In Praise of Students and the Suffragettes

                                          In praise of Students

The engagement of Prince William to Kate Middleton may have taken the spotlight of the demonstration of students in London but I think the issue of how to fund undergraduate education has not gone away.  There is considerable anxiety around how the students of the future will be able to afford their Higher Education and no doubt many will be put off going University.  Those that do will face the burden of starting their working life with a financial millstone round their neck and of course as they get older will also add that other significant millstone of life in as they acquire mortgages.  

It is not therefore a surprise that we have seen the first of the demonstrations against these proposals and I am sure more protest will follow across the Country.  The news that Cleggy and co were planning a U turn on their position even as they were signing all those pledges has added to the anger.  During the course of this week the media focus on the demonstration has focussed on the violence that erupted and the graphic demolition job on the windows in Conservative Party HQ was beamed into every sitting room.  I am sure that most readers will like me have deplored the violence and the damage to property and I hope that organisers of future demonstrations will take steps to ensure their participants understand the need to peaceful protest.

Having said that I have heard many people talk about how they are so far the only citizens who have seriously taken to the streets to protest at the savage cutbacks that are descending on us.  Some of my acquaintances have said that the wish the British were more like the French or even the Greeks.  What does it take to fire up enough passion to truly get us all going?  I can still remember with clarity the demonstrations against the Vietnam War.  I can recall the Poll Tax demonstrations and in recent years the thousands who turned out to protest when the Labour Government introduced the Hunting Act (Ban).  So far however the response to the financial tsunami which will decimate our public services and put at least a million people on the dole has met with a rather muted response from swathes of the British public.  Even the TUC is holding back its day of action until March.

A friend of mine has reminded me of a couple of things Emmeline Pankhurst had to say about protest over a hundred years ago.  Had she been around today she may well have helped smash those windows.  After all she did say, “The argument of the broken window pane is the most valuable argument in modern politics. There is something that Governments care for far more than human life, and that is the security of property, and so it is through property that we shall strike the enemy. Be militant each in your own way. I incite this meeting to rebellion.”

 Of course history teaches us that the militants within the Suffrage movement did not win the vote for women although it certainly helped in raising the temperature and uniting working class women behind the cause.  So to our students I say thank you for reminding us that sometimes we have to get out of our armchairs and let our government know how we feel about what they are intending to do to us in our name.  The next time you demonstrate make it peaceful and hopefully others will join you in your legitimate right to protest.

I have penned this blog to coincide with the 100th anniversary of an event known as Black Friday when the Suffragettes demonstrating against Parliament were subjected to six hours of police brutality and which led to the Suffragettes becoming militant.

I attach a link describing Black Friday.  http://www.counterfire.org/index.php/features/75-our-history/7697-the-suffragettes-black-friday-and-the-two-types-of-window-smashing

In Praise of Students published in The Times and Star under the banner of The Thin Red Line  18/11/10

Building Bridges – a year on

Building Bridges – a year on

How this year has flown by! It is hard to credit that a year has gone by since the downpour that caused such a catastrophe here in Allerdale.  Those two days when the rain came down and flood water rose to unprecedented levels.  When people stoically faced the horror of water invading their homes and businesses and for whom today those events remain a frightening memory.  There were many people traumatised and are afraid still as the risk of further flooding has not yet gone away.

That was the night of a thousand acts of bravery and kindness.  When neighbour helped neighbour and communities came together to do what they could to help.  It was the night that defined us as a community and showed the world that we West Cumbrians faced with adversity collectively rise to its challenge.

Much has been written then and since about the response of the Emergency Services in that first couple of days. The met office warning of severe rainfall and flooding was sufficient to place the county on high alert and even before we saw any flooding emergency plans were being implemented.  There came a point on the 19^th when it became clear that the County was going to require a large scale emergency response and Gold Command under the leadership of the Chief Constable was created.  All the public services play a role in such an emergency.  There are very well written procedures in place which are tried and tested and practised as well.  By the afternoon before that flood key personnel from across the public services were assembling into Team Cumbria.

At the time that Gold Command was being created and meeting in Penrith other teams were meeting to plan for the recovery.  So it was that as the rains came down and the flooding began we had an emergency response team there with their primary task of preserving life and property and another team working out how to rebuild our communities afterwards. How well they served us that day and how much we owe them.

No one could ever have anticipated the consequences of such a unique rainfall nor the impacts of so much water pouring into the rivers and water courses.  No emergency plans had ever predicted the wide scale flooding that did occur and I know that the emergency plan never reckoned with the wholesale collapse or severe damage to our road and bridge structures.  Had it not been for the heroic actions of the Police and members of the public there could have been far greater numbers killed.  The death of PC Barker defines the entire event and he will always be remembered in Workington and Cumbria for his bravery on Northside Bridge.

