Serious accident on the A49 Ross Road near to the Ship Inn. The accident happened around 7am and there are long tailbacks, which will take some time to clear, even though the road has now be re-opened.

A Sink Hole has appeared in Union Street resulting in the road being closed to all traffic

Ok, bets are open, how long do you think that white boarding will last? Lovely big plain white canvas :)

I'm going for graffiti by Sunday 1st Feb :)

Another barking mad survey. Analysis of dog types by post code across the country. In Hereford the results are:

3,000 Labrador Retreivers

2,200 Jack Russell Terriers

1,500 Border Collies

1,500 English Springer Spaniels

1,300 Cocker Spaniels

I wouldn't want to be on the post in Cardiff. 6300 Staffordshire Bull Terriers, as is the case in most large urban areas -356,000 nationally.

"Projects which help councils deliver more for less by working with local communities and neighbourhood groups awarded share of £2 million.

Herefordshire Council Project to develop better support for vulnerable residents by working with GPs, parish councils and communities to develop Wellbeing Hubs in isolated rural areas."

HC is one of 24 councils to receive part of this fund.  Each council will receive between £60k and £90k - lets hope it is put to good use and not used to produce a report!!

In the seventies our nation was in ruins. Brought to its knees by the Callaghan and the Labour Government who'd literally bankrupted our economy, we all raced to the ballot box and invited Maggie Thatcher to dig us out of the hole we were in.

Back then public service was a place you went to work if you wanted a steady job, a job for life and a pension after thirty years. Of course back then, the pay for all public service workers was extremely low but the trade off was all the things I've mentioned previously and the chance to live in rent free housing. Also, back then, the hirearchy from within these public services had walked in everyone's shoes, done most of the jobs, they were not academically particularly bright but they knew how to get the job done.

That was true of all our emergency services and it was most definitely true of the Council.

But then something remarkable happened that changed the course of history for all our public services. What was that? Arthur Scargill and the Miners Union who challenged Thatcher.

As a consequence of this important period in our industrial history. Two significant things happened. Over a two year period the Police were awarded two huge pay rises which catapulted them into the high earners bracket and they began to become skilled in riot training.

As for the outcome, you all know what happened but it wasn't this event that impacted upon our public services. The huge pay rises awarded to the Police changed public services forever. Thereafter, the Police began to realise that they didn't have to empty someone who was tall and had some commonsense. No! They opened the doors to the high achieves. Those with a Degree.

In the meantime, the other public services who were still on their pittance of a salary wanted and got what the Police had been given.

Now the other public services were becoming high earners, like the Police, they to opened their doors to the highly qualified academics who then began their climb up the promotion ladder.

By the early nineties, tired of Margaret Thatcher and forgetful of what Old Labour had done to our economy, we raised out and voted in Tony, the liar Blair who, under the banner of New Labour decided to embark upon a vast public service job creation programme and a belief that Public Service Organisations should model themselves on successful private sector management styles.

And they did. Very bloody quickly. Out went the old, in came the new and before you knew it every single Public Service agent began to build its new model of leading from the Centre. Gone were the days when someone got promoted for their operational achievements. They were either cast aside, retired or simply ignored. Decades of knowledge and experience were lost to the new breed of leader who, armed with a fistful of Degrees, no operational experience and an inability to see anything in a straightforward way, they began their relentless change.

By the time we hit the year 2000AD, the public service chant of, 'If we want the best, we have to pay the best', had completely overwhelmed our public services resulting in no self control, a sense of self entitlement and worse than everything, a cultural ethos of outsourcing that saw the suits getting shot of all the dull and uninteresting things.

For them, filling in potholes, cutting the grass, emptying the rubbish and doing all the other mundane and boring stuff was no longer wanted. They thirsted for the interesting areas of business. The areas that they, armed with their degrees and their unusual language could challenge themselves and become involved in the exciting stuff. The sort of stuff you could corner, create an empire and better still, charge up the pole of success, get a bigger salary and a pension pot that you and I would die for.

