Monthly Archives: December 2023

Unless senior politicians and their policy advisers take on the barriers of lack of time, lack of knowledge, and lack of access, their proposals for getting more people involved in influencing policies will remain limited in their impact. Image – from the quickly-forgotten Civil Society Strategy from Theresa May’s Government in 2018 – noting the challenge ofContinue reading “Time, knowledge, access – policy makers must consider these factors when considering public involvement in improving things”

At the first online meeting of the Cambs Unitaries Campaign (I can’t name names because The Chatham House Rule) I was reminded of first principles. “Why bother?” Or rather, the first option to a political problem or issue is: Do nothing. It’s a bit like when someone disrespects you on the internet/social media – orContinue reading “‘If a Cambs Unitary Council is the answer, what is the question?’”

Is it worth revisiting some of the policies of the previous Labour government in the run-up to the general election? For their candidates and activists interested in local government policy, most definitely yes. I declare an interest as a former civil servant who worked during that last Labour government – I took a redundancy packageContinue reading “Total Place 2025?”

You’ll see more such reports as we get to crunch time with some very big decisions looming over the next 12 months. I tried to put things together at this evening’s meeting at The Guildhall in this thread. Alternatively search for @CamCitCo on birdsite on 06 Dec 2023 and you’ll see more. You can alsoContinue reading “Cambridge: The state of the city 2023, vs East Anglia – Levelling Up 2023”

Can residents make day-to-day public transport an issue in the run up to the general election? (Also – Great Cambridge Crash Course intro session this Saturday!) The image/graphic is from Unite Scotland and I like it. TL:DR? Drop Richard an email and say you’re interested in helping with campaigning for better bus services in 2024Continue reading “How austerity crushed bus services in Cambridgeshire”

As the final few sessions commence this month, what issues do you think we need to cover before both the local elections in May 2024, and the general election whose date is unknown? I was interviewed by Alex Elbro on Cambridge 105 about what the first group of sessions had covered – you can listenContinue reading “The Great Cambridge Crash Course 2024 – what local issues could we include?”

And it should be ready just in time for any looming general election (unless it’s called for very early 2024! 364 days after rail expert Jonathan Roberts delivered the results of his study into a radically-improved rail network to Rail Future East (I blogged about it here – scroll halfway down), Rail Future East confirmedContinue reading “Railfuture East commissions new Haverhill-to-Cambridge rail study”

It was as if delegates at the Form the Future Conference 2023 at Churchill College were following the lead of Members of the UK Youth Parliament when the latter did the same just over a year ago (see my blogpost here). Above – have a listen to Izzy Garbutt MYP from 05 Nov 2022 TheContinue reading “Cambridgeshire teachers along with local employers tear into ministerial education policy failures”