29 September - Peter’s vanity project
In my opinion, attempting to open a tiny cinema in a
small town like Sidcup was doomed from the start. As an AV snob I truly hate the
move to the streaming of films because the quality is not as good as it is on
disc and one’s favourites, which one might have paid for, can be withdrawn with
little or no notice. But many people seem to think a film viewed on a mobile phone
screen and heard over some crappy Bluetooth ear pieces can do justice to a
multi-million dollar production intended to be seen
on a forty foot or bigger screen accompanied by a dozen or more loudspeakers. But they do and more fool them.
Clearly (the then) Cabinet Member Peter Craske and his Council had no misgivings and
did little or no due diligence when they engaged the Really Local Group to
install a tiny three screen (30 odd seats each) on, ironically, the site of the
old Sidcup Blockbuster video store. In my admittedly technically biased opinion
it did
not provide me with a better viewing experience than I can have at home, so it
did not attract me for more than one visit. So who did it attract? Not enough obviously.
The cinema opened in the middle of 2023 and the company went into liquidation 18 months
later leaving Bexley Council with a reported £55,000 of unpaid debts. Despite
that Sidcup’s doors remained open thanks to a generous handout by
Bexley Council; £12,000 a month admitted and up to £17,000 reported. In July
this year the cinema finally closed, supposedly for a refit.
Believe it if you like, it is still closed. Pubs and shops get refurbished in a
matter of days.
This
blog is prompted by an article posted yesterday on the
London Centric website.
It reports that The Really Local Group’s cinemas were supported by substantial
public funds and in return it has left unpaid tax bills, unpaid film
distributors, unpaid staff and unpaid small businesses. Peter Craske must be
really proud of his failure to spot the obvious and maybe MP Louie French
regrets backing the cinema so enthusiastically.
The one remaining cinema in Sutton hides a pile of rubbish because the bin
collectors have not been paid and there is evidence of bailiff activity. Like Sidcup’s
StoryTeller it shows a restricted range of films because some film distributors prefer to be paid.
In Catford, where the cinema was an early failure and the Council was not stupid
enough to bale it out, the luckless caterer had to chase the cinema operator
for the money he was owed. From what little information we know from Bexley
Council, they will not even try.
I suspect that this is the sort of area which will benefit from having a Reform
UK Council next May. My occasional discussions with their local finance experts
suggest very strongly that they will not be taken for mugs as Councillor Peter Craske clearly has been.
This blog relies heavily on the
London Centric website and a tip
off from @tonyofsidcup.
Index to StoryTeller related blogs.
26 September - The Bottle battle
Ye Olde Leather Bottle has featured on Bonkers
more than 50 times, most recently
a month ago.
A property developer more closely associated with Bexley Council and its
Planning Committee than honest people might consider to be wise has turned what was once
Bexley’s oldest pub into a hazardous impassable rubbish heap but maybe his luck is running out.
He has been served with a Community Protection Notice. This requires him to
secure the site such that unauthorised access is no longer possible except that
The Public Right of Way must be restored.
By today!!
If the developer does not comply Bexley Council will take steps to ensure that
he does, failing which he will have to pay for the Council to do the work.
As yet there is no sign of compliance.
You will have noticed the lack of chat and news
here. The fact is there has been no Bexley Council news and there are no Council
meetings until October. On top of that life has been getting in the way and what
little spare time there has been has gone on updating another website I look
after. Also I have not been completely well recently, nothing serious, and I have a friend who
needs some of my time. This week I have one medical appointment, two funerals to
attend and the garden is getting totally out of control.
See you later I hope.
It was rumoured several months ago and yesterday Councillor James Hunt X’d that it was more than a rumour and
today it is official. The woman who said that criticising Councillors is criminal and those that engage in such activitities,
i.e. me, should be arrested will not be standing for re-election next May and
will not be Leader from November. Boris Johnson’s most favoured London politician
(he said so publicly and in writing) will soon be gone.
Teresa O’Neill presided over a difficult period for all Councils with funding steadily
reduced by successive Governments and was never quite directly associated with
the criminal activities of some of her Councillors and Senior Officers so one
might say she did reasonably well in the circumstances, but there is no denying
that Bexley went steadily downhill during the seventeen years of her Leadership.
Reform UK will be denied the chance of soundly beating her in eight months time.
17 September - “Underhand and illegal”
Bexley’s Labour Group has
reissued their
Press Release about flags (PDF) which
originally escaped from captivity earlier than they intended.
Lamp post flags are “underhand and illegal”.
Image extracted from
News Shopper report.
Index of Labour Press Releases.
16 September - Utterly Dimented
Two dozen commuter parking spaces wasted. Is it just a cynical ploy to fill the Felixstowe Road car park?
No resident benefits from this vindictive act by Bexley Council. (All day Free reduced to a 4 hour maximum stay.)
15 September - A CPZ designed by random number generator
Yesterday
was the first weekend since the introduction of the AW1 CPZ and it coincided
with an event at Lesnes Abbey. Every parking space was taken and it extended to the
footpath in places; right to the top of New Road where a pavement parker was ticketed.
