The Market Hall in Derby is a great asset for the City Centre. Built in 1866, it is a Grade II listed building. By 2017 it needed significant roof repairs, and work […]
Market Hall transformation: Council needs at least another £15m to complete it.
This is Derby Celebration event – sports, arts and culture collaborate to improve essential life skills of young people
A colourful, vibrant, and inspiring event took place in the Market Square on Saturday 13th July as a fitting end to a year long project called – This is Derby. The project […]
Council’s library strategy will fail until it accepts that the answer is NOT with Community Managed Libraries (CMLs)
The Council’s policy, with respect to the 10 non-statutory libraries, was to encourage volunteer led community groups to run them; so-called Community Managed Libraries (CMLs- as defined by Locality). No such groups […]
Jamie: Derby Poet – making the ‘Best of a Bad Situation’
How different would Jamie’s life have been, had his surname not been Thrasivoulou? Born to very young parents, in 1984, in Alvaston, when money was very tight, in a household that was […]
Successful Christmas Lights switch on shows spirit of community
Lisa Higginbottom of Brilliant Communities, and Matt McGuiness of Furthest From the Sea had a bright idea a few weeks ago. In the face of the Council cancelling the very popular, annual, […]
Council refuses information request on Labour Party agent’s privileged access history
The Grant Thornton report issued in June 2016 was very critical of the access rights given to James Shires, the Labour Party agent. Shires has his own security pass for the Council offices, and […]
Derby City Councillor’s 2015 expenses – Surprising!?
Obtained under Freedom of Information – this is the full list of all expenses claimed in 2015. I must confess, I was expecting it to be a longer list, and to be […]
Project Touchdown : the challenge of sleeping rough on the streets
Cold, cold , and cold again. Brain numbed by a disturbed night’s sleep, each 15 minutes punctuated by the chiming of the bells, reminding you that it’s cold. A mind blurred, and […]
Derby City Council’s Budget con-trick. Where did the £70m go?
In October 2014 the Council reported that £69m cuts needed to be made in the 3 years following 2014/15. 2015/16 – £22m ; 2016/17 – £24m ; 2017/18 – £23m – due […]
Council pays itself an extra £6m whilst axing Voluntary Sector Grants and Citizen’s Advice Bureau.
Cllr Banwait tells us that the Council’s finances have been destroyed by the Tory Government and that the 100% cuts to the Voluntary Sector Grants, Citizen’s Advice Bureau (CAB), as well as […]
Cllr Rawson reveals Labour Group’s cynical political priority
Anyone who has anything more than a passing interest in the behaviour of the Derby City Council Labour Leadership will be well aware of the constant politicking taken in every nook and […]
I absolutely agree with Councillor Banwait….
I absolutely agree with Councillor Banwait when he criticised the Tory Councillors for proposing a motion at this evening’s Council meeting to ‘Save Moorways’. I totally agree that this gave the campaigners, […]
Voluntary Sector Grants: Council confirms no facts were used in making decision
In a previous article I questioned whether the Council had full knowledge of the facts in support of their decision to cut Voluntary, Community and Faith (VCF) Grants. The first of my […]
The Homelessness Paradox; It’s not just a housing shortage.
Home-lessness is often confused with House-lessness, and the belief that to be homeless means that someone therefore lives on the street. This is part of the paradox. There are very few true […]
JET: Nail-biting times for Sharief – can they keep paying his £60k pa rent?
“JET’s survival could only be secured by remarkable and individual actions…..This is particularly true of the Sharief family who have donated £39,600 over the last 3 years to JET” (Quote from JET’S […]
Diwali : Festival of light at Derby Hindu Temple
The annual Diwali celebration took place on November 6th 2015 at the Hindu Temple in Normanton. The lights were switched on by the Mayor, Paul Pegg, and the event included dance, and […]
Derby Refugee Advice Centre : an essential gearbox for those seeking sanctuary.
Making progress in the UK for Asylum seekers and refugees can feel like a constant battle with conflicting, interlocked, meshed and crunched cogs, frustrating the free-wheeling machine that should guide them through […]
Derby Feste : Saturday
WHEEL HOUSE BY ACROJOU MARKET STALL BY C12 DANCE THEATRE LAUNDRY XL BY DIRECTIE & CO / TOTAAL THEATER SURTAL ARTS FRANTIC BY ACROJOU UNDERGROUND BY MOTIONHOUSE MAN IN A BOX BY […]
Derby Feste : Friday Night
2 quite difference performanecs on Friday night – a sensuous, love story, with a beast-turned-man, “winning the beauty”, and a parade of “other-wordly”, stilt-walking sauruses. Great opening to the Feste Festival. SOUL […]
Derby Soup – local crowdfunding of small projects – with something to eat.
