Camden Road Surgery - one of the surgeries affected by Labour’s privatisation of GP services - is holding a meeting for patients on Wednesday 4th March, 2pm, at the surgery.

UnitedHealth, America’s largest healthcare provider, won a contract from NHS Camden to run the Camden Road surgery as well as the Kings Cross surgery and the Brunswick surgery last April - despite being out-scored by local doctors in NHS Camden’s own rating system. Patients (and doctors and staff) at Camden Road have told us how this decision has led to serious problems at the surgery.

Cantelowes Liberal Democrats have been supporting the campaign to keep Camden’s GPs in the NHS, and to keep the NHS public. Thanks to pressure from local residents, NHS Camden have finally agreed to hold a meeting to let patients know what is going on - but they haven’t advertised it, and they’ve chosen a time when many people will be at work! So if you are a patient at Camden Road Surgery, you can go to the meeting at 2pm next Wednesday 4th March. If you can’t make it, if enough people complain about the time and the lack of advertising we may be able to force them to hold another.

To find out more about the campaign and to show your support, visit the national Keep Our NHS Public campaign and the Camden branch.

Gordon Brown has been told that George Orwell’s dystopian novel 1984 - where every aspect of people’s lives are watched over and regulated by an oppressive government - was meant to be a warning, not a blueprint for Labour rule.

Shadow Home Secretary Chris Huhne MP issued the stark warning today as the Liberal Democrats launched their Freedom Bill - a pledge to role back the draconian laws passed by successive Labour and Tory governments.

In 2006, the Liberal Democrats revealed how Labour had created over 3000 new laws - one for each day Tony Blair was in power. Under Gordon Brown - if anything even more authoritarian and dictatorial than his predecessor - things have only got worse. Chris Huhne MP said: “This draft bill is the first time a major political party has brought all of the laws which have undermined civil liberties together in one piece of legislation so that they can be easily repealed. We have called it the freedom bill because if the measures within it were all repealed, it would represent the greatest victory for freedom in Britain in the last 20 years.”

To find out more about the Freedom Bill and to sign up as a supporter, visit the Freedom Bill website.

One of our major commitments to the residents of Cantelowes in the run up to the 2006 elections was to fight for a new cycle and pedestrian link to be built between Agar Grove / Murray Street and the top of Camley Street - providing a safe and direct link to St Pancras International Station, the hidden gem of Camley Street Nature Reserve and into the heart of the Kings Cross development.

We had a huge success last year securing the funds for the project - and at last there’s clear evidence of the work going ahead! These photos, taken by Cllr Paul Braithwaite on the latest of his regular inspections of the site, show the area cleared in preparation for the building work to begin.

Paul said: “Since being elected I’ve put heart and soul into getting this pedestrian and cycle link built. It’s been a lot of hard work, so I’m delighted to see real progress being made. It’s due to open this summer, and will provide a safe and enjoyable 15minute direct connection for local residents to St Pancras, avoiding the pollution of York Way and St Pancras Way. With this new link and Ben’s work to make York Way more pedestrian-friendly, we will have successfully secured access into the exciting new Kings Cross development that otherwise would have been closed off from Cantelowes neighbourhoods.”

Camden Community Safety Partnership invites you to a community event on Wednesday 18 March 2009, 6pm-8.30pm at Hamilton House Conference and Meeting Centre, Mabledon Place, King’s Cross, WC1H 9BD {map}.

Crime and antisocial behaviour has gone down in Camden, bucking national and London trends. But there’s always more to be done, and to improve the response to antisocial behaviour, drug use and crime on Camden’s estates and in neighbourhoods you are invited to spend an evening with the different agencies involved in the Community Safety Partnership.

In an informal “marketplace” atmosphere you can find out what the partnership is doing to make our neighbourhood safer, hear about the different ways in which you could get involved and share your thoughts about how work might be improved. At the event you will also be able to bid for two small grants allocated to support resident and tenant groups in addressing community safety concerns. Grants are for £500 and can only be awarded to constituted groups.