I warned a Chinese couple that parking part way across the dropped kerb belonging to a lady who has far more
success with
Parking Enforcement than I do was a bad idea and they gratefully moved on.
I have tried to find out exactly why residents of Elstree Gardens are not
enthusiastic about the new CPZ whereas on the other side of Abbey Road they are.
The best quote I have is “Elstree/Kingswood is a sea of yellow lines with not
enough bays and without logic. A six hour restriction is too long when visitor permits are
only five. Albany Park is 11-1 and then 3-4 in the afternoon. It stops commuters
waiting until 13:01 which is a consideration with the working hours prevalent
post-Covid but still permits carers/traders etc. to visit and park for most of
the day while preventing commuter parking”.
Lack of logic is evident
right across the CPZ north of Abbey Road; is it the
same along Elstree Gardens? I took a short walk to have a look. Restrictions
there are not a mish-mash of inconsistent double lines as can be found in Priory
Gardens. Some turning circles fully lined, others not at all and a few, like my own, half and half.
In Elstree Gardens there is consistency but none of it is like the inconsistent
Priory Gardens. Elstree residents have single yellow lines where there are
dropped kerbs and marked parking bays where there are none. That is consistency
of a sort but not consistent with what may be found across Abbey Road.
Nowhere in Priory Gardens has single yellow lines or marked parking bays so
people living there who have bought a permit can park pretty much where they
like. In Elstree Gardens they cannot; not even across their own drive. It is
hard to see how the AW! CPZ was not designed by a lunatic.
Elstree Gardens even has a section which is open to anyone for a maximum stay of four hours and a designated Disabled Bay. Inconsistency rules the day.
There are many examples of incomplete lines of which two are shown above.
Abbey Road (below) remains a monument to Bexley Council’s vindictive nature. This
morning and early afternoon only six cars occupied the 26 spaces available. 20
motorists displaced to where they might cause inconvenience to nearby residents
instead of doing no one any harm. Demented.
Did the Cabinet Member have a clue what he was doing when he signed off this badly executed scheme?
14 September - The intolerant Left is never far away
My
news gathering comes mainly from YouTube with some newspaper websites thrown
into the mix; never the BBC or any other sort of TV. On the illegal immigrant front, the mainstream
media, if its radio output is any guide has covered Epping, Canary Wharf and
Waterlooville, next door to Portsmouth for those whose geography knowledge is a
little rusty. Never anywhere else but YouTube shows that some 30 or so
localities have seen protests, the nearest of which may be Islington.
The protests are always the same, locals worried about their women and children opposed by
bussed-in protestors waving identical banners and chanting the same slogans.
“Nazi scum off our streets” being the most common. Ironic when it is them who
have been imported by an organised group to shout down local residents whose streets they may be.
If you watch enough of them you get to recognize the same old faces every time.
Typically men with ponytails and women with excessive piercings and ridiculously coloured
hair. A lot of them very obviously dreadful and genuinely ugly people in every sense of the
word. After an hour, sometimes two, they all pack up and go home, the time for
which they have been paid having expired. I have no idea how anyone can be
so repulsive and objectionable and appear on camera for all to see. Having said
that some must be ashamed of what they are doing and hide behind balaclavas, placards and umbrellas.
Without exception they refuse questions from journalists while local residents
are always more than happy to speak.
I met one of them yesterday.
My daughter is an expert at breaking computers and after a quick visit yesterday
which diagnosed a keyboard which had gone crazy and doing its own thing, I found
myself standing on a late afternoon Elizabeth line train from Farringdon. I
found a seat at Liverpool Street and at Whitechapel moved to another to allow a
black couple and their two children to sit together. Then did what everyone
seems to do, tinker with their phone; in my case to see if I could find out what
had gone on at the much advertised Freedom March. I scrolled through the Daily
Telegraph and Daily Mail websites and the comments some of which I may have liked.
As we approached Woolwich, a lady; I use the term loosely, berated me for being a
racist and for “reading all that sh1t”. Why is it that Lefties cannot abide
differing opinions and anyone who isn’t a carbon copy of themselves is a racist?
The IQ level of a muppet presumably who cannot get their two brain cells around the idea of independent thought
that might be different to their own.
The black couple who had taken my seat looked on with heads shaking at the outburst. The
Leftie got off the train at Woolwich where she may belong.
13 September - Waving the flag
I
now know why the Labour Party Press Release which appeared here earlier today
was dated three days after I received it.
It was accidentally distributed before being ready for publication.
Maybe a replacement will be along later.
12 September - Bexley Council : Thoroughly vindictive, as usual
There was absolutely no reason for it but Bexley Council appears have adopted
the policies of the Far Left. Hit motorists at every opportunity. By reducing
the time limit on the 26 (approximately) Free Spaces in Abbey Road, Bexley Council has successfully driven the
commuters away. If today at 12:30 is typical, and it was the same yesterday, 20 cars are now parked outside
other people’s houses in an area not yet covered by a CPZ. It benefits nobody
but may have massaged the ego of one of the power-crazy numbskulls who run
Bexley’s Highway's Department.
