Forum Topic

Grimebusters Hotline - a flop?

Just read the latest headline and it is astonishing to think that only 2 calls per day to this hotline is costinng the Council a whopping £182 per call!To save money why not just close this hotline and ask people to report any problems to fixmystreet.com. ?Another sugestion - why not ask for more volunteers to become Streetwatchers?Surely we cannot afford to waste money in this way?

Jean F Fernandez ● 5209d23 Comments

Cllr Mahfouz's Grimebusters hotline is getting less than two calls a day so he will appreciate some support from his cabinet colleague Cllr Tailor.

Phil Taylor ● 5194d

I get what you mean about small businesses. There are lots of bookkeepers, gardeners, builders, etc. in Ealing. The thing is that I only see Ealing Council trying to help shopkeepers; the Southall "white elephant" carpark that is planned is an example of this thinking. There does not seem to be any help for other small businesses.

Maggie Tomlinson ● 5204d

There is a lot more to local businesses than "small filthy convenience stores" as you put it (which in any case only exist because people find them useful).Small businesses are the single biggest employers in the country.  It is damned hard work running one.  I'm quite sure that the majority of "public servants" would crumple before they had even got as far as filing their first VAT return - the fruits of which help to keep these vast armies of public "servants" in work in the first place.Besides, it's all about pressure groups.  If the majority can't or won't visit sufficient pain on our elected betters then nothing will ever change.

Tony Colliver ● 5206d

> The value of the difference between Ealing staff > Ts and Cs and the kind of Ts and Cs most people > have at work is about £30 million. This is what *REALLY* disgusts me about the way that our government services (local or otherwise) are run.I am absolutely sick to the back teeth of being expected to continue to fund the extraordinary privileges accorded to those in the public sector.

Tony Colliver ● 5206d

Here! Here!What about doing what the majority want and not some party hacks, proprietors of small filthy convenience shops ("local businesses"), and property developers (Arcadia, Dickens Yard) want.

Maggie Tomlinson ● 5206d

Doesn't it inspire you, as a mere resident, to see Messers. Mahfouz and Taylor slogging it out?No, thought not, me neither.The cuts were coming, due to profligate spending, and now we have the well-known profligate spenders (remember 'Response' and the great success that was?) trying to justify closing day centres and building unneeded car parks while those who oppose them simply oppose them.I would love the day to come when those who seek public office (don't forget to hand back your basic £9,200 councillor's allowances lads - these together would add up to a saved day centre) actually work together for the common good without hiding behind party ploitical barricades. A utopian ideal I am unlikely to see in my lifetime sadly.

Nigel Brooks ● 5206d

Simple making one of Ealing Council's top ten executives redundant would ensure the survival of the Albert Dane Day Centre for the disabled if the saving is really only £156,000 a year!

Maggie Tomlinson ● 5206d

Cllr Mahfouz,You seem to have changed the subject.  Perhaps you could tell readers here how many times Labour put up an alternative budget during the four years you were in opposition.  I am sure that you never did.  The £6.5 million figure you have used is derived from Labour's own press release.  Here:http://www.ealinglabour.com/ealing-conservatives-challenged-to-provide-alternativeIt is hilariously wrong.  The Albert Dane saving figure as stated in both cabinet papers and budget papers is £156K not £536K.  The PCSO figure should be £250K not £750K.  The property strategy figure in the actual budget is £1,383K not £1,970K.  That chops £1.467 million of your figure straight away in simple Labour errors.  Most of the saving in the property strategy is from squeezing people into Perceval House.  No problem with that.  The bit no-one likes is building three shiny new offices for council staff.  Again with parking I don't think any Tories have suggested that we would continue to freeze charges but merely that after a four year freeze Labour's increase was a bit eye watering.  I cannot recall anyone complaining about the digitisation of the CCTV infrastructure.  I think that takes another £2 million out of your £6.5 million leaving maybe £3 million I would like to put back in.  The value of the difference between Ealing staff Ts and Cs and the kind of Ts and Cs most people have at work is about £30 million.  I think we could find your outstanding £3 million with some gentle negotiation with the council's own staff. 