The event will be informal and hopefully enjoyable - light refreshments, tea and coffee will be provided and there will be prize draws for those attending. For more information about the event contact Dave Francis, Community Engagement Officer, on 020 7974 2477 or dave.francis@camden.gov.uk

This weekend I was at the spring conference of Liberal Youth, the youth wing of the Liberal Democrats. It was a lively and inspiring event – there’s some real talent in Liberal Youth: some seriously impressive people and some very exciting plans. Most importantly, it was a lot of fun, which probably explains the increase in the number of people there.

The highlights for me included a very lively and robust debate on diversity, where we went beyond the usual platitudes and excuses and started to come up with a real liberal answer to the problem of the unrepresentativeness of Parliament, Councils and the party itself. This is an area where I think liberals have struggled: most would reject positive discrimination as a crude quick fix that does more harm than good, promoting people based on arbitrary or irrelevent qualities rather than merit and cutting people (i.e. the voter) out of the process. However, we have to accept the clear evidence that the only thing that has made a substantial difference in promoting diversity is all-women shortlists. There’s a lot more work to do on this, but this was one of the most productive and focused debates on this topic I’ve been to.

Another highlight were the debates about Gaza and the Middle East. Passions were certainly roused, and we came within 3 votes of selling Jerusalem on e-Bay and using the profits to address the needs of the victims of the violence! But after long, intense and highly insightful debate a balanced but firm statement was agreed. A similarly impressive debate about our priorities for Europe led to the adoption of three campaign priorities for the European Parliament elections in June: protecting the environment, tackling human traffiking and reforming EU institutions.

I think every Liberal Youth member should also be proud of a particularly ambitious motion that was passed about meeting our environmental commitments. After some amendment to make is financially responsible and deliverable, a clear commitment and plan to make the organisation carbon neutral was overwhelmingly approved, setting a great example to the federal party and other youth organisations as well as putting our principles into practice.

A few years ago when I was more involved in the youth wing (then called Liberal Democrat Youth & Students or LDYS), conference was a pretty mundane and trying experience – uninspiring, monotonous, poorly-attended and dominated by a small clique obsessed with constitutional bickering. I’m really pleased to see those days are over, and that Liberal Youth is a modern, exciting and active organisation empowering young people to really make a difference – and have fun at the same time! The healthily contested elections this year are proof of how lively things have become, and there is a very impressive range of candidates.

There are also very active and vibrant Liberal Youth groups in Camden and at London’s universities – contact me if you want to get involved and I’d be more than happy to put you in touch!

This evening, the Executive Environment Sub Group considered a new Appraisal and Management Strategy for the Camden Broadway Conservation Area. I made a deputation at the meeting, urging the Sub Group to recognise the need for significant regeneration of the Broadway and to ask for support from the Council as a whole for that regeneration work.

The new Management Strategy is good - but the unusual thing about the Camden Broadway area is that there isn’t much to conserve! We need to preserve the few good bits that are left, but most importantly we need to regenerate the area and tackle some of the problems that blight it - antisocial behaviour, the burnt out former brothel, the general untidiness and run-down feel of the area.

These were the issues that came out most strongly in the consultation. They couldn’t be addressed in the Conservation Area work, but they have all been passed to various council officers and departments. That’s a start - but we’ve been fighting for improvements for a long time, and what we need now is a whole-Council commitment to regeneration. Without that, the Conservation Area status will not only lose the support of the community but it may even start to contribute to the problems in the area by preventing improvement work.

Tonight, we put Camden Broadway on the map - we got some of the most senior people in the Council to discuss it and recognise the need for improvement. Now, we need to keep the pressure up. Soon I hope to hold an open public meeting to review where we are, and get real community buy-in for our work to improve the area. As soon as I have a date I’ll post more information on the website.

Shadow Secretary for Energy and Climate Change, London MP Simon Hughes, visits Camden tomorrow as the Lib Dems unveil an ambitious pledge for energy-efficient homes that dwarfs the Labour Government’s inadequate proposals.