Are we sure that the responsible Cabinet Member is called Diment and not Dement?
Abbey Road just after 12:30 today. By 3 p.m. the nearest white car had been given a PCN for overstaying the new and unnecessary four hour limit.
I
have always had an aversion to on street parking charges. I could never see
the logic of paying taxes to wear out the roads through driving around and paying
extra to not do that. I am quite proud of never paying Bexley a penny to park on their property.
Obviously I am an extreme minority nutcase and some people regard £15 a day as a mere
component of their commuting costs. Then there are the selfish ones who think it
is OK to leave their cars on other people’s property.
A few weeks ago on
the Priory Gardens Facebook page - which I can no longer find
- [see below] residents were speaking of getting their Managing Agents, Centro Ltd, to do
something about it. Mark the reserved bays, maybe a fold-down bollard etc. Centro seem to be pretty good,
always out maintaining their properties and yesterday one of their vans pulled
up outside my house and two suited and booted members of their staff took a good
look around the reserved parking areas armed with notebooks and clip boards.
Total speculation on my part but it looked like they were looking at the parking issues.
If you had gone to the website
justpark.com as I did yesterday to check local
parking availability for today you would have found that a bay managed by Centro
in Coptefield Drive could be rented for £8 a day - except that it had been
booked already and is for the next couple of months. Is £8 a reasonable fee? I was thinking two or three pounds would
be plenty but that sort of money is an obvious temptation.
Looking further afield will show you that the best part of £200 a month is common while one greedy optimist is looking for £692.
My house happens to be the closest CPZ AW1 house to Abbey Wood station and if I
ever get around to
repairing the gate it is possible to be on a Liz line train
within seven minutes. Maybe I am missing an opportunity to get rich quick. (I
bought the necessary timber immediately but time and medical issues have been the enemy.)
Monthly fees.
Note: Found it. https://www.facebook.com/p/Priory-Gardens-Belvedere-Community-100075836239407/
9 September - Where did they go?
It
is so quiet around here. The absence of vehicle noise while turning back when
a parking place cannot be found is very noticeable. I am grateful to Councillor
Sally Hinkley for taking the leading role in tackling the sometimes intolerable
parking problem brought about by the Elizabeth line since 2022. It may have its
drawbacks elsewhere but my immediate neighbours are all very pleased with the
end result. It is not a perfect solution but the big danger is displacement to areas without a CPZ.
To that there is no easy answer or even any at all.
So where have the Liz line lurkers gone? According to my postman they have
descended on the Bedonwell Road area. Jammed solid. Well they were bound to go
somewhere and the 469 bus provides an easy, though somewhat infrequent link to Abbey Wood station.
Whilst my end of Coptefield Drive is free of parkers, the area that provides the
shortest walk to the station in and around Carrill Way is not. There are
fewer parkers than usual but eleven of them were displaying PCNs when I checked at 11:30 this morning.
Further away no one had been given a PCN. Commuters do not like walking further than they have to.
There were as expected plenty of free spaces on Abbey Road now that the four
hour restriction has been imposed. This takes Cabinet Member Richard Diment into Craskean depths of vindictiveness. It serves no purpose whatsoever. I had
wondered if it was a way of encouraging more visitors to the Abbey but that
theory is defeated by the fact that vindictiveness does not apply at the weekend.
I asked the Civil Enforcement Officer how the reduced hours of parking would be
monitored but while most CEOs are friendly, some most definitely are not.
8 September - Today is the day
In
general I have always been against Controlled Parking Zones, too often just a
money making exercise. My view was reinforced by former Cabinet Member Peter Craske who
in 2011 tripled the not too unreasonable price of a permit from £35 and then attempted to
justify it with a whole series of lies.
He actually said in Council that his aim was to maximise the value of CPZs - to the Council obviously.
He also claimed that the administration fees were £240 for every parking permit issued.
And
a load of other things. It never did cost £6 a foot to paint a white line.
Nevertheless I voted in favour of the CPZ (AW1) introduced today. I think my
comment on the consultation response was along the lines of I was on the fence
but as all my neighbours are in favour I will go along with it. I would not be much
affected if Bexley Council and the Police properly enforced the old rules.
With one exception the Police incorrectly said that blocking roads was a Council matter
while Bexley Council refused to ticket a vehicle I reported which was
overlapping my neighbour’s drive by eight inches. The excuse was it would look
“a bit mean”. They have however penalized others one of which (Photo 2) was over
the boundary by fewer than two inches. Meanwhile Deputy Director Kevin Taylor is
happy to see roads illegally blocked.
He believes his staff can do whatever they like while on duty.
The new CPZ spans two distinct areas. The so called Priory Gardens Estate of
251 houses and 68 flats approved in May 1984 before people hating Mayors were allowed to limit domestic parking facilities.
Some similar and adjacent developments came along later, squeezed between Abbey Road and the
railway line and all pre-Khan so with adequate provision for car parking.
