Polls Apart (From Watford Observer)

Polls Apart

3:14pm Thursday 30th April 2009 in News By Doug Lawson

No-one wants to buy a “similar property in the area”; there are no offers of six pizzas for the price of one or suggestions of help landscaping my postage-stamp sized back garden this week. There’s a new super power in the battle for the letterbox and it is printed locally on fully recycled toilet paper. Yes, its Election time again and this week the two big players (or so they claim) want to share their thoughts with us all. So instead of glossy leaflets with unfeasibly colourful foodstuffs and badly spelled ingredients, there are broadsheet-sized, but red-top styled newsletters instead. Nothing from the Tories yet; I imagine they’re still playing Pin the Pandemic on the Prime Minister.

Despite the obvious conceit, the papers do share one thing with the real newspapers they mimic though – bad news!

Labour, who gave us the Controlled Parking Zones (CPZ) and whose work is apparently now complete, tell us the Liberal Democrats are “failing on parking”. Now, they say, it is up to the Liberal Democrats to appease the masses, by squeezing all the extra cars, taxis and white vans into the Streets of the area; Streets built in the 19th century, when the only transport was made of wood or said “Neigh” while providing fertilizer for the roses. We’re told this is not as difficult as it sounds, due to the vast sums of money the Lib Dems are “raking in” from parking meters and fines.

The Lib Dems meanwhile are also interested in keeping the public happy; they listened carefully to public voice and have decided the way forward is to park skips in the streets to aid with tidying up. I only hope they remember to give the skips Visitor’s Parking Permits for the duration of their stay. It might be an idea to have at least one of their skips follow Labour’s Nigel Bell round the area. In the newsletter he takes us on a tour of Vicarage/Holywell where those naughty Lib Dems have been wantonly allowing trees to grow roots, letting white van men park outside allotments and fly-tippers to err... tip flies. The worst offence by far though, was allowing the Croxley View sign to become grubby; fortunately Nigel was on hand to ask for it to be cleaned or replaced, as well as posing for a photo (go on Nigel, give it a wipe with your hanky!) Both parties are also worried about the state of the local roads and in particular potholes, though they also seem confused about who is responsible. Labour blame Lib Dems, who in turn blame the Tories. They’re both wrong of course, it’s actually secret option C – “all the money was spent on traffic calming measures” (I was surprised to find that potholes are not in this category).

The Lib Dems are also concerned about scheduled roadworks in Vicarage Road – gas main repairs and then a subsequent resurfacing. Susan Gaszczak says “Ideally we would have seen both schemes carried out at once” Ideally? I’d say it should be compulsory. Also of concern is the Highways Agency’s planned work on the M25 which will lead to increased traffic on Whippendell Road. It seems that Susan’s plan is to count the extra cars, then “complain and try to get the Highways Agency to reconsider the scheme”. Excellent. Tesco Metro can rest safe in the knowledge that their delivery of cheap plonk will not be hindered – Susan is going to ask Scoop, Muck and Dizzy to fix it another way.

Meanwhile back to the problem of rubbish; Labour would also like to remind us that they formerly took away three “bulky items” for free, but those greedy Lib Dems want £25 for the same service. It’s not clear what sort of bulky item they took away or where they used to put it for that matter, I wonder if the unexplained hole in Labour’s accounts during their tenure would be big enough to qualify? Does anyone know where they put that bulky item?

Of course they’re not alone in their problems with calculations: on one side of the Lib Dem’s newsletter is a breakdown of the “hike” in Council Tax by the Conservatives, which it implies is far too high. Turn the sheet over and there is a section complaining that the Conservatives rejected a proposed £3m investment in road repairs and maintenance, to keep down the costs. That would be the costs that contribute to the increase in … err … Council Tax. When you finish reading the newsletter you can make it into your very own Moaning Möbius Strip.

The problem with all the “information” in these newsletters is that it is largely just finger pointing. Valuable opportunities are lost in a sea of rhetoric. Bulky items shouldn’t be the responsibility of anyone but their owner (Google Freecycle for an example of how this can work). Residents should be encouraged to take some pride and personal responsibility for their living environment rather than being taught to look to their council to tidy up the mess they sweep out of their nests. Neighbours with big cars or vans, should be persuaded to help neighbours without. Neighbourhood watch could become Neighbourhood Join In. Of course if you have a second home within an easy commute of your first, the question of where your neighbourhood actually is, does arise, but most of us don’t have that burden I suspect.

It’s probably a pipedream, but maybe, just maybe if the main political parties all stopped scoring cheap points, they could start playing the game, focused on the real issues that would otherwise get lost.