolder are not actually very accessible. If you live in (EG) Boston Manor Road the route to those schools is tricky. Quite a long walk (or a bus) to the GWR, then a H91 (not that frequent) to Gillette Corner. Then through the probably intimidating tunnel and another long walk up Syon Lane etc. A lot better on a bike, of course, but Syon Lane is narrow and has no cycling facilities, which seems like quite an oversight. I will raise it with Katherine Dunne. But I also have this little ambition to try and get some alternative bus arrangement working with Sky, the University (who both run private buses) and Hadley (who I think should, once they build. Pipedream? Well, so was the NHS in 1945, and no doubt was a library in Brentford until someone talked to Andrew Carnegie who was a 19th century Bill Gates (I will not taint him with any odour of Musk).

On Wednesday I had a meeting with a resident - one of the victims of the ludicrous fines the council and its contractor APCOA is levying. This man lives on a boat, and his waste is left correctly in the alley beside the old O'Riordan's pub. All my time as a councillor - bear in mind this used to be my ward - it has been notorious for major flytips and overflowing bins. I connected with the problem three or 4 years ago and the previous laughable bins were rectified. But things have deteriorated, including the service provided by Lampton 360 recycling. The excellent manager who was there from the start of Lampton has departed in dubious circumstances (I would be very surprised if it was voluntary and even more surprised if there was any behaviour on his part that led to his departure). When I was still on the Cabinet the waste trucks were already past their sell by date and recently they have got very unreliable. The council is now announcing they have replaced them, something we were planning to do 3 years ago, when it was already 2 years late. This resident was fined £1000 by APCOA who are one of the council's fining partners. He had put a cardboard box in the relevant bin, that you can see at the back of this picture, having brought it there from his boat. If you may have noticed, it has been a bit windy and cardboard placed in a bin like the picture is at risk of ending up somewhere else. Because he was doing the right thing he did not remove the label so when some zealous inspector found it not in the bin he (or she, who knows) said AHA, we've got one. They went to his boat and gave him a ticket for the maximum allowed by law - £1000. No appeal process - pay or we'll see you in court. He is the determined type. I immediately offered to support him in court, as did his neighbour who is a magistrate. This is how that recycling centre looked like mid afternoon on Sunday.

I have written to a number of people in the council including the CEO, Leader Cabinet members and more junior officers. The latter have written back to say the fine is correct, as they said of the fine to the lady with a wool business. I say they are ridiculous and an abuse of power. I don't know what any of the senior people think, because none of them have bothered to reply. This is a problem for Lampton, because access is very difficult, overloaded bins don't load easily. Their contract is to pick up what they dropped but not to sweep the street - if they did - not so much on public roads but on estates - they would never complete their rounds. I have asked Hounslow Highways to deal with it. But I will take up any case I hear of when I judge the fine to be unjustified. I am very angry about all this, especially as the manifesto commitments on waste (and some others) we made 3 1/2 years ago have been quietly ignored.

That's largely it for this week. I have some casework to work further on but it takes me a while to catch up after a week away.

Oh. It is 3 years since I was supposed to be in South Italy (I just have been there) but 3 years ago I didn't make it because I was in hospital. My life was saved, I think, by Katherine Dunne, Lara Parizotto, and my daughter (and of course the NHS). My daughter gave me this laminated notice which someone had put on my bed. The first couple of paragraphs are not correct but of course the hospital didn't know but the rest I think is accurate.

My daughter told me they were thinking of sending me to a recovery place in the country where I, as a vegetable, could tend some vegetables. Thanks to my loving friends I was saved from all that. You may think I am a vegetable, but I am roughly the same veg I was before this brain haemorrhage so I'm afraid you didn't escape from me that so easily.

Next week will be my 500th blog. Perhaps I will celebrate but need to decide how and where!

Councillor Guy Lambert