There are few houses on Abbey Road which divides the CPZ but they like those in
nearby Kingswood Avenue and Elstree Gardens were probably built in the 1920s and
1930s when car ownership was almost unknown. It is not always possible to turn one’s front garden into a parking bay. (Photos 3 and 4.)
Which Council clown thought those residents would welcome a CPZ in the way Priory Gardens has? I have yet to meet a resident living there (here?) who is
not rejoicing this morning. The roads are clear and quiet. Much quieter because
commuters no longer drive up and down looking for another non-existent space.
It is not the same further east where residents are complaining to their Councillor. Mine was
first noted as pushing for this CPZ in 2022 and
knocked on my door in 2023 seeking support for her proposed consultation. Earlier this year, through her Transport Users’ Committee
membership, she welcomed AW1 being the first of the newly proposed CPZs to be installed before all the others in the pipeline.
Probably she responded effectively to all the Priory Gardens residents being badly affected by the Elizabeth line and Elstree Gardens etc. residents said
nothing because they were not seriously affected. Now they are biting the Belvedere Councillors on the bum.
But what are Councillors to do? if Elstree Gardens etc. are excluded from the CPZ every Elizabeth line commuter will descend on them. There is no obvious answer.
The AW1 CPZ seems to be
plagued with inconsistencies some of which have already been featured here.
A few have been corrected with all the Priory Gardens flats being given arguably illogical but identical signage.
The boundary between the old AW CPZ and the new AW1 is now correctly marked (Photos 5 and 6 below) but if you pass right through it from West to East all the roads to the left have
repeat signage (Photo 1) but none of those on the right. Why?
A fair number of yellow lines are still incomplete. (Photos 7, 8 and 9.)
Will the CPZ make a difference? It already has. (Photo 11.) There were fewer commuters to be seen as soon as the signs started to be uncovered a couple of weeks ago.
Nowhere did the Council tell visitors the CPZ start date.
Speaking
of visitors, most residents will have to shell out a fiver if one of their
friends drops in throughout the six hour restriction period. The permits are valid for only five hours. (Photo 12.)
My view and that of my neighbours is perhaps a narrow one. Every one of us has off
road parking facilities. Those without in older houses are having to pay dearly to park their car.
The first tickets were issued at 1:45 today and I was disappointed to see that a van that had not moved in nearly three weeks (Photo
10) did not get one. Apparently it has a permit and is one of allegedly nine vehicles owned by the same resident!
Will the Civil Enforcement Officer numbers be increased to cover the extra workload? Not according to the one I spoke to. Extra work but no extra pay.
You will note that the four hour restriction on the free bay in Abbey Road is driving commuters away. It is usually full by
7 a.m. and all day. No advantage whatsoever to anyone. No one
other than squirrels and foxes live there. A prime example of bloody minded vindictiveness by Bexley’s rotten Council. (Photo 5 and below.)
It is much the same further east where the very few houses that front Abbey Road
are deprived of their parking spaces, photo below, for no reason that anyone can fathom. Bonkers, but it is Bexley.
Did someone say that CPZs are all about the money?
7 September - Cheap and cheerful and possibly not total crap
Here’s another bunch of social houses going under the hammer.
https://www.rightmove.co.uk/properties/166252085#/?channel=RES_BUY
https://www.rightmove.co.uk/properties/166346702#/?channel=RES_BUY
https://www.rightmove.co.uk/properties/166382927#/?channel=RES_BUY
https://www.rightmove.co.uk/properties/166251986#/?channel=RES_BUY
Is the whole of Maiden Lane a Council Estate?
List of auctioned Housing Association addresses with links to original blogs. Hover over address for date. (Revised 1st December 2025.)
