Blog 510 1st January 2026

2 weeks blogless - how does Brentford survive? Probably like me watching ancient films like Jaws and The Godfather on the gogglebox and on one occasion in my case visiting the friendly local Everyman for a new film called Eternity. Sort of fun if a bit empty and no patch on A Matter of Life and Death.

I also got interested in numbers but you can read my erudite thoughts on the universe elsewhere https://www.guylambert.blog/post/numbers-and-a-bit-of-the-universe

That aside I have been fairly inactive, like everybody else. Some discussions about planning, contributing to a Green party response to the plans for 'Albany Riverside' or in English, the redevelopment of the police station, Watermans etc. Personally I am a bit torn. I am desperate to get the horrible - derelict for a couple of decades - police station site redeveloped, and a 'new Watermans' arts centre. But the plans as published have a massive financial hole, no developed plans (or vision, and very little space) for the Arts centre and very little affordable housing of any nature. It is a very far cry from what was approved several years ago and I have little confidence that this is deliverable, even at the poor level which is proposed.

It used to be The Melvinator's speciality (and I didn't always agree) to call for a deferral of the decision. Back in the day there were elections of committee members (at least in the Labour party) which were also hotly contested but Mel, Tony Louki, John Todd and I were all independently-minded and often led lively discussion of applications and sometimes overturned officers' recommendations. My sense now is that Planning is a rubber stamp. I just went through the planning committees last year. A lot of them were cancelled and not a single application was refused or deferred. May be connected by the fact that only one - Conservative John Todd (I used to annoy John by calling us the 'awkward squad' ) and none of the former Labour councillors are longer allowed on that committee. And all but two Labour councillors are on the Special Allowance payroll and one of the two exceptions is the secretary of the Labour Group. Not much independence there (though of course Hina Mir may have lost her allowance after being suspended by Labour after being fined £40,000 by the courts for immigration and employment matters! Private Eye reported as succinctly as ever, where Hounslow is now providing regular infamy.

In fact, there was rarely more than 1 opposer and perhaps a couple of abstentions. Not sure why the council bothers having a planning committee, though of course they rarely do.

Whatever, a Green party comment will go in, and we'll see what happens. If I was a betting man I would not stake my savings, nor even my souvenir "Vote Sadiq Khan for London" mug against the rubber stamp.

What else have I been up to over the Christmas break? Without my usual matching to the calendar, here's a couple of things.

I regularly cycle down the river to Hammersmith via Duke's Meadows and back along Cycle lane 9. Perhaps I should stop doing it because it often does my soul any good (apart from the soul food of following our gorgeous river where it is not blocked off from cycling).

There's one of those industrial flytips that occur there from time to time.

Lovely jubbly. Of course I reported it to Hounslow Highways but they immediately closed it, probably because it is not on the network they are responsible for. I therefore wrote to cabinet members and officers alerting them.

Next, the closed arch underneath the railway has been reopened by vandals (again).

I've always though planters are more attractive and effective if the plants are facing the sky. Also the big one which blocks the road was more effective before it was removed onto the verge.

On the way home I thought I would take a diversion through Gunnersbury Park. People are writing to me suggesting I should object to things going on there, as I used to when it was in my ward before 2022.

It's looking OK and the cafe, once a victim of a fire (arson?) about 5 years ago has been rebuilt and ready to reopen. But other things never change. The house on the corner, which I have been trying to persuade the joint owners Hounslow and Ealing Councils to bring back into use, has of course not changed.

Well, that's not quite true. Somebody has spent a few quid putting a steel plate on at least one of the windows and a spiked barrier across the back alley, where I was dealing with ASB and drug dealing nearly a decade ago.

It is a nice detached house which I assume was once for the park keeper. Empty for at least two decades. I suggested it would make an excellent council house, but the Director of Housing said not viable. I suggested to the leaders of Hounslow and Ealing that it should be sold, perhaps by auction. It will need some work (removing steel bits for one thing!) but I reckon with refurb and a garden fence it must be worth perhaps £1.5M which would come in handy (for example, building a boat house in Brentford). Sadly, nobody takes any notice. Meanwhile the small mansion, stables (listed both) and the Potomac pond and folly remain unrestored and unavailable to the public of Brentford, nor do the derelict site of the old 'model farm' where I once campaigned for a skateboard park to be provided for the local yoof. Nobody seems to be interested.

Somebody wrote to me about this rather handsome tree that lives next to the police station. They asked me to ensure its survival was protected if the redevelopment ever takes place.

I confess I barely remembered there was a tree there but I thought it rather splendid. A greener Green compadre managed to identify it as a "Tree of Heaven" which makes it sound even better. But not so: apparently it is a 'noxious weed and vigorous invasive species' and looking further I found another Green had complained a while ago about the same type of beast lived in the library garden

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ailanthus_altissima

So now I am trying to find out if anything was done about all this invasion.

Oh, and the ward councillor's main responsibility: parking. Someone wrote to me about what he thought was an unjustified parking ticket in Orchard Road. He had parked with 2 feet on the pavement as he and everyone else in Orchard has been doing since Dick Turpin was patrolling around here (almost). Of course I am not allowed to interfere with these important legal cases, admittedly not involving prison (unlike, allegedly 'flytipping' an envelope next to an overflowing bin) but I do, when I see fit. The victim of this had pointed out that had he parked 'illegally' he would have blocked the road, potentially upsetting neighbours and bringing on an assault or similar or at least quite a bit of wailing and gnashing of teeth. This point was made to the officers, who rapidly rescinded the PCN to their considerable credit. I put on my Sherlock deerstalker. outed my magnifying glass and looked at Google Earth. I spotted between the cars a hint of white paint on the footway.

Google Earth now includes historical pictures so I alerted Watson and we perused pictures from 2008. All was revealed

White lines all up the footway. Also it is apparent than parking anything bigger than a vintage Austin 7 would block the road.

That's about it, but I think you should know what the Great British public, assessed by leading pollster YouGov, thinks which party Father Christmas would vote for.

Where Santa goes, the public follows and I expect to have a landslide amongst elves and reindeer come May 7th. I will be campaigning for Votes for Santas.