Streetlife

Yes thanks wandsworth for clarifying

Post Op, but back again and I am amazed that Wandsworth Council feel confident to write anonymously through Street Life but do not allow face to face planning / discussions with us. The main focus of our efforts is to maintain and extend what is available to 8-14year old kids. The younger children are provided for by One O Clock clubs etc but the older kids require much more supervised activities. The council have not provided accurate statistics for in-door users as they stood by the gates to the younger kids playground when gathering their statistics and most older kids enter the facilities by a different gate. Anyway this is not the forum as you so rightly pointed out for anything more than general conversation so I will leave the debate here and only update you when it finally ends hopefully with a working adventure playground remaining in place for another 40 years and services available to connect our young teenagers to the diverse community  that we share in Battersea!

Jane E and Elizabeth O: if the facility is genuinely being used by large numbers of 8-14 year olds (and not the small percentage that Wandsworth's statistics indicate) then I would support looking at it again.  Maybe Wandsworth Council can tell us a bit about how the statistics were compiled - where the survey was done, times of day, days of week etc.  It is important to find ways to occupy kids of this age, I'm sure the council is fully aware of this but I don't know if this is the right facility for them. 

The survey was conducted last summer throughout the entire six weeks school holiday.

Staff were at the playground gathering responses from when it opened in the morning until it closed in the evening.

Wandsworth Council:  Were these staff who should have been working with children, or staff drafted in for the 6 weeks to fill in forms?  If the latter, how much did that cost?  If not, why were they pulled off their proper jobs.

What would the survey results be on a school day?  Surely, on those days it is more likely that older children will spend a bit of time letting off steam before going home to (or not to...) do homework.  The younger children will probably go straight home.  After all, according to the posting on the School Crossing Patrols, it is claimed that most young children are taken to and from school and don't, therefore, need the help crossing roads.

My survey, on a school day, would tend to support the idea that your survey results were dependent on the timing of your survey.

No news on the increase to £70 million question?  Why, I wonder.

By the way, I have just ask Cllr Dawson how much the income is from the Battersea Park Playground.  When I was there the other day, a school group from Croydon had made a special booking for their end of year treat.  This indicates that, with expansion, York Gardens and Kimber Road, together with Battersea Park as it is, could be a source of revenue for the Borough.

Jane, if you want your thorough research done I don't think its right to then moan about the cost or of having staff dragged off other duties.  Also, school holidays are a time when children of this age will potentially be bored and might otherwise get up to mischief so it is a good time to do the research. 

Sorry maybe I am being naive - but I don't understand why the new structures would prevent the slightly older kids from going to the Adventure Playground ? Am I missing something ? Also I have been to the Adventure Playground MANY MANY MANY times and I have rarely seen kids older than 10....

I am not trying to defend Wandsworth here but you just have to look at the state of the playgrounds on Clapham Common (which are managed by Lambeth) which are very tired looking (not to mention the sand-less pits...I have asked Lambeth to replace the sand about a million times now and they still remain empty) and the playgrounds on Wandsworth Common and in Battersea Park which are run by Wandsworth which are always very well kept and with excellent equipment.

I really admire you Elizabeth O for fighting like this for something you believe in. But I do think that for some others this is just another excuse to have another Wandsworth Council bashing !!!

BDB: the problem with the commercially produced structures is that they are static.  The home made structures change all the time, with young people helping playleaders to adapt, mend and improve structures.  In other words, the new structures will be boring if young people have been using them over the years.

I have just been doing some number crunching to put the costs into perspective.  Wandsworth put their monthly expenditure on line.  Wandsworth claim they need to save £70 million (without explanation).  The savings for taking staff away from Adventure Playgrounds and School Crossing Patrols (keeping children safe) is £460,000 a year.  The cost of replacing the Adventure Playground equipment is £500,000.

To put this into context: in March (just one month) WBC spent £500,000 on trees.  They spent £2.5 million on furniture and £1.5 million on agency staff and advertising for staff.  The total cost in March was over £450 million. (compared to £17 million in February and £11 million in April).  To me, that would indicate that there are cuts to be made elsewhere and that in March departments were spending like crazy before the end of the financial year.  I have only looked at some headings, not all.

This makes the cuts to the safety of young people look particularly perverse and unpleasant.

Lulu: I'm not complaining that research was done but am questioning the methodology.  Looking at the research which was done on York Gardens, much of it was as a response to questions put to accompanying adults.  That distorts the results completely.  Hence my questions.  Each Adventure Playground also has a commercially equipped playground suitable for younger children.  Again research in this area would give distorted results.

I have not yet been given information on the income.

Tony Belton has kindly pointed out that there was a one off payment to the Government in respect of housing in March.  This accounted for over £400 million.  However, even adjusting for that, the expenditure in March was £7.5 million more than in April and nearly £5 million more than January.

As has been pointed out on another string - Jane's analysis of our financial situation contains some very misleading information and some important omissions.

She claims that, according to the information she has gleaned from our website, we spent £2.5m on "furniture" in March.

The figures she cites are freely available for all to see on our website under a heading clearly entitled "Equipment and Furniture"  - and while we did spend £2.5m in March, this included a whole range of miscellaneous items like scaffolding hire, playground equipment, books for schools, spare parts for council vehicles, occupational therapy equipment for the homes of disabled people and many general items needed to repair and renew properties occupied by council tenants.

She also omits to say that of the £450 million spent that month, £433 million was a single payment to the Government under new national rules ending the old council housing subsidy arrangements.

And, being honest, Wandsworth I have already admitted this as posted above.

It still does not alter the fact that there was an end of financial year spending increase.  I realise that some money has to be held back to cater for contingencies, but in some categories, the increase is very high.  Why does the equipment/furniture amount jump from £888k in February to £2.5 million in March and drop to £195k in April.  The same types of item will be counted - it doesn't matter what is included in that category.