What is remarkable is how much has been achieved in the last 12 months.  The recovery of the area has been a headache.  At first it seemed interminably slow.  Thousands of us on either side of the river and with only a few road bridge crossings left we were faced with the misery of travel in slow convoys of traffic before we could get to work or to our homes.  Doing some everyday things like going to school or to shop or to the Doctors became a major headache.  On top of the flooding we also endured one of the coldest of winters.  To add to the misery came difficulties in gritting roads and pavements.  In the cold dark days that followed many people facing such difficulties to their daily lives eventually became frustrated and angry at what appeared to be a slow response from the public authorities to the recovery. 

I did say that even as the emergency evacuations were taking place there were countless public servants around the County planning ahead to help with the recovery.  The fact that a year later we do have many so many people back in their own homes and businesses and a great deal of the infrastructure repaired or nearing repair is a testament to their work. For example as it became clear that we had lost bridges in Workington we had staff out there surveying the river bank in Workington trying to establish the location where we could build a footbridge.  The building of Barker Crossing by the Army in ten days was a remarkable achievement but it could not have been done without the help of council workers who had done the groundwork.  The building of the temporary railways station near Dunmail was also built in unprecedented time but required considerable planning and partnership working to get the job done with such speed.

Some of the work has gone on behind the scenes unseen.  We all got frustrated at the apparent lack of progress at getting bridges repaired and opened.  Of course they had to be inspected first and that could only be done when it was safe to do so as we had to put staff into the water to inspect bridge foundations below the water line.  That was extremely dangerous and painstakingly slow work.  However it was done and it was also heroic and we owe those bridges being repaired and opened in the shortest possible timescale to the teams of engineers who made it possible.

The opening of Barker Crossing and the creation of the new railway station and associated measures and even the opening of a temporary Tesco store were milestones along the way to bringing some sort of normality.  However the one enduring issue for many was the lack of a road bridge across the Derwent in Workington. The daily traffic jam on both sides of the river was taking its toll on people and sapping morale.  It was hampering recovery.  Local people became convinced that the County Council / Government were not doing enough to get a bridge built.  Frustration and anger and resentment began to build.

There came a time when the focus of attention did begin to switch from Government and what it could and should do to help us to the inevitable demand to know what the local authorities were doing.  Local Councillors started to feel the heat.  Now it is an interesting thing this because at the end of the day local councillors were enduring the self-same difficulties of daily life just as much as the rest of the population.  However your Councillor is supposed to be the champion of their local communities.  They are expected to get stuck in and ask the hard questions, get answers and more importantly get some action.  It is of course easier said than done.

In my view the measure of a local councillor is those who are prepared to step up to the plate when there are difficulties and who are not just prepared to sit in Council briefings and talk but who are prepared to be the advocate of their community.   They should be prepared to stick their neck out a bit and not just present the face of the Council.  We really do need more of the awkward squad around at such times.  We do of course need them to act reasonably and with some intelligence.

At one point I guess I qualified for the awkward squad brigade.  It happened that John Bailey from Derwent Bookshop spearheaded a petition asking the Government and the Council built a road bridge sooner rather than later.  He was supported by the Times and Star and the Rotary and I agreed to help along with some of my fellow Councillors.  The Facebook page he created had hundreds of supporters.  I do not think was not an unreasonable demand although I know that some of my colleagues working within the County Council and Allerdale probably thought I should have portrayed their efforts better.   I know that everybody was working feverishly behind the scenes to find a way to deliver that bridge. However I agreed to help John and others and found myself distributing copies of a petition and standing in Workington Town Centre on the busiest day of the year getting people to sign the petition. It was not difficult because people were walking up to us in droves, even queuing up to sign it. I am sure I was viewed as a bit of a traitor by colleagues who were doing their hardest to deliver a temporary bridge for Workington.  However many of those people did not live in West Cumbria and did not endure what we did every day or listen to the quite upsetting stories of people who were really suffering. The morale of local people was very low at that point and they needed something to focus on.  For some the simple act of signing a petition made them feel they were doing something to help make something happen.  I am glad I helped and I still feel it was the right thing to do.

Since then the temporary road bridge has been opened and work has been underway for several weeks to repair Workington Bridge.  The County Council has consulted on plans to build a replacement for Northside Bridge and also for Navvies Bridge.  Many of the bridges that were damaged have been repaired and traffic is flowing more or less normally again.  In the intervening months we have had the tragic loss of life when the school bus from Keswick crashed and then the indiscriminate shootings of Derrick Bird.  Despite everything that has been thrown at us our typical West Cumbrian resilience has come to the fore and helped us to cope and adjust. 

