• Minutes are a summary only, issues raised with individual officers after the main meeting are actioned separately with the relevant officer.

The Chair, Councillor Adrian Jones, welcomed forum members and 11 members of the public.  Apologies were received from Dave Hale and Carol Thomas. 

Cllr Adrian Jones welcomed Garth Goddard and Bruce Riley to the forum, as they wanted to come along to give us an update on their services. Garth Goddard from Chernobyl Children’s Lifeline – explained there was a charity shop opening in King Street. 

The money raised will essentially bring children affected from the Chernobyl disaster to Britain for one month which will help with their health. 

Gareth explained that in Belarus the cancer rates are very high as the ground is contaminated and therefore so are their crops etc.  If they are brought away from the radiated environment they will have better a better quality of life and improves their health. 

The shop will open beginning of May and will mainly sell good quality garments to the community.  He also explained that they have obviously had to spend money to open the shop so they are now looking for any grants available.

Q: What can people donate to the shop?

A: Anything that is sellable and of good quality and we do except cash donations.

Q: Where do the children stay?

A: With host families who are fully vetted.  My wife and I are actually a host family. 

Q: Is it different children each time?

A: Yes. there is a website you can go on www.ccll.org.uk to find out about the charity and the work we are involved in.

Q: Are there enough host families?

A: Yes, we also have help from Social Services vetting the families.

Michelle Gray gave a presentation on “your neighbourhood” The street where you live theme, part of the Neighbourhood Plan for the area.

Key Points that where highlighted for the area forum to address:

• Road Safety & Maintenance
  • Pot Holes
  • Uneven Pavements
  • Speeding encourage 20mph schemes in residential areas
  • Parking
  • Street Lighting

• Street Cleanliness
  • Litter
  • Dog fouling

• Community Safety
  • More Police Presence
  • A successful Neighbourhood Watch Scheme
  • Installation of alley-gates

• Leisure
  • More Sporting Activities
  • Extra services especially for under 5’s
  • Free activities for all young people

• Housing
  • Private Landlords
  • Anti Social Behaviour (especially in private rented properties)
  • Litter/Fly-tipping (especially in residential properties)
  • Respect for each other with the community

Update: The Area Forum panel has also acted on your feedback following the Neighbourhood Plan Consultation, and subject to site visits with officers and elected members the road safety funding will be allocated to:

• Improve access - improvements to dropped pavement kerbs in Martins Lane, Seaview Road and Liscard Road.

• Speeding traffic - purchase a Vehicle Activated Sign for Liscard Road.

• Traffic calming measures - in Wright Street working in partnership with residents to improve the safety of this road particularly for children and young people living here.

• Safety measures - around Egremont Primary School working in partnership with council, elected members and school

What next: June 2012 - all 11 area forums will cover the next round of themes of “Your Family” and “Your Economy”. All themes will be collated and form a local action plan to address issues and future developments for the local area.

• Anyone who is interested in being part of the Neighbourhood Plan developments to contact the Community Engagement Team. Tel: 0151 691 8026 email: michellegray@wirral.gov.uk

Merseyside Police Neighbourhood Inspector - Justin Diggins Police are running an environmental CAT (Community Action Team) walk in Seacombe on 8th March (1.00pm – 3.00pm) Meet at Mobile Police Station. It is a walk around to essentially have a look at the area and suggest any improvements working in partnership with our partner organisations.

Police have closed down the Leasowe Castle Pub (not to be confused with the Leasowe Castle Hotel) as it was associated with organised crime and had not paid its gas bill since 2002. 

Explained they were also looking at other pubs in the area.  In March there will be one month of action re: cannabis.  Explained this was often happening in rented accommodation whereby criminal gangs put tenants in properties to grow cannabis. 

Made everyone aware of the incident at St James’ Parish re: armed robbery.  Reassured forum members that it was not guns it was a hammer and knife, no one was hurt and the criminals were from Liverpool. 

Merseyside Fire and Rescue – Natalie Hughes The Wirral District is led by Paul Murphy who has overall responsibility for the 6 Community Fire Stations along with the Wirral Community Safety Team which is located at Wallasey Fire Station. The Community Safety Team is a cross functional team which consists of both operational and advocacy staff, and is structured to focus on the Prevention and Protection of Wirral’s communities through engagement with the most vulnerable individuals in our communities.

Wirral Community Safety Team are currently developing and publishing a Wirral Community Safety Plan which will be accompanied by 6 Wirral Community Fire Stations Plans that are linked to the Merseyside Fire & Rescue Service Integrated Risk Management Plan. 

