A14 News Welcomed

All cross your fingers for some good news tomorrow on the A14.

We need more Tarmac not just fiddling about with junctions in the way that Julian Huppert seems to be suggesting. If he is serious he must be the only person in the county that thinks that way with the exception of a small number of Cambridge City Lib Dems who seem to float through a world that lacks reality. Must be like living in a marshmallow, all soft and gooey, but not of any real use to anyone. See below the press release.

“Transport chiefs at Cambridgeshire County Council have welcomed news that improving the A14 could be included in the Chancellor’s Autumn statement tomorrow, Tuesday.

The County Council has been leading, with our partners and local MPs, a campaign to make sure the vital road improvements stay on the Government’s agenda.

The Council has been in talks with Government and ministers arguing the road needs increased capacity and improved performance to help unlock housing and business development at places such as Northstowe and Alconbury.

These improvements are vital to help drive forward the economic prosperity of Cambridgeshire and the UK.

Cambridgeshire County Council Leader Nick Clarke, said: “The fact that Government is taking the A14 issue seriously is down to the long and sustained campaign we have been leading on with our partners. Improving the A14 is vital for improving safety, supporting business and reducing congestion. But it is not just vital locally it is important regionally, nationally and internationally. At the moment it is a barrier to growth at a time when Cambridgeshire could help kick start the economy.

“We have argued that it needs increased capacity and improved performance so that the traffic flows freely and unlocks housing development and business opportunity at places such as Alconbury and Northstowe. We have made these arguments strongly to Government and it looks like they have been listening. The news of Government’s strong commitment to finding a solution is a great step forward but we will continue to push for the process to be carried out speedily and turn from talk to tarmac.”

Health and Wellbeing Board – District network meeting

Cllr Sue Ellington was selected by all the districts to represent the district views on the health and wellbeing board.

We met at SCDC today, together with Tony Orgee, Cabinet member for H&WB. Sue is doing a great job ensuring the districts are fully represented and wanted to check with me that her progress was in the right direction. A brilliant start.

Care Network Cambridgeshire

Interesting meeting with the chief officer of this charity. They do some excellent work in helping to support vulnerable adults.

I was able to signal my positive view on charitable work. I explained I welcome working with charities but, but, the business case must stack up. If a charity can provide the same or better service at less cost or in some other way add value then I am up for it. We can not assume all charity work is efficient or the best. It has to be proven.

What we must always remember is the output for the people of Cambridgeshire at a price they can afford.

Source Cambridgeshire – opportunities for local business

http://www.sourcecambridgeshire.co.uk

The day after the government revealed a package of “radical reforms” aimed at making it easier for British firms to bid for government contracts, I was delighted to hear news about Source Cambridgeshire.

Businesses often tell me we should work harder to ensure local businesses are aware of opportunities to win Council contracts. This website does just that and also includes opportunities to win work from South Cambridgeshire DC and the County’s Fire and Rescue Service.

Source Cambridgeshire is a new central advertising portal for contract opportunities in Cambridgeshire and the East Midlands. We shall be using the site to advertise all tender opportunities over £30,000. It is an interactive website where suppliers can register and sign-up to receive email alerts for tender opportunities in their chosen area of business.

On the portal, suppliers will be able to see a list of:

• Live Contracts – contract opportunities currently advertised.
• Recurring Contracts – which they may be able to bid for in the future.
• Awarded Contracts – which may provide sub-contracting opportunities.

Please do make businesses aware of the website.

There’s also an iPhone App – search the App Store for Source East Midlands to find it.

Leaders and Chief Officers meeting

This is an informal meeting of all the chief execs and leaders from the districts, police, fire and NHS as well as myself and Mark Lloyd.

We had a really good discussion and agreed a work plan for the Cambridgeshire Public Services Board as well as discussing data sharing, financial strategies, the A14, changes in the Health Service and better management of public sector assets. As well as the formal discussions, the meeting always presents a great opportunity to address some bi-lateral issues including a discussion today with the Chief Constable about data-sharing with the Youth Offending Service.

