SOUTHEND ON SEA

There are many great reasons to come to Southend on Sea, here are just a few:-

The Longest Pleasure Pier in the world, with a train service too.

Probably one of the most iconic conference, meeting or wedding locations in the country The Royal Pavilion on Southend Pier.

The Forum on Elmer Square– Southend’s newest location and joint library venture with accademia. Upto 200 delegates in a state of the art facility or smaller rooms available and just two minutes from the station in the heart of the town.

The Cliffs Pavilion, our largest venue, upto 1600 delegates perched atop the cliffs with glorious estuary views and outside space to take in the sea air!

Excellent Hotels, many with estuary views and great conference, meeting and wedding facilities. why not try the Roslin Beach Hotel, The Park Inn Palace or the Westcliff for exceptional sea views and facilities. A tad further afield, all of 3 miles from the seafront, and only a 5 minute walk from the station is the Holiday Inn at Southend Airport with very interesting views and great facilities.

Southend has numerous small guest houses, nearly all have 3-4 stars and great sea views.

Southend is served by two train lines, C2C fom Fenchurch Street for 7 stations in the south and centre of the town and Gt Eastern from Liverpool Street for London Southend Airport and Southend Victoria. Trains run approx every 10 minutes peak and every 20 minutes the rest of the time- thats time two of course!

I should mention our great climate, over 7 miles of beaches, the wonderful fishing village of Leigh Old Town, the boutique and niche shopping area of Leigh on Sea, marine activities including kite surfing and many many interesting restuarants, the list just goes on….

What are you waiting for- all this and less than 1 hour from London

Details of the above locations and hotels can be found at http://www.visitsouthend.co.uk

hotels.com and tripadvisor

http://www.theforumsouthend.co.uk

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It’s All In The Name

So why one has to wonder does Southend Council think ‘Cultural Centre’ is a good one?  Let’s face it how many children or teenagers or even any visitor is going to get excited about visiting a ‘cultural centre’? indeed even our die hard locals are sceptical!

Would you hold your wedding or celebrate an important birthday in a ‘cultural centre’? Well I suppose a few might but surely ‘Pier Pavilion’ is better, especially if Southend is allowed to add Royal or Jubilee to it- The Royal Pier Pavilion or The Jubilee Pier Pavilion are both a little more exciting and in no way deter from the place being used for ‘cultural’ activities and there are a number of other possibilities along this theme – Southend Royal Pier Pavilion etc. It was put up in 2012 the Jubilee year after all and since we lost out as a city could we not please have a Royal Pier to reflect the Pier’s royal heritage or even a Royal to officially open it.

There are many uses that The Pier Pavilion could be used for- cultural events certainly, but also exhibitions, parties, weddings, fund raising events, mini conferences, artists at work days, lectures, school room etc and I firmly believe that labeling it as a ‘cultural centre’ will deter more than it will attract. So come on let’s get it changed before it’s too late, let’s put some sparkle into the end of our pier after all it is supposed to be fun!

 

These are my views and are not the views of the Southend Conservative Group or Associations.

Southend Summer- It’s a great place to be…..

So at  last the sun is out and the children have broken up. The last few days have seen thousands flocking to our beaches and seafront. The new water fountains at City Beach have been a real hit with the children. Perhaps it was our win in the Tour de France but cycling on the seafront cycle track seems very popular too, for all ages.

For those that want to get active there is the Southend Marine Activity Centre where all sorts of watersports can be experienced and there is the Essex Boot Camp which trains in both Leigh and Southend on the cliffs, evenings and weekends.

If it’s a bit of culture that you fancy then take a look at visit southend where you will find a whole list of events, many on the pier too, over the summer.

 

 

 

Feeling hungry then  download a copy of Dine on Sea and choose yourself a place to eat.

The Pier Pavilion or Cultural Centre is at long last ready, so why not go down the pier and take a look and decide for self if you like it or not.

For a picnic by the sea try East Beach in Shoebury it has picnic benches and BBQ facilities ready for you to use your grills on, wide green grass expanses and no cars, so take a ball or two and have some fun by the seaside- or you could just watch the kite surfers whilst sunning yourself.

For something a little different why not go to Leigh, have yourself a morning coffee, browse the shops then wander down the old staircase beside the Church to Old Leigh, cross over the bridge and perhaps have a light lunch or just take the camera for some intersting shots of this working fishing port..