Bexley
30 Bourne Mead - £165,000
2 Eynsford Crescent - £190,000
15 Marden Crescent - £300,000
Pengarth Road - £160+,000
34 Pengarth Road - £300,000
53 Pengarth Road - £310,000
Rye Close - £320,000
44 Stansted Crescent - £170,000
44 Stanstead Crescent - £140,000
Bexleyheath
Grove Road - £145,000
94 Halcot Avenue - £195,000
121 Halcot Avenue - £210,000
33 Oakhouse Road - £360,000
Parkside Avenue - £260,000
80 Pelham Road - £260,000
Crayford
Crayford Road - £270,000
Dale End - £139,000
1 Dale Road - £295,000
38 Dale Road - £270,000
65 Dale Road - £295,000
60 Heath Road - £249,000
83 Heath Road - £260,000
22B Iron Mill Lane - £275,000
179 Iron Mill Lane - 155,000
187 Iron Mill Lane - £135,000
235 Iron Mill Lane - £320,000
176 Maiden Lane - £255,000
191 Maiden Lane - £160,000
191 Maiden Lane - £160,000 (2nd auction)
206 Maiden Lane - £250,000
230 Maiden Lame - £250,000
234 Maiden Lane - £250,000
234 Maiden Lane - £175,000
4 Medway Road - £210,000
4 Medway Road - £270,000
4 Medway Road - £225,000
Russell Close - £155,000
44 Stansted Crescent - £170,000
20 Stour Road - £205,000
Erith
21 Athol Road - £220,000
Hilden Drive - £285,000
52 Jennington Road - £250,000
Springhead Road - £255,000
Sidcup
Burnham Road - £190,000
11 Diana Close - £275,000
Ellenborogh Road - £149,000
Ellenborogh Road - £155,000
Ellenborough Road - £269,000
5 Ellenborough Road - £210,000
63 Foots Cray Road - £325,000
2-48 Heron Crescent - Not priced
Ladbrooke Crescent - £220,000
Maddocks Close - £255,000
50 Mallard Walk, £180,000
Maylands Drive - £320,000
56 Maylands Drive - £200,000
56 Maylands Drive - £180,000
17 Partridge Road - £300,000
Pembury Crescent - £129,000
Pembury Crescent - £135,000
30 St. Andrew’s Road - £240,000
Welling
29 Beal Close - £250,000
19 Berwick Road - £275,000
39 Burnell Avenue - £300,000
18 Burnell Avenue - £280,000
79 Darenth Road - £275,000
47 Denton Road - £145,000
17 Ridley Road - £235,000
77 Tyrell Road - £290,000
2 Wycliffe Close - £310,000
5 September - Elwyn Bryant : 1937 - 2025
I attended my first Council meeting
at the invitation of Michael Barnbrook
who died on Valentine’s Day last year and Elwyn Bryant and now he has gone too. His health had been a mystery for two or three years and
every test under the sun failed to reveal the cause. The most obvious symptom
was his loss of weight. However much he ate, he gradually got lighter and
consequently weaker. Earlier this week he was taken into Queen Elizabeth
Hospital where he slowly slipped away yesterday with his family around him.
As the name implies, Elwyn was born into a Welsh mining community but he was having
none of that, he joined the Royal Navy soon after the Korean war ended and spent
most of his seven year’s service in the Far East. He was always pleased to tell
me how he flew in Sunderland flying boats at the invitation of the RAF.
Later in life he became a Convener for the Union of Post Office Workers but he
was as far from being a red hot socialist as it is possible to be.
When chasing officialdom he was like a dog with a bone and fearlessly made phone
calls to people of whom I would steer well clear. If a difficult letter was
needed, Elwyn would fire it off before getting a second opinion on it from his Council pestering friends.
He leaves a wife and, I think, two sons and a step-daughter.
James Brokenshire MP and Elwyn Bryant.
Elwyn lost his final battle with Bexley Council. In recent months he could only get around his own house with the aid of a walking frame but Aspire (Bexley’s contractor) refused to give him a Blue Badge. One technical obstacle after another put in the way. A week ago Elwyn told me he was going to write to his MP Louie French but I suggested it might be a better bet to contact his Councillors, Cameron Smith and Kurtis Christoforides.
4 September (Part 3) - Computers on wheels - Phase 2
There
was a phone call before I took my bus ride to Chislehurst
to see if my car had been
shipped off to Tilbury as I had been told it needed to be two days earlier. It had not been. The
call was to offer a petrol engined courtesy car - I forget which model - but I refused
it. I am not going to return to the inconvenience of finding petrol stations and
paying for the pleasure of smelling exhaust fumes when my EV runs on Solar for
free. I had been promised in writing that if the out-of-spec battery failed (LG
had made a manufacturing error and it could catch fire) I would be loaned another identical EV.
Whoever it is who dishes out courtesy cars came back to me with the offer of a
2024 model EV but I would have to get myself to Watford to pick it up. They
agreed to pay any travelling expenses incurred but there was no way to get it
back to Belvedere without incurring one of Sadiq Khan’s travel taxes so I declined that offer too.
I took the SL3 and 269 to Perry Street to ask Ancaster (the dealer) what was
going on. The answer was a mixture of bad news and better news. My car had not
been picked up and that was not expected to happen for around 14 days. Meanwhile
it sits out in the open instead of its normal protected life in my garage.
Once returned to Tilbury it was likely to wait there for a minimum of four
months awaiting the availability of a replacement battery which is hopefully
clear of LG’s mistakes. Hyundai’s dealers are almost powerless when up against
Hyundai UK’s intransigence, incompetence and total disdain for customer care. I and
other Hyundai owners have seen how poor they can be over seven years. See photo below.
However my receptionist seemed to realise that being given five years of the
runaround by Hyundai UK should not go on longer than necessary. She said that the whole operation was going to cost
Hyundai something in the region of £18,000 and that it was ridiculous that they
were happy to add to the inconvenience by not delivering a courtesy car to my home.
She made a phone call and put some pressure on someone or other to do something
helpful. Along the way she extracted an assurance that if no EV was forthcoming
all my petrol bills would be reimbursed but the real answer was to provide the EV promised in the first place.
This morning someone phoned to tell me that an EV will be delivered to my door, probably tomorrow. Well done Ancaster lady.
So Ancaster, despite in my opinion, a shaky start, have done all they can given
the uselessness of Hyundai UK. A manager called me today with name and phone number in case of further problems.
