Heidi Allen on tax credits social media and the housing crisis in Cambridge

08:24 Friday 23rd October 2015
BBC Radio Cambridgeshire

DOTTY MCLEOD: It has been a very busy week for South Cambridgeshire’s Conservative MP Heidi Allen. Her maiden parliamentary speech on tax credits drew praise from all sides for its compassionate tone to those who will be affected by cuts. But equally it drew criticism from those who say her voting record doesn’t match with the sentiments she expressed. Here’s a quick taste of her speech.
HEIDI ALLEN: As these proposals stand too many people will be adversely affected. Something must give. For those of us proud enough to call ourselves compassionate Conservatives, it must not be the backs of the working families we purport to serve.
DOTTY MCLEOD: Well Heidi Allen joins me now. Hello there Heidi.
HEIDI ALLEN: Good morning Dotty.
DOTTY MCLEOD: So the charge is that you said one thing, you said that changing and cutting tax credits is a bad idea. But then you voted along with it anyway. How do you plead?
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Fen town heritage at risk

08:25 Tuesday 20th October 2015
BBC Radio Cambridgeshire

CHRIS MANN: Vacant and deteriorating buildings are blighting conservation areas we’ve heard earlier today, the assessment of Historic England who put four Fenland town centre areas on their ‘heritage at risk’ register. They are in Chatteris, Whittlesey, Bowthorpe in Wisbech and March town centre. A conservation area is one that’s recognised as having special architectural or historic interest. John Ette is the Heritage at Risk Principal Advisor for Historic England in the East, and earlier he said this to me.
JOHN ETTE: We’ve been working very closely with the council and their conservation officer staff, and it’s very much sites which have got a declining trend in terms of their overall condition. It can be the loss of architectural details as well as the other features that we’ve discussed this morning. And problems with the public realm or vacancy or quite frankly neglected and empty buildings which can be a problem attracting heritage crime in particular too. And those are quite a challenge, and a challenge across the region, not just in Fenland.
CHRIS MANN: Well Johnny D. has been in March town centre for us this morning.
JOHNNY D: So sir, today we understand that the Historic England have actually put March, where we are right now, on the heritage at risk register. Does that surprise you at all?
PUBLIC ONE: It does a little, but it does seem to be a little run down in places, and probably could do with some TLC I guess. But I don’t know where the finance will come from.
JOHNNY D.: Well if we look round us here, a lot of the shops seem well kept. They’ve got flats above the shops, all painted nicely and not too bad. I see a building there covered in scaffolding which I highlighted earlier. And up the road there’s a shop, I think you mentioned, propped up a little bit with some damage it’s had structurally.
PUBLIC ONE: Yes. I think that needs to be looked at, that particular building, because I wouldn’t like to be living above it. But I think there’s cause for optimism perhaps. The people I speak to from work love the area they live in. So I think they’d like to see something done, and for it to be taken out of the ‘at risk’ register.
PUBLIC TWO: I think it’s a good idea. Plenty of buildings in town are old, and if they’re falling down, why not keep March nice? Do you know what I mean? It’s a lovely place. I’ve been here four years. Come up from London. I’d never ever move back. And it’s got a bit of history hasn’t it? There’s loads of old buildings around to have a look at. They just done one up round the corner here, trying to keep it in context. It took them ages to get an arch. So yes, I think it’s good.
CHRIS MANN: Johnny D. talking to people in March. let’s bring in councillor David Oliver. Morning David.
DAVID OLIVER: Good morning.
CHRIS MANN: Portfolio holder for Community Safety and Heritage …
DAVID OLIVER: Yes.
CHRIS MANN: … at Fenland District Council. So your reaction? Four conservation areas put at risk by Historic England, is that deserved?
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Climate Change Act under fire as steel industry contracts

