Back in business

This blog is back in business. Having been out of the country and therefore the Bush for most of the month of August I is back, and intending to get back into the swing of things with the usual concoction of local news that breaks here ahead of anywhere else and a bit more of experimenting with what the web allows us to do to bring local communities to life online

And an awful lot seems to have been hapenning while I've been away! First off here's footage of the Deputy Prime Minister together with his coalition Conservative colleagues making a pretty hamfisted photo opportunity at Shepherds Bush Village Hall. The only problem? Nick Clegg's colleagues at H&F Council are closing it down as part of their local cuts programme and they didn't tell him - so the Deputy PM ended up looking like a right plum in front of the cameras:



The pic above is of Andy Slaughter (on the right) our local MP pointing out that the sheepish looking guy at the centre is the one selling off their centre - he is Cllr Stephen Greenhalgh, the leader of our Council and leader of David Cameron's radical wing of the Tory Party trying out numerous policy experiments on the Bush. My favourite bit on the BBC video is of Cllr Greenhalgh shrugging his shoulders and making that "Bovvered?" facial expression - speaks volumes.

We've also had one of the local fruitcakes threatened with jail for a hammer attack on Shepherds Bush Market tube station plus the news that lots of our local parks are to lose funding. On a London level it seems Boris is in two minds over whether to stand as the Tory (plus LibDem?) candidate which could prove interesting if it ends up in Ken getting back into City Hall - the Western congestion zone could stay after all. Ooh, it's all go here you know.

I’ve been away in a conflict zone for the first two weeks of August and then in the south of France for a much needed family break for the latter two. Plenty of sun, unlike the Bush staycation I had last year and I understand from the news you had much the same crappy weather here that I remember from 2009 in August!

Lots ahead of us in September – planning decisions, the decision on who is to challenge Boris to be our Mayor and the ever meandering saga over the “super sewer” otherwise known as the Thames Tideway Tunnel.

Thanks for reading, hope you didn’t mind the break in service too much and do keep sending the stories through