Under the Lib Dems, every UK home would be made energy-efficient within 10 years. A Lib Dem government would underwrite renovation work worth £6,500 per household under a Green Loans Scheme, which would be paid back through energy bills that should fall because of improved energy efficiency of the renovated house. More than two million homes a year would be upgraded, with contracts going to regional building companies rather than large national companies such as Wimpey and Barratt.

The Lib Dem pledge comes after the Government has admitted that less than 1% of British homes meet the industry standard. Last week, the Audit Office reported that as much as half of Britain’s poorest households were ineligible for help from the £852m Warm Front scheme to cut fuel bills with grants for home insulation and heating.

Simon will be in Holborn tomorrow evening, talking to local Liberal Democrats and supporters. This is just one of the many social events and policy discussions we have in Camden. If you want to get involved and come to future events, contact Jo at jo@shaw2win.org.uk

Lib Dem campaigners called on Mayor Johnson to take tough action to tackle pollution on Euston Road – one of London’s most polluted – and not to scrap Phase Three of the London Low Emission Zone. On Monday of last week, as Londoners struggled through the snow, Boris Johnson scrapped the planned extension of the Low Emission Zone safeguards to smaller vehicles.

Local Lib Dem councillor Paul Braithwaite, said:

“Local people in Kings Cross and Somers Town are the ones that suffer from breathing toxic air – along with the kids at Argyle School, just 100 metres away from Kings Cross Station.

“It is perverse and very disturbing that Mayor Johnson has decided to axe the vital next stage of the Low Emissions Zone – due October 2010. This was the only realistic way for London to tackle white van man and other diesel polluters.

“We know that it’s a difficult time for small businesses, but instead of dropping new air quality standards we should be providing practical help to enable them to make the changes at minimum cost.

“More and more people are saying that ‘we can’t afford not to go green’, as a successful economy and clean environment go hand in hand. Mayor Johnson clearly has not got this message.”

Local Lib Dem campaigner Jo Shaw added:

“Residents in Somers Town and Kings Cross already have a much lower life expectancy than people living in other parts of the borough. The Mayor should be protecting and improving our health, not undermining plans to make our air cleaner. Mayor Johnson should be helping Londoners breathe more freely.”

200 kilometres of inner London roads woefully fail European minimum standards for pollution – many of these are in Camden. More than a thousand Londoners die each year because of the effects of air pollution.

Diesel engines in taxis and vans are the main causes of toxic particulate pollution – this aggravates asthma, and causes cancer and heart disease, and other health problems. Environmental campaigners highlight that Euston Road has one of the highest concentrations of these polluters in the borough:

A kilometre ring of taxis daily surround St Pancras their diesel engines idling, emitting fumes and pollution
Bus stands make York Way a toxic canyon
Trains out of Kings Cross and St Pancras are predominantly diesel powered
Congestion on Euston Road makes it one of London’s worst polluted

The Low Emissions Zone (LEZ) within the M25 ring road was implemented in 2008. As a consequence all lorries over three and a half tons must now be fitted with filters or incur punitive daily fines. Phase Three of the LEZ was due to be extended to “white van man” in October 2010.

Camden Liberal Democrats propose that instead of cancelling the Phase Three requirement, Mayor Johnson should set up a scheme to contribute to the cost of making vans, taxis and other affected vehicles compliant, instead of perpetuating the damaging effects to health.

Many London councils, including Camden, are in contravention of the EU Air Quality Directive with regard to particulates (PM 10, PM 2.5) and noxious emissions (NO2). That is primarily because of the use of diesel in the capital.

Particulates known as PM2.5 have now been widely recognised as being the most dangerous to health. They result from burning of fossil fuels, particularly diesel, but also gas boilers.

PM2.5 particulate pollutants are one thirtieth the diameter of a human hair. Their small size means that they can easily enter the blood stream where they can have a bad impact on health.

The European Union recently proposed that the safe level for PM2.5 should be redefined to just 10 micrograms per cubic metre of air; a figure that is frequently exceeded in London. London is hardly even collecting tracking data on PM2.5 (whereas New York has recently set up 150 locations for measurement in 2009).