As I am writing this news has been coming in of the floods in Cornwall and

 I am sure local people will have those caught up in it in their thoughts.  I know that many local people have become fearful with the recent heavy rain and it is inevitable that further flooding may occur.  There is very cold comfort in the intention of the Government to cut the flooding budget and also cut the budget that DEFRA has available.  Our own experience here tells us that spending money on proper flood defences can actually save the exchequer money.  One can only hope that Cumbria is given all the resources needed to ensure what happened last year does not happen again.

First published in the Times and Star under The Thin Red Line 18th November 2010 to commemorate the first anniversary of the flooding of Cumbria

The Cemetery at Kleve in Belgium

For over fifty years my Father did not know where his brother found his last resting place.

There were three Adair brothers.  Harold the eldest went into the Army in Burmah, my Father, Peter who was the youngest, went into the Army and served in India and Stanleywho  served in the RAF.  You can imagine how their Mother must have felt with all her sons involved in the war.

The story of my fathers war and Harold I will leave to another day.  This story concerns Stanley, a wireless operator, who sadly lost his life on the 13th August 1943.  High in the skys over Germany his aircraft, a Lancaster Bomber, was destroyed losing the entire crew.  The Bomber was on a raid with many other aircraft and came down at Russelheim.  We know today that the crew were found by local people and were buried in a churchyard there.

My father of course was in India fighting his war.  The war in India is often referred to as The Forgotten War and my father always says that he was one of the last to be demobbed.  When he got home he arrived to find a nation trying to recover from the horror and tradgedy of the war.  Everyone had lost someone so it goes without saying that although they never forgot they also did not talk about it much.

Stanley had married a local girl and I know that for a while they lived in Moss Bay.  I know that is young and pregnant wife will have got the telegram.  Sadly the family did not seem to keep in touch so some of the detail was lost as people put things behind them and got on with life.

I grew up believing as my father did that his brothers aircraft had come down somewhere in the North Sea. It was the stuff of family legend and it seems incredible now as I write this that we did not know the truth.  I have for many many years observed Remebrance Sunday.  As a Girl Guide I first took part in the Rembrance Parade in the town.  My Parents would also attend.  Like many they would take part and silently remember those they had lost.

I have been a Councillor for over twenty years and have continued my annual act of remembrance although this time I am in the Civic Party and often lay a wreath.  As a member of the Town Council I became involved in discussions to become twinned with a town in Germany.  I am one of the four people who first went to Selm in Nordrhein Westfalia, Germany.  The Twinning Committee had organised a visit to Selm to visit the Christmas Market.  I was astonished to learn that my father was to go.  He had rarely travelled abroad and certainly had never been to Germany.  It was during the planning stages that a friend of mine approached me and told me he had been doing some research about my Stanley. It was then that I heard for the first time that Stanley had lost his life in the skies above Germany.  What he also told me was that after the war bodies of fallen allies were exhumed and then buried in military cemeteries.  Stanley is buried in Kleve on the Belgium German border not far from that famous bridge at Arnhem.

I resolved that we would go there if we could.  I told my Mother but not my Father.  One of Brothers agreed to join us.  The coach company told me that if necessary they would take us to Kleve during our long weekend stay.  We told my father on the coach on the way to Selm.  By this time my friend had done some  further research and was able to give him further information about how his brother and other crew had lost their lives. 

The Stadt Direktor in Selm will always have a place in my heart.  He provided his car and driver to take us to the Cemetery. It was a bitterly cold day with snow on the ground and there was not a soul in sight.  It was strange to see all the footprints in the snow in this very peaceful place.  I imagined the ghostsof  our war dead on a daily patrol. I had a problem on arrival because I had no idea where Stanley was buried and Kleve is a big place.  I heard my Mother worry about this and I heard my Father say to her that Barbara was sure to have a plan.  It was a heart sinking moment. 

It turned out to be easier than I expected.  There was a rather grand archway into the Cemetery and in the arch was a iron door in a little recess.  I was able to open it and find books with records oof everyone buried there and where they were to be found.  Stanley was buried with his fellow crewmen. 

My father removed his great overcoat to reveal he was wearing his suit and a medal I had never seen before.  He laid the wreath at the big memorial stone and it joined dozens of others that had been placed there.  We walked through the cemetery looking at the thousands of crosses and stones and the names of the men and occasionally women who were buried there.  They were so very young.

We finally found Stanley's last resting place and my father laid a wooden cross on each of the graves of that lost Lancaster Bomber.  My father was finally able to pay his respects to his brother.  He is 86 now and I do not expect he will pass that way again.

My family are grateful for those that helped us find Stanley again.  Especially to the German town of Russellheim for giving him a decent burial. Finally to the kindness of the people of Selm who made sure my Father could see his brothers grave.

