Lisa Forbes on Lady Lodge Arts Centre

I was sifting through some old books and found this picture of the Lady Lodge Arts Centre, built in Orton Longueville by the Peterborough Development Corporation. Under Labour, Lady Lodge flourished as an artistic and cultural centre for the Ortons. There were live shows, workshops, bars and activities for all the family.

The Tories took power and after a few years decided to bulldoze the Arts Centre. This is what the same site looks like today. Strangely, Conservative councillors are really proud of what they have done and the money they've saved by destroying facilities in Orton Longueville. Mr Cameron is promoting something he calls 'The Big Society' - obviously nothing to do with communities coming together to enjoy themselves.

Some people say all the parties are the same, that it makes no difference who is in. This is a clear example of the Tories bringing about real change in your neighbourhood.

Now wait for a developer to be invited in and for the profitable new homes to be built.

This Tory created social disaster is an example of why politics makes a difference, and why you should vote Labour on May 5th. I'm determined to end the neglect of this ward.

Lisa Forbes NHS Special

The Orton Longueville City Council Election takes place on Thursday May 5th and as the day gets nearer I'm more and more excited about representing you and making a start on the dozens of issues that have been raised with me during the Campaign. As a local resident, I know what it is like to live in an area the Tories don't care about.

The Tories themselves realize that the Council can be better managed without them. They're busily outsourcing services to private companies (e.g. Enterprise) and charities (e.g. Vivacity). The Tories admit their education record is poor and have given our local secondary schools to alternative providers.

But this is not an ordinary election. The Tory-led government is using the global financial crisis as an excuse to attack the living standards and welfare of ordinary working people. They've wanted to slash the welfare state to ribbons for years and now they're doing it. People are so stunned by rising prices (inflation at 5%), pay freezes, job losses, benefit cuts, shrinking pensions, and lost public services they hardly know what to do.

Thursday May 5th, 2011 is your chance to get a message back to the Tory-led coalition and their minions on the City Council. Vote against cuts that go too far, too fast. Vote to tell the government that ordinary working people need help, not punishment, in this desperate crisis. Vote to save the NHS.

Mr Cameron and Mr Clegg like to say there is no alternative and no choice, we simply have to slash the welfare state and cut living standards for ordinary people. But this isn't true of the National Health Service, where they claim they're ring-fencing the budget. All the destructive moves on the NHS, none of them mentioned during the General Election, are a choice, the Coalition's choice. This is what they are doing:

• Mr Cameron promised the NHS budget nationally would be ring-fenced.

• Instead £20 billion in so-called efficiency savings is to be removed.

• There is no extra money to cover increased patient demand and increased health costs.
  

Peterborough Primary Care Trust has ordered 20 percent cuts, to be made immediately.

Many private health companies donated generously to the Conservative Party before the election.

80 per cent of the NHS budget is to be given to GPs who have been forced to form up to 500 consortia across England.

• Orton Medical Practice is under temporary management until at least December 2011so will be left behind in the scramble to escape the collapse of the Primary Care Trust.
  

• Hospitals and health trusts are to become independent; and will be allowed to borrow money and make profits.
  

• The Department of Health will cease to be responsible for the NHS. The health service will be run as a market overseen by a new Independent Commissioning Board.
  

• There are to be no limits on the involvement of private companies in health provision.

In a few years, there will be no NHS as we have known it.

This is why Thursday May 5th, 2011 is such an important day. Please vote to send a message to the government - TOO FAR, TOO FAST.

With your support, I'll use my term on the City Council to ensure that Orton Longueville is not a poor relation and that the interests of ordinary working families are taken into account.

Tory Councillors Caring for You

I don't know about you but I'm getting sick of the excuses we hear from the Council whenever we complain about the appalling state of the Ortons. The Tory councillors seem perfectly happy with how things are, so I've been walking the streets with my camera to capture the neglect that is Orton Longueville today.

This image shows what has happened to many of the seats provided for local residents. Reduced to a pile of broken bricks, these give a simple message, 'No one cares'. There is a real problem with the engineering bricks used throughout the township.

They are simply breaking up into fragments so that everything looks as though it is falling apart. The Council doesn't bother with repairing surfaces, so we have a hazardous patchwork of broken tiles and bricks. This is so commonplace in the Ortons it is obvious there is no system to monitor this process of erosion and decay, no budget to finance regular repairs, and no way to communicate with hived off service providers.


No one is keeping an eye open, in fact they hope you'll come to accept this standard too.