09:23 Monday 19th October 2015
BBC Radio Cambridgeshire

PAUL STAINTON: Somebody contacted the show this morning, it was Rob in Bretton in Peterborough, with a bit of a rant saying ‘It seems to me we can prop up banks, but we just let our steel works close.‘ And then UKIP’s Nick Clarke, former Leader of Cambridgeshire County Council claiming that climate change, the Climate Change Act has significantly raised household energy bills, and contributed to the demise of the steel industry, a second major player in which is to announce major job losses in the coming days we think.
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Tata Steel expected to announce 1,200 jobs going in Scunthorpe, just a week after nearly 2,000 jobs were declared at risk in Redcar. And Rob in Bretton, as I mentioned, called in. Unions are asking for the Government to step in and save the industry. Well, how simple is that? Let’s speak to Jonathan Aylen, who’s a steel expert from Manchester University. Jonathan, morning.
JONATHAN AYLEN: Good morning.
PAUL STAINTON: So we spent billions propping up our banking industry, yet we’re not going to spend billions it seems propping up more traditional jobs. Is it easy to do that anyway? Is it easy to step in if you’re a government?
JONATHAN AYLEN: Well I think Rob (from) Bretton’s got an excellent point. The banks acted completely irresponsibly and were bailed out seven years ago. They partly nationalised HBoS and RBS and Lloyds to guaranteed their solvency. And here you have two firms, SSI which is closed up on Teesside and now Tata Steel. Both have invested in their industries. They’ve both innovated, which is the kind of thing these modern manufacturing firms are expected to do. They train their workers. They export. And then their dilemma is completely ignored. So Rob (from) Bretton is dead right. There’s no justice.
PAUL STAINTON: One of the problems caused, it’s because the price of steel has dropped through the floor. Now UKIP’s Nick Clarke, a leading local politician, says a lot of this is to do with the Climate Change Act significantly raising bills.
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MPs question leaders of charity Kids Company

17:11 Thursday 15th October 2015
BBC Radio Cambridgeshire

SAM EDWARDS: A big day for the charity Kids Company. In a series of heated exchanges with MPs the leaders of the charity have denied it was a failing organisation. The charity which supported vulnerable young people closed back in August, a couple of months ago, just days after receiving a £3 million grant from the Government. It collapsed amid claims of financial mismanagement, and a police enquiry into allegations of sexual abuse linked to the charity. The founder of Kids Company Camila Batmanghelidjh and the chairman of the charity’s trustees Alan Yentob were grilled by a Commons committee. Camila Batmanghelidjh explained how Kids Company helped those most in need.
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Cambridge Health Emergency – a voice for Addenbrookes

07:26 Wednesday 14th October 2015
BBC Radio Cambridgeshire

DOTTY MCLEOD: A few weeks ago when the Trust that runs Addenbrookes and the Rosie was put into special measures plenty of you got in touch wanting to show your support for the hospitals. Well three weeks on it seems that the fightback for those places is starting to find its voice. Last night a meeting took place in Cambridge for people who want to defend Addenbrookes. They formed a campaign group called Cambridge Health Emergency. Martin Booth joins me, a retired Addenbrookes worker who helped organise last night’s meeting. Morning Martin .
MARTIN BOOTH: Good morning.
DOTTY MCLEOD: So why organise this meeting last night?
MARTIN BOOTH: Well as you said a lot of people have already expressed their concern and alarm really about events at Addenbrookes over the last few weeks. First of all we had the Chief Executive and the Finance Director resigning out of the blue with no notice at all. And then following that the Care Quality Commission report saying that the Trust was ‘inadequate’, something which a lot of people would disagree with to be honest, but at the same time highlighting very serious problems, which the report indicated many of them were caused by a lack of sufficient funding and resources, particularly the lack of staff to fully provide the services that are needed. And then the Trust being placed in special measures.
DOTTY MCLEOD: But what’s your campaign group going to do? What’s your aim Martin with this group?
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Daniel Zeichner – making the case for Cambridge

