Anti-Bullying Week

This week is Anti-Bullying Week.  So I thought I would link to the Connexions video about cyber-bullying that I mentioned a little while back.

http://www.youthoria.org/bullying

I would also like to pass on my thanks to the children from Bottisham and Soham Village Colleges who attended the Children and Young People's Scrutiny Committee at Shire Hall last week to talk about the work they were doing to deal with bullying and to give us their own views.  Hearing about issues like this from young people is so informative.

Bullying can have a huge impact on Young People's lives.  As adults we have a duty to treat it seriously.

Not JUNK at all

The marvellous traffic around Cambridge made me a little late tonight for a preview of a film made by JUNK Theatre Group called "WASTED" which was shown at the Cambridge Arts Theatre.  But I was lucky enough to see most of it and was hugely impressed.

The film is to be shown in Cambridgeshire schools as part of the PSHE curriculum, telling the story of a young girl and her friends in the events leading up to a road accident which results in one of the friends being critically injured.

JUNK Theatre group is an organisation for Cambridgeshire Young People and operates out of The Junction in Cambridge (which is also a great music venue btw).   Judging by the standard of acting in this film, they have a great deal to be proud of.  I am told there is a possibility of it being put online some time.  If it is I will link to it.

Donarbon Waste Treatment Facility

We had the meeting between the County Council Cabinet and the Senior Management team at the new Donarbon  Mechanical Biological Treatment (MBT) facility yesterday.  It is quite something.  The idea of the site is to take the waste out of our non-recyclables bin (the green one in Fenland!!) and extract as much as possible from there to minimise what we send to landfill.


It does not fulfill the role of getting rid of our recycling bins because the value of the recyclable material from there is nowhere near as good as what we get from a recycling bin, but it will really help us to move forwards and make sure we improve the level of recycling - which is important because it will minimise the amount the County has to pay in increasingly costly landfill taxes.

Remembrance Sunday in Whittlesey

Remembrance Sunday is very important to me.  Those of you that know my background will understand why.  I was brought up as the son of a soldier, my father served 37 years.  I was born in Aden during the conflict there, and also served 6 years in the Army.  My 3 brothers also served, including in Iraq and the Falklands (where one of my brothers was on HMS Antelope).

This year is even more poignant for me, because a number of Ammunition Technicians have been amongst the casualties in Afghanistan - and that was my profession as a soldier.

Whittlesey always does itself proud on Remembrance day and today was absolutely no exception.  As well as being greeted by lovely weather, we were met by a huge crowd at the market square when we reached it today.  Once again there were loads of wreaths and crosses laid and the behaviour during the minutes silence was exceptional.

Remembering the victims of war is so important, it is heartening to see that recognised by so many people in the Town.  Congratulations and thanks to everyone who organised and took part especially to the Royal British Legion and the Ivy Leaf club who hosted us before and after the parade.

Sometimes I'm nosey

Last week I went to Huntingdon to be nosey in and around Connexions where there were some Young People filming for a DVD about cyber-bullying.  Once again some great young people involved, all of whom go to Stageworks in Buckden.  It was interesting, not only to see the acting, but to develop my understanding of cyber-bullying and to meet such interesting young people (as well as the Connexions staff who were there).

I really don't think us old 'uns understand issues like this enough.   The difference between this and the bullying that we experienced and understood is that you can never turn off from it.  The idea that you don't want to turn on your computer or mobile for fear of what might be on it is something we should all understand.

I also went to the Youth Fair in Whittlesey.  Again it was a pleasure to be there. I met one organisation Stonham, that I hadn't dealt with before but also chatted to a number of people and organisations that provide support to Whittlesey. It was interesting to see Drinksense there, and then to see them at the Scaldgate Centre on Friday night showing some videos to some of our young people.

Ofsted Report on Safeguarding and Looked After Children

The Ofsted Report on Looked After Children and Safeguarding was published last Friday.


This followed a two week inspection of our services.   The report can be found here.


I could go on for ages about the report, but my comments are out in the public domain anyway, so you are just as well reading my views on the BBC website.

Visit to New Road and Whittlesey Locality Team

On Friday I had the privilege of visiting New Road School.  It is not in my County Council Division, but I asked to visit anyway.  I'm glad I did it, it is was really useful to talk about education from a Whittlesey perspective, but also to ssee the confident young people that were in their classrooms.   you always know you're on to a winner when the children are coming up to you in the classroom and showing off their work and it happened a couple of times with me in New Road School.

After I had been their I popped in to have a chat with the locality team in Whittlesey, who are located in the same building and also to have a bit of a nose around our Children's Centre.  It was a good chance to chat over a cup of tea and see how things are going.  The one thing I am always impressed with in our locality teams is commitment to their areas, and this is definitely true of the Whittlesey team.