Sunday 1 July 2018

Lorber invites Brent CEO to take a walk in the park & survey residents' views on the meadows issue

Paul Lorber in Barham Park
Paul Lorber, former Lib Dem councillor has taken up the issue of the state of Brent's parks and the council policy to allow meadows to develop to encourage biodiversity - and to save £450,000 in grass cutting costs. Wembley Matters alerted readers to the proposal and critiqued it nearly a year ago. LINK

Dear Ms Downs

On a sunny summer day Barham Park in Wembley is usually full of people relaxing on the grass, playing games and chasing around with their children.

None of these is happening anymore since Brent Council to stop cutting the grass.

What has been created are not ‘wild meadows’ as has been claimed as these need planning, preparation, proper planting and cultivation - but a mess full of uncut grass and weeds. As a result of Council action local people are being deprived of usable access to the Park - at the height of the summer.

There was of course no proper consultation about this and no proper consideration of the consequences. All the talk of encouraging local people to participate in recreation and exercise is of course a lot of Brent hot air.

As you know schools will break up soon and our Park will be needed by families and their children.

As I was advised that the next cut in a Barham Park will not now take place until October it would seem that Brent Council is happy to ignore the needs of families and their children over the 6 week summer holiday and keep our parks overgrown and neglected.

I cannot imagine that officers could be so irresponsible to recommend this course of action and Councillors so stupid as to accept this advice.

I strongly recommend that you undertake a tour of all the Parks Brent and ask local people what they think of the state of their parks and the current Council policy of effectively keeping them out.

Hopefully such a tour will persuade you that the current position is not acceptable and you will recommend immediate action to get the grass cut and the parks open spaces brought back to an acceptable standard so that local people can once again use and enjoy them.

I look forward to your prompt action on this scandal.

Yours faithfully

Paul Lorber
Local resident and taxpayer and user of Barham Park

6 comments:

Scott said...

If the figure to cut the grass in parks across London to the taxpayer has been £450,000, then this is another fine example of why Labour can't be trusted with our money.

You could employ two people on £50K a year, nearly double national average salary buy them two top of the range ride lawn-mowers at £2000 each, keep the grass cut and still leave them with time to do many other things - saving almost £300K a year.

These people just don't know the value of money. They bleed it.

Sandro said...

Ahh yes Scott....but that would be too difficult for the people that run Brent Council to understand. They think that spending £17 + million pounds for some concrete steps for Wembley Stadium is good value for money so what chance would they have in understanding your common sense point above!

Anonymous said...

Goes to show what happens as soon as the elections are over - all the promises of great things disappear and are replaced with stupid ideas. Didn't expect it to happen this quick though!

Anonymous said...

You should take a look at the goal post in Fyrant Park near the Barnhill entrance. Took my nephew there for a kick around yesterday afternoon, and the goal looked like it was about to collapse. H&S need to get over there pronto!

Jaine Lunn said...

It will be interesting to see what the response will be, I agree with Scott I have been banging on for years about the state of King Eddies Park since we lost our Park Wardens and maintenance or lack of it was transferred to Veolia. It would seem a pointless PR exercise was executed under the Queen Elizabeth Jubilee 2012 to "Protect the Park in Perpetuity by assigning Fields in Trust as Trustees. It would seem they have no powers but to ensure it can't be built on, and no power to force the Council to ensure it is maintained to a high standard. Never ever to receive a green flag again.

Martin Francis said...

I reported the fact the the goal post was down more than a year ago and asked for its reinstatement. The last time I looked it was propped up against a tree.