The Chair, Councillor Leah Fraser, welcomed the forum members and 15 members of the public to the meeting.

Apologies were received from Margi Allen and Chris Jones. Best wishes were sent to Chris Jones, who had been involved in an accident, on behalf of the forum with the hope that he gets well soon.

The Chair informed the forum that the interpreters from Merseyside Society for Deaf People would be filming and would only be recording their interpreting and asked if anyone had any objections. None were received.

• Update from forum members “what’s been happening in your area”

The following points / matters arising were raised from the minutes of last meeting held on 11^th February 2009:

Fr. Leon Ostaszewski clarified the following, from the February forum

• Page 3 – clarified that the parking problems mentioned in the minutes related to Wallasey Road.
• Page 4 – The information kiosk mentioned was at Birkenhead Bus Station.

Councillor Leah Fraser added that information was available on benefits available to grandparents who have been left to look after their grandchildren, and agreed to pass this onto Carole Thomas.

The Community Engagement Co-ordinator gave a brief overview of her report, highlighting the following:

• You Decide Survey 2009/10 – a questionnaire was made available to vote on what local people would like to see in their area. There are two pots of funding per forum £20,000 for the provision of additional services / activities and £18,200 for the provision of road safety initiatives. She urged people to complete and return the questionnaire and offered to give further information and advice on this at the end of the meeting. The Chair added that the questionnaire was available to all Wirral residents and asked the forum to get as many residents as possible to complete the questionnaire.

The Chair asked if there were any questions on this and none were raised.

Partner Updates

Merseyside Police – Sgt. Diggins highlighted the following:

• An initiative to tackle knife crime took place last week and led to

Ø  8 people being arrested locally for carrying knives

Ø  8 retails stores being tested

Ø  19 primary schools, 4 youth clubs and local internet cafes being visited, in relation to crime prevention and the danger of carrying knives

Ø  Safety Arch – this was used in the Liscard and Seacombe area in the evenings. This is basically a large metal detector and was used on people entering licensed premises to check for knives etc.

• S30 Dispersion Order – a few zones have been subject to S30 orders this year, which are to conclude in July. Customer community questionnaires were issued prior to the start of the order and want feedback to ascertain whether these have been effective.

• Operation Staysafe – a pilot for Wirral, to be operated from the Allandale Centre, is due to start on 19^th June 2009. This will involve taking young, vulnerable people along to the centre and contacting their parents. The scheme will be advertised in the press in the near future and will run every 4/5 weeks during the summer.

• Tackling drugs / changing lives, initiatives targeting drug related problems have led to :

Ø  Seizure of £50,000 of controlled drugs from one address in Seacombe, based on community intelligence information.

• Local Newsletter issued by the Manor Road Police Station, copies of which were available at the meeting
• Policing Pledge Information, issued by the Home Office, which is a 10 point plan setting out what can be expected form the Police Service. Further information on this was available at the meeting.  ...  view the full minutes text for item 2.

• opportunity to raise travel issues

The Chair thanked Simon Finnie from Arriva for attending the forum again and Simon gave the following update:

• New vehicles used on the 432/433/437 routes have improved the punctuality and reliability of these services, and passenger numbers have increased in excess of 5%

• 15 new low floor buses will be introduced on the 403/413/423 routes will be introduced in September 2009

• The recent increase of the afternoon 432/433 services has had a positive result and led to an increase in passenger numbers

• The issue of connections to Lime Street Station has been looked into, and there is scope on the 432/433/437 to service this on an hourly loop basis. The problem is the amount of building work still going on in Liverpool City Centre, causing grid locking problems. Once we are satisfied that the work outside Lewis’s is complete we will look at this again, probably around September 2009, as this is high on our agenda

• We work closely with Merseytravel on improving service provision

The following questions / issues were raised:

1.  Carole Thomas – are there any plans to service Norton Street Coach Station from the Wirral?

A. We want to get buses through the tunnel as quickly as possible, if we were to take the 432/433 services through this area it could cause delays to these, but it is something that we will look at with provision of service to Lime Street.

