SBC in School Safety Shocker

It seems Health & Safety rules have passed at least some SBC-run schools - for about 25 years! - when the Paper Boy was at school in "that England" in the 1980s you weren't allowed in the wood- or metalwork workshops if you had long hair, a tie on or anything that projected from your body by more than half-an-inch.

The final arbiter of this was "Stan" who apparently lived in the workshop since nobody ever saw him arrive or leave - and every workshop the Paper Boy has been in since has had a "Stan" - and his sole raison d'etre and entertainment was scaring the life out of the unversed users of the workshop with stories of fingers drilled off and eyeballs pulled out by spinning lathes, and the like. He was also the one that sent you to the stores for a long stand (or for variety - a long weight), left-handed screwdrivers, tartan paint and the like.

Obviously a life in the Borders is less valuable now than one in England was 25 years ago.

Funny how some things just pop up from nowhere

The Southern Reporter (a sister publication of the Berwickshire News concentrating in the 'bricht lichts' of Roxburghshire & beyond) apparently carried the story last week that the new supermarket in Kelso is to get the go ahead. For those that care it's not option "T" but option "S" that's going to get the formal nod on October 25th by the planning committee.

Duns councillor welcomes new houses - 50 objections

The BBC News website reports that the SBC Councillor for Duns (previously mentioned here for bizarre letters to the Berwickshire News) has welcomed the plans for 62 additional houses in the town despite 50 objections received by the planners at SBC. Is this a wise move less than 6 months from election day?

Recycling - Pay per bag if you're a school

Seemingly hell bent on being the most laughable local authority in the country, SBC are levying a charge of 60p per bag of recycling collected from it's own schools. You couldn't make this stuff up.

The wheels of SBC turn slowly

Following on from the condescending communication by SBC concerning misaddressing three months ago and our collective follow-up via the community council, The Community Council at the seeming behest of SBC's Duns Office has asked us all for the same information once more ahead of a public meeting - date and venue to be arranged.

The more interaction I have with SBC, the more convinced I become that there are too many amateurs involved at too many levels.

SBC Leader considers standing down in May 2007

BBC News website reports that the erstwhile ex-SNP-turned-independent leader of SBC is considering standing down at the May 2007 elections. One consideration is that he wants to start a family but leading SBC is a 100% commitment others mentioned are "private sector job offers" and electoral ward changes. As part of the electorate, one hopes (optimistically rather than realistically) that there is no nepotism involved.

For those not versed in Scottish politics - the SNP is a party that is campaigning for Scottish independence, the Conservatives (full title the Conservative and Unionist Party) are pro-Unionist or alternatively anti-independence. Strangely the leader of the SBC resigned the SNP whip to become independent and lead a coalition with the Conservatives.

And they say "Power Corrupts"....

I fear that we have awakened a sleeping giant and filled him with a terrible resolve

Powerful words, allegedly spoken by Admiral Yamamoto after the bombing of Pearl Harbor in December 1941.

Following up on yesterday's letter, I called it's author at SBC to discuss some points. After a protracted conversation I was left no further forward in getting to the bottom of the issue. The end of the conversation was a suggestion to get in touch with the Community Council - via a non-existent noticeboard.

After some considerable digging I unearthed a contact for Community Engagement at SBC. I contacted her and was offered an incorrect email address. After yet more digging I located the correct email address for the Community Council chairman and sent him an email enquiring where and when the next Community Council meeting was to take place and that the process was to get an item on the agenda.

Within 30 minutes a response was forthcoming with an invitation to call him to discuss why I wanted to speak to the assembled council. I called. Some 45 minutes later, after outlining the letter and my response to it, I got off the phone with an action step to canvas my neighbours in East & West Mews.

I constructed a quick note to the neighbours and delivered it (at the time of writing) 4 hours ago. So far out of 21 leaflets sent, I've had representations from 6. All in the same boat as me to a greater or lesser extent. Three of them have already responded to the SBC author, many in very similar terms to my own letter, two of the others have decided that as they are now "not alone" that they too are going to respond to the SBC author.

The man at SBC, I fear, does not know what he has ignited here - feelings are running high and he is the current target of venomous words from otherwise peaceable citizens. I'm looking forward to the response to my missive that should land on his desk on Friday morning.

A condescending communication from SBC

I arrived home today to be greeted by a letter from Scottish Borders Council. The letter is addressed to all residents of my and the next street.

In it an officer of SBC writes (in the style of a teacher admonishing an errant child) that we are all upsetting some residents of another nearby street with a similar name by not giving our addresses correctly. His implied conjecture is that we are doing this on purpose by wilfully giving our addresses in an ambiguous format.

Several things about this letter have annoyed me.... The content implies that only the residents of the nearby street are affected. This is far from the truth. The fact that we as residents are responsible for the situation and we are required to make changes. There is no similar call for those in the nearby street to show some understanding and community spirit in directing the misguided drivers etc to the right destinations.

The tone of this letter from SBC has prompted me to write a substantial letter in reply pointing out that not one of these problems actually has a root cause with the residents that are now being vilified by the council and suggesting some ways forward to improve the situation.