The Council doesn't care about signs either - there is no effort to renew, maintain or replace signposts or street name plaques that have reached the end of their natural lives. This example shows a spot where the signs rusted away years ago, leaving the uprights to sit on the corner as a reminder of how civilized the Ortons were before the Tories got their hands on the maintenance budgets.

Some plants, shrubs and trees do receive an annual trim. Judge from these pictures how well they set off the area. In the shot below, notice the missing coping stones and the litter impaled in the bushes.








But there's plenty of colour in Orton Longueville Ward and you'll love it if you are a teenager with a spray can. You may be less happy if it is your house that has attracted the youthful artists with their taste for vivid images. There is obviously no system for identifying and removing graffiti - the examples below have been on public display for ages.
The left hand cartoon greets local primary children as they arrive at school; the right hand landscape decorates a resident's home.





The Tories have been decisive in dealing with other problems, however. The beautiful Lady Lodge Arts Centre, with its cluster of historic farm buildings, performance facilities, bars and workshop units for local business has been run down, left to the mercy of vandals and finally demolished. I wonder whether the Council will choose to replace the lost community facilities or whether the site will be sold off for private housing. It is a shameful betrayal of the Development Corporation legacy.

On the whole, the Tories have always preferred to save money, even if this has meant creating a stark, rundown environment for local residents. The picture below seems to embody their vision of what Orton Longueville should look like.

There is no point writing to your Tory councillors about these problems - they are more interested in saving money and expect to win local elections without making any effort on our behalf.

I'm absolutely determined to campaign for Orton Longueville and to demand an end to the blight that has fallen on the local landscape. You deserve better than this and cuts or no cuts this squalor must be tackled.

Lisa

March 2011

Orton Longueville Campaign

The Labour campaign for Orton Longueville is in full swing now, with our strong community team delivering newsletters, knocking on doors and contacting local people. There has been a very positive response, with many households feeling the pinch and wanting to tell us their personal stories. Pay freezes, lost pensions, lost benefits, lost jobs, lost facilities and rising prices are a lethal cocktail. People are spelling out where it hurts.

So many of you are angry about bankers taking millions of pounds in bonuses while the sick and disabled have their benefits reduced or removed. The Tories say we are 'all in this together' but they're asking the poor and disadvantaged to pick up the bill for City fat cats.

We're also picking up lots of complaints about the neglect of the local area. Tory councillors seem to have gone to sleep on the job - how else can you make sense of the graffiti left on walls month after month, the crumbling and broken brickwork, the pot-holed roads, the smashed seats and the dismal shrubbery? Our team are taking photographs and we're demanding that these problems are tackled.

Those of you registered with the Orton Medical Practice have learned that Dr Cartmel has a temporary contract while the NHS Primary Care Trust decides what to do next. The Trust has to save millions of pounds, so closing GP surgeries with less than 4,000 patients looks like a good deal to them. Sick people in Orton Longueville don't agree. I'm campaigning to ensure that your point of view is heard.

Tories have never worried much about the health service, so we shouldn't be surprised that the priority now is to cut costs and create money-spinning business opportunities for private contractors. Health companies have donated large sums to Conservative funds. I wonder why?

Much more startling is their attack on defence spending and the police, areas that Tory politicians once saw as vote winners. Local people are telling us that the closure of RAF Wittering is having a ripple effect across the Peterborough area. They are asking why the government is constructing aircraft carriers when there are no aircraft to put on them. Families are asking why the Tories are putting them at risk by reducing police numbers.

Doesn't security matter any more?

Education is another major worry for families in the area, with primary and secondary schools across the city facing serious budget reductions. Rebuilding plans at Orton Longueville have been put on ice.

The Tories on the City Council have proved their incompetence by bull-dozing three secondary schools, only to discover there are not enough places for local children. They are thrilled that Orton Longueville has been taken over by another school in the Cambridge area - but what does this tell us about the quality of management in Tory Peterborough?

We're hearing all this from local people already but the cuts have barely begun. The Tory-led government plans another five years of this, slashing away at the welfare state, sacking public sector workers, reducing benefits and driving poor families out of their homes. If the cuts slow the economy down, there'll have to be more cuts, until there's nothing left.

Mr Cameron, Mr Osborne and their cabinet of millionares are the most dangerous, anti-social politicians in modern British history and we need to stop them - soon. And we need Labour councillors who understand ordinary families and their lives. Please get in touch and join our campaign.

Lisa

February 2011