Music and the Deaf Concert

This is possibly the most inspiring event I’ve been to yet as Deputy Lord Mayor. It was a concert in aid of the charity Music and the Deaf, at the Town Hall. This charity is unique in that it enables the 10 million people in the UK with hearing loss (1 in 6) to enjoy the world of music. Dr Paul Whittaker OBE is the Artistic Director of MATD and has been profoundly deaf all his life. He was admitted to Oxford by Wadham College to read music in 1983 after rejections from many other UK Universities on the misguided basis that “deaf people can’t do music”. Paul founded MATD in 1988 and has I thinkemphatically proved how wonderful music is to deaf people and how they contribute just as much to music as those with non-impaired hearing. I’m sure he has changed and enriched thousands of lives through his amazing work and commitment.

The concert was really good both in terms of being fun and being musically excellent. I hugely enjoyed along with the Mayor of Witney, the Chief Examiner of the London College of Music and Steve Webb MP. It was just stunning to hear some Mozart piano duets played by two profoundly deaf men and Paul Whittaker’s command of the pipe organ was just wonderful. I parituclarly enjoyed Paul’s rendition of Noel Rawsthorne’s Hornpipe Humoresque.

Thames Valley Police and Crime Panel

image tweeted by @biloddy

I attended this meeting today because I am the opposition shadow for crime and community safety on the council. Oxford’s member on the panel is Cllr Pat Kennedy, the Oxford City Executive Board member with that portfolio. The panel’s job is to hold the Police and Crime Commissioner for Thames Valley to account. This Commissioner’s area covers Oxon, Berks and Bucks so is rather large – it has one member from every principal local authority in the area, giving a membership of:

Councillor Bill Bendyshe-Brown (Wycombe District Council), Councillor Mark Booty (West Oxfordshire District Council), Councillor Noel Brown (Chiltern District Council), Terry Burke (Independent Co-opted Member), Councillor Anita Cranmer (South Buckinghamshire District Council), Councillor Trevor Egleton (Buckinghamshire County Council), Councillor Jesse Grey (Royal Borough of Windsor and Maidenhead), Councillor Bill Jones (Vale of White Horse District Council), Councillor Pat Kennedy (Oxford City Council), Councillor Kieron Mallon (Oxfordshire County Council) (Vice-Chairman), Councillor Iain McCracken (Bracknell Forest Council), Councillor Tony Page (Reading Borough Council), Councillor Barrie Patman (Wokingham Borough Council), Councillor Pam Pearce (Aylesbury Vale District Council), Councillor George Reynolds (Cherwell District Council), Councillor Bill Service (South Oxfordshire District Council), Councillor Mohammed Sharif (Slough Borough Council), Rajinder Sohpal (Independent Co-opted Member), Councillor Cec Tallack (Milton Keynes Council) and Councillor Quentin Webb (West Berkshire Council)

It elected a chair and vice chair today for the year, and we heard the Police and Crime Panel Annual report as well as the annual report from the commissioner himself. There was a bit of a silly debate about the Commissioner’s expenses where the panel decided it was not its remit to decide if the Commissioner should have a driver or not. There was a report from the Oxford Safer Communities Partnership, which I think does great work in our City an update on issues particularly of importance to Oxford as a City. There was an update on operation Bullfinch from Chief Constable Sara Thornton and Superintendent Christian Bunt and they also gave an excellent overview of the work Thames Valley Police is doing to develop multi-agency approaches to child sexual exploitation.

At the end of the meeting Cllr Kennedy and I asked about the closure of the custody suite at St. Aldate’s police station meaning that all prisoners would now have to be taken to Abingdon. I felt assured by Supt. Bunt that this was a sensible move as the Oxford facilities are awkward being at the top of the building and rather past their sell-by date. He said he would circulate a short memo to councillors addressing concerns about the risk of new arrangements meaning police officers might take longer to get back on the streets after an arrest and I was reassured that vulnerable people arrested in Oxford then released from Abingdon would not be just put on the street with no means to get back to Oxford.

You can follow the PCP on twitter as @ThamesValleyPCP and the commissioner as @TV_PCC

Discover Oxford’s hidden heritage during Archaeology Day

There is a treat in store on Sunday 14th July when you are invited to look below the surface of Oxford and see what lies beneath! During Archaeology Day, there’s fun for all ages on offer with a range of demonstrations, hands-on activities and mini-lectures covering a series of fascinating subjects.