The highlights of my response are these:

Our street is currently called "East Mews Acacia Avenue" (not really - names changed to protect the innocent) the next one is called "West Mews Acacia Avenue", although it was "Acacia Avenue East Mews" when we moved in and SBC changed it without telling us about 3 months later. Cue another round of address changing shenanigans. The other affected street being "Acacia Avenue".

Some buffoon somewhere decided that it was a super idea to incorporate an existing street name into two new streets - it should be noted that the streets were not named by their residents, but by an element of SBC apparently acting on the suggestion of the community council. I seek clarification of who took the decision, who was present and what part they all played in the process. Of course this makes every wrong address the fault of the residents of East & West Mews.

Address format - Most companies will now ask for a postcode and a house number. They will then automatically fill the address information from the Royal Mail Postcode Address File (PAF). They then do not allow editing of that pre-filled address – it comes from the PAF, therefore as far as the company is concerned it is correct. Depending on the version of the PAF in use in our case it's either "East Mews Acacia Avenue" or "Acacia Avenue East Mews" - even so when it's correct it runs to 27 characters without the house number - Royal Mail's maximum in the defined format for the PAF is 30, other systems in use that I know of are as low as 23. So any misguided deliveries are naturally entirely the fault of the residents of East & West Mews!

Utility companies – Without exception I provided both gas and electricity companies with the supply point identification number, which according to OFGEM pinpoints a supply regardless of any address on record. Despite this both Scottish Power and Scottish Gas managed to change the account for the corresponding house in Acacia Avenue. My fault of course!

Deliveries - Since the first day I took possession of the property, Royal Mail’s delivery staff have, with one exception, found the right letterbox into which to deliver mail. The error in that case was confusion between East & West Mews whilst 1 West Mews was still under construction. Courier Companies are much more problematic, they continue to attempt to deliver packages to “Acacia Avenue” even when the address on the package contains terms like “next door to 39 Acacia Avenue” in addition to the correct address. As a resident, I have little control over the apparent inability of the delivery driver to read the address. On one occasion I’ve been forced to drive halfway across the country to retrieve a package because it’s been refused by the resident of Acacia Avenue, with no good grace to point the driver 500 yards down the road. When I get an occasional enquiry from a courier seeking an address I do my best to help because I know what a pain it is to have to drive 60+ miles round trip to pick up from the "local" depot (at least one of courier's depots is 164 miles round trip along winding country roads - allow 2h each way if traffic is light, add 20 litres of fuel at 98.9p/litre locally). Not to worry - it's all my fault, nothing to do with the resident of Acacia Avenue getting an occasional knock on the door because the delivery driver can't or won't read the address on the package, and I'm not inconvenienced at all by a 4h round trip costing me £20 to pick up a package that she refused to direct 500 yards. She's upset, I'm fuming having wasted four hours and spent £20 unnecessarily.

Tradespeople – I noted with some amusement at the time my stair carpet was delivered that the fitter had been to the right house number in “Acacia Avenue” which is a bungalow, and one would naturally assume not usually equipped with a staircase requiring carpeting. Again he had the full correct address and his additional notes said “next door to 39 Acacia Avenue”. That's right - my fault - my omniscience didn't run to knowing that a carpet fitter wouldn't try to fit a stair carpet to a bungalow!

The letter that has provoked me runs to 4 paragraphs - my response is 6 pages. It appears that this officer of the SBC is in for some unexpected 'light reading' on Friday morning when the letter arrives at Council HQ.

What chance of any success in getting a response? Personally I think the chance of a satisfactory response is almost nil, although I shall persist in writing until such time as I get a satisfactory response, assuming SBC don't change the name of the street again of course!

Bloody Henry!

An SBC crew (of 2) turned up today to replace the green-lidded bin delivered in error with a composter bin, which they last did on March 16th..... This time the gadgies (neither of whom were the original gadgy) went away muttering about "Bloody Henry" - presumably the wildly efficient original gadgy that arrived on March 16th. I can only assume "Bloody Henry" didn't update some jobsheet somewhere in the depot - too busy doing the job I suppose.

ASAP happened today

SBC have exceeded all expectations and today the composter (in lieu of the green-lidded bin) and the lilac bags have been delivered, only 6 working days after asking for them to be provided.

The 'gadgy' assures me he'll return later to pick up the superfluous green-lidded bin.

edit: he did indeed return and remove the superfluous bin

Recycling equipment arrived today

Well after the previous excitement of the Recycling Roadshow, the actual accoutrements arrived today. A grey-lidded bin, a green-lidded bin, a stash of clear bags and a piece of soggy papier-mache that I surmise is the leaflet describing all the acceptable recyclables. The expected lilac bags failed to materialise, so no paper and cardboard recycling is possible here at this point in time... also the requested (at the roadshow) composter (in place of the green-lidded bin) didn't materialise either - so a call to the recycling team will be required to sort this out.

I did notice that some of the neighbours were eying up all of their newly acquired bins with interest or possibly suspicion. No doubt some mention will be made in the letters pages of the Berwickshire News of the evils of so many wheelie bins and complicated bag content rules.