Well what do you think?

A1073 still a boon or not? Do you live in the area affected?

We will be putting your thoughts and ours on the web over the next few weeks.

It is interesting that the Bus shelter at Morrison’s although not used by local bus services any more the following facts show it is being used quite frequently by CallConnect.

Looking at bookings for the past two months, there were 190 booked to Morrison’s and 170 journeys booked from Morrison’s in Dec. There were 130 journeys booked to Morrison’s and 115 journeys booked from Morrison’s in Jan.

The regional select committee is about to publish a report in March highlighting some of the most glaring deficits.

A breakdown of Government figures by the East Midlands Regional Assembly shows the region gets just 46% less than the UK average for housing and community facilities - £114 a head compared with £212 nationally.

On transport, the disparity is almost as bad at 39%. And the amount the region gets for police and fire services is 20% less than the UK average.

The Conservative leader of Leicestershire County Council, David Parsons, is scathing.

"On the West Coast rail line, they spend more on car park renovation that they do on the whole of the Midlands Main Line. It's outrageous."

So how has it been allowed to happen?

The chairman of the regional select committee, Labour MP Paddy Tipping, tells the Politics Show:

"There are strong regional identities elsewhere. The North West or the North East have always argued their case.

"We've been a bit timid in the East Midlands when it comes to regionalism."

He is particularly concerned at the deficit on police funding.

"They have been underfunded for many years. We've made some progress, but there's a long way to go."

The chief executive of the outgoing regional assembly, Stuart Young, says he believes part of the problem is the Government's criteria.

He insists they're "too rigid and too complicated".

Andrew Pritchard, the assembly's director of housing and planning, says the region doesn't get anything like what it needs for affordable housing or improving existing homes.

Meeting targets for new homes is difficult enough, he says. But the funding deficit and the state of the economy makes it even less likely.

There is a time change to the meeting which will now be held between 1pm and 3pm on Saturday April 17^th.

The venue remains the Council Chamber at Priory Road.

John Hayes your local Member of Parliament will be in attendance.

We have provisionally booked the Council Chamber for Saturday 17^th April from 10am to 12noon. The agenda and confirmed time (in case we have to switch to the afternoon) will be published on the web in March. It will also be in the Members Newsletter.

Well it is crunch time for the project to re-open Littleworth Station. We still need to raise around £5000 to get the feasibility off the ground. Unfortunately EMDA have turned us down because they only finance large regional projects.

Reply from EMDA. Quote:

 “At the strategic, regional level we often play an active role in helping fund with partners, or commissioning direct ourselves, technical assessments and feasibility studies to help influence and inform the investment decisions taken by Network Rail and others.  We prioritise how we use our limited funding to focus on the key strategic rail and other transport priorities for the East Midlands.  Given the local nature of this proposal, I would suggest you approach some of your local or sub-regional partners, such as the Local Authorities in which the line is located, or the County Council as the Local Transport Authority.  We are unable to provide any direct assistance in the form of funding,”

Peterborough City Council has also declined because of the lack of funds available.

We have as you know approached SHDC & LCC for funding but you guessed it. ‘No funds available.’

So you see unless funding is available from other sources the project will shortly have to come to a close. The downturn to this is of course there will be no improvement in commuting is the local area even when the 2400 homes are built in Holland Park causing even more congestion and maintenance costs to our roads. This is when we are getting an upgrade of the line in 2011, a possible rail hub which could open up the line to more passenger traffic because the line will be accessible longer during the day.

WE should be looking at 20 to30 years down the line as to what our future needs are going to be, not rushing at the last minute to provide a much needed resource at an inflated cost.

The meeting on Thursday will bring up some of these questions and we hope many people will turn up to air their views.

Hope to see you there. (details of the meeting are on our home page)