Posts Tagged: Sutton

Sutton — No Comments
28
Oct 08

Introducing Sutton Chat, a new forum for the borough

Today I’m launching Sutton Chat, a new discussion forum for the borough. If you’re local, I hope you’ll take a look and join in. Don’t be put off by the silence — we’ve only just started.

It’s good to see that the amount of online discussion in the borough is increasing in quantity and to a degree, in quality. Several local bloggers have built up a good readership, produced great material and have hosted some worthwhile discussions. Bloggers: I’m right behind you. May you go from strength to strength.

What’s missing is a good neutral forum where anyone can raise a topic for discussion. Running a blog takes a fair bit of commitment. Sutton Chat aims to fill a gap and encourage more people to get involved with local issues online and hopefully in real life, too.

While Sutton Chat is politically and commercially independent, it’s designed intentionally to reflect my own ideas of how a site like this should work. Members must register using their real names. My aim here is to encourage people to be accountable for what they say and to enable people that know each other in real life to recognise each other and carry those relationships forward on the forums.

As an advocate of simple design, I’ve done my utmost to ensure that the site is clear and straightforward to use. Most of the usual cruft found on online forums like signatures, post counts and smileys is absent. The idea is to allow members to concentrate on pure discussion, making it both easier to read and to write.

Forums don’t run themselves. If you’re keen to debate the hot local issues and get to know more people in the area I hope to see you online soon at Sutton Chat.

Citizenship / Sutton — 8 Comments
13
Oct 08

Sutton’s (oxy)moronic “voluntary smoking ban”

What a great day for liberalism and local democracy. The good burghers of Beddington and Wallington have enacted a “voluntary smoking ban” in the area’s public playgrounds. £3200 of honest, hard-working local taxpayers’ money has been allocated to the scheme which local councillors now hope to roll out across the rest of the borough.

This radical and presumably unique project has just one minor flaw: it has no legal basis whatsoever. Sutton’s LibDem councillors see no legal or linguistic impediment to the idea of a “voluntary ban” which in plain English would probably look more like a request. Deviant playground smokers flouting the voluntary ban run the risk of muted social disapproval. Serious and repeat offenders may find themselves being tutted at by council wardens.

Fortunately, the council has science on its side. The new “voluntary ban” is the permanent establishment of a pilot scheme that was enacted after Councillor Bruce Glithero complained that passive smoking left his daughter spluttering. His research findings can be read in more detail in the latest edition of the Journal of Anecdotal Evidence.

Sutton is to be congratulated for this bold experiment in local democracy. The beauty of a “voluntary ban” is that you can “ban” anything, just as long as you don’t ban anything. Everyone can have a go. It’s democratic, accessible and incredibly liberal.

I’ll be writing to my local committee to address the following issues with voluntary “bans”:

  • Men not wearing shirts in public. “Ban” them.
  • The word “whatever” used as a sentence substitute. “Ban” it instantly.
  • People wearing hoods when the weather is fine. A “ban” is the only solution.
  • Groups that cross the road in a haphazard and slovenly fashion. If a “ban” won’t make them cross brisky, simultaneously and perpendicularly to the carriageway, nothing will.
  • Rainy weekends followed by fine Monday mornings. Surely a “ban” would be a step forward?
  • Children sitting on steps and talking. “Ban” it immediately! Oh, they already did, for real.

What would you “ban” today?

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Updated on 19 October with a photo by Cllr Terry Faulds of a sign in Beddington Park.

Sutton — No Comments
18
Aug 08

Twittering Sutton

Problems:

1. Sutton Council’s Latest News section doesn’t have an RSS feed or any easy way for the public to track it other than by visiting it regularly.

2. The Sutton Guardian has more dirt than diamonds (although at least it has a feed).

3. Other things happen that don’t get reported.

4. You don’t have time to plough through two dozen websites to keep track of what’s going on in Sutton.

Solutions:

1. Visit http://twitter.com/suttonboro for a concise, well-edited overview of borough activity.

2. If you use an RSS reader, subscribe to the feed at http://feeds.feedburner.com/suttonboro

3. Subscribe to the latest updates by email, if that’s your thing.

Enjoy.

Citizenship / Sutton — No Comments
24
Jul 08

Positive citizens or trainee consumers?

Growing up in Sutton just got a little more confusing.

You may remember that this is the place where the council spent £15,000 to remove a set of steps on which young people liked to sit. It’s also the place where a housing association sees fit to impose a 9pm curfew on its tenants’ children.

Now the borough’s police and town centre retailers have teamed up to hand out “Positive Citizen” discount cards for local shops and businesses to the area’s youths — which they’ll lose if they misbehave.

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