Archaeology Day runs from 11am-4pm on Sunday 14th July. All activities are free so there’s no need to book! Why not come along to Oxford Castle and discover the hidden gems?Activities include: Coil pot-making, Medieval tile-making, Pot reconstruction, Tattoos and Finger-weaving. There will also be a demonstration by the Wychwood Warriors Oxford University Re-enactors

Archaeology Day is a joint collaboration between Oxford Preservation Trust and Oxford Castle Unlocked. Both teams have been successfully working in partnership since 2009 to ensure this free annual event has become an interesting and popular event.

What not turn up? You can contact Lindsay Kell at Oxford Preservation Trust on 01865 242918 or l.kell@oxfordpreservation.org.uk if you have any queries.

Philippines Independence Day Celebrations

I was invited to attend the celebration of the 115th Philippines independence today at the Kassam Stadium in Oxford, hosted by the Oxfordshire Filipino Community, affectionately known as FilCom. This organisation was founded 11 years ago in Oxford and this is the 10th annual independence day celebration it has held. It was also the first time it was held at the Kassam Stadium, which, given the size of the place, I think us a good indication of how successful it is.

The morning started with a parade with some lovely flowers and fine Philippine national dress on display, including lots of very enthusiastic children. There were brief introductions from lots of the sponsors and then we had a large joint mass, presided over by the Priest of the Church of Corpus Christi in Headington. I stayed for lunch but sadly was unable to stay for the afternoon cultural show which looked like it would be great fun.

I learned today that there are probably about 3,000 Filipinos in Oxfordshire and about 1,000 of them are members f FilCom. The Filipino community is hugely inclusive and integrated and engages in many religious, sporting and cultural activities. The community does a huge amount for the people of Oxfordshire and it is said that if you removed all Filipinos from our County then the NHS would fall apart as so many work in our hospitals, particularly as nurses.

It’s fantastic to see the Filipino community successfully reaching out to so many other communities including Nepalese, Indonesian, Chinese, Malaysian and Vietnamese people. It is a real credit to the causes of celebrating culture, building relationships and advocating equality and diversity right across our county. This sort of work is incredibly valuable, and never more so than in times of economic difficulty. I know that when times are hard, people can be tempted to blame their problems on others – and that helping people get to know their neighbours and set aside their differences is the best way to avoid this happening.

philippines2

There were lots of dignitaries there, including Voltaire Onesino D Muricio, the First Secretary and Consul at the Philippine Embassy in London.

A few years ago I was lucky enough to visit the Philippines myself, and I have very fond memories of all I saw in Cebu and Bohol, and all the people I met. I hope that the Filipino community feels as welcome in Oxfordshire as I felt in the Philippines.

North Hinksey Primary School 40th Birthday Ceilidh – an invitation for all!

A colleague at work has asked me to advertise this as widely as I can so I hope nobody minds me posting it here in my blog.

It’s on Sunday 9th June 2013 from 4-7pm at North Hinksey Primary School. Tickets are £5 for adults and that includes a welcome glass of wine, after which you are welcome to bring your own. There’s no charge for children attending and there’s a Barbecue with soft drinks on sale. Entretainment by the Kismet Ceilidh Band.

Having attended a fantastic ceilidh just this weekend gone as part of the Lord Mayor’s celebrations and the visit of the Bonn delegation to Oxford to celebrate the 66-year old twinning link, I can say that ceilidhs are lots of fun and I definitely recommend attending! You can get tickets from www.wegottickets.com (just search for Hinksey in the search box on that site).

Overstepping the mark with protest

EDL-wreath

It was brought to my attention yesterday that an English Defence League event was being advertised today to lay wreaths/flowers at the Cenotaph in Oxford. Oxford doesn’t have a cenotaph so I assumed it meant the war memorial, at the top of St. Giles, which is just within my ward. There was a picture on the facebook page which you can see here [Update 9 June I’ve cropped it so as not to advertise the EDL].