2.  There is no 433 service after 6.60 pm or at weekends, leaving many elderly people stranded as would need to go to Poulton Road to get a bus to Liverpool. The off-peak service for the 433 should be extended to remedy this.

A. This will be looked into and considered for our September 2009 route amendments. From a business point of view weekends and evenings are areas we would look at to grow our service, especially with more leisure facilities being available in New Brighton and Liverpool One.

3.  Dave Hanlon – What is the situation re: traffic problems in Sir Thomas Street; could something be done re: 1hour+ gap in the 413 evening service from Liscard to Wallasey Town Hall?

A. The issue re: Sir Thomas Street is being looked at with Merseytravel. The issue re: 413 evening service will be considered at the next review of evening and weekend services.

4.  David Hale – can the issue re: 413 evening service be resolved by the next forum meeting?

A. The next service change is due in September 2009 (we try to keep changes to a minimum to avoid problems for users and bus drivers) so this should be done prior to the next meeting.

5.  Carole Thomas – we had been assured that the new buses were to be in place by the end of May 2009.

A. There was a delay due to another large bus operator placing an order with the firm that supplies the new vehicles, then cancelling this. The cancelling of the order led to staff  ...  view the full minutes text for item 3.

§  opportunity to raise your issues & concerns

The Chair gave an update on the following:

• Liscard Hall – an update on this is due, will contact council officers and request that they write to community groups on what is happening on space in the park.

• Public Inquiry on library closures – this took place over last two days, and was run by Sue Charteris, who will send her recommendation to the Secretary of State for a decision. There will be a 14 day period for interested parties and the Council to make further representations and respond to these. The decision should be made within the next six months.

1.  Diane Ledder – when giving the council submission Alan Stennard said that the submission was to be taken to the area forums and created the impression that there had been ongoing discussions on this with the forums.

Chair added that he was probably referring to the special are forum meetings that took place in the parliamentary constituency areas, despite requests that these be taken to the local area forums. She added that on Friday she was informed of an audit of the Council’s assets had taken place, and that she was surprised that the councillors had not been involved in this.

Brian Kendall added that he felt that consultations should be more local than area forum level and that he wanted to get more people from the Seacombe area involved in the Wallasey Village Campaign.

2.  Dave Hanlon – there are few youth services in this end of the borough. Mosslands youth club was a thriving place 10-20 years ago but has declined in recent years, besides this there are only the Wallasey YMCA and the Allandale centre. There is no provision in Wallasey village and there should be more provision in the area for young people.

Chair – requested that the forum discuss youth provision and activities within the Wallasey and Egremont area, as there was not one answer to this, and the following discussion took place:

Joseph Lee – we are trying to tackle this problem in partnership, we need to break youth into younger and older sets, bring back role models, respect and give young people a focus. The Allandale centre is only looking at 8-13 year olds and has very limited resources.

Jo McCourt – the three main areas of youth provision (Wallasey YMCA, Allandale Centre and Mosslands Youth Club) used to be run with staff employed by the local authority. Changes in policies mean that they now have no staffing from the council and have to rely on external funding, so have reasonable youth provision buildings with no-one prepared to pay for the staffing of these, leading to an inability to provide adequate services for young people.  The YMCA building is owned by the council but the responsibility for all repairs lies with the YMCA.

Tony Mooney – the Fire Station Centre is still being developed. We have been working with partners, such as the Anti-Social Behaviour (ASB) Team to do outreach  ...  view the full minutes text for item 4.

Help yourself to refreshments and visit the following exhibition stands:

Ø  “You Decide” 2009 – 2010 (take a few minutes to complete our questionnaire on what additional services you would like to see in your area)

Ø  “Funds for You” (funding available for local community groups)

The Chair thanked everyone for attending the meeting and invited them to look at the exhibition boards, and requested that they complete the You Decide questionnaires.

The meeting closed at 9pm

• Tuesday 20^th October 2009 – Wallasey Town Hall, Brighton Street, Wallasey, Wirral CH44 8ED

The next area forum will be held on Tuesday 20^th October 2009 at Wallasey Town Hall, Brighton Street, Wallasey, Wirral CH44 8ED