Harringay, Haringey - So Good they Spelt it Twice!
Finsbury Park - Easter Saturday
I'm aware that the number of staff for our parks has been (or is about to be cut). Judging by the state of Finsbury Park over the last couple of warm weekends the staff have already gone. The litter problem seems to be worse nearer the Seven Sisters/ Blackstock Rd gate, perhaps because of the traffic to and from the funfair.
So here are a couple of radical ideas for the council to cope after the staff have gone:
1/ Tax. I had a discussion with a couple of HoL members on Twitter this week about taxing fast food outlets for the cost of clearing up. If it's a problem with funding for litter clearing them surely the cause of the problem should contribute to the clear up.
2 Parking Charges. It costs 50p to park for 2 hours in Finsbury Park. This seems too cheap - how about increasing this to £2 an hour with the money invested in clearing the park.
3. Encourage the people organising the funfair to run a litter sweep. It's part of the licensing agreement for music events in the park that the event clear litter so why not the funfair ?
4. Close the park. Seriously, it's a lovely park ruined by people. Close it and you remove the need for staff and reduce the litter. Problem Sorted.
Tags for Forum Posts: finsbury park litter, litter
Replies to This Discussion
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Permalink Reply by Kit on
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So it's not council cuts or messy English folk. It's bloody foreigners. Again.
*sigh*
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Permalink Reply by Old-Age-Emporium(OAE) on
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We do not send tanks onto our streets to manage our citizens...are you suggesting that we should learn from other nations on this point as well !
Just to pursue for a moment Gordon Keenan's OTT rejoinder to GK/OD above:
No, not tanks on "our streets" - but belligerent armed vehicles of similar ilk - not to manage "our citizens" of course but, within recent decades, to put our subjects in their place. (Think Falls Rd, Bogside, Newry . . .)
But today (or at least in the 3rd quarter of 2010) we ensure that our friends can play with similar toys. Our Government approved for export:
to Bahrain: CS grenades, smoke ammunition/smoke canisters, tear gas/riot control agents . . . .
to Libya: Tear gas/irritant ammunition; crowd control ammunition; small arms; ammunition for 'wall-and door-breaching projectile launchers'; military utility vehicles . . .
to Algeria: combat helicopters / military utility helicopters . . .
to Saudi Arabia: components for armoured personnel carriers - yes, those same APC tank-substitutes as I remember so fondly in my home village in the 1970s-1980s.
You're right, Gordon. We're not a third world country, so we prove it by sharing our toys with our friends in the the third-world and emergent nations.
And yes, my post has as little to do with Finsbury Park on an Easter Saturday as yours did.
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Permalink Reply by Alan Stanton on
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GK/OD has raised a reasonable issue and I hope we can discuss it reasonably.
There are problems with foreigners moving from place to place. I once had words with someone who'd moved from Islington, and who'd put out rubbish bags under the mistaken impression that Haringey used this system. Visiting Paris, I got a tirade from a shopkeeper because I'd put stuff in the wrong coloured bin.
Zena and I challenged some Chinese neighbours who we saw lugging fridges across the street from their home. They had no idea that the Council has a free collection service for fridges. And since this particular pavement corner is used as an informal "collection point" they were probably following the example of other "locals".
We need to accept that people from other places may have different rules and expectations. But then to build a common understanding of the rules and systems here.
In 1998, just after I was first elected as a councillor, a group of women called at my home. They lived in our street and each person originated from a different part of the world. One - an Irishwoman married to a Greek - said: "We are the United Nations and we've come to complain about cleaning in this street!"
Keeping our streets, parks and other public spaces clean, attractive and safe can and should be an issue which unites us.
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Guys, this is my last post on this subject. I hereby promise. But lets stick to the facts and not get lost in an arguement around migration and other issues. I find Old age Emporiums comments opportunist at best and personally, offensive. I'm not here to talk about such matters and i think anyone other than Mr Emporium can properly see that I was not condoning/advocating/ignoring action of the kind he describes by anyone anywhere.
I'd like to concentrate on what unites us around Finsbury Park and practical solutions for the future:
Yes, we need many,many more bins across all our Parks and streets.
Yes, we need some more communication campaigns
Yes, we need many,many,many more staff in our parks.
But the bottom line is who pays and how do we find the money ?
Some people have suggested Fines. I've intimated that I believe that is not the money earner that people may think and that it may go so far as to put more people at risk in confrontational situations.
There appears to be a lot of support for charging the organisers of events. I broadly concur with that but I don't think it would be long before you'd find precious few events - which wouldn't trouble me, but might others - and critically I still don't think you'd prevent the problem or raise the resources to cope with litter and vandalism which is endemic.
As mentioned previously I do advocate placing a local recycling charge on the shops and let them find inventive ways to have us return the empties and the packaging to them. Siansbury,Tesco,Waitrose - its amazing how innovative they can be when the bottom line is MONEY !
My one final radical offer would be the introduction of National Community Service for us All. We've got the Groundwork Groups, the BCTV's et al who can organise us. Why should everyone - those who are already in employment as well as unemployed not be required to give 6 months community service per every 10 years once you're over 18yrs. You'd be Paid at min wage - and for existing employees your job would be kept open and filled much like maternity/paternity time - and if you don't want to do it then you can buy your way out of it by paying the equivalent or a little bit more for someone to take your place.
I'm not trying to pass the buck onto slothful migrants or unemployed they are or are in the process of already being mandatorily required to do it for free by this govt and others. I'm trying to find a sustainable way to encourage us all to share responsibility for our communities, to work together and be paid at least the Min wage when we do it.
Final thought - we could just pray for rain as it always appears to have an impact on the amount of rubbish strewn in parks !!
Cheers
GK
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Permalink Reply by Gina Fenton on
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We need larger, fox-proof bins (as others have observed). I used the Council's online reporting system to suggest this and no one has even replied. This would cost, but not much, and would have a very swift effect. The large wheelie bin Hugh photographed in Regents Park is an ideal, quick solution, it could be achieved in days (chained down, of course!) I am often in my local park with the dog and I regularly clear up litter. When I do,others invariably join in (especially children, which is fantastic). People are not all the dirty blighters we grumpy old men and women like to believe! But I have trouble finding a bin to put it in when I have finished, and I know those rotten foxes will drag it back out when I have gone home! Couldn't the Council come up with some fast, creative solutions such as this?
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Permalink Reply by Hugh on
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This from the 20th April minutes of the Friends of Duckett's Common:
Serious problems were identified regarding littering. Chris Poore (Haringey Council) reported that the workforce dealing with park litter throughout the Borough had been heavily reduced.
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