I added myself to the facebook event and posted this on the event’s wall: “RIP Lee. I hope this is a peaceful and fitting memorial to a young man so cruelly taken by some extremely dangerous and misguided young men. I know that many Oxford people of all races and all religions would strongly share that with me.” Nobody deleted it so I went along at 1pm. You’ll note that the picture has no mention of Woolwich or of any particular faiths or races.

I arrived to the war memorial just after 1pm to find a huge bunch of people, including some with Socialist Worker Party literature. Here they are:

I stood and watched this group jeering at the people who had presumably laid the flowers on the war memorial and they jeered at them as they walked away down St. Giles. [Update 4 June: I had an email today saying: “Hi tony my name is shane and i attened the demo on sat to pay my respects to drummer lee rigby and was discusted in how the uaf was acting i got accused of being in edl just because i was wearing a help for heroes tshirt .i walk off with a friend. N got jeeard by the uaf . Would they react the same at a repat?”. He gave me permission to add it here]

The protestors were climbing all over the war memorial, as you can see, and when they got up I was horrified to see that they had been sitting on the floral tributes to Lee Rigby that had been laid on the memorial. [Update 6 June: It transpires that the reason the protestors were climbing the memorial is because a local press photographer asked them to. As such that means it’s unfair to blame that action on those present]. The floral tributes were squashed and badly damaged [although I concede I didn’t see them before the protestors arrived so that could have been anyone] and indeed one young woman tried to walk away with half of the flowers. I have a picture of her but it’s probably better if I share it with the authorities than post it here. She eventually put the flowers back after a bit of an argument with me. Here they are.

Now I want to be very clear that I in no way support any sort of hate activities that are associated with any political group, including the EDL, but today I saw absolutely no sign of any EDL banners or clothing and no sign of any stereotypical EDL behaviour. What I saw was a loud and unruly bunch who were showing hate towards what seemed to me to be a peaceful and lawful act of remembrance for a young solider who had lost his life at the hands of two very badly misguided other young men. If I do see any hate activity from ANY group in Oxford I will challenge it rigorously but the only hate I saw today was from the protesters in the picture above.

Decimating a floral tribute and climbing all over a war memorial is to me a mark of sheer contempt and disrespect and I’m afraid will just fuel hate, not peace. I will happily support an act of memorial as ward councillor. I will absolutely NOT support even any hint of racism, Islamophobia or any other form of hate – be it from the EDL or any other group. Today I saw it from another group.

The way to beat hate is with hope, not with hate.

Lib Dem Group fully supports Christmas Market in Broad Street

Councillors received details this week of an application to hold Oxford’s Christmas Market in Broad Street from 13-22 December 2013. It has been held at Castle site in Oxford’s West end for a few years but has always struggled with the lower footfall there. Last year there was an application to hold it in Broad Street but the council rejected it. It was extremely disappointed about that as the market is great fun and really adds to Oxford at Christmas time. One correspondent said

“To hear that the Council had turned-down your application to relocate to Broad Street just seems absolute madness. Not only was your event something rare, that many other Cities would be proud to host, but one that was particularly festive that brought joy and cheer and attracted people to visit Oxford itself. I simply cannot comprehend the Council’s decision, particularly in this time of economic hardship when such an event could only boost visitor numbers and trade to the City of Oxford.”

And I do rather agree! As far as I could tell there were several objections, some of which I’ll try to address:

1. Colleges on Broad Street don’t like the disturbance and traffic disruption. I reply that the Market is out of Term Time so although prospective students are being interviewed in the proposed weeks of the market they hardly are going to bring removal vans and I suspect the market will not make any more noise than the normal traffic on Broad Street during the day.

2. Local traders will lose business to the Christmas Market. This is I think is just nonsense. Looking at the Broad Street traders, they are things like bookshops, a newsagent, Boswells, Bravissimo and the tourist information centre – the Christmas Market would hardly compete with them and I think the increased footfall it would bring would actually boost their businesses.

3. The Covered Market would suffer. Again I think more people in the area will be a good thing for the Covered Market traders, not a detriment.

I think the area would be more vibrant in December with a Christmas Market and more profitable for everyone.

I am pleased to say that my colleagues on the LibDem Group on the City Council have agreed with this position this week so, Christmas Market, I am delighted to tell you that you have the full support of the Oxford City Council LibDem Group. You heard it here first!