However there has been total silence from Hyundai UK. No reaction to yesterday’s
X post. No response to Monday’s email. If you are in the market for a new car, Hyundai is
the name to avoid.
Thanks to my industry contact I now have the name and email address of the top
man at the Driver and Vehicle Standards Agency who issued the urgent instruction
to change some Hyundai (LG) batteries and who has been sitting on his backside wasting
taxpayers’ money ever since. Also their
Code of Practice. (Actually there has been a change of personnel since 2020
but you will get the point.)
Do you think a Civil Servant might do his job if I complain? I have my doubts.
So Hyundai are having to spend £18,000 on a seven year old car. The most
expensive one on Auto-Trader at the moment is available for £12k. but it has
47,000 miles on the clock while mine is at 38,000. It would cost Hyundai less to buy me out.
By the way, My Superloop SL3s did not go anywhere near Bexley station and
provided a quick and easy route to Chislehurst. Why do
Bexley Councillors want
to take the facility away?
Note: The photo above is the one that got me a threat of
police action. Taken through a glass screen where customers were encouraged to watch.
Four owners meet to compare notes when EVs were a novelty.
4 September (Part 2) - More profit than BexleyCo
Five years ago, in the good old days
when I had
access to a car, I drove over to the back streets of Erith to take a look at
two Council owned houses (176/8 Slade Green Road) which had been left to rot for three years and then mysteriously caught fire.
Vandals probably.
It was speculated that the Council had
also acquired the next door Community Centre and its car park and had in mind developing the
site. Well it seems there was some truth in that story and they have granted themselves planning permission. (25/00147/FULM)
The permission is for 44 flats and the Council owned site is offered for £2,750 plus. The conditions
on Rightmove’s website are worth a read. (See below.)
From a couple of run down houses to nearly £3 million. Oh, that BexleyCo could be that successful.
Click image for Rightmove website.
4 September (Part 1) - Commuters on wheels
Tomorrow
is the last commuting day when drivers will be free to inconsiderately block the roads of
Belvedere (Fossington Road to St. Augustine’s Road approximately) at will.
Conway (Bexley’s lighting and yellow line contractor) was out from around 08:30
yesterday uncovering the signs that were still blacked out and erecting
those that they missed two weeks ago.
So far they have not fixed the incomplete yellow lines. (Photo 1.)
It probably is a good idea to indicate that the private parking areas are not
subject to the CPZ (Photo 2) as I have encountered residents who thought otherwise. Then I
suppose it follows that they must be reminded when they leave home again (Photo
3) but the
same logic dictates that everyone’s drive should be festooned with ugly signs.
Fortunately Bexley’s Highways Department may be silly but not that silly!
The
parking restrictions which do not come into force until next Monday have
already had an effect, Most days recently my road has had spare spaces all day. Maybe
that’s because commuters are increasingly parking on private property. (Photo
4.)
This new CPZ numbered AW1 appears to be very poorly thought out. The cul-de-sac
which is the mirror image of mine (Samson Close) has a complete circle of double yellow lines.
The Western end of Coptefield Drive is only half lined and others not at all.
In other indications that CPZ AW1 is something of a bodge job, further
inconsistencies provide more traps for unwary motorists, Too often that is what road
traffic regulations are all about.
If one drives towards the new CPZ from Abbey Wood one first passes the
long existing AW CPZ
exit sign. (Photo 5.) Then on the left one might see two AW1 entry signs (Photo
6. Carrill Way, Carill Way or whatever it is today) but if one turns
right into Elstree Gardens one enters CPZ AW1 without any warning whatsoever.
Photo 7.) Yet it is clearly part of a CPZ. (Photo 8.)
Click any image for a larger view.
3 September - Computers on wheels
Note: This blog which is about how Hyundai UK must be the worst for Customer Service of any UK based
car distributor was written early today but not posted until after a dealer visit as they were
keeping me in the dark and I needed to check if there were any mitigating circumstances.
Basically there are not and a further report will have to be written. The
dealer’s news could not have been worse.
He is trapped by Hyundai’s utterly useless procedures and inefficiencies
but his failure to answer phone calls or email doesn’t help.
Seven
years ago I bought a new car, electric because my internationally acknowledged motor engineer son told me
they were the future, that hybrids were a silly compromise and that hydrogen will
never happen. The Hyundai Kona was the first car that would get me to his home
in Wiltshire and back home again without having to charge the battery
en-route.
As you can see, I was treated like Royalty when buying the car on Day 1 of
availability in the UK. Hyundai encouraged its early buyers to join a Facebook
Group and I was one of the founder members. I still read it occasionally and
seem to be the only Day 1 owner still driving the same car. (There are some Day 3s and Day 6s.)
I immediately took to the electric car, quiet, no gear changing, no possibility
of stalling the thing and easily first away from the lights when boy racers were still
impatiently revving Ford Escorts.
It has never gone wrong, well two halogen lamps have failed, cornering and
courtesy, the others are all LED and I have never had to pay for charging away
from home - because I haven’t needed to. The brake pads are still as good as new because
the regenerative braking does nearly all the work. I changed the tyres at 24,000
miles, not because they were worn out but the factory fitted items were renowned for excessive road
noise and wheel spin. Michelins were much quieter.
