Alert boxes

In October the three East Dulwich Liberal Democrat Councillors Cllr Richard Thomas, Jonathan Mitchell and I allocated £25,000 to help fight shop crime in East Dulwich. This was the number one priority for investment from the local Crime Prevention Officer.

Just before Christmas another 100 traders in East Dulwich signed up for Alert boxes – a proven method to reduce shop crime by typically 57%. The Alert Boxes have been programmed and will be delivered during mid January.

Big thanks to the East Dulwich Safer Neighbourhood Team and council officers nad project managers for making this happen – Andrea Allen, Sarah De Souza and all the traders who have joined in the scheme.

Riverside new councillor – déjà vu

A by election in the Riverside Ward in Southwark gave me a huge de jevu feeling. While canvassing for the excellent Liberal Democrat candidate Anood Al-Samerai I kept coming across Labour leaflets with covers identical to those used in East Dulwich in 2006. Same broken windows on estates not located in Southwark. Same Police officers in uniforms that the Metropolitan Police have never used – looked like West Midlands Police officers. All stating that Liberal Democrats are soft on crime. Err, that would be Southwark with crime down ahead of tough targets set by central government through hard work of Liberal Democrat run Southwark Council working with the Police.

I also had the same de jevu that voters in Riverside would see straight through such rubbish. They duly did and Anood virtually received 50% of the votes – 1,114 out of 2,248 and extended the majority over Labour.

Well done Anood.

Lordship Lane

Good news.

The Lib Dem East Dulwich councillors Richard Thomas, Jonathan Mitchell and myself supported a Living Streets pedestrian audit of Lordship Lane. To make more of the recommendations possible we ensured that Southwark Council applied for £100,000 to improve Lordship Lane for pedestrians. We need to make it easier and more pleasant to get from one side of Lodship Lane to the other.

We have just heard that we’ve been successful and can spend the money during the next financial year from April 2008.

What do you think is needed – get in touch.