Guest Speaker at the Cambridge Union debate on the Human Rights Act

It was my honour and pleasure to be invited to speak at a Cambridge Union debate on the Human Rights Act last night. It was a lively affair as you would expect with the Lib Dems on one side and us Conservatives on the other.

You can feel the history and sense the great men and women who have spoken at this famous institution.

It seems, from the feedback, that I didn’t let the side down. Phew.

Always good to listen to bright people, what ever their age.

CCS Open Distribution Centre – New Jobs Created

It was my great pleasure to formally open this new distribution centre. It will improve efficiency and drive down costs. I had an opportunity to eat a school meal and I have to say I did not recognise it as one. It was tasty, not over cooked and I am told very balanced.

A great success story that is likely to produce revenue for the Council as well as providing a fantastic service for our schools and meeting the need to provide balanced meals for our children.

In June of this year, Cambridgeshire Catering & Cleaning Services, (CCS) was awarded a 4/5 year contract, to supply school meals to Northamptonshire Schools from September 2011. This is in addition to supplying the schools in Cambridgeshire. All the meals will be prepared and delivered from CCS’s production centre, which is based in Huntingdon and are expected to reach 18,000 meals per day once all the Northamptonshire schools are up and running.

To meet this demand, CCS has had to secure additional facilities and has now separated the two major elements of the work involved. All food production is undertaken from the operations original facilities at C3, on the Ermine Business Park in Huntingdon. All distribution will now be from the new Distribution Centre at Tower Close, in Huntingdon.

The securing of this contract has lead to a number of full and part time jobs being created, for production and delivery staff, with the number of meals produced each year expected to top 4 million.

2030 Vision for the Cambridge sub region.

This was my second meeting of this group who are looking to identify the right conditions and provide the right businesses to grow the sub region.

There was a good turn out from the County Council of both officers and members. I was flattered to have our vision of “Cambridgeshire is open for business” shared with everyone. This was building on my last visit to the group when I was one of the guest speakers.

I had a challenge laid at my door to make it easier to find the signpost to the right civic leadership on our website. A fine question I will be addressing.

South Cambs and City Learning Disability Team visit

Well, well, well, yet again I find another dedicated team serving the people of Cambridgeshire. I am always heartened by the calibre of our staff and in this case a forward thinking, results driven team who fully understand the need for strong financial controls as well as the best possible care. Excellent team spirit and ethos.

I enjoyed the briefing and meeting the team. It was not long before we were chatting about all sorts. Despite me being normally provocative, to stimulate the debate, they had answers for most things and seem ahead of the game in many areas.

I did pick up a number of process issues that do not make sense to me and seem to be getting in the way of our staff. Suffice to say these are now in hand.

Lib Dem front bench casualty of allowances review

I have no idea why the Lib Dems call themselves Liberals. In reality they turn on each other at the drop of a hat. Kilian Bourke is set to rule his group with a rod of iron it seems! Probably more like a ripe banana in reality but his intentions are clear.

Geoff Heathcock, an honourable and hard working County Councillor, has been forced to give up his opposition health brief because he dared to have a different view to his group when it was supposed to be a free vote. Now, I don’t agree with many of Geoff’s views but I do believe that he had the right to vote in any way he chose, if his leader had really allowed a free vote.

My Conservative group were given the free vote and exercised that right. Quite right too on such matters.

Kilian Bourke seems to have fallen into the trap of only just staying on the side of truth by a technicality. A dangerous place for a politician. Didn’t Bill Clinton try that defence???

On the 2nd Dec I wrote to Kilian Bourke to ask who was on his front bench as it all seemed to be a muddle. I noted that the one front bench member I knew WAS still there was Geoff.

On the 7th Dec Lib Dem County Councillor Belinda Brookes-Gordon tweeted about Geoff in the past tense as a result of my blog. She subsequently apologised for this error and Kilian Bourke confirmed that she had made this error and Geoff was still on the front bench. He even urged me to speak with democratic services to confirm this.

And now, on friday, we find out that Geoff has in fact been shoved out because he dared to listen to the debate in the chamber and use his “free vote”. It seems he has lost the confidence of his group.

My view is that Geoff is more effective than most of his group put together. Shame.