The 200km of roads London has just three pollution-measuring stations, compared with New York’s 150. There is no measuring station near Kings Cross. Camden only has one PM2.5 measuring station in Camden, in Russell Square, run by DEFRA. The Euston Road is under the control of TfL, as are most of the main air pollution “black spots” in the borough.

The responsibility for ensuring that air quality in the UK conforms with the EU directive lies with central government. The UK is likely to be fined by the EU for failure to comply with the EU directive on air quality.

The government has delegated some of its regulatory powers to the GLA, which has implemented the Low Emission Zone. There are complaints that the GLA has not been enforcing the LEZ regime against lorries through the fining system set out in the scheme.

Camden Lib Dems are putting the environment at the heart of everything the Council does, and from this week a new service will help businesses in the south of Camden recycle more.

The reusable bag service will allow businesses without space for bin storage to recycle paper and card. It is an expansion of the commercial recycling service introduced by the Lib Dem-led administration in April last year. Although this service already includes the collection of paper and card, some businesses haven’t been able to take part because they had no room to store the recycling bins.

Businesses that sign up will get free reusable bags, similar to the ones some residents have. They’ll be collected by existing kerbside collection vehicles. If successful, the scheme will be rolled out across the borough.

A shocking dossier from the Liberal Democrats has revealed just some of the ways our taxes are being wasted on extravagant and incompetent projects.

Despite the hardship many local families and residents face, Labour found £130 million to refurbish the Ministry of Justice’s office, £29 million to build accommodation for asylum seekers which was never built, £7 million for chauffeur-driven cars for ministers in just one year - and £50,000 for a party to which only 20 guests were invited!

A massive £13 billion has also been spent on an NHS records system which doesn’t work.

How our money is wasted

* £13 billion on an NHS record system that is a complete failure
* £130 million on refurbishing Ministry of Justice offices
* £81 million on a Department of Transport economy drive that was supposed to save £57 million
* £29 million on accommodation for asylum seekers that was never built
* £265.8 million the amount the government spent on advertising, marketing and public relations in 2007/8, an increase of £197.2 million since 1997-98
* £200 million wasted over the past five years on IT projects that were never completed
* £7 million on chauffeur driven cars for ministers in one year
* £28.78 million in rent for unoccupied houses for soldiers and their families
* £330 million overspent by government departments on their premises
* £4.2 million by the Government’s Qualifications & Curriculum Authority on hotel rooms in an 18 month period
* £50,000 on a party to which only 20 guests were invited
* £2,000 each on image and public speaking training for Home Secretary Jacqui Smith and Culture Secretary Andy Burnham

Local Liberal Democrats have extended a warm welcome to Cllr Syed Hoque after the Haverstock councillor announced his resignation from the Labour party. Cllr Hoque, who was Labour’s frontbench spokesman on adult social care, will join the Liberal Democrats to become the party’s 24th councillor in Camden.

The news is a further boost for local Liberal Democrats following recent by-election victories over Labour in Kentish Town and the Conservatives in Hampstead.  Since the last borough elections in 2006 the Liberal Democrats have continued to surge forward, gaining a further four councillors.  Meanwhile Labour have lost three councillors and the Conservatives have lost two.

The Liberal Democrats are now another step closer to taking full control of Camden Council in 2010, and are the only real opposition to Labour in Camden’s two parliamentary seats.

Jo Shaw, Parliamentary Campaigner for Holborn St. Pancras, said: “Councillor Hoque is by no means the only former Labour supporter in Camden to be feeling let down and disillusioned by a party that seems to have forgotten about ordinary people.  Many people have felt taken for granted by Labour for years.

“Labour are at rock bottom and losing support every day.  Fortunately, all those who believe in an ethical foreign policy, defending our civil liberties, and protecting those on the lowest incomes will find a natural home with the Liberal Democrats.

“Everyone knows that only the local Liberal Democrats can challenge Gordon Brown’s Labour party here in Camden.  The Tories are in a poor third place.”

