vertical massing who came up with the pile of cobblers? it seems that’s what we call flats in labours Salford

The final two houses on this riverside area of Littleton Road were demolished and the area finally cleared and flattened last week. Meanwhile, outline planning permission for Miller Homes and ID4 Living was granted in June this year for the whole Riverside area, including housing proposals for these streets.

Part of the reason that the seven streets were demolished was that “there is a limited choice of housing in the area, with poor choice of family homes for either existing families or to attract new families”.

Yet the area is being developed as three storey waterside flats – or as the planning application states “vertical massing – to provide suitable framing, surveillance and landmark presence in key areas such as Littleton Road, Riverside…”

Salford Council acknowledges that there is a 20-25% premium on waterside properties (see here) and these flats, which the developers hope to commence either in the winter of 2011 or beginning of 2012, will be in Phase 1 of the Riverside development. Other Phases, such as the redevelopment of social housing in the Whit Lane area, are spread out until 2025…

When outline planning permission was granted for the masterplan, John Merry, Leader of Salford City Council and Deputy Chair of the NDC said “This represents a real opportunity to open up this spectacular riverside site and to transform this part of Central Salford.”

Read the Full story on the Salford Star.more flats that Salford residents can’t afford?

Cut Trident, dont replace, save £97 billion

Posted on Wednesday, 15th September 2010 by Glenn Vowles MSc, PGCE, BA

(via Vowles the Green in Knowle – Original Post)

From Greenpeace UK: Right now the government is discussing exactly what to cut from national budgets. Over the next few weeks final decisions will be made – in the firing line are schools, hospitals, housing and disability benefits and essential support for renewable energy.

At the same time they seem determined to green light spending £97bn on a new generation of nuclear weapons. Spending which is due to start at the end of this year.

How can it be that spending on building weapons of mass destruction is protected while investment in the 20 year Schools for the Future programme is scrapped?

And how can they justify giving the nuclear weapons factory at Aldermaston an extra £1billion funding every year to build new nuclear warheads – while scientific research funding is cut?

Again and again polls show that the public don’t want new nuclear weapons. Weapons that the international community is working to eliminate.

Meantime senior military figures are warning against spending billions on Cold War weapons that are irrelevant to our military needs, while troop numbers face sharp cuts.

Please make your voice heard. Write to Chancellor George Osborne today. Let him know that you want to protect essential public services and cut Trident.

Louise Edge
Greenpeace Peace campaign

Please pass this message on.

Part of a debate on Coal take some time and read it in full

In 2007, we imported 43 million tonnes of coal, of which 22 million, more than half, came from Russia. Responding to a question that I raised, the Minister with responsibility for coal said that the value of those imports was £2.072 billion. So, we have exported more than £2 billion of our money to bring in foreign coal. The cost to our balance of payments has been a massive £2 billion, and our dependence on Russian coal is both startling and frightening. This whole debate is about how green we are, and it is not very green to transport millions of tonnes of coal halfway around the world.

The real scandal and even greater cost, however, is the human cost, because that coal is covered in blood. More than 5,000 deaths a year occur in the coal mines of China: four deaths for every million tonnes of coal that are mined. That is bad. But it is even worse in Ukraine, where the death rate is seven deaths per million tonnes. To put those figures into perspective, the last time the death rates in the UK industry were as high as those in China was in the 1920s, and we have to go back to the 1880s to find rates as high as those in Ukraine. Hon. Members should consider what life was like in the 1880s in the places that they represent, compared with now. That is what we are talking about. That is whywe are subsidising coal. We have done away withBritish Coal—the cleanest, safest coal industry in
17 Mar 2009 : Column 166WH
the world—and we are relying on cheap imports based on death and dying. There is blood on the coal; there is no doubt about it. We are doing this for  coshttp://www.publications.parliament.uk/pa/cm200809/cmhansrd/cm090317/halltext/90317h0001.htmt.

It’s funny when you think of Tories some things allways stick in your mind.

Fresh of the Salford Star today. read it and weep…

THE TUC IN MANC-LAND

As trades unionists converge on Manchester this week a new report shows just how much Salford and similar areas will lose out as a result of cuts to be announced by the ConDem Coalition government.

The Where The Money Goes report, commissioned by the TUC and UNISON and using calculations based on official government figures shows that “the bottom 10 per cent of the population will suffer reductions in services equivalent to 20 per cent of their household income, while the richest 10 per cent will lose the equivalent of just 1.5 per cent from cuts that the Government plans to implement by 2013. Across the income distribution, the poorer the household, the more they will lose”.

The study calculates the results of the planned £34billion worth of cuts, with the biggest losers being lone parents (11 per cent) and single pensioners (9 per cent) – the very people who need support the most. The report adds “A typical family with two young people on modest earnings will suffer cuts equivalent to 6.2 per cent of their income.”