These are just a few of the many things on offer in Southend, so do a little digging and have a great day out in Southend, it’s a great place to be.

It was really great to be able to watch the new pavilion being slowly winched up from the barge and then down on to the decking. In about 4-6 weeks it will be ready for business. The black weatherproofing will be hidden behind the softer cream of the exterior finish, the glazing will be in and it will be clear to all that  the new pavilion will be a real assest to the town. Well, to nearly all, as there are always those that object and disagree for one reason or another.

Now this brings me to the point of my post, Southend can be a great destination, it can attract jobs and tourists but it would be a great deal easier if some of the habitual objecters just stopped being so negative and gave the town, the council and those trying to get things moving a chance. How to they think it looks if someone is coming into town for a job interview to pick up the paper or to go online and read some of the truly negative and nasty comments- well not great and this impacts on not only job applicants but those wishing to open a business or invest in the town.

Whether you personally like or dislike the design of the building, the town has very firmly stated over several years and consultations that it wanted the Pier to be a maritime/cultural place not an extention of the arcades, a place for families, locals and visitors, young and old and that is what the council has set out to provide.

So let’s get behind the town, stop the negativity and at a time of deep economic crisis and strife support this initiative which will hopefully attract more visitors to town and provide residents with a good quality venue- all this will add up to a beter economic climate for Southend, more jobs and more oportunities.

The Pier Pavilion is on its way!

Tomorrow will be a landmark day for Southend. At long last the new building has been hoisted on to a barge that will slowly bring it from the docks in Tilbury where it has been assembled to the Pier. It should be lifted on the Pier some time tomorrow.

See the pictures taken by the reporter here and especially this one

 

 

INDEPENDENT PARTY IN DISARRAY

You couldn’t make this up…..

Over the past few days the Independent party have been getting up posters about the ‘spy car’ these postershave gone out in Ron Woodley’s name on behalf of the Independent Group.

However,  some Independent Cllrs have been calling for the CCTV car to be deployed in their wards!  If they cannot even agree on the CCTV Car how can they think that they could form a co-alition or take control of the council….

No wriggle room for Martin Terry

I have very little desire to spend much time commenting further on Martin Terry’s increasingly surreal blogs. He responds to my previous post by claiming I failed to provide context.

Well I posted not only Martin’s comments, but the entire article from the Echo so that there could be no question of misrepresenting the context.

Besides how much wriggle room is there in the words ‘ I agree with EVERYTHING (Anna Waite) said or ‘What she said was entirely right’

Independent leader damns himself with his dishonest and fake comments (with evidence).

I suspected when I posted about Martin Terry on Saturday that he lacked the self awareness to stop incoherently ranting about me, ‘bilge pumps’ and whatever other phantom evils invest his mind.

What Martin Terry didn’t realise is that to an extent I was counting on his response as a basis of bringing something rather interesting to light.

Martin Terry has made great play of the offense he takes from my ‘supposed’ comments about single mothers. Never mind that he regularly misquotes or misunderstands what I said, he describes my comments as a disgusting attack, blighting single mothers, as spiteful, nasty, shameful and disgraceful. He also repeatedly calls for my resignation.

So why would I repeat all these accusations? Well let us take a look at the Southend Echo newspaper of February 29th. This was the Echo’s second story on this topic.

As part of this piece the Newspaper gives a comment to the opposition. A whole box set aside so we can read the views of the opposition councillors, and who did they pick to give this comment? Why none other than the fulminating Martin Terry, leader of the Independent party.

And what did Mr Martin Terry have to say about my comments? Why, he said that he totally agreed with them.

Expanded and unedted section from article in Southend Echo from 29th February 2012 showing Martin Terry’s comments. See below for context.

Not that I should resign, or that he was appalled or even that he agreed only in part.

No, he stated that he TOTALLY AGREED with them. Let me quote him again where he says “what [Anna Waite] said was ENTIRELY RIGHT“.

There is more than enough  hyperbole in politics and I have no wish to add to it by making exaggerated comments or personally insulting the guy, especially when his rants say more about him than I could. But who, in all honesty, can respect Martin Terry, or have him as their party leader, when he carries on like this?

