HBC makes me ill....seriously!

[Acrylic-bob]

In almost all of the indicators of good health the Borough of Hyndburn and it’s population scrape along the bottom when compared to the rest of the country; Higher than average levels of infant mortality, Life expectancy at birth – how long you are expected to be able to manage to survive - is also very low, as is life expectancy for adults. Deaths from coronary heart disease are 30% higher in the borough than they are in the rest of England and death from accidents are 23% higher. Teenage pregnancy in the borough runs at 71 per 1,000 girls (aged 15-17) compared with a National figure of 46 per 1,000.

Shocking reading. The Primary Healthcare Trust ascribes the causes of this appalling state of affairs to the following reasons; deprivation across the borough caused by low paid employment, poor quality housing and lower levels of education.

Low Paid Employment! Remind me again just who it is who bends over backwards to lure employers, any kind of employers, to the borough with bribes of rent and rates holidays and speedy trouble-free, no questions asked, planning applications?

Poor Quality Housing! Strangely, it turns out that the same people have a statutory duty to monitor and intervene when property is no longer being maintained to recognised standards, just as they have a duty to ensure that new housing complies with nationally recognised standards.

Lower Levels of Education! Surprise, surprise! It seems that the same group of people are responsible here too, since they have the statutory duty to administer the provision of education within the borough.

Who is this shady group, I hear you ask, who seem hell bent on sending us all to our graves long before our contemporaries in the rest of the kingdom? Why, it’s the same people who, only last year, were trumpeting loud and long their “Thirty Years of Service to the Community”. Yes, that’s right, HYNDBURN BOROUGH COUNCIL!

Perhaps now you can see why local politics is such a vitally important subject; council incompetence doesn’t just hit you in the pocket, it can shorten your life!

If HBC were a saleable commodity, it would come plastered with Health Warnings! Either that, or it would have been banned years ago.

[Acrylic-bob]

It absolutley kills me to discover that Hyndburn is the 51st most deprived borough in the country, out of a list of 354!

How did we get into this state????????

[Graham Jones]

Hi Bob,

I don't think HBC admisnister education, thats LCC. In reality though government dictat on curriculum along with independent schools, primarliy church, means LCC have very little control over educational standards.

I agree with Housing and would add this: we are about to pull down allegedly slum terraced housing and rather than build spacious green, larger houses to mix the tenure and household type we are going to build more shoeboxes. In which we are encouraging previous residents to move back in; the same poor people, or new poor people [in general], who can only for the most part afford shoe box housing. And we are building to almost the same density with, in most cases, lower quality build than the old terraced. You then have to question whether the small open spaces created in the new developments will also be quickly ravaged by nature and problematic individuals and lack of maintenance.

I don't think we are breaking the spiral of decline [and knock on ill health etc..]. As market forces kick in and the economically mobile move outwards and upwards to fulfull their dreams, the new areas will be for those at the bottom of the ladder. We are in dannger of building the slums of tomorrow today in my view.

Low paid employment is much harder. Its a question of basic economics. If Hyndburn is lacking in educational attainment then we produce things at a greater cost and less efficiently. Less ability to enterprise, less new business's, less creative or cutting edge business's, less profit, less money, lower wages, more brain drain, higher costs because we are away from the Franco/German/Benelux economic heart/centre. If you made the new Techonolgy Park successful at Whitebirk then those people coining it in over there would then simply use their new wealth to live in the Ribble Valley and shop in Manchester, certainly not Hyndburn. We get a halo effect possibly. Hyndburn's only major employment market historically is to work harder for less. Two words; Express Gifts. Of course it would be great to break the mold but our neighbours in Burnley have the lowest IQ in the country supposedly and we're right next door. The answer lies somewhere between better education facilities, a quality university for East Lancs, attracting large scale inward investment with employers who build up a skilled workforce, and making people believe in Hyndburn as a cutting edge place, a place to live and work.

As long as kids believe smashing up bus stops and dossing all night is creative then there is little hope of creating wealth which is dependent not on a few people earning a lot but a lot of people earning more. And as long as people slag off destructive kids and wider youth, authenticating destructive behaviour as an acceptable sub-culture to those within it, instead of helping, then the longer Hyndburn stays at the poorer end of the scale.

[cashman]

going back to the lower paid employment, its always been not very good,but i wonder if the front page of the observer has given the answer?(without realising)

[Acrylic-bob]

Graham! How nice to hear from you again, I was worried that you had gone for good. Ok, I'm claiming artistic license on the LEA thing. But the rest of wot I wrote stands up I think.

Cashman, we seem to be looking through the same glasses.

[SPUGGIE J]

Originally Posted by Acrylic-bob

It absolutley kills me to discover that Hyndburn is the 51st most deprived borough in the country, out of a list of 354!

How did we get into this state????????

The council worry more about its self than the bourgh.

[garinda]

Having lived in both London and Glasgow, admitedly in leafy enclaves, it is shocking to find how far Hyndburn is down on the table of deprived boroughs.

I can only imagine places like Easterhouse, Brixton, Plaistow, Hackney, are further down the table than even us.

[chav1]

i dont know about ill but HBC have been getting on my tits for years

[Acrylic-bob]

Is it like a hard lump that doesn't go away when you massage it? Could be malignant counciloma. I should get a doctor to have a look at that If I were you.

[chav1]

Originally Posted by Acrylic-bob

Is it like a hard lump that doesn't go away when you massage it? .

i think most of the male population has sufered from that

[Tealeaf]

Originally Posted by Graham Jones

Hi Bob,

Hi Graham & Bob,

As someone who when not in Church, works & resides in the 1st & 2nd most deprived boroughs in the country (Hackney & Tower hamlets respectively), I would like to make the following observations in response to the comments below:

I don't think HBC admisnister education, thats LCC. In reality though government dictat on curriculum along with independent schools, primarliy church, means LCC have very little control over educational standards.

Yes....LCC is the LEA for Hyndburn. And Yes,their role is simply to enforce & monitor central government guidelines and the common cirriculum within Lancashire. However, other than any role in managing at a local level HM Schools Inspectorate, I really don't see what useful job they have, other than play at bureaucrats. The best schools are quite simply those which have less interference from bureacrats - either independant, or as the statistics prove conclusively, where the Church (Anglican or Catholic) - is involved

I agree with Housing and would add this: we are about to pull down allegedly slum terraced housing and rather than build spacious green, larger houses to mix the tenure and household type we are going to build more shoeboxes. In which we are encouraging previous residents to move back in; the same poor people, or new poor people [in general], who can only for the most part afford shoe box housing. And we are building to almost the same density with, in most cases, lower quality build than the old terraced. You then have to question whether the small open spaces created in the new developments will also be quickly ravaged by nature and problematic individuals and lack of maintenance.

I have not yet seen any 'New Build' property in relation to the Elevate project, so I can only on speculation, agree and say that on past evidence the new properties going up will be of substancially lesser quality than what could have been done with the older terraced stock. Unfortunatly, the housing problem has been with us for years & at a local level, neither Labour or Conservative administrations have shown any imagination or possible solution to that problem. What appears to be hapening now is a tawdry repeat of the big city slum clearances of the 1950's & 60's. Everyone is aware of estates that replaced them and all the social and economic problems which arose.

I don't think we are breaking the spiral of decline [and knock on ill health etc..]. As market forces kick in and the economically mobile move outwards and upwards to fulfull their dreams, the new areas will be for those at the bottom of the ladder. We are in dannger of building the slums of tomorrow today in my view

Yet the property price rise in Hynburn was the 2nd largest in England, according to the Halifax a few months ago. Accepted,it started from a very low base level, but now that the average property price is £100,000 or thereabouts that is a simple reflection on supply and demand,on peoples incomes and their expectations on the long-term value of their property. So it can't be all that bad.

Low paid employment is much harder. Its a question of basic economics. If Hyndburn is lacking in educational attainment then we produce things at a greater cost and less efficiently. Less ability to enterprise, less new business's, less creative or cutting edge business's, less profit, less money, lower wages, more brain drain, higher costs because we are away from the Franco/German/Benelux economic heart/centre. If you made the new Techonolgy Park successful at Whitebirk then those people coining it in over there would then simply use their new wealth to live in the Ribble Valley and shop in Manchester, certainly not Hyndburn. We get a halo effect possibly. Hyndburn's only major employment market historically is to work harder for less. Two words; Express Gifts. Of course it would be great to break the mold but our neighbours in Burnley have the lowest IQ in the country supposedly and we're right next door. The answer lies somewhere between better education facilities, a quality university for East Lancs, attracting large scale inward investment with employers who build up a skilled workforce, and making people believe in Hyndburn as a cutting edge place, a place to live and work.

I really would not spend much time contrasting ourselves to the Franco/German Economic model. With the former currently going up in flames & the latter with 9% unemployment and both with a per capita GDP lower than the UK, there ain't much there to shout about. The simple fact, though, is that Hyndburn's economy - with above average numbers working in manufacturing - more closely resembles the failing French or Germany economies than the highly successful English South Eastern economy or even other micro economies within the North of England.

Twenty miles south-east of Accy is Hebden Bridge, which in recent polls and based upon various economic and social criteria was voted one of the best places to live in the world! Yet 30 years ago the place had much in common with Accy...a declining manufacturing base, rising unemployment,poor quality housing. Wht went right there and what went wrong here? Maybe it might be worth taking a charabanc of councillors over there one day to find out.



As long as kids believe smashing up bus stops and dossing all night is creative then there is little hope of creating wealth which is dependent not on a few people earning a lot but a lot of people earning more. And as long as people slag off destructive kids and wider youth, authenticating destructive behaviour as an acceptable sub-culture to those within it, instead of helping, then the longer Hyndburn stays at the poorer end of the scale.

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[chav1]

Originally Posted by Tealeaf

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[Gayle]

Hebden Bridge is a good example of rebranding. It became a little haven for artists and culture, people started going and it became more and more popular without ever losing the intimacy of the scale of it.

If they managed to do it other towns can too!

[WillowTheWhisp]

Hebden Bridge has been through a few changes, some of the phases have fizzled out but in the long run it stayed up rather than down. One of the main things that strikes me about the place is the lack of pound shops and the number of interesting shops ( a couple of which are no longer there which is a shame). It also has the "tourist appeal" of the river running through the middle with the bridges over it and I still reckon we could improve Accy if we made a feature of the River Hyndburn instead of trying to pretend it isn't there.

I keep meaning to take some photographs of the "improvements" to Broadway for the benefit of ex-pats but I keep forgetting to take my camera out with me.

[chav1]

hmm there is a reason why we pretend the river hyndburn dosnt exist willow.

next tiem your passing it spend a few mins looking at what passes by and you will soon see why its called the river stink amongst the locals lol