Phil Taylor ● 5206d

Cllr Taylor,You had the chance to put forward your alternative budget at the start of the month... let us all know exactly where you would have made the savings to fund the items you stated you wouldn't cut.Unless I am suffering from a terrible case of amnesia, I seem to recall that despite your group being nearly five times the size of the Lib Dem group, you didn't put forward an alternative.That means that your shadow cabinet (which outnumbers the cabinet!) didn't have the time or the inclination to ask the officers for some help with basic sums on the things you claim to care about.  At least the Lib Dems gave it a shot.Given it is your government that is imposing these massive cuts targeted specifically on local government I would have thought you had a moral duty to put forward your alternative.  But you didn't.You bottled it.Over the past 10 months your group pledged to overturn £6.5m worth of savings.  With no proposed or worked through alternative savings this can mean only one thing.Your alternative budget was an 8% increase in every single council tax bill across the borough.8% in the first year of what could have been a Tory administration, heaven only knows what you'll propose next year!If you feel you have some worked through alternative savings then perhaps you should have spoken to your party leadership before the budget meeting... do you think they let you down by not agreeing your proposals?  Perhaps they're not listening to you any more because they know you are a liability?I suppose there's only one way to fix it Phil and that's to stand and become Ealing Conservative Group Leader in May.  Good luck with that! Happy to offer what help I can to your campaign.Best wishes,Cllr Mahfouz

Bassam Mahfouz ● 5206d

Cllr Mahfouz,Your £5.5 million figure for management cuts is not one that appears in the budget papers, at least not the ones made public online.  The budget papers show that £2.455 million will be saved on management costs next year.  That said this number mainly relates to very low level team leaders, assistants, etc.  Very little attempt has been made to curtail senior management costs next year.  The budget sees very senior management numbers unchanged next year, the top 21 who cost us £2.9 million per annum.At the Overview and Scrutiny Committee meeting on 2nd December where we looked at the budget I challenged the council’s chief executive as to why we were seeing immediate 50% cuts in some frontline services whilst management costs were largely unchanged. He explained that only 7 out of 77 service heads (the layer that sits underneath the top 21 referred to above) had so far been put at risk as a result of the current proposals. So that is a 9% cut in service heads.  The budget has seen immediate 50% cuts in many frontline services but has left the senior management at the council largely unscathed.  The time to make big changes in the senior management team was May 7th last year the day after the election.  Labour has let us down badly. 

Phil Taylor ● 5206d

With respect, Councillor, why do we need to have graffiti removal teams working the weekends? Surely it would make more sense to remove the graffiti 9-to-5 weekdays when it does not incur higher weekend working costs?

Maggie Tomlinson ● 5207d

Maggie,You state that you want to get rid of the hotline (020 8825 8825), not the graffiti removal service. As I have said in my quote on the article (http://www.ealingtoday.co.uk/default.asp?section=info&link=http://nnet-server.com/server/common/congrimebustersea002.htm), and the figures actually show:* The cost of an 'out of hours' phone call is £1.85* The vast bulk of the cost is actually ensuring we have graffiti teams on the weekends - i.e. a real service improvement* The latter costs will be subsumed as part of a new graffiti contract very soonThe 'underlying resources' for the hotline are staff taking calls on a 'pay per call' basis at £1.85 each call. The most important part of the hotline was the improved service level agreement which means a 24 hour turnaround on reported graffiti to ensure we keep on top of this problem and deter 'artists' from doing it in our borough.  Making Ealing Cleaner is a real priority not just for this administration (one we are very much delivering on) but also for our residents.On your other point, at least £5.5m will be cut in management, so I am not sure where your source of information is.Best wishes,Cllr Bassam MahfouzCabinet Member for Environment & Transportwww.twitter.com/BassamMahfouz

Bassam Mahfouz ● 5207d

Like I said, I'm with Guy Fawkes on this.  :-)