Ownership qualifies me for Octopus’s seven pence a unit tariff so except for the
£30k. purchase price it has been dirt cheap motoring.
The downside has been Hyundai
UK and to some extent their dealers. One in Maidstone (the nearest service depot of
the dealer I purchased from) said they were going to call the police because I
took a photograph of my own car as it was going on the ramp. It was the first
opportunity I had of looking at the underside. After the manager was told where
he could go he sent me a whole series of emails explaining how I had
broken the law. Idiot. Obviously he killed any possibility that I would ever buy
a another car from him.
Fortunately Ancaster in Welling switched from being a Vauxhall
(?) dealership to
Hyundai and the manager there was brilliant and always took a close interest in
my EV. Unfortunately Lee was transferred elsewhere and has recently left the
company. It was somewhat downhill from there.
Hyundai UK soon acquired a reputation on the Facebook Group for being uncaring
and unresponsive to those who contacted them and then in November 2020 they
dropped their bombshell. A number of cars had been fitted with a
potentially faulty LG battery and the Driver and Vehicle Standards Agency was
insisting on it being replaced as a matter of urgency. Three further letters said
that the replacement would take a maximum of five days during which an identical
electric car would be provided and the job completed by October 2021.
Meanwhile I must not park it under cover - my garage - or charge it fully - so I
could not drive to Wiltshire and back any more. The restrictions would have
caused higher insurance costs, more weather related depreciation and on road
charging costs. I was given no compensation whatsoever.
And I heard no more.
At recent car anniversaries I emailed Hyundai UK to ask about their rate of
progress and why the oldest cars have been left until last.
Last year they said on a Wednesday that they would call me on the Friday to arrange
a battery replacement. This year they asked me to be patient as they hadn’t got
any batteries or technician capacity. Hyundai UK is a company that can
warn owners in 2020 that their car might catch fire (and
world-wide 14 did) and should not be kept in a garage or charged
excessively but five years later are content to risk owners being incinerated.
Nevertheless I
judged that as only 0.0001% of the affected LG batteries had caught fire, the
delayed DVSA recall was not much of a problem and the later I was given a new
battery the better. There is not much to go wrong with an EV and a replacement
battery will give it a new lease of life. Having said that the old battery is
still doing 100% of the miles it did when new. Driven carefully I can get close to a 400 mile range.
This week the car is seven years old and with a month’s notice I booked a service
and MOT. Unfortunately Ancaster has moved from Welling to Perry Street,
Chislehurst but I arrived there before opening time on Monday morning thanks to
Thames Water not having left any unattended holes along the route.
I sat in the waiting room, at first with two other drivers and later on, a few more.
It was a little annoying to be placed sixth in their queue at opening time. One of
the receptionists noticed that queue jumping was going on but her client who had
blatantly queue jumped protested his innocence. When my time came I commented on
the queuing situation but was basically told that I couldn’t count.
Whatever happened to the ‘Customer is Always Right’? Getting close to calling a
customer a liar is not the best way of forming a relationship, so we were not off to a
good start and I got the impression that my receptionist was not really interested in anything I might say.
It doesn’t help that Ancaster place a computer screen between receptionist and customer so that there can be little human
interaction as neither can see each other. It is very
off-putting.
By the time I left, my phone had a text message on it with a link to a service
progress chart. By 11 a.m. it showed a half way marker but over the next four
hours it did not move at all. Then my phone rang for all of four seconds.
The number indicated it was Hyundai so I called it. After three seconds under
nine minutes I was told no service agents were available. Fortunately I still
had the phone in hand when it rang again. The Ancaster lady said it was bad news and I
thought an MOT failure perhaps, but it was far worse than that.
I was told that they had applied a software update but it had failed half way
through and now the car would not start up at all. Hyundai HQ had told them it
must go back to their main depot in Tilbury because the update had likely
screwed up the battery fatally.
I accepted it calmly, these things happen, and was assured that I would be kept
informed of progress. I have not been. I tried phoning and that took another nine
minutes listening to a message about buying a new car from Ancaster. What a way
to treat potential customers.
The email address Ancaster had used to contact me proved to be ‘No Reply’ although
it didn’t say so. Brilliant; but I found another which did work. Unfortunately
there was no response to that either.
So I am now carless and haven’t a clue about what is going on.
How to treat customers. Not. This afternoon I shall have to catch an SL3 to Sidcup hospital
and make my way from there.
Note: Even after seven years, dealers do not really
understand electric cars. My guess is that the software detected the known
manufacturing defect in the LG battery and closed the system down for safety
reasons. The software probably did not trip over itself and wreck the system as
was implied but instead did what it was supposed to do. Disable a battery
known to have been assembled incorrectly. It
is, after all, four years since Hyundai said that things may become critical
and it is well known that the fault becomes worse over time. Because they have
so badly let customers down the dealer is having to pick up the problems.
