Category: Wokingham and West Berkshire Issues

I have followed up the problems facing people in the Caribbean by talking to Ministers and attending briefings. More importantly, the Foreign Secretary has arrived in the area with many more UK people and equipment to support the recovery operations.

The UK sent the 16,000 tonnes Mount Bay auxiliary ship to the region with a helicopter, supplies and medical capability to take care of immediate needs on the British islands, and to help elsewhere. The French sent two 2.600 tonnes frigates to assist their islands and the Canadians sent a larger frigate. These ships also have helicopters. The Dutch have sent a smaller logistics vessel. The UK has helped clear runways and improve air access to the islands, and is assembling suitable air transport to help move people and supplies.

Ministers have ordered HMS Ocean, a 21,500 tonnes large ship loaded with supplies to sail from Gibraltar to the effected area with considerably more supplies and equipment on board. The operation will move from meeting immediate needs to longer term work to rebuild the infrastructure of the islands as events unfold. British consular help and advice is available on the islands and anyone needing assistance should contact the local personnel and help lines.

Today when I was having another of my walks to inspect the work and hear feedback on what is happening to Wokingham town centre a constituent came up to me to say how worried she was about the volume of development going on. She was pleased to see I was viewing it and surprised to learn I do that every week! She also on reflection said she agreed with the idea of Town Centre improvement, and was more concerned about the scale of housing developments in the wider Borough.

Let me explain again to all those interested. I visit Wokingham, Earley and Winnersh every week and travel through them on many occasions. I live in Wokingham Borough, shopping and using local facilities. I visit the villages in the west of the constituency regularly as well. I walked around all of them in the recent election, and went to Burghfield for an event a week ago. I usually go to see any area where a complaint or problem has emerged where it is better to see it for myself on the ground. In the last few days I have visited Wokingham Town Centre and the Emmbrook area to see progress with building, have been to Arborfield following constituents concerns, to Winnersh and the Earley peripheral to see progress on the Winnersh by pass and to Shinfield to see the continuing delays with completion of the Shinfield by pass where it crosses the motorway.

I keep in regular contact with Wokingham and West Berkshire Councils, as most of the development and traffic issues are Council ones, so that they know what concerns my constituents and where people would like improvement or better service.

I have been asked to look into the law allowing landlords or the public authorities to ask people to move who are living in caravans and other temporary accommodation on land without permission. There is a current case in Arborfield that is worrying some residents.

There are two main legal routes to sort these out. The first is the landowner has a right to go to court to get a court order to ask the people to move off the land. This is usually granted and is enforceable. In the Arborfield case the land is owned by the MOD who assure me they are taking this action when I followed up at the request of a constituent.

The second is a provision in the criminal law under the 1994 Criminal Justice Act. This allows the police to act quickly to move people on where there is evidence that they are causing nuisance. Residents who think they are should provide the evidence to the police.

The issues in this case seem to be one ones about speed of enforcement, as the law allows action to be taken.

I held a review meetings with the Chief Executive of the Royal Berkshire Hospital yesterday.

We covered a wide range of issues concerning quality of service and the future development of medical care in our area.

I was able to report a very low level of complaints to me about the service the hospital is offering. The Hospital of course has its own complaints and patient feedback systems which should normally be used where there are issues. They monitor these closely and are best placed to deal with them directly.

I visited the Tim fourth anniversary celebration today in Burghfield. Since its foundation it has recruited many volunteers to provide friendship, help and support to those in the community who need it. It now covers Mortimer, Wokefield, Sulhamstead and Ufton Nervet as well as Burghfield where it started.

I congratulated Bev French and her team, thanked the volunteers and wished them well in helping more people in the community. I had attended one of their early meetings and was pleased to see the expansion and progress of the group.

Anyone wishing to volunteer or needing help can contact them on 07778 911183 or email bev@togetherinmission.org.uk. It is part of registered charity no 1135307.

Wokingham Borough schools report a 99.1% pass rate this year at A level, above the national average. Well done to all involved. I hope it means many of you can go on the courses and futures you have planned.

I also congratulate all in West Berkshire that have done well in the exams.

It was good to see strong job generation again in the latest UK official job figures, with further substantial falls in unemployment. In Wokingham the unemployment rate remained low, with the constituency in the top 25 for a low rate nationwide out of 650.

We are now at record levels of employment, with good progress on creating more full time jobs. The national unemployment rate is 4.4%.

I received this letter from the Department for Transport:

I am writing to inform you about new rail investment that we are supporting to improve journeys for passengers and support the economy in the Reading area.

Passenger numbers have more than doubled since privatisation of the railways 20 years ago and our country’s railways need to adapt to cope with this and future demands. This includes investing in new stations, new services and upgrades across the country.

As you may be aware, we announced £20m for a second round of the New Stations Fund in 2016, following the success of the first £20m round, which has already delivered passenger benefits in South Wales, the East Midlands, the South West and South East through new stations. We have funded this competition to improve journeys for passengers, and create new leisure, training, employment and business opportunities, by supporting the delivery of new and fully accessible stations.

Reading Borough Council applied to the New Stations Fund to deliver the new Reading Green Park station. Following the evaluation of all of the applications we received, I am delighted to inform you that we will be supporting this new station. This means that the new Reading Green Park station will be benefiting passengers and opening up access to new rail journeys in the South East from March 2020 at the latest.

Our priority is to deliver improved journeys for rail passengers across the country, and we look forward to this station providing real benefits to the Reading area.

Yours sincerely

Paul Maynard MP

I have received this news release from West Berkshire Council regarding Berkshire superfast broadband coverage:

Superfast Berkshire, a multi-million pound programme to deliver access to high speed broadband throughout Berkshire has entered its final phase.

The programme initiative was started in 2011, under the umbrella of the Government’s (Broadband Delivery UK) national programme, set out to deliver superfast broadband to areas not serviced by the commercial plans of the private sector. Over the past five years the programme has driven superfast broadband coverage across the county from 87% to 95% under Phases 1 & 2. Contracts have just been awarded to BT and Gigaclear under a third phase which is now under way and will see superfast coverage extended to more than 99.5% over the next 2 years. This will make Berkshire one of the best served counties for superfast broadband across the UK, benefiting residents and businesses alike.

Contracts for the third phase have been signed with BT to extend coverage to 7,400 urban premises and Gigaclear to extend coverage to 6,100 rural premises. Not only is this good news at a county level, each of the 6 Berkshire districts will also achieve coverage of over 99%, providing much more equitable access for all areas of the county, a key objective of the phase 3 procurement. However, the work doesn’t stop there as Superfast Berkshire working with BT, Gigaclear and other suppliers under their commercial plans strive to hit the magic 100% target of total coverage for Berkshire.

In total more than £40m will have been invested in the Superfast Berkshire programme by both the private and public sector to deliver superfast broadband. This includes around £29.3m from partners BT, Gigaclear and Call Flow Solutions, £5.5m from Berkshire local authorities & Thames Valley Berkshire Local Enterprise Partnership and £5.2m from national government (BDUK).

Superfast Berkshire has also actively engaged with broadband market providers since the start of the programme to encourage expansion of their commercial plans, allowing public sector funds to be used where they are most needed. This has also given consumers more choice where superfast provision already existed or overlaps.

Berkshire has seen the demand for faster and faster broadband speeds with more and more businesses, people working from home and normal family activity all with increasing numbers of applications relying on fast internet access. Take-up of superfast broadband products delivered under phase one has risen to over 47% so far (the third highest across the UK) and take-up under phase two is also starting to climb.