Welcome to the Penge & Cator Councillors’ Blog

Cllr John Getgood, Cllr Kathy Bance MBE and Cllr Peter Fookes

Thank you for visiting our website.  Please let us know if there are other features you would like to see.  Your local councillors for the Penge & Cator Ward on Bromley Council are Kathy Bance MBE, Peter Fookes and John Getgood.  We are proud to have been re-elected at the 2010 elections.   

We hope this blog will help keep you in touch with local events and the decisions of your local council.   Please use the comment sections.  We cannot promise to reply to each one individually but we will read them regularly and try to update news.   We want to read your views and opinions because by letting us know what you think is important, you will be helping to make sure that we are speaking up and campaigning on the right issues.

We hope you will find our site helpful.  We will try to update the content regularly and thanks again for calling by.

Peacock’s in Penge is saved

Our Peacocks has escaped the list of stores to be closed so for now its future seems assured.    One of our residents has told us that the staff who work there said that, if people locally supported the store while it was in administration, they would stand a good chance of staying open, and so it has proved.   Well done to them.   He syas “I am wearing my new black jumper with pride!”  Let’s all go round and congratulate them.

Broken roads or broken children – Bromley Tories make wrong budget call

When setting their budget on Monday, Bromley Tories were faced with a choice.   In the previous weeks, council finance officers had worked the figures to find another £1.7mn while still keeping to a nil budget increase.  What an opportunity.  Amongst all the gloom of the cuts imposed by the coalition government, here was a chance to protect services to the vulnerable.

The Labour group welcomed a change of heart over reducing spending on mental health services and support for Carers.   And that still left a further  1.3mn. 

Despite there being clear evidence that children’s services had been unfairly hit by previous cuts, Bromley Tories decided to use the money to reverse proposed cuts in highways and refuse.  

The Labour alternative proposal was to make the remaining £1.3mn in the annual budget available to support children aged 0-5 and to support school improvement.   The progress of Bromley children in the early years had been raised as a cause for concern in a recent Ofsted report on the council.  

We did not abandon roads and the other environmental spending.    With the council reserves climbing to around £70mn, there was plenty of leeway to make sure our roads and verges were well looked after out of money available for one-off spending.  

We believe our budget proposal would have protected Bromley’s highways and greenery while at the same time reducing the risk to our youngest and most needy residents.

Opening date for new Aldi store

Looks like its to be 19th July.   A lot of building work still to be finished.  (For those who don’t know, it’s by the traffic lights on Croydon Rd on the old Robin Hood site.)  Still worried about possible traffic congestion on that corner but Bromley traffic planners said it would be ok ………

Car Club parking bays proposed for Penge streets.

Car clubs have grown significantly across London in the last five years.  The number of members had risen to 132,000 in January 2011. The number of car club vehicles now totals over 2,500.   

A car club provides its members with quick and easy access to a car for short term (from ½ hour) hire.  Members pick cars up from on-street locations and pay on a pay as you go basis.   Members can make use of car club vehicles as and when they need them.  This has led to reduced dependency on car ownership and has environmental advantages. 

In Bromley around 500 residents are signed up to a car club but only two cars are currently available within the Borough.  Bromley is lagging behind other boroughs in supporting car club facilities.  The council is now looking for a further 10 – 15 road side parking spaces for car club cars.  

In Penge & Cator ward, the council will be consulting residents in Franklin Road, Oakfield Road and Howard Road.  They have identified these roads as locations which will not add to local parking pressure.

Planning Consent given for extra flat at 149 Maple Rd

     Planning permission was given last night for the conversion of the existing two bedroom ground floor flat and basement into 2 one bedroom maisonettes.  No objections from local residents were received.  The existing six two bedroom flats were recently built on the site of the former London Tavern/Hop Exchange pub.

Parking scheme proposed for Penge East, Sydenham side.

Generally, local residents have resisted controlled parking schemes, where, after paying a fee, residents can have sole use of parking bays at certain hours.   However, residents in Linden Grove on the Sydenham side of Penge East Station, have recently responded that the majority were in favour of such a scheme.   Linden Grove suffers from large amounts of commuter parking.

Shops in Newlands Park could benefit from a new parking scheme

A parking scheme has now been proposed that covers Linden Grove and the area of Newlands Park outside the shops.   We can provide more detail on request but largely the spaces in Linden Grove would be reserved for residents only between 12 and 2 pm.  Spaces in Newlands Park would become shared use between permit holders or short term pay and display, to help free spaces for shoppers.

Residents in Linden Grove and NewlandsPark are being consulted on the scheme now.   If you have any comments you would like the council to consider, you can email them to Leon.Darrell@bromley.gov.uk or get in touch with us.   The closing date for comments is February 21st.

The Queen to Visit Bromley for Diamond Jubilee celebrations

The Queen is set to visit the borough for an event to celebrate her Diamond Jubilee in May.

The London Borough of Bromley has been selected to host an event as part of South London ‘s Jubilee celebrations.  Residents and visitors will be able to see Her Majesty and The Duke of Edinburgh as they visit the borough for a special event to commemorate the Queen’s 60 years on the throne. The visit will take place on Tuesday 15 May 2012 as part of a regional tour when the Queen will visit just 3 south London boroughs.

The Queen has visited the borough in 1986 to open Bromley Civic Centre and to visit Crystal Palace during her Golden Jubilee celebrations.

More details about the event will be released over the coming months.