The TUC General Secretary Brendan Barber said that “The poorest ten per cent are set to suffer from cuts equal to 20p for every pound of their income, while the richest ten per cent suffer from a cut of less than one and half pence in their standard of living. In other words the poorest ten per cent lose more than thirteen times as much as the richest ten per cent. Right across the income bands – the poorer you are, the more you lose.”
 
He added that the “cuts will make the poll tax look as if it was dreamed up by Robin Hood…The only conclusion is that the Government is making a political choice, not following economic necessity. But voters last May did not vote for a radical and permanent cutback in the scale and scope of public services.”

Calling for action to oppose the unfair cuts he said “The poll tax was defeated when the decent majority said that it offended the deep sense of fairness that we share in this country across party divides. The cuts have only just started to bite. When their full extent becomes clear, I know the country will join with us in saying no to policies of such eye-wateringly unfairness.”

This week there are lots of fringe meetings around the TUC Congress – here’s a list of some of the juciest…

Tonight 13th September 5:30pm
The Poor Can’t Pay – National Unemployed Workers Centres Combine
Room 6 Manchester Central

Tonight 13th September 6:30-8:30pm
Film Premier of Blacklisted – documentary about the blacklisting of trade unionists by construction companies and their fight for justice – the film includes contributions by Ricky Tomlinson and there’s speakers including John McDonnell MP and Prof Keith Ewing.

Tues 14th September 12:30
Con-Dem Cuts – the trade union response
Premier Inn, Bishopsgate (opp GMex) Lower Mosley St
Speakers include Derek Simpson and Tony Woodley UNITE joint gen secs; Bob Crow Gen Sec RMT and Mark Serwotka from PCS (this is a Morning Star Fringe meeting).

Wednesday 15th September 5:30pm
NSSN Fringe Meeting with Bob Crow RMT Gen Sec
Friends Meeting House (opp GMex and Central Library)
.

• The full Where The Money Goes report is available at www.tuc.org.uk/extras/wherethemoneygoes.pdf

Four month to complete a defence review who are the Con/Dems kidding?

“The last defence review took 13 months to come to conclusions and it was a good review. In this review, we are coming to conclusions about four months after it began, being run by a body which didn’t exist four or five months ago.”

Shadow defence secretary Bob Ainsworth said the report showed the government’s review was being undertaken “at reckless speed with George Osborne in the driving seat” and was in danger of becoming a “cost-cutting farce”.

He said: “It is clear this review is being held firmly behind closed doors without serious consultation with the public, our armed forces or industry. So much for the transparent government the coalition promised.

“The report also raises serious questions about the funding of Trident. The coalition government’s failure to give a straight answer on who will be paying for our deterrent seriously undermines the basis of this review.”

Green PARTY membership up by 50%

 

It was obvious when i visited Manchester Green Party for the first time that the party were active, but the upsurge in membership as been a surprise even to me, the calls we are receiving as been a pleasant surprise, but we still face the task of putting people in to office.We all have to start somewhere and our task will be hard but i have every confidence we can succeed.

When is it irresponsible to make statements that are true?

Downing Street sources highlighted the “Christmas for criminals” warning by the Police Federation as an example of the sort of claim that needs to be challenged.

Paul McKeever, the federation’s chairman, warned that up to 40,000 police officers would have to be axed if cuts of 25% are introduced. This would lead to “Christmas for criminals”, he said.

A Downing Street spokeswoman said: “We will be challenging lobby groups that are making inflammatory arguments. We will take their claims on. We will highlight when it is irresponsible to make statements like that

I wonder what part of this country does the Home Secretary live in, and if she phones the police what form of response she would get? get real Mrs May.

The home secretary, Theresa May, has dismissed fears that deep spending cuts could undermine police ability to tackle possible civil unrest and insisted the British didn’t respond to austerity by rioting on the streets.

May told the police superintendents’ annual conference that it was “ridiculous” to suggest savings could not be made in policing and went on to challenge the political orthodoxy that fewer officers will inevitably mean more crime. The home secretary pointed out that around the world significant falls in crime had happened alongside stable or even falling police numbers.

Some of the stories coming out of Norwich

James Bryan, a civil servant at the Insolvency Service living in Lakenham, was voting shortly before the polling station closed.

The 27-year-old said he was from a “traditional Labour background” but had not voted for them.

“I went Green,” he said. “I’m not happy with Labour, haven’t been for many years.”

“If you have a vaguely leftist view they’re the only party available at the moment.”

The Green Party were the only choice for people who wanted to avoid swingeing cuts to public sector services for elderly and vulnerable people, he added.

And they were the only party who supported his union when central government announced plans to cut pension rates for the civil service.

Another issue deciding his vote was the collapse of the unitary authority.

“It’s been going on for so long its a bit of a muddle for me, but I’m annoyed so much taxpayers’ money has been wasted,” he said.

He voted Liberal Democrat at the general election, but had become “very disillusioned” with the party for siding with the Tories.