You can read more about the Oxford Christmas Market at http://www.oxfordchristmasmarket.co.uk/ and don’t worry about the message on the front page – it refers to 2012, not this year! If you want to make comments on the application you can contact info@oxfordchristmasmarket.co.uk and I ask you please to copy in events@oxford.gov.uk

One message I have sent is that if the Colleges are concerned about noise then one thing they could do it arrange electrical power supplied between then for the market. That would avoid the need for a smelly and polluting generator and would presumably provide some income for the colleges during the period.

I would be great to see lots of messages of support so please do get emailing and tweet and facebook this blog post!

Labour spreading misinformation about benefits reform

I was horrified to read the column from the Labour Leader of the City Council in my copy of “Your Oxford” (the City Council’s twice-yearly public information newspaper) as it makes some very basic errors about benefit reform and was nowhere near being balanced or even handed.

The two claims were that child benefit is going to be rolled into Universal Credit and that all claims for benefits will have to be made online under the new system. Both claims are just plain wrong and therefore in direct breach of the Code of Practice about such communications from the Department for Communities and Local Government. Paragraph 15 of that says:

“Local authorities should ensure that publicity relating to policies and proposals from
central government is balanced and factually accurate. Such publicity may set out the
local authority’s views and reasons for holding those views, but should avoid anything
likely to be perceived by readers as constituting a political statement, or being a
commentary on contentious areas of public policy.”

I am pleased to say that the Council very quickly saw the error of its ways when I raised this matter and immediately stopped distributing the “Your Oxford” newspaper. It’s an outrage that over 27,000 had already been delivered and that 60,000 had been printed. This is going to be an awful lot of reprinting and I dread to think what it will cost the council.

I think it’s terrible that Labour continually tries to use “Your Oxford” as a party political leaflet when it should confine itself to public information given in a balanced and informative way. Scaremongering at public expense by distributing misinformation is just outrageous. I will continue to pursue the council to find out how much the monumental cock-up will cost the public purse!

Since the date this happened there have been a few news stories about it – The Oxford Mail, and The Oxford Times ran it and I got to appear on BBC South Today about it as well as doing piece on BBC Radio Oxford’s drive time. My colleague Cllr Jean Fooks also had a letter in the Oxford Times about the issue.

Disgusting treatment of the Covered Market and Labour’s contemptuous remarks

The Covered Market is one of the nicest things in Carfax Ward, the part of the Oxford I represent. I blogged last year about the terrible neglect of the place by the City Council and I’m getting increasingly worried that the appalling treatment it is getting by the Labour administration is going to kill it off once and for all. I use the Market Barber in the covered market and works to that unit seem to have been going on for ages too. I hear of stories of bodged roof repairs meaning units get flooded when it rains and there is a leak into the cellar and someone’s storage space that the City Council should have addressed months ago.

There’s an article about this in the Oxford Mail today about this and I have to say I am disgusted by the remarks Labour’s Colin Cook makes about some of the long serving and hard working traders. He says,

“This situation is not just down to high rents. It’s partly as a result of the age of some traders, who are looking to retire and cash in their chips.

“When rents are assessed for market traders we look at close comparators on the high street.”

I don’t know about you but I think that is pretty outrageous, not to mention ageist and totally lacking in gratitude for the wonderful service to our City and tourist attraction the Market represents. I do rather agree with the Oxford Mail editorial comment about this. “while the council has a duty to maximise its income from its asset, it has to be big enough to realise that and make the necessary adjustments to make this an attractive business opportunity.”

My colleague Cllr Jim Campbell put the rent issue rather well in a letter to the Oxford Mail earlier this year. He says “Although the rate of inflation over the past five years is less than 18 per cent, they have proposed rent increases of between 40 and 60 per cent.”

I think it is an utter disgrace that Oxford Labour claims to be the champion of fighting bad landlords and at the same time has so badly neglected the Covered Market and is pushing such clearly ridiculous and unsustainable rent rises.

Labour: You are killing the HMO sector already with onerous costs on landlords – please don’t now kill the Covered Market by pricing the tenants out of the retail units.

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Tony Brett

Liberal Democrat Campaigner and ex-Councillor