Epsom & Ewell Liberal Democrats

Liberal Democrat County Councillors in Surrey have today voted against proposals put forward by the Independent Remuneration Panel (IRP). The report published by the IRP recommended that a Special Responsibility Allowance (SRA) of £10,000 be allocated to Deputy Cabinet Members, a set of roles only introduced to Surrey County Council in May this year.

The enforced closure of the walking route to St Joseph's school from the Abelea Green estate, via the church car park, has led to increased congestion in White Horse Drive and chronic traffic problems in West Street and Rosebank.

To reduce these problems, the school's governors have proposed a "park and stride" scheme. A petition will be considered on Monday by SCC's local committee for Epsom & Ewell, asking for the parking restrictions in the Abelea Green estate to be relaxed to facilitate this.

"Things fall apart- the centre cannot hold
Mere anarchy is loosed upon the world……….."

These words of WB Yeats resonate.

The bizarre nature of our current politics degenerates still further and nothing seems to be co-ordinated or connected. Like some high risk Mad Hatter's Tea Party each silo sits in a puddle of its own illogical absurdity.

The directors of the Abelea Green management company have forced St Joseph's RC church in Epsom to bar the gate between their car park and St Joseph's primary school, to prevent St Margaret Drive on the Abelea Green estate being used to access the school via the car-park.

After spending years trying, the directors who live on the estate eventually succeeded by pointing out that the lease for the car park access road mentions the church and the hall, but not the school.

There will be peace:

when attitudes change;

when self-interest is seen as part of common interest;

when old wrongs, old scores, old mistakes

are deleted from the account;

when the aim becomes cooperation and mutual benefit

rather than revenge or seizing maximum personal or group gain;

when justice and equality before the law

It is quite ironic that Epsom's Residents' Association (RA) council is pushing to over-develop the site of the Wells social centre with a four-storey building of 23 flats. Epsom had the fantastic windfall of having the huge sites of five redundant hospitals made available to develop for residential purposes.

Parking charges of £1.30 per hour, with a maximum charge of £5.00 per day, were introduced in the car parks on Surrey County Council's Countryside Estate, including those at Norbury Park, on 6 August 2018 despite significant opposition from local residents. Previously there was no charge.

Liberal Democrat County Councillor Hazel Watson (Dorking Hills) said: "Following the introduction of the parking charges, the car parks, unsurprisingly, have been virtually empty.

Railway cutting land at Mill Road, Epsom, now mostly behind green hoardings, is the subject of another planning application. 18/00271/FUL proposes 31 units in a serious of blocks, with associated parking. The area to the north of the site is retained as a wildlife sanctuary (where there are badger setts and other wildlife). Comments must be submitted to the council by 13th October.

This coming Saturday 8th September, there is an opportunity for everyone to visit derelict Horton Chapel

Visitors can learn about the heritage of the site and the plans which have been made for its future use.

Free tickets are available from hortonchapelproject.org

Horton Chapel Arts & Heritage Society has been created to develop and run the building along charitable lines. It bid successfully from the Heritage Lottery Fund and is currently awaiting legal matters to be processed by the borough council before starting on work.

Liberal Democrat county councillors in Surrey have criticised the ruling Conservative administration for recruiting a new "Business Manager" post, on a salary of more than £43,000, when at the same time planning hundreds of staff redundancies and millions of pounds of cuts to front line services.

The advert, which has appeared on the Guardian website, seeks to recruit a "skilled networker" to County Hall whose work "will often be politically sensitive". The salary offered is £43,638 for a working week of 36 hours, with the promise of a "generous local government salary related pension".