At a special meeting of the Woking Borough Council Licensing committee, a decision was taken to suspend the license of J Sainsbury’s Ashcombe Parade, Kingfield Road, Woking, for one month.  Other conditions added to the license included the prevention of sale of alcohol between 12pm and 6pm, to protect young people from the illegal sale of alcohol as well as requiring J Sainsbury’s to construct an alcohol sales kiosk distinct from other tills.  This decision was not taken lightly and will not come into force until October, pending appeal. 

J Sainsbury’s had failed two test purchased to persons underage carried out by Surrey Trading Standards, who had been called in at the request of Surrey Police.  As the matter may still be appealed, I will not go into further details, other than to say that hopefully this will serve as a warning to other retailers to ensure they do not serve underage drinkers and as a welcome outcome to those responsible retailers already following the law.

I have received an email recently from a Knaphill resident asking what I have done for Knaphill recently, commenting that people in Knaphill don’t care about

Zimbabwe. While I don’t agree with this sentiment and do not want to give away personal information about case work, here is a brief run down of the kind of case work I have been doing. Helping residents ask for council owned trees to be cut back and rubbish clearedAsking for more parking enforcementGetting a Community Speed Watch group goingRequesting greater clarity of road name signageInvestigating traffic calmingFinding out about the process for council tenants to get a dropped curbVisiting the sites of some potential developmentsLooking into having more bins strategically placed in the villageHelping a resident with re-housingAssisting a resident with more car parking signage – leading to a fineConsultation regarding cycle paths to and from KnaphillCleaning graffiti from road signsInvestigating road adoption issues 

In nearly all cases, being a new councillor, it was quite time consuming and I have to thank political colleagues from all parties and not the least council staff for their help and patience.   

At lot of other case work is also done by Knaphill Councillors Ric Sharp and Diana Smith, as well as by Lib-dem Parliamentary spokes person and Councillor Rosie Sharpley.

Saturday 16^th August, I took part in my first Knaphill community speed watch.  Along with two other volunteers from our team of six, we set up along Redding Way with two warning signs spaced clearly ahead of each side of the area where we had the speed camera.  Wearing bright florescent jackets we recorded the number plates of all cars speeding over a certain limit.  These have now been sent to Surrey Police for processing.  Owners of cars travelling too fast will receive a warning or final warning letter depending on past records.  

What was most notable was how dramatically drivers reduced their speed as they went past, with many slowing to below 24 mph.  We had a few drivers sneer at us, but far more drivers waving in support of the need to keep the speed down in the area.  Hopefully word will get out  

that, at any time we could be out in Knaphill with our speed camera and drivers will take more care.

 

On Wednesday evening last week, I sat down with the chief executive of Woking Borough Council and of the Ambassadors in Woking to discuss recycling and marketing.  While it was only a conversation rather than a meeting, we did have a good chat.  One outcome is that the Ambassadors may be doing more to offer customers the change to recycle their waste on the way out of the cinema and theatre.  This is good for two reasons, firstly so customers can recycle, but also as it offers an opportunity to make it the expectation of customers that their waste will be recycled by businesses, which is often not the at the moment in Woking.  Secondly we talked about the lack of advertising of events at the Rhoda McGaw and of upcoming event in general (rather than the current or next big show) at the Ambassadors and while we had differenced of opinion, I think steps were made to make sure that the younger and newer citizens of Woking are better informed about the excellent range of shows on offer.

Having just spent an hour two cleaning my bin of maggots and other such nasties, I really can relate to the need expressed by many on the door step to make refuse collection more frequent than biweekly. One solution often mentioned is the collection of non-recyclables weekly during the summer.  I had hoped that more clarity would be available on food waste recycling that may help with this problem, but I understand it will be mid September before this is the case.  I for one hope that Woking opts for the more controversial option of creating its own refuse collection company, so that it is not tied into a contract that does not offer the flexibility needed to change the service to shifting demands and could also possibly offer business recycling at a rate that does not make the cost prohibitive.  I would really be pleased if we could also ensure that any more frequent collection was carbon neutral and did not reduce recycling efforts in the borough.  One way to do this would be through environmentally friendly fuelled collection vehicles.  Although I know that this is not policy for either the Conservative group or the Liberal Democrat group at present, it is a conversation worth having, with cost implications and the views of

Woking residents taken into account too.

Together with Diana Smith and Ric Sharp I have been visiting local people over recent to ask them to sign a petition for more Youth facilities in Knaphill.  The petition was also available at the recent Knaphill Residents Association Rock on the Hill event.  The wording is below:

 We the undersigned ask the Woking Local Committee to endorse the view that Surrey County Council should take a full leadership role in providing more ‘places to go and things to do’ for young people as part of the overall Youth Offer within Surrey. We ask that underused youth centres and school premises are regarded as a resource that can be ‘brought to the table’ locally in partnership with authorities such as Woking Borough Council and with Voluntary organisations to provide a wide range of positive activities for young people out of school hours, with affordable access by public or community transport. In the Knaphill area, we request that a Youth Offer be developed which includes:

·         Lakers Youth Centre open regularly at evenings and weekends as a ‘youth hub’ and including youth café style provision.

·         Youth café style provision compatible with its present use being developed at Woking Youth Arts Centre                                                   

·         An additional ‘drop in’/youth café facility on the Brookwood

Hospital estate and within walking distance of any new housing.

·         More sports opportunities for all local young people using existing school facilities and recreation grounds.

If you would like to sign it please visit any of the Rock on the hill events or contact me by email