Fix My Street

Local residents group North West Two are now using Fix My Street to file reports with Brent Council. I’ll be working with the other residents groups in my area to get links to FMS on all the community websites I can. Fix My Street (FMS) is A LOT faster and easier than using the Brent Council reporting system. All I need to do to report via FMS is enter the street name, choose the right street and then write up the problem....

November 11, 2008 · 1 min · Rob Dyke

Dollis Hill House renewal project in jeopardy

News earlier this year was that the Heritage Lottery Fund announced stage 1 funding towards a grant of £1.2 million to help restore Dollis Hill House. This would have enabled Dollis Hill House Trust (DHHT) to work with Training For Life and Brent Council to annex a section of a public park for pseudo-social-enterprise, or, in the words of the DHH, to bring about the “commercial exploitation of the house’s prime and dramatic location, balanced with a positive vision of the house’s future as a cohesive focus for the growing and increasingly diverse population of the surrounding area....

November 10, 2008 · 1 min · Rob Dyke

MySociety's 'Free Our Bills' campaign

Today I’ve accessed three different MySociety websites: TheyWorkForYou, WriteToThem and WhatDoTheyKnow. I honestly don’t know what I’d do without these powerful tools: MySociety are indespensible and we’d all miss them if they weren’t here. I was using WriteToThem to contact Sarah Teather to urge her to support Early Day Motion (EDM) 2141 that her parliamentary colleague Jo Swinson has tabled.  FREE OUR BILLS CAMPAIGN, 22.07.2008, Swinson, Jo That this House believes it has a duty to publish Bills in such a fashion that they can be accessed as easily and as early as possible by the public; notes that the non-partisan Free Our Bills campaign is urging the House to publish bill texts in a new electronic format to improve accessibility and public scrutiny of legislation; further notes that the changes requested would have no impact on the content of Bills, nor upon the process by which they are currently made; considers that the new format could be delivered cheaply and quickly; acknowledges that the Leader of the House’s office did not accept a prior request for new formatting from mySociety, nor provide an explanation of why the changes could be made; and calls on the Leader of House to ask House of Commons Clerks to work with Free Our Bills campaign staff to commence publication of Bills in the new format....

November 4, 2008 · 2 min · Rob Dyke

More booze on the Broadway - respond now!

The NW2 residents association is alerting local residents to an application for a 24h license for the sale of alcohol by a new business opening on the broadway. The former New Heights Furniture Shop in Cricklewood Broadway has been taken over by a supermarket called Way–2–Save. They have a branch in Neasden which has very good range of food, fresh fruit and veg and a halal butchers which would add to the choices for supermarket shopping in the area in a positive way....

November 4, 2008 · 1 min · Rob Dyke

Lib Dems choose open-source and free software

According to Publictechnology.net, the Liberal Democrats have decided to go for Open Source software for organisational infrastructure. The LDs have selected an open-source consultancy and technical services business in Rugby, Credativ, to migrate and support crucial parts of the LibDems tech needs. I’m very pleased to see this commitment to free and open-source software by a major political party!

October 4, 2008 · 1 min · Rob Dyke