We have held a series of planning meetings at local fire stations, involving partners and staff in the design and delivery of community safety activities to improve responsiveness to local needs. The Plans recognise the diverse nature of the communities of Wirral and will enable our Community Safety activity to be tailored specifically to the needs of the local community and complement the delivery of agreed local priorities.

The initiatives within each of the plans will be bespoke to that area however there will be cross cutting themes for the Wirral which will include:

• The reduction of Accidental Dwelling Fires, Deaths & Injuries
• Road Traffic Collisions Education and Reduction
• Reduction in incidents of arson and anti-social behaviour
• Seasonal Activities – Fire Watch & Bonfire Strategy

Some of the more innovative initiatives which will be included will be:

• Homeless project
• Excess winter death initiative
• Fire Fit Active Challenge

Feedback on Bonfire period for 2011 – extremely successful on Wirral with an obvious decrease in ASB fires across the District. Local events supported this with Beechwood & Ballantyne and Ridgeway High School holding bonfire night events.

Older Peoples Parliament - Stan Thompson Announced it was a pleasure to be back and read over his extensive report contained in the papers. Older People’s Parliament newsletters was available at the meeting for people to take  ...  view the full minutes text for item 3.

Anti Social Behaviour- My Mother got a letter about anti social behaviour in her street and to be honest it scared her as she is on her own of a night.  I have also had youths on my car, up lamp posts, on walls and she has had litter in her garden.  The area is in need of CCTV. 

A: My colleagues in Technical Services don’t really like putting CCTV on lamp posts.

A: Cllr Bernie Mooney I also live in that area.  I will give you my card at the end.  There are troublesome families in that area.  The Police have been great though and it has improved and is being monitored. Others areas of concern are Blue Bell Woods, Breck Road suffering from vandalism and under age drinking especially at weekends. 

A: Inspector Justin Diggins, Lea Road area there is a lot of private land lords and that is where some of the problems are. We are aware of the issues and area is being looked into.

Road repairs - Father Leon Ostaszewski, Belvedere Road, may I remind Street Scene were roads need repair.  Britannia Road was done and has withstood winter.  Could people be so kind as to remind streetscene about any big gaps in roads/pavements etc.

Wheelie Bins - People bring wheelie bins down end of road for collection and they end up by my mums house so kids climb on them and damage the wall.  Could you communicate and tell people not to leave them outside my mums house? There has been a fire in the alley also.

A: We can look into this.  We have a list of collection dates so we can house call and tell them.

Update: No. two is right at the end by the alley-gate, Unfortunately there is no option for half that side but to present there, In reality there should only be about 8 properties presenting there (once per week).  Essentially we have asked these 8 or so properties to present there.  The only thing we can do is to assess how quickly bins are being returned to properties after collection. If they are leaving them out then we can letter drop the residents. We can then communicate our findings to Mr Hall. Contact: Fergus Adams, Contract Manager, Technical Services Department, Waste & Recycling, Cheshire Lines.

Litter Issues - Maldwin Road wheelie bins not emptied properly and litter is left in the road after bin collections, also Rice Lane has had few incidents re: fly-tipping

Update: If residents ever feel a mess has been left by the bin crews then we can ask them to return to rectify this. Residents must report the incident asap to Streetscene. With Rice Lane if the issue relates to within the entry. Again if residents report it to Streetscene they will be asked for further info (e.g. do they know who did it, what size is the fly-tip etc.). Depending on the answers given these incidents may be visited by  ...  view the full minutes text for item 4.

NEXT MEETING - The Chair Cllr Adrian Jones thanked all who attended and closed the meeting and announced the next area forum would take place on:

Tuesday 19^th June 2012, Wallasey Town Hall, Brighton Street, Wallasey, Wirral CH44 8ED starting at 6.30pm

Issue/s raised before the Area Forum:

Respite Care - As you know Council provision for respite care was closed last year without any adequate replacement being arranged. We now understands that WIRED has been asked to organise facilities. As far as we can make out there is at present a hiatus in the care provided, and we consider it incredibly lax that facilities were closed before adequate replacement was organised.  We are also concerned that the replacement provided should be as good as the Council provision it replaced.  One of the advantages of places like Meadowcroft was that the clients and their carers knew what to expect and could rely on the quality of care, not least because the staff were familiar with each client and the clients knew the staff.  Have adequate criteria been laid down for the new provision? How is it going o be overseen? etc.

A: Chris Beyga - Head of Personal Support - Following the closure of several respite facilities last year we provided an immediate alternative for respite for people at Girtrell Court and Sylvandale. This has proved extremely popular, so much so that both facilities have been very well used.  People also now have the option to access a personal budget to utilise other forms of respite such short breaks and holidays etc.  To the best of my knowledge Wirral Council have not commissioned Wired to provide any respite facilities at all and I am unaware of any such initiative.