You can read my comments on Southend Town Centre here

Independents- A New Dawn? Hardly- they can barely hold a conversation, let alone run a council.

It might seem an odd choice of website to promote, but I would urge anyone thinking of voting independent to visit Martin Terry’s blog. He seems to have a rather creepy case of ‘mentionitis’ about me (8 highlighted references to someones name in a single post does come across as slightly obsessive). It’s not how normal adults generally conduct themselves. He’s sort of a ‘real world’ internet troll.

Anyway his central theme that I am somehow controlling the local conservative party is (perhaps sadly from my point of view!) as entirely false as the rest of the innuendo on his blog. The post of chairman is mainly concerned with administrative and organisational issues. It can certainly be a busy job at times but it doesn’t involve setting or determining ‘policy’.

I genuinely find it quite sad that the residents of Westbourough have to be represented by someone like this. What do you think officers of the council make of his ranting and raving? I think his behaviour on council was embarrassingly poor at times. I have huge respect for the professionalism and independence of Council staff  but someone as aggressive and unpleasant as Martin Terry is an almost totally ineffective advocate for his residents.

He talks on occasion about some sort of post-parties collaborative council, but at a very fundamental level the man is not capable of collaboration because he is so fixated with attacking anyone who disagrees with him – no matter how trivially obvious it is to everyone else that he doesn’t have a clue what he is talking about. I remember as a portfolio holder him shouting at me in full council because of some comment in a report and when I later read the report I realised he had completely misunderstood it, and I do mean completely.

I think that’s what bothers me about the independents. I was a councillor for a long while before the ‘independents’ started to win any seats and for that time disputes between local politicians were about policy and principles. However, a lot of what the independents say is – and I don’t know whether it’s dishonesty, or that they don’t understand, or don’t want to understand – so far removed from the reality of what is going on that discussion become impossible.

Instead they run very personal campaigns which seem to primarily work by making as many outrageous claims as possible and relying on enough people currently mistrusting politicians that some of it sticks. In national politics there is a competitive media and plenty of rescources to ensure that overtly cynical politics gets exposed. In the local arena we’re far more reliant on a deal of goodwill, honesty and integrity from candidates. Sadly if there were three words that don’t generally characterise independant campaigning they would be these.

How can anyone have a debate with someone who can’t go two minutes without spitting something about ‘Anna Waites Tory boys’ (sic). If a conservative candidate put up blogs like that about a labour or liberal democrat I would personally ask them to take it down and  point out that politicians, as public servants, should conduct themselves with a greater degree of professionalism. I would expect the Labour and LibDem parties to take the same approach.

Anyway, I don’t generally complain about what people have to say about me – it’s not nice but if you’re in politics it comes with the territory – however, I feel this kind behaviour almost reinforces the idea that somehow places like Southend can’t do ‘grown up’ politics. If you were sat in Whitehall or Westminster reading a blog like that would you be persuaded of the benefits of localism and greater autonomy for local authorities? I wouldn’t.

Benefit fraudster receives suspended sentence

A woman from Westcliff-on-Sea is now paying the price for working while dishonestly claiming benefit.

Joanna Needs, 28, of Fairview Drive, admitted seven counts of making dishonest statements to obtain Housing and Council Tax benefit between 2008 and 2011 when she appeared before magistrates in Southend on April 18.

She was given a six-month suspended sentence, ordered to wear an electronic tag to ensure she complies with a 6pm to 6am curfew order and told to pay £100 towards prosecution costs in addition to repaying the wrongly claimed cash.

The court heard that Mrs Needs began claiming Housing and Council Tax Benefit from Southend-on-Sea Borough Council in August 2008 after stating that she and her partner were not working and were in financial difficulties. During the time she was claiming for the benefits she continued to maintain that the couple’s financial situation was poor.

However, a data matching exercise later revealed that she was receiving an income from KPMG Ltd. Checks established that she had been employed by the company from 2001 to 2011 with a monthly salary paid straight into her bank account.

By failing to declare this extra income Mrs Needs received £11,786.01p of Housing Benefit and £1,345.53p of Council Tax Benefit she was not entitled to.

“If you have any suspicions over a person’s entitlement to benefit you can call the Corporate Fraud Investigation Team directly on 01702-215254 or e-mail counterfraud@southend.gov.uk.

“All information received is treated in the strictest confidence.”