LINK TO MESSAGE BOARD!

Click here for Council Tax graphs posted by Robin Smith.

Local Information/News Websites

North Tyneside Council Most of the documents that can be found in libraries are also published on the Council's website. There is a helpful search engine on the Home page.

Tyne Town The Town Centres website with news and helpful links to related websites.

News Guardian This is published each week, usually by Thursday evening, and provides access to archived news and letters pages.

 

Topics

A Town Council for Whitley Bay - Update

I have received some guidance on how a Town Council for Whitley Bay may be formed from Alan Campbell, MP for Tynemouth. Mr. Campbell has given this in a letter dated 25 April 2008 in response to questions that I asked by email.

Mr. Campbell also provides a page on his website for consultation on the topic that he first raised in a letter to residents sent towards the end of 2007.

30 June 2008

A Town Council for Whitley Bay

On 10 March 2008 there was a special Area Forum in Whitley Bay arranged to provide basic information about the idea of a Town Council for Whitley Bay. Town and Parish Councils already exist in many other local authority areas and I have chosen one within the area of East Devon District Council (EDDC) as an example. EDDC has 3 Town Councils and as many as 30 smaller Parish Councils. One of the Town Councils, that of Exmouth (ETC), is comparable to Whitley Bay in that it is a seaside town with a similar area and population (about 26,000). Below I have provided direct links to a variety of sources of information relevant to the topic. These include the websites of EDDC and ETC, the text of the Local Government and Public Involvement in Health Act 2007 and other PDF files that include reference to powers that may be devolved to appropriate Parish/Town Councils by the "Principal Council" - North Tyneside Borough Council in our case.

The aim in providing the infomation is to allow residents who are interested in the possibility of having a Town Council an opportunity of making an informed assessment before coming to a conclusion.

The website of Exmouth Town Council includes minutes of a variety of meetings - the Council itself, the General Purposes Committee and the Planning Committee. It is possible to get a flavour of what a Town Council can do by reading these.

The East Devon District Council website provides a Parish Council Toolkit that gives guidance on governance and legal matters including that on the 'Powers and Functions of Parish Councils' and 'the Role and Responsibilities of Parish Councillors'. The EDDC website provides details of the 2008/09 Council Tax (and Parish/Town Council precepts) and there is a copy of the Council Tax booklet, 'Working Together in East Devon' as a large PDF file (1.13 MB).

The Local Government and Public Involvement in Health Act 2007 (c28) is 272 pages long and includes a section, Part 4 - Parishes - running from page 60 to 79 that covers issues of how a Parish Council may be formed - but I am still waiting for somebody to explain it to me! On page 66 chapter 2 has the heading, 'Power to Promote Well-being' and a short section on 'Extension of power to certain parish councils'. I believe this is the basis of the additional powers that can be devolved to Parish/Town Councils. The Department for Communities and Local Government have produced a report entitled, 'The Quality Parish and Town Council Scheme - The Quality Scheme Explained' (only 60 pages long) which appears to explain how a Parish/Town Council can qualify to take on the promotion of WELL-BEING.

There is also a document, Local Government and Public Involvement in Health Act 2007 - Explanatory Notes that is 85 pages long.

The 'Notes of the Whitley Bay Area Forum' on 10 March 2008 provide a good introduction to the topic but they are not minutes of the meeting. I attended the forum and it was not agreed that a petition be circulated to residents of the Whitley Bay area seeking their views on the proposal. It was agreed that the views of residents should be sought - but when it comes to a petition as envisaged by the 2007 Act the area for the proposed Parish/Town Council must be defined and responses should surely be on an informed basis rather than party political prejudice. I think we should await the outcome of consideration of the topic by the Overview and Scrutiny Committee of North Tyneside Council first.

N.B. The system of Local Government in Devon is to be changed to one with Unitary Councils by May 2009, similar to what will happen in County Durham and Northumberland. District Councils will cease to exist and the latest proposal for Devon (by EDDC) is to have 4 Unitary Councils - see 'A Vision for Devon - A Concept for a Four Unitary Pattern of Local Government in Devon'.

27 April 2008

Parking (updated 3 February 2007)

DPE is to be introduced in 2007 throughout the Metropolitan Borough. A Draft Parking Strategy Report was presented to the Cabinet Meeting of 12 December 2006 and a copy can be found in the Library and downloaded from the Counicl Website. The document is intended to be the basis of "consultation with stakeholders" but there does not seem to be any indication of how residents will be consulted during the six month period from January 2007 that is proposed.

The Draft Strategy Report has maps with the proposed short term, medium term and long term parking zones indicated. For the GERA area I have produced a map that shows the existing and proposed parking zones. Click here to view this map in a separate window!

The authors of the Draft Strategy Report explain their view that many zones that current have no ticket machines are "unenforceable". It is clear that, with the exception of the "Permit Holders Only" zones (for example, the east end of Grosvenor Drive), other zones will have ticket machines installed. Therefore, in the case of the Grosvenor Estate there will be ticket machines installed in Grosvenor Drive (to the west of the junction with Kings Drive), Kings Drive and Queens Drive.

Nearly 20 years ago residents agreed that the whole of our area should be for residents' only. (See the report referred to below). We did not then want our streets turned into a shoppers' parking zones or for longer term use by local businesses and commuters. The points need emphasis once again - that we do not have back lanes for permit holders only and that we live in purely residential streets.

DPE is the officially recognised acronym for Decriminalised Parking Enforcement. DPE allows local authorities to take over the functions of traffic wardens from the police, with the advantage that monies from parking tickets (for example) go straight back to the local authority. Several local authorities have inplemented DPE successfully in as much that the administration of the scheme is self-financing.

Parking is the topic that led to the formation of GERA - the "Grosvenor Estate Residents' Association" in 1988. A copy of the report produced by GERA then is available to download (see below). It raises issues that are still relevant to whatever plans are (or were) being considered by the "Whitley Bay Parking Strategy Group". (This Group no longer meets - the last meeting was in December 2004.)

The 1988 GERA report is a PDF file (Adobe Reader needed) and is about 500 KB. There are three plans that are part of the report and each is a JPEG file of about 300 KB - smaller versions about 150 KB. (These numbers will be of interest to those who do not have broadband internet connections!)

Gera 1988 Report | Plan 1 | Plan 1 (smaller) | Plan 2 | Plan 2 (smaller) | Plan 3 | Plan 3 (smaller)