Probably I should inform the Driver and Vehicle Standards Agency that their
instructions have been so flagrantly disregarded by Hyundai UK.
Wilton Road is the heavily congested little road
which leads to Abbey Wood station. Once a busy little shopping centre boasting a
newsagent, delicatessen, butcher, two grocers and a greengrocer, pharmacist, off-licence,
florist, beautician, launderette, dry cleaners, both ladies’
and gentlemen’s hairdressers, two cab offices, two betting shops, two pubs, a
café, ironmonger and electrical appliance retailer. When Crossrail (Elizabeth line)
was on the horizon Bexley Council, for the first time ever, noticed that Wilton
Road existed and asked the shopkeepers to set up a Trader’s Association to provide
a contact point for Council Officers.
For reasons that don’t really matter I was appointed their Secretary and
arranged all their monthly meetings. I still have all the Minutes and Audio
recordings from February 2016 to February 2020. When the Council got wind of who
was Secretary the Association was told to find a new one but after a week or two
of deliberations the Council (it was more Greenwich than Bexley) was told to get stuffed.
I was alone in attending every single one of the meetings. I heard
Bexley Council Officers saying (literally) that the shop owners were sitting on
little goldmines with the extra footfall brought about by the new railway. The
shop owners were encouraged to invest in their businesses to take advantage of
their good fortune. One cab office took over its rival and spent an absolute fortune on a modern
computer booking system with a stack of servers in the back room. Peabody took
soundings on whether their Harrow Inn site should include an M&S or Tesco.
It all came to nothing.
A monthly market was short-lived and almost no one walks to Abbey Wood station. There is a
succession of train passengers delivered by car and the buses are all out of
service while using the road as a turning loop.
Peabody never did build on its Harrow Inn site (demolished 2009) and far from
becoming a gold mine the shopping centre has gone into decline. I have not spent
so much as a penny there since before Covid. It is all bad news and has shown
how bad Councils can be at strategic planning.
Recently, the Co-op store in McLeod Road has permanently closed leaving the area
seriously short of general grocers. One of those in Wilton Road has halved in
size and the other survives by catering for the high proportion of foreign born
residents. Greenwich Council has allowed
its side of the street (the borough
border runs down the middle) to deteriorate and anything that needs repairing
gets a cheap bodge job if they can be bothered to get off of their backsides at
all. Bexley Council does its best to deter shoppers with its regular CEO patrols.
Linda Williams who lives above her ladies’ hairdressing salon has gone down the
petition route. It may be an act of desperation; who takes any notice of
petitions? Certainly not Bexley Council which runs a scheme designed to allow them to be killed at will.
Anyway, if you agree with Linda you can sign at
https://www.change.org/p/need-of-grocery-shops-at-abbey-wood.
She gives her reasons there and It is simple enough to sign and will cost you nothing. Abbey Wooders should give Linda some support.
1 September - Reform UK has combined two branches to form a single Bexley Branch
Friday’s blog got me into a little bit of trouble,
totally unjustified in my opinion. I had received copies of
messages which appeared to come from an Old Bexley and Sidcup Reform source or I
suppose from someone who has suitable contacts with them. I personally do not
know anyone who is a member of OB&S Reform unless perhaps supporter James Hunt
has joined after telling me several months ago that he hadn’t.
The Bexleyheath and Crayford Branch, that is a couple of their members, has
asked me a few questions about Bexley’s history but my contacts with them are
few. That said, the OB&S messages were to and from names that I recognised and
one was very unhappy about the merger. Reasons were given but to state them here might be
enough to identify my source to those in the know.
Very soon after posting the blog I received an X Direct Message from a Reform
supporter to say he had seen the same or similar email to mine and confirmed the OB&S
Chairman who he names was not a Happy Bunny having been displaced by Tom Bright from the Crayford branch.
Until that point in 16 years of blogging I have only once been accused of making
things up, by Daniel Francis MP as it happens but nothing on BiB is ever an
invention. The point may be missed occasionally, finance is a problem for me, but everything is firmly based on truth.
For that reason I was not at all pleased to have Tom Bright,
erstwhile Chairman of
Bexleyheath and Crayford Reform UK, tell me I was talking “nonsense” and claimed
to know my source. He said that Bexleyheath and Crayford members are “very
pleased with the amalgamation”. He goes on to say that as a blogger I should
“more thoroughly check your information before posting in future, Malcolm. I
would say it is very much in your interest to do so.”
Is that some sort of threat?
Who does this intemperate upstart think he is to think he can dictate how BiB
operates? I repeat, I had seen the messages that came out of OB&S Reform which
gave a whole load of reasons why the Tom Bright takeover is a bad idea. I am not alone in having access to those messages.
However if the end result is that the Old Bexley Chairman has been sidelined It is a very
good idea to appoint Tom Bright and it is to be expected that Bexleyheath and
Crayford members will be pleased. Rather an impertinent young upstart as
Chairman than someone with a quite appalling record of dubious dealing. I remain
a bit of a Reform UK sceptic, but where else can a lifelong Conservative go
right now?