Brent Council's green bin 'grab and smash'

Brent Council has been collecting green bins this month from those households not willing to pay the £40 annual 'garden tax'.

They collected from the close in which I live about 10 days ago and I don't think any household has kept their green bin.

We were told that the green bins would be stored by the Council for re-use and there was some discussion on Streetlife about possible re-use.

Now a Sudbury Court Estate resident writes:

Good afternoon Martin, 

I  thought you would be interested to know about a recent development in connection with the above.  

At home we compost the majority of our garden waste and did not take up Brent's most very generous offer to pay a surcharge for removal of our garden waste. We were advised that redundant bins would be collected during June. 

Today, two vehicles arrived, one to empty any bins containing waste followed by another to take the bins away. The Contractors then proceeded to smash the wheels and the bottoms of perfectly good bins with a hand axe. A pure act of vandalism and a total waste of resources. How environmentally friendly is that? At a time when Brent Council is whinging about Government cuts forcing them to cut services, they are destroying perfectly good equipment which could be used by others. 

I have issued my comments to our local councillor and chairperson of our Residents Association requesting their comments. 

I hope you can investigate this matter in your usual efficient way. 

With very best regards. 

Sudbury Court Estate Resident.

Can anyone shed light on Brent Council's, or is Veolia's, action?

Walkers get active in Fryent Country Park via Streetlife

It has been great to see local people organising various walking groups in Fryent Country Park  on Streetlife this week. One group is walking in the park as I write this. LINK

Since I made the above video celebrating the park's Green Flag Award, Brent Council has withdrawn from the award and has privatised parks maintenance in the borough. Veolia has taken over the role as part of the Public Realm contract.

I hope that these two decisions do not signal any deterioration in the care of our park.  We are lucky to have the volunteer work of the Barn Hill Conservation Group who are out in the park most weekends clearing litter, maintaining footpaths and enhancing its unique landscape.

Fryent is a wonderful resource and deserves to be better known. With the pressure on green spaces for development it is vital that it is used and valued by local people.

I run nature walks and activities in the park for Brent School Without Walls LINK and many parents accompanying school groups are amazed to discover it for the first time.

On Saturday September 6th Willesden Harvesters, Kensal and Kilburn Fruit Pickers, Mapesbury Pickers the Conservation Group are joinign together to harvest fruit from the 900 or so small trees in the park.

If you are interested in joining them contact: Michael.Stuart6@gmail.com

Controversy over Council, Police, UKBA action in Cricklewood

Combined action by the UK Border Agency, the police and Brent Council on migrant workers has created controversy in Cricklewood which has spilled over intolively debate on the Streetlife forum of the Kilburn Times LINK

The local streets have long been a traditional picking up point for casual building labour in the early morning. It used to be mainly Irish workers but is now generally more recent migrants.

Mapesbury Safer Neighbourhood Team have cuiculated this notice via email, letters and the NW2 Residents' Association:

Some see this crackdown as partly a result of media hostility towards Eastern Europeans and point out that it was not raised as an issue in the past. It appears to reinforce prejudice and increase division when Brent Council was critical of the way UKBA raids on stations and the 'racist van campaign did just that. Nevertheless the Council are cooperating with UKBA in this case seeing it merely in terms of 'anti-social behaviour'.

A further point made is that while migrants are being attacked for living off  benefits they are also attacked when trying to get work.

Asking the public to note down vehicle registration numbers and pass them on to the police is likely to cause considerable controversy.