Welcome to the third edition of my regular monthly column for the Erewash Conservatives Website.

Much of my focus during October has been on producing the Conservative submission to the Boundaries Commission regarding ward boundaries and names, following their decision that Erewash will have 47 Councillors, a reduction of 4, with effect from the next Borough elections in May 2015. The Commission have called for ideas on how the various wards should look like and the closing date for this exercise is 11 November. They will then give this matter a lot of thought and publish a draft decision on the warding arrangements in February 2014. There will then be a further consultation period before a final decision is made.

The main Boundaries Commission’s requirement is that wherever possible, each Councillor should represent the same number of electors. In practise this is not possible, but there should be no variance greater than 10%, whether plus or minus, from their figure of 1,893. They are also very keen on reflecting community interests and identities. They like strong easily identifiable boundaries and wish the result to help the Borough Council deliver effective and convenient local government.

The Conservative submission reflects these priorities and we have tried to ensure that most of our rural wards are unchanged and keep the same boundaries as their Parish Councils. It is much more difficult in Ilkeston and Long Eaton, but we have tried to limit the disruption to electors which occurs when boundaries change. I would encourage residents to write or email the Boundaries Commission www.lgbce.org.uk with their views.

Early in the month I attended the raising of the Green Flag at Victoria Park in Ilkeston. This was the third year in a row the Council had been given this National award, which reflects the excellent way the Park is cared for, both by Council staff and local residents .

There was a Full Council meeting on 10th October, which was unusually a relatively pleasant experience with not much of the usual rude and disrespectful behaviour from the Opposition. Long may this continue.  I would much rather all Councillors work together for the good of Erewash, than the confrontations we have seen in the past. The Council meetings are now filmed, so whether that had an impact I could not say. I am hoping that arrangements can be made for future meetings to be streamed onto the internet, but it depends on cost.

The following day was the presentations to the winners of Erewash in Bloom which was held at Morley Hays Golf Course, a lovely venue. There were once again more entries than the previous year and the various winning gardens were truly beautiful and I was very glad I did not have to separate them. My congratulations to all the winners.

I attended the Long Eaton and South Erewash Community Forum at Long Eaton Town Hall, when we heard a presentation on the future of the NHS Erewash Clinical Commissioning Group. After that, many questions were asked about what was going to happen when the Long Eaton Fire Station was closed and replaced by a smaller one somewhere in the Breaston area which would rely on “retained firemen”. This would mean Long Eaton would lose its full-time fire fighters. Residents were up in arms, especially when they heard that the only Erewash public consultation would be on Ilkeston Market Place on 9th November. Let us hope it doesn’t rain! However Labour’s Councillor Hosker who is the Chairman of the Derbyshire Fire Authority, which will make the final closure decision, was there and he promised to try to get a public consultation event indoors in Long Eaton.

The other main talking point was the County Council’s plan to replace the flower beds and trees at The Green in Long Eaton with a square of tarmac and four sets of traffic lights. The pedestrian refuges on the stretch of Derby Road between Eaton Farm and the centre of Long Eaton would also be removed and replaced with yet more pedestrian controlled traffic lights. The intention is to try to reduce cycle accidents, but in my view the knock-on effect on the flow of traffic along Derby Road would create havoc. There is already a main National cycle path parallel with Derby Road through West Park which the Borough Council have recently resurfaced and that does not appear to have been considered as an alternative at all. If residents object they should contact the County Council.

As a change from politics, I went to the Chatsworth Centre to hear a talk on the battle of Rorke’s Drift in the Zulu wars given by a guide from South Africa. He was excellent and I believe the Rotary Club of Long Eaton Dawnbreakers raised a large sum towards helping a school in Ghana.

Also, non-political was the Annual General Meeting of the Pennywest Neighbourhood Watch and Residents Association, which I chair, that was held at West Park Leisure Centre. We heard from the Head of Customer Services at EMH Homes (the new name for Three Valleys Housing) followed by Jessica Lee, our MP, who spoke about the success of the Jobs Fair and life in Parliament to an interested audience. She then spent some time answering questions from residents.