Now, all the dull and boring stuff has moreorless been outsourced. All our public services are now dominated by the offspring of those who became grateful that Maggie Thatcher decided to give the Police a huge pay rise.

That one single political decision started off a chain of events that's sees you and I staggering around wondering why we've got long bloody grass, why the Council has become a bureaucratic beast of burden, why we've potholes you could hide a domestic cat in and why High Town has been destroyed and abandoned to a bunch if people who have a Degree in Making Love in Sixteen Different Languages.

Me? I regret the three day working weeks of the Seventies when, at four o'clock the power went off we all went home and sat behind a lit candle wondering how the Council still managed to fill in the potholes, cut the grass, empty me bloody bin and do it with a smile on their faces cognisant that we all appreciated their help, albeit their wages were very low and not many of us wanted to do their job.

Sometime in the next twelve hours something highly significant is going to happen to all of us and I think it's wonderful.

Thank you Greece, thank you to all men and women born Greek and thank you to Syriza the far left party that looks increasingly likely to win the Greek election and have a majority that'll enable them to form a Government.

For those of you that aren't familiar with this modern day European Union 'tragedy,' this Greek working class party want at least half their debt to the EU wiped out and they want an immediate end to the austerity economic programme that was forced upon this proud people by the mandarins of Brussels, the IMF and the German Chancellor.

Since the negotiated loan agreement with the EU and the IMF, the Greek economy has shrunk by a full quarter and over 25% of its citizens are unemployed with absolutely no chance whatsoever of ever getting another job in their lifetimes. Factor all this in with high inflation, poverty levels that are beyond our imagination, a national feeling of hopelessness and no fear of consequences because the worst has already happened to these great people, they've voted for Syriza and I couldn't be happier.

If as I hope the Germans and the rest of the EU refuse to reduce the debt and give the green light to end the austerity programme the Greek people will walk away from the EU. They'll go it alone, they'll bring back the drachma and despite the pain that'll be visited upon them, they'll do it, they'll be happy doing it and be content in the knowledge that their destiny is back in their own hands and they will decide what is best for themselves rather than some faceless bureaucrats from the IMF and the EU.

If however Syriza, manage to negotiate a reduction in debt then that makes me happy as well, because then the Italians, the Portuguese and the Irish will want the same. This then pretty much means, more and more quantative easing, an end to gathering in more weak economies like Albania and Belarus, less expansionistic EU policies, less chance of further conflict behind the old iron curtain and more and more likely that the Euro will eventually go belly up and then we can draw a line under this mad social engineering experiment that is the European Union.

THOUGH still not a certainty, the accursed Link Road to Nowhere last week took a step nearer to being more than the collective wet dream of Messrs Jarvis, Johnson and Phillips, and the other limousine-owning members of the Cabinet who believe that roads are our salvation.

So how much will it really cost, this 800m-long strip of dual carriage tarmac, stretching from Edgar Street to Aylestone Hill?  'How long is a piece of string?' as my old gran used to answer when asked the unanswerable.

The only 'known' at the moment - and this from no less an authority than former Leader John Jarvis - is that £27M has already been borrowed and banked to fund this pointless vanity project.  The 'unknowns' include: what the Wolverson family was paid to close down its Rockfield DIY store; what the costs of the two 'settlements' with Royal Mail (RM) and Jewson - announced at the end of last week's public inquiry were; who pays for the construction of RM's re-located vehicles park on Jewson's land; and how much Hereford Futures (HF) paid to various highway design consultants over the last five years.  Who will ever forget that Kafkaesque moment when, attempting to unravel HF's £3M running costs, the Scrutiny Committee was advised that the defunct company's recoords and files were in the process of being shredded!