Things are starting to get back to normal today. Street clearing and gritting went on throughout the night and today - having been contacted  by residents I have specifically asked for Camden Mews, Murray Mews, North Villas and South Villas to have their pavements cleared, as they are now very slippy and dangerous particularly for the number of elderly people living in these areas.

As rubbish collections have been suspended since Monday, teams are out in all main town centres clearing bins, fly-tipping and litter. Veolia refuse and recycling collections are operating a full and normal service from today, except in those areas where access is not possible or dangerous. Refuse collection on estates have also started today. The combined kerbside collection will happen on Sunday this week as well, to try and address the backlog. This will mean that residents will have at least one collection from low-rise housing this week, unless there are access problems. Commercial waste and recycling is back to full service, providing up to three collections per day.

Vulnerable residents are still being prioritised and Housing services are on alert due to the risk of leaks as the snow and ice thaw. Caretakers are still focusing on clearing and gritting. The Maiden Lane Estate Office is operating a full service.

All schools, children’s centres (except Gospel Oak which has a power failure today), play centres and youth centres are open.

Hopefully the disruptions after the heavy snowfall are over (though sadly that means the fun is over too for those of you who were able to enjoy it!). There are still weather warnings from the met office though, and there is still a lot of ice on the ground.

Don’t forget to send us your snow photos!

Although there has not been the snowfall predicted, freezing temperatures have made road conditions more hazardous. Overnight gritting teams have kept all main routes gritted and driveable with care, and most London Buses are operating again (including all in Camden). Gritting of all main routes will continue throughout the day as required.

Day shift teams are now concentrating on gritting pavements on main roads and side roads. Many of Camden’s side roads are inaccessible to the main gritters and road clearers, which would damage parked cars. These are being cleared by smaller JCBs and gritters over the course of the day.

For up to date information on Council services see the Council’s website or call 020 7974 4444, and for information on public transport and roads see TfL’s website or their news update.

Though still understaffed, the Maiden Lane Estate Office was open and offering a full service to residents from 9am today. All main paths, external steps and walkways were cleared and gritted yesterday, and more maintenance work was carried out today. Caretakers collected rubbish from across the estate this morning, but as refuse collections were cancelled across the borough yesterday and today the rubbish is being stockpiled until tomorrow.

Finally, I spent the snowy period looking out for problems and thinking about local services and vulnerable people - but it was clear when walking around the neighbourhood that lots of people were making the most of the snow and having a really good time! Send us your photos, and we’ll put them up on the website to show everyone how beautiful - and how much fun - our area can be! Send your photos to benlibdem@googlemail.com

The heavy snowfall last night has caused massive disruption to services in Camden and across London. I’ve done two tours around Cantelowes ward this morning to spot any major or urgent problems - if you have seen any I’ve missed I’m available all day by email and ‘phone - ben.rawlings@camden.gov.uk or 07823 533 415.

Transport across the city is severely affected, with no bus services at all and many tube lines partially or fully closed. For the most up-to-date information, see Transport for London’s website or read their adverse weather update. National Rail services are also severely disrupted - check National Rail’s website for up-to-date information.

Council services are also severely affected by the weather and the inability of many Council staff to get into work. However, all major Council buildings are open and essential services are being prioritised second only to services for vulnerable people. Most services are running but with reduced staffing numbers, so please be patient if trying to get through. Kentish Town District Housing Office reception is closed. Caretakers are out in force clearing paths and pavements - I’ve seen several as I walked around Cantelowes.

The Maiden Lane Estate Office is open, again with a reduced staff and concentrating on emergency services/responses, vulnerable residents and clearing/gritting paths. The Office will be open until 5pm today, after which time the normal Council number (020 7974 4444) should be used. Again if you have any problems, contact me on ben.rawlings@camden.gov.uk or 07823 533 415.

Up-to-date details on Council services are available on the Council website, or by calling 020 7974 4444. The forecast is for more snow and more severe weather warnings have been issued. You can find out more at the met office website.