11th November 2010

http://www.firstworldwar.com/poetsandprose/binyon.htm

FOOTNOTE

For many years veterans in our Town were concerned that there was no permanent memorial with the names of those men and women who had lost their lives in WW1 and WW2 and later confilcts.  The names of our war dead from the two great wars were buried inside the cenataph during its construction.  Finally they got their wish and we now have a permanent memorial inside St Michael's Church.  Wireless Operator Stanley Adair heads the list of the names of those who paid the ulimate sacrifice for our country during WW2.

Welcome to Austerity Britain

Well now we have it!

After weeks of speculation and a steady drip feed of announcements on various departmental spending cuts we have finally got the Chancellor’s pronouncement as he unveiled the Comprehensive Spending Review.  It is every bit as grim as the Government predicted it would be and we are now living in Austerity Britain,

The people of Britain will for the next few weeks be treated to a media frenzy of analysis and political backbiting and we will have to come to terms with what it will mean for all of us as individuals, family by family and business by business.

Let us deal with the good news first.  It is good news to have it confirmed that the Government is honouring its promise to go ahead with its major refurbishment of West Cumberland Hospital. It is equally good news that Cumbria will be one of four areas in the UK to enjoy the roll out of super speed Broadband.  We should also be happy that the benefits that our pensioners have such as the Winter Fuel Payment, free TV Licences and free bus travel have been untouched.

However there are no silver linings in the Emergency Budget announced in July or the review of spending announced this week. Taking both of those into account the Chancellor has cut Government spending by £81 billion.  The devil will be in the detail of what some of his announcements will mean and it may be weeks or months before we understand what the full extent on public services and the pound in your pocket will be.  I aim to describe that impact to ordinary people over the next few weeks. 

Local Government and some of its services are going to suffer because around 26% of the grants given to local councils have been cut. Councillors and officers in Cumbria County Council have been working since the summer in order to identify what will be priorities and to prepare itself for what the Council’s Leader, Eddie Martin described as a financial tsunami.

The County Council spends some £845 million on running its services.  Of that £205 million is raised locally through the Council Tax on local ratepayers.  Another £103 million is raised in fees and charge such as hire of library books, charges for home care and residential care etc.  £324 million is ring fenced for local schools and is given to them directly. That leaves £214 coming directly from the Government for grants in one form or another. Some of those grants were for specific items and therefore ring fenced. E.g. Sure Start Children’s Centres.. 

It is this grant from Government which will feel the impact of the £26% cut.  The government has also removed all the ring fencing around this money so local councillors will be forced into making very hard decisions about whether to continue funding Children’s Centres or fill holes in roads.  The impact of that cut on the County Council is somewhere between £50m - £60m over the next four years and comes on top of the cuts the council had to find in this years budget. 

Now I did say that there was no silver lining in any of this.  Some could be forgiven for thinking that at least pensioners have been protected.  However one of the cuts yesterday was to the bus subsidies given to local authorities.  In rural Cumbria that is bad news.  It means that the council will not be able to subsidise all of the bus routes that it does at the moment and inevitably bus services will be cut.  So the bus pass may still be around but there will be less buses for our pensioners to get on. There is also a devastating cut of 15% in the funds to relieve flooding.

Another serious cut is in housing and the ending of tenure for life of what we used to call council housing.  It means that anyone new coming in and registering for social housing will be required to pay 80% of the market value as rent and will not be allowed to stay in those properties indefinitely.  The silver lining here apparently is that this will free up the cash to build 150,000 new homes.  They are not necessarily going to be built by local councils or housing associations of course and many people will be expected to buy them.  When we add up the impact the changes to benefits, including those for children, it will be hardly surprising if the gap between the rich and the poor will continue to widen.  It seems that the poorest will pay more for the mistakes of the rich and the wealthy drawing inevitably to the conclusion that the silver lining has a tear in it.

The impact of the Comprehensive Spending Review will be felt for decades.  490,000 jobs will go in the public sector alone and some of those job losses will be in West Cumbria. Many local people are now living in fear of losing their jobs and being forced to join the dole queue. The cancellation of major capital schemes like the one that would have seen a new school in Workington and a virtual rebuild of Netherhall in Maryport will work itself out into another round of job losses in the private sector.  Watch out for job losses in the building and construction industry as this works through.  Also in the retail sector as there will be less money to spend on goods and services. It is being predicted that we will see around 1 million out of work as a result of these measures.

The Chancellor reckons we are all in this together.  It’s a great sound bite made to make us feel as if we all are suffering equally.  The reality is that the poor and families on middle incomes and children and students are taking the hardest hit while the Bankers who have caused a global crisis around the world get off with a paltry sum.  They owe us big time and I think Osborne whilst claiming he was being tough in reality let them away with it.

Cameron, Osborne and Clegg were born into a wealthier world that most of us and have probably never had to really struggle to pay the bills or look for work.  We may be all in it together but it does not include the Conservative and Liberal Democrat Coalition who applauded the Chancellor yesterday when he laid bare the deep cuts he is making to our public services and the damage it will do to economy.