Author Archives: Cambridge Town Owl

A pause in the reorganisation of local government in England means that those local councils that were otherwise due to have local elections in 2027 in the absence of a restructure, will now go ahead as planned It was a miserable day in Parliament for the Housing Communities & Local Government Secretary Angela Rayner asContinue reading “Local elections for councils in East Cambridgeshire, Fenland, and Cambridge to go ahead in 2027”

Papers in the Cambridgeshire and Peterborough Combined Authority’s Skills Committee contain principles that go beyond a specific cohort that is the focus of government policy The meeting papers for the Adult Skills Committee of 14 September 2026 are here and the documents in Item 9 contain slides on the Youth Employment and Participation Strategy forContinue reading “Youth participation plans could apply to adults as well”

Daniel Zeichner MP (Lab – Cambridge) has tabled a Parliamentary Question (PQ) to the Housing Secretary for answer on Monday 07 September 2026 What they call the Oxford-Cambridge Growth Corridor has been debated before – I wrote about it in a 2-part blogpost nearly a year ago: The question itself is a generic one –Continue reading “Cambridgeshire MPs debate the OxCamArc in Parliament – Part 3”

What national and local public policies miss on community development and tackling loneliness in society Image: Front page of The New Statesman by Kris Andrew Small for housing policy reporter Vicky Spratt in September’s edition – £read the latter’s article here. The following sounds painfully familiar “Go to university, get a job, buy a house,Continue reading “Proximity, regularity, and affinity”

In the meantime, Skoda in the Czech Republic shows the UK what we could have had – if only successive governments had invested in the declining manufacturing base for a new generation of electrified public transport systems TL:DR? Persuade your councillors, council officers, MPs, elected politicians and senior transport people to go and visit theContinue reading “Greater Cambridge Transport Strategy stubbornly refuses to mention ‘light rail’ or ‘tunnels’”

One participant in the CPCA’s Mass Rapid Transit trying to make the case for buses vs trams Image: The Vengabus inspired by Dutch public transport and Europop. Looked like a step up from what Stagecoach offered Cambridge in the same year, such was the state of privatised and deregulated buses Above – Appendix A –Continue reading “*“If you can make buses sexy, you will be billionaire.”*”

At the same time, Huntingdonshire District Councillors debated a Motion of No Confidence in the council leader (which may or may not have finished by the time I finish this blogpost!) In a Westminster Hall debate in Parliament, the Conservative MP for Huntingdon Mr Ben Obese Jecty raised issues over both the delay on aContinue reading “Minister for Local Government delays decision on Cambridgeshire’s future until October 2026”

Only for a few weeks mind you – because the political parties have their annual conferences in late September/Early October Image: From the Trials of Democracy project by Menagerie Theatre from 2024 You can: Labour get theirs out of the way early I’m sure it used to be the party in government was the oneContinue reading “Parliament returns – Autumn 2026”

The announcement came earlier today (26 August 2026) highlighting a new piece of legislation that will be tabled by ministers on the water industry. For those of you not familiar with the essentials, have a listen to The Cambridge Radio podcast hosted by Lewis Herbert here from 12 July 2026 where he interviews Deputy ChiefContinue reading “Greater Cambridge Development Corporation re-opens search for Chief Executive”