Total: 31 posts
Posts in: Commentary
My own personal and political takes on issues affecting Southall.
Investigations
Local Democracy
Commentary
Ealing Labour
Research
Housing
Section 106 money: where did Southall’s “developer tax” go?
With council elections less than three months away, Ealing Council is busy using “Ealing Council’s magazine for residents” to promote news of Ealing Labour’s local “achievements” in an effort to persuade voters that, …
Environment
Community
Commentary
Ealing Labour
Research
Exposes
Bangarang! Pirate Pete and the Lost Bin Collections of Southall
This is the shocking story of how for sixteen years Ealing Labour councillors talked rubbish about having to make “difficult choices” to cut services to save money, ignoring thousands of residents' protests, and in doing so created a …
Local Democracy
Environment
Community
Commentary
Health
Pollution
How to Report Nuisance and Pollution in Ealing
Reporting a Nuisance in Ealing
A short epic of civic persistence (and becoming the problem)
Please complete this form.
Invocation
Sing, website, sing.
Of forms and thresholds, boxes small,
of windows that open into darkness,
of daytime hotlines …
Investigations
Local Democracy
Environment
Community
Commentary
Pollution
Exposes
The Council Investigation That Found Nothing
They Did Check It Out. That’s What Makes It Worse.
A response to “Why didn’t the council investigate?"
Following publication of my article on the Johnson Street fire, a reader asked: “Why did no one from the council check …
Local Democracy
Commentary
Ealing Labour
Features
Housing
Demolition Man: Peter Mason's Legacy of Half-Built Homes and Hollow Promises
This is the story about how a council leader failed to deliver the new homes he promised to build, and how he wasted hundreds of millions of pounds of taxpayers money in doing so.
It’s also about how he ended up demolishing half-built homes …
Investigations
Local Democracy
Commentary
Ealing Labour
Berkeley Group
Features
Corruption
Exposes
Ealing For Sale
Peter Mason’s foreword to Ealing Council’s 2023-2027 Land and Property Strategy [pdf] promises to “retain assets for maximum resident benefit.” It’s a reassuring commitment from the council leader who styles himself as …
Campaigns
Commentary
Podcast
Children's Centres
AI
Save Ealing Children’s Centres Campaign Update
Save Ealing Children’s Centres campaign raised over £5,000 in just eight days to begin legal action against Ealing Council to prevent closure of ten and of the borough’s twenty-five children’s centres.
An audio summary of my …
Local Democracy
Commentary
Children's Centres
Personal
Corruption
The Pied Piper of Ealing
A couple of weeks ago, big kid sang at the Royal Albert Hall in “Ealing Together: Harmony in Diversity,” performing lyrics by Jewish socialist and renowned children’s author Michael Rosen in a new song “Ada in Ealing”, a …
Local Democracy
Commentary
Podcast
Children's Centres
Corruption
AI
So it Goes: AI on the Absurd Logic of Ealing Council
🎧 I fed my satirical piece about Ealing’s democratic innovations into Google’s NotebookLM.
Two AI hosts discovered how perfectly logical it is to close children’s centres while voting yourself a 70% pay rise. They marveled at the …
Campaigns
Local Democracy
Commentary
Children's Centres
Ealing Labour
Features
Corruption
Exposes
Perceval House W5: Where Local Democracy in Ealing Goes to Die
The Children’s Centres Crusade
Chapter 1: The Art of Political Contradiction
In the London Borough of Ealing, our elected representatives have perfected something remarkable: the ability to hold completely contradictory public positions …
Local Democracy
Environment
Community
Commentary
Gasworks
Features
Personal
Pollution
Southall Odours
I step out of my house and immediately notice the artificial “cotton fresh” scent of odour suppressants wafting south from the old Gasworks site. How can this be? They finished remediating the contaminated earth in 2019, and people have …
Environment
Commentary
Gasworks
Research
Health
Personal
Pollution
COPD
Last week I received confirmation of a diagnosis of chronic obstructive pulmonary disease (COPD) based on results of spirometry tests back in August (it took that long for my GP surgery to get the results from the test centre, and only after my own …
Local Democracy
Community
Commentary
Ealing Labour
Features
The Cuckoo's Nest
Ealing Genocide Supporters Club (aka Ealing Labour Party) held their Southall Branch meeting yesterday at the Dominion Centre in Southall. Under the guise of a “Your Town, Your Voice” community get together, our local elected repellents …
Environment
Community
Commentary
Features
Housing
Health
Developers, if you Really Want to Help
This was survey feedback given to developers proposing to build a massive data centre on the site of the industrial estate down the road from me, but it applies more broadly to all big developers, especially those with annual profits of half a …
Local Democracy
Commentary
Ealing Labour
Features
Personal
Corruption
ToryBoy
ToryBoy The Movie is the account of filmmaker John Walsh’s disillusionment with what he saw as the corruption, lies, hypocrisy and general incompetence of Blair’s Labour government, and his conversion to the Conservative (Tory) Party …
Environment
Commentary
Gasworks
Ealing Labour
Health
Ethics
AI
Risks to Health from Remediating Southall Gasworks
AI is more ethical than Ealing Labour Party. No money was exchanged.
