I had a call from the owner of a property on Ship Street this morning complaining that nobody had informed the residents there of the change of collection day for their waste and recycling and that it was piling up.  I passed this on to the council officers concerned at 11.24 this morning and got the following reply at 14:14 this afternoon: “We have collected the waste from Ship Street today and will letter drop the residents in domestic dwellings. Unsure how this has happened but please accept our sincere apologies on behalf of the project team”

I have to say I am extremely impressed.  Well done and thank you to all at City Works for  sorting this out so quickly (170 minutes), particularly Ian Bourton!

A useful meeting today I thought.  It was attended by quite a few police officers including the chief inspector for Oxford as well as county council community safety people, neighbourhood action group council officers, and nightsafe.

It appears that disorder in Cowley Road  area, particularly on student club mights is becoming a bit of a problem.  Lots of Brookes Students attend Fuzzy Ducks at the O2 on Wednesdays and tend to be a bit noisy walking around the area afterwards, particularly Divinity Road and Southfield Road.  I’m sure many of us have been there – being noisy late a night, not going to Fuzzy Ducks! It’s a problem though because it keeps the other residents of the streets around awake (remember students are residents too).

Thames Valley Police officers have been voluntarily working extra hours on Wednesdays to cover this but the Chief Inspector reminded us all that this is on a good will basis and she can’t easily or quickly force her officers to do this.

The need for joined-up working was  re-iterated and all agreed that there should be a central repository of information about problems around the Cowley Road area be they noise, licensing issues, crime or general antisocial behaviour.  I think all were in agreement.

City Council Licensing Officers and The Police plan to take members of the Divinity Road area Residents’ Association out with them as well as some Brookes senior staff so people can experience Cowley Road area first hand at busy times.  I suggested it would also be good to include students in this initiative as peers are often then best group to communicate with students, and indeed any group.

I hope this problem can be sorted out as it’s not fair on anyone who wants to sleep at night in East Oxford.  I firmly believe that students are a good thing for Oxford and vital to our economy but it is really important that all groups in the city, particularly busy and densely populated areas like East Oxford, understand each other’s needs and situations so that we can all get on with our own lives without disrupting others.  I am sure mutual understanding rather than penalising people is the way to move forward here.

This was a long hearing today that I chaired with Cllrs Van Coulter and Clark Brundin joining me on the panel.  There was several local residents present, some supporting the pub and some against it.

The pub is owned by Greene King and has a new-ish tenant who is the  Designated Premises Supervisor. I think it would be fair to say he faced a few problems and problem customers when he took over the pub and that he has worked hard to manage and reduce the problems of noise and antisocial behaviour, with perhaps not quite as much success quite as soon as everyone, him included, would have wished.

I find it difficult that these hearings  are set up to be rather adversarial when they are actually trying to reach common ground between the licence holder and the relevant and/or interested parties.

This was a situation where it seems that communication had broken down between residents and the pub, even though the tenant lives there and so is a resident himself!  I hope we went some way to re-opening those channels  of communication and that the two councillors who requested the review will be able to help facilitate that.    I was pleased and grateful that the solicitor acting for Greene King and the tenant appeared to be trying to be conciliatory as did the opposing residents and the requestors of the review.

After much hearing of evidence and discussion we imposed several measures, many suggested by Greene King, to mitigate the problems but were conscious that to do too much would stop the business from being viable and all present had agreed that would be a bad thing.  Measures we took include (but are not limited to) the tenant will do a DPS training course; SIA-approved door supervisors will be in place when there is regulated entertainment and for as long as Thames Valley Police deem necessary; the tenant is to organise at least bi-monthly residents meetings with the Police, Greene King area manager and the City Council Licensing Manager present; and a noise limiter is to be fitted to make sure that neighbours are not disturbed by music from inside the pub.

We also asked for a prominent sign on the front of the pub giving a Greene King contact for residents to use if there were any further problems – although I did urge people to contact the tenant manager directly in the first instance.  I do think that taking complaints too high too early can often be a contributing factor to breakdowns of communication.

I hope that these measures, and the others we imposed, will enable local residents to have their peace restoredwhile also enabling the tenant to run a viable and community-orientated business.  Particularly, I hope the door staff will be able to prevent all the trouble outside and around the pub.

Please note this post does not form an official record of proceedings and should not be treated as such.  The decision notice from the City Council is the definitive document.

After about an hour of propaganda from the consultants and the council officers the City Executive Board (CEB) unanimously decided to close Temple Cowley Pools and sell off the site.  This is a sad day for Oxford and I feel hugely sorry for the Save Temple Cowley Pools group, particularly Nigel and Jane, who have worked so hard and with such sincerity to try to save the pools.  I was particularly disgusted at the way at least one member of CEB sat and scowled at those making such well-considered and serious points.  I also didn’t think it was very polite of the member who arrived late to clomp through the room in extremely loud shoes not once but three times while a member of the public was trying to address CEB.

I also note here that Cllr Malik, councillor for Cowley Marsh,gave apologies and was absent from the meeting.  What a shame there was nobody at the meeting to represent those who have Temple Cowley Pools at the heart of their ward.

The only good thing is that Stephen Brown (leader of our group) immediately called in the decision to the Value and Performance Scrutiny Committee of which he is chair. I don’t think it will change anything but it will at least give the CEB members some time to reflect on the gravity of their decision and the disastrous impact it will have on Temple Cowley and the surrounding area’s residents.

A fascinating meeting today that showed all the signs of being extremely useful. It had people from Oxford Homeless Pathways who run O’Hanlon House, PC Paul Phillips from Thames Valley Police, The Practice Manager and a Senior Receptionist from the Luther Street Medical Centre, a housing officer from A2Dominion, that runs Luther Court, me and a county councillor for the area.

Lots of  useful links were made and I felt there was much good will and willingness towards partnership working.  I’m glad to have attended and made the links.  I’m also extremely impressed with the breadth of services that Oxford Homeless Pathways provides for the people of Oxford.

Today we had a 90 minute session about planning and how the law and all the various guidance works and importantly, what are and are not material considerations in making planning decisions.

We looked at a real case and how it had first been refused by officers and that decision upheld at an appeal but then on a second application with changes a new appeal was allowed by a planning inspector.

Councillors are in a difficult position because on the one hand we want to represent our constituents and decide according to their wishes but on the other hand we must abide by planning law because if we don’t we can lose appeals and planning inspectors can award costs against us if they think we’ve refused something unreasonably – and that of course is a waste of public money.  Colin Cook put it nicely saying that it is the quality (i.e. is it a material consideration) of opposition rather than the quantity (300 people just not liking something) of opposition that matters in taking planning decisions.  It is for this reason that the planning training is compulsory as it’s important that councillors get these decisions made as well as possible.