Ok, for argument's sake, let's say the Rockfield pay-off was £6M.  Which would have to mean that the combined RM / Jewson figure would be at least three times greater (negotiating lawyers are no fools when they have precedents to quote).  So that's £24M.  Add in the Jarvis borrowing figure of £27M and you've already hit £51M.  Are your eyes watering?  Then factor in another £1M to cover the road consultants' fees, plus six sets of legal costs.  At £52M - or a staggering £65,000 per metre - this would make the Hereford Link Road (if it ever got built) easily Britain's most expensive urban motorway.  More expensive even (per metre) than the notorious M25 London orbital motorway.

Austerity didn't hit the top of the food change.

http://councillors.herefordshire.gov.uk/documents/s50023075/Appendix%20A%20-%20Draft%20Pay%20Policy%20Statement%202015%20-%20EP%2014%20January%202015.pdf

http://councillors.herefordshire.gov.uk/documents/s50023076/Appendix%20B%20-%20Top%20tier%20org%20chart%202014%20-%205%20Jan%202015%20EP%20140115.pdf

https://www.herefordshire.gov.uk/media/7693610/pay_policy_statement_2014.pdf

So you have to pay an addtional 30p in order to pay for your parking? Do I understand this correctly? But you do receive free texts NOT! (You have paid 30 p for the privilege) 

From my understanding the previous service which was provided by PayByPhone  was subscription free, so I am confused as to why Herefordshire Council have opted for this more expensive company? I see Oxfordshire Council have done the same see this article

In London the Council have opted for the reverse, The London borough of Southwark have changed from RingGo to PayByPhone, see this article

So what's the difference between these two company's other than one being free?

I had a walk around the city centre the other day and decided to count how many empty shops we have, how many do you think? I am sure that I may of missed some.

1.

Lets see..

I've been looking at his photograph. You can tell an awful lot by staring at the image of a local Councillor who's about to destroy something good and of importance to the people of Hereford.

For a starters, his eyes are to close together. I've never trusted a man whose got those eyes that imply, 'don't sit down and play three card brag with me because I'm a rotter, a cheat and a bloody big ninny.'

Course that ain't the whole lot. Not at all! You'd be a strange fish if you went around disliking everyone simply because their eyes were not to your liking. Im sure his loved ones would say, 'well, we like his bloody eyes just the way they are and anyone who says otherwise is an idiot and shouldn't have unfettered access to a keyboard.'

No! It's more than that. Much, much more than that. His head for example. Whilst its not overly huge, it ain't small and I don't like his hair cut. Where I come from you get a basin shoved on your cranium and the shears do the rest. This man takes great pride in his hair cut and that's another reason why I've come to the conclusion I wouldn't want to break bread with him. Anyone who takes that sort of pride in his hair cut instead of sitting down with a bowl on his head and getting his hair sheared off like the rest of us ain't to be trusted.

And I've been speaking to folk about Harry. He's not liked. I've yet to speak to anyone who says they like spending time with him fishing for barbel on the Wye. To a man, they say he's tight. Mean! So mean and tight, he'll turn the gas off when he turns the bacon over. That's bloody tight for you!

No! The facts here are speaking for themselves. This is a man with eyes set to close together, there's something about his head that I don't like, he ain't getting his hair cut like me and he's a man who's tight with his money.

Then there's the personality. Good grief! This poor man must have been badly scarred by his days as a child treading the boards playing King Herod every year until he reached puberty. It couldn't have been easy sat there when the teacher shouted, 'you boy. The one with the eyes set to close together. In all my days of producing Nativity Plays you are the best Herod Ive ever seen and whatsmore, if ever we decide to stage an Easter Play, you are my Pontius Pilate.

Yeah! You can tell an awful lot about someone by simply studying their photograph. And if you're reading this Harry, and you will be, unless you change course Im going to write you a part in a lurid tale about a man elected into Office who kept scurrying up my drainpipe demanding demanding something that I've yet to decide upon!

Leave the Working Boys Home be, build the Firestation that we don't need in some other place and stop destroying our heritage. Then, and only then will your torment end!