17:20 Friday 9th October 2015
BBC Radio Cambridgeshire

CHRIS MANN: Cambridge is at a crossroads, poised for the next wave of growth, but being held back by its infrastructure. That is the view of Cambridge Ahead, a group of business leaders and academics committed to growing Cambridge into the top small city in the world. Today they launched A Case for Cambridge, their plea to central government to invest more in our region and benefit the whole country. The Chairman is Ian Mather. He said Cambridge can’t rely on its history to thrive in the future.
IAN MATHER: People come to Cambridge. They stick here; I did over thirty years ago. And they love the place, but it does need to develop to attract some of the best industries in the world. But doing that at the same time as keeping it a special place. And it’s a difficult act to do, but I believe it can be done.
CHRIS MANN: Ian Mather of Mills and Reeve. Antony Mattessich is the Managing Director of Mundipharma International, one of the many pharmaceutical companies that chose to base themselves in the city over the last decade. He said Cambridge is competing with cities like San Francisco and Boston, and it’s vital that we continue to be an appealing option to the talented people that he wants to recruit.
ANTONY MATTESSICH: When they have children where are the kids going to go to school? Is there a place in the schools? What is my commute going to be like? What is my house going to be like? Where do I have to live? I would also mention that we have people who .. they’re not quite ready to settle down in a place like Cambridge. They want to live in London. If they want to live in London, the questions are what’s the commute going to be like coming from London.
CHRIS MANN: Today’s launch featured a discussion with the area’s MPs, asking how we influence central government. But Rupert Read who stood for the Green Party in Cambridge in the last General Election, unsuccessfully, thinks we should also be asking the question whether we want the city to continue to expand.
RUPERT READ: What we’re saying in the Greens is, this growth can’t go on for ever. There’s a serious danger now we’re going to lose forever the very special character that Cambridge has, if we carry on recklessly growing it and sprawling it out into the countryside.
CHRIS MANN: The Cambridge case may be about academics and decision-makers, but the Leader of Cambridge City Council Lewis Herbert insists they’re taking everyone’s opinions into account.
LEWIS HERBERT: In some bits of the world you’ve either got governments or you’ve got business, who just don’t care about what people think. It really does matter what people think in Cambridge, and if we cannot answer the needs of the people on low incomes as well as those that need to be attracted as international brains, then it will fail.
CHRIS MANN: That’s councillor Lewis Herbert. Well Cambridge MP Daniel Zeichner, the newly appointed Shadow Transport Minister, was part of this morning’s panel, and he joined me in the studio later to discuss how it had gone.
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Ansar Ali on diversity and community cohesion

09:23 Wednesday 7th October 2015
BBC Radio Cambridgeshire

PAUL STAINTON: Theresa May causing a bit of a stir yesterday, saying that high migration had made a cohesive society impossible in this country. She made that speech at the Conservative Party conference yesterday. Is she right? Net migration into the UK currently stands at a record high of course. 330,000 in the year to March came here. Some will say the increase in population puts a strain on services, causes fractures in society. Others that immigration has helped improve our economy and given us a wider cultural understanding. So we’re asking this morning do we all rub along together very nicely? Is Theresa May wrong, and do her comments inflame the situation? Are her comments more damaging to society than any one of us? Let’s speak to Ansar Ali. He’s a member of the Muslim community in Peterborough of course. Ansar, good morning.
ANSAR ALI: Good morning Paul.
PAUL STAINTON: Is she making things worse?
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Funding award for Cambridge Big Data developer

08:22 Tuesday 6th October 2015
BBC Radio Cambridgeshire

DOTTY MCLEOD: Have you heard of the Internet of Things? This is when everyday objects are connected to each other using web connections. It means that they’re able to collect and share data. So for example you could set your house lights to come on for just before you get home at night. And some people say that the potential benefits for all of this data are enormous. So for example you could take data from vans to look at where and when the most traffic occurs, which could then mean smarter scheduling, so companies could cut their fuel use, congestion could go down and in turn accidents could drop. There is one problem though with this. Most databases don’t have the storage space or processing speeds to manage the huge amount of data that can be collected. But a Cambridge-based company called Geospock thinks it might have the solution, by looking at the ultimate data storage unit, the human brain. Steve Marsh joins me now, the founder of Geospock. Morning Steve.
STEVE MARSH: Good morning. How are you doing?
DOTTY MCLEOD: yes. Fine thank you. So the Internet of Things. Exactly what is the vision with that first of all?
STEVE MARSH: I think it’s the overarching goal that by collecting data from everyday objects we can get better contextual understanding of the world around us, and then so improve it.
DOTTY MCLEOD: And you’ve been awarded £3.5 million worth of funding to bring something to market. What exactly are you aiming for?
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