Tony Colliver ● 5207d

Ealing is known as political bellweather in terms of indicating change in the country as a whole at election time, or so the pundits have said. However, I fear that we really see in Ealing is election of two equally bad (from a professional perspective) dominant political groups: Ealing Labour Group, and the Ealing Conservatives. Neither delivers what they promise the electorate and so whoever is in power in the Council gets booted out as a protest vote. The next lot in fail to deliver and so they get booted out, etc., etc. It has nothing to do with policies it is just a reflectioni that they are equally awful.The Conservatives groom rats on the allotments while the Labour Group groom their trade union buddies who work for the council. No one actually consistently improves and polices baseline services properly or does any cost/benefit analysis of the services Ealing provides.What should we do?

Maggie Tomlinson ● 5207d

> For a party that sets out to be inclusive and to > help those least well off its actions have been bizarreI agree - in fact, 'bizarre' doesn't even begin to describe it.Still, I suppose the electorate gets the scumbags that it votes for...  nobody else to blame but themselves.(Personally, I prefer Guy Fawkes solution...)

Tony Colliver ● 5207d

Thank you for your kind comment. I meant redeploying the resources underlying the Grimebusters hotline NOT the graffit removal service itself. I am just finding the Labout Groups logic unfathomable. For a party that sets out to be inclusive and to help those least well off its actions have been bizarre. No cuts in management in Ealing Council yet the least able are being hit most.

Maggie Tomlinson ● 5207d

The grafitti team are also responding to reports by Streetwatchers as well as the reports sent to fixmystreet.com

Jean F Fernandez ● 5207d

I would not agree with you that graffiti does not usually harm people.  If left it leads to a slow but sure degradation of the environment for everybody, and that most assuredly does harm people - lots of them.However to compare graffiti cleaning services directly with care for the disadvantaged in society is of course a false dichotomy to some degree.Nevertheless, personally it is a no-brainer to me to close down the £182 per call "hotline" and have graffiti incidents reported by email / the council web site.I would then be very happy to see the fruits (something in excess of £80,000 per annum by my reckoning based on £182 per call and two calls per day) of this efficiency saving redeployed to whichever alternate cause is judged by your good self to be the most deserving.

Tony Colliver ● 5207d

I have to admit that I would prefer to see proper inclusive facilities for the disabled and the mentally ill in Ealing rather than having all the graffiti cleared up. Graffiti does not usually harm people. A lack of social care does.

Maggie Tomlinson ● 5207d

As far as I can see the GrimeBusters are doing a good job.I frequently see them attending to fresh graffiti in a timely manner all over the borough.You may be lucky enough to live in a street or area that is relatively untroubled by the idiot youths who roam about armed with spray cans and marker pens.I, unfortunately, do not, and therefore have to put up with the consequences of their actions on a regular basis.Long may the GrimeBusters team prosper and survive say I.

Tony Colliver ● 5207d

It seems pretty obvious to me that the grimebusters vanity service resources should be redeployed to keep the disabled day centres going as well as the LINKS service. Does anyone disagree (apart from the knee-jerk-looney-left types in the Ealing Labour Group and the Trade Union Club)?

Maggie Tomlinson ● 5207d

How many other Ealing Council services are a flop on this basis? The cost of even the reduced numbers of envirocrime officers is not justifiable in terms of the outcome of their own actions. There are probably more instances of services that Ealing Council should not be providing on the basis of no justification in terms of costs!

Maggie Tomlinson ● 5209d

The trouble with populism like Grimebusters (an egoistical councillors Ghostbusters) even on occasion when it takes the eye, is that funding and resources are stripped from the regular and steady maintenance of services required by residents. A visual example to jog memories would be lamp posts remaining unpainted for donkeys years. More abstract to some would be the reduction in road resurfacing expenditure, easily unnoticed for four of five years, but a false economy which only results in many poor road surfaces requiring expensive work at the same time. 

Robert Darke ● 5209d