What are the risks to health from remediating Southall Gasworks on site in the open air? The land is highly contaminated with benzene, naphthalene and a while host of other VOCs, …
Local Democracy
Environment
Community
Commentary
Gasworks
Ealing Labour
Health
Ethics
AI
I am the Leader of Ealing Council
I asked Google Bard to advise me on a local matter.
I am the leader of Ealing Council. I have received more than 250 reports about a BAD odour nuisance and air pollution from the remediation of the highly contaminated Southall Gasworks land. We had …
Investigations
Local Democracy
Environment
Commentary
Features
Health
Pollution
Response to Ealing's Air Quality Strategy and Action Plan
Ealing Council’s draft Air Quality Strategy is a 64 page document together with a 40 page Action Plan, and the consultation period runs until 30 January 2023. It’s taken me the best part of six weeks, all my spare time over Christmas and …
Investigations
Local Democracy
Commentary
Ealing Labour
Features
Housing
Corruption
The Property Lobby: the Hidden Reality behind the Housing Crisis in Ealing
There will be 14,800 new homes in 23 new developments in Southall over the next few years. 14 units over 10 stories high, and 7 over 20 stories high. Up to 40,000 new residents (and their cars)!
One third of the total new developments in the whole of …
Campaigns
Local Democracy
Environment
Commentary
Gasworks
Ealing Labour
Berkeley Group
Health
Corruption
Pollution
Weasel Words on Air Quality Monitoring
Weasel words from Ealing Labour Council, who for six years have shown utter contempt for the health and wellbeing of Southall's schoolchildren forced to live in the toxic stink created by Berkeley Group's unsafe development of the old Gasworks …
Investigations
Local Democracy
Commentary
Ealing Labour
Berkeley Group
Features
Corruption
Ealing Monopoly
Who wants to know more about how, twelve years ago, an exclusive group of rich, mostly white, middle aged men in suits planned to take advantage of the financial crash and austerity politics to sell Ealing's public land and buildings for profit …
Local Democracy
Commentary
Ealing Labour
Features
Corruption
Exposes
Ealing Labour Leaks
Is anyone interested in seeing a selection of leaked WhatsApp group messages from some Ealing Labour councillors?
An inside look at what they really think about Bell, Mason, Sharma?
The institutional bullying and corruption they kept quiet for …
Local Democracy
Environment
Community
Commentary
Ealing Labour
Housing
Health
Corruption
Pollution
From the Southall Big Plan AGM in 2017
Some perennial problems that our elected representatives seem to be unable - or unwilling - to do anything about.
Some things never change!
Priority from nine years ago - clean streets! 
Julian Bell's Ten Year Plan. 
40% …
Investigations
Local Democracy
Commentary
Ealing Labour
Housing
Look at these Bricks!
Imported from the original Twitter thread (via Thread Reader App), where you will find a better and complete viewing experience.
Look at these bricks!
Is 2500:
A) The year the new cinema in Ealing will finally be opened to the public?
B) The price …
Campaigns
Environment
Commentary
Gasworks
Ealing Labour
Berkeley Group
Health
Personal
Corruption
Pollution
Exposes
Strawberries for Pigs?
Little did we know at the time, but these little strawberries were usually engulfed in a toxic plume of benzene, naphthalene, and god only knows what else.
Sensibly, the wife refused to eat them.
We later discovered that official planning documents …
Environment
Community
Commentary
Gasworks
Health
Personal
Pollution
High Traffic Neighbourhood
Took me an hour (as opposed to 10 minutes) to drive my lad home from school this afternoon, thanks in part to the High Traffic Neighbourhood (‘Improving access for HGVs’) in Southall ‘Green’.
Like a rat, I tried the side …
Environment
Community
Commentary
Gasworks
Berkeley Group
Health
Personal
Ethics
Pollution
The Gaslighting Zone
@Southall_Wside @theCALMzone @bonappetit #StopPoisoningSouthall @SouthallGaswork
You guys are really taking the piss now, aren't you?
@Southall_Wside @theCALMzone @bonappetit @SouthallGaswork .@PHE_London report on the health impact of …
Environment
Community
Commentary
Podcast
Gasworks
Ealing Labour
Berkeley Group
Health
Exposes
Pull the Other One, Julian
Environment
Commentary
Gasworks
Berkeley Group
Health
Pollution
Exposes
Lies, Damned Lies, and Statistics?
From my original Facebook note.
Berkeley Group founder and chair Tony Pidgley promised to share their onsite air quality monitoring data with us almost two months ago. We’re still waiting.
Today,I finally received a response to my email of 29 …
Environment
Community
Commentary
Gasworks
Berkeley Group
Health
Pollution
Exposes
Countering the Southall Waterside Narrative
From my original Facebook note.
1.Look how great we are!
Berkeley will tell you about all the good work they do in the Southall community:
·Giving a tiny fraction of their £600m profits to the local homeless shelter
·Creating the ‘edible’ …
Commentary
Gasworks
Berkeley Group
Health
Pollution
Meeting Berkeley Group
Last Wednesday, I and two other #Southall residents met with @berkeleygroupuk's @damian_leydon, @rickwatler and @SangheraJags, and their PR company representative and note taker @chattycoley of @LocalDialogue, at their #SouthallWaterside HQ. …