Hi everyone, I'm very new to this so please bear with me if I'm doing this the wrong way, I find myself in a real predicament, and would really value anyone's input if they have any help for me on this.  I will try not to bore you with all of the details at this stage (don't want to put you off reading it), I find myself with a fine from G24 for parking in a disabled bay on a retail park (which I gather is classes as private land parking).  I am entitled to occupy this space with a current blue badge, (I was using my son's car therefore the letter was sent to him via the DVLA I assume). The incident apparently occurred on 18th December the letter arrived a few days ago, I am worried sick about this, I have read many posts on different forums and mainly say that private land fines are hard to enforce, but the majority I have come across are with regard to overstaying the limited times, I can find virtually nothing about disabled parking though I guess really from G24's point of view a fine is a fine!  I feel sure I put the badge in the window but I cannot honestly swear to it, along with physical disability (difficulty walking very far), I suffer from a condition known as fibromyalgia one of the symptoms of this are what is loosely termed 'brain fog' which simply means lack of concentration, periods of poor memory & confusion, hence me not being 100% about the badge.  I have since been back to the car park and happened to see the young man in operation, he literally ran to the car as soon as the driver was away from the vehicle, took a quick shot front & rear on his mobile phone and disappeared into the crowds, He was dressed in normal clothes nothing to say he was a parking attendant, despite on G24 website showing their attendants wearing Hi vis jackets with the name on, I contemplated speaking with him but didn't see the point & didn't want the confrontation I guess.  My question is does anyone know what I should do I have read so many conflicting stories, I cannot afford to pay the £100 and really if I'm honest more to the point feel it's unjustified I was entitled to be there, also a lot of the posts I have read refer to unreasonable charges relating to overstaying stating that it's unreasonable to charge more than the land owner would have lost, well in this case they would have lost nothing as I was entitled to be there and also in and out and off the car park in less than 30 minutes only popped to buy dog food. Sorry if I've rambled on when I said I wouldn't but it's really stressing me out, please can anyone help??

Just been sent this video which shows the bin persons dumping black bags in a local residents property....seems like we hve bin persons behaving anti-socially:

They were going to have to find an extra £750,000 to freeze council tax and they say they could not do that. What about the £1,000,000 underspend for their "change management" or does that mean the change is going into management's pockets. What about the parking charges of nearly two million pounds - is this going towards more bottled water and biscuits?

It is interesting how all the areas that the council under took in the past have been whittled down, through out sourcing, to just 3 areas. With all the money being sucked out of the locality by non elected quangos including the LEP and private companies on lucrative contracts. You just feel that your pocket has been picked again.

Work started yesterday (Monday 12 January) to install new low-energy street lighting along Herefordshire’s roads.

We live in the Country 3.5 miles from the City .

For various reasons we use our back door when we leave our home . Three days ago the Postman knocked on our front door with a parcel , on opening the door as well as the Postie and the parcel I found a very damp Yellow Pages which must have been put / thrown there some two / three days previous . Was put rightly / wrongly straight into the recycling bin.

Today I walked down the lane from our home passed , what I know is an empty home because the occupants are enjoying the sun in Spain , and are there for the next week . The drive to their home is " secured " by a five bar gate , thrown over this gate was their copy of the Yellow Page , even more soaking and useless than mine .

I accept fully that the distribution of this publication by somebody gives them employment but they have a responsibility to ensure that this publication is distrubited properly - it's what the advertisers pay for and expect.

I know that I could have complained to Yellow Pages - and perhaps I should have - but at my age I certainly have better things to do with the rest of my life .

Report here about Herefordshire Council considering the proposals for a joint property vehicle (JPV) with Worcestershire and the alternative options for commissioning of property services.

Part of the government's instruction for regionalism of services and management of key services.

Strangely the council appear to be wary of it, although there is mention of putting in place a partnership agreement with a private sector partner while retaining an intelligent client/strategic asset management capability within the council.

Is that a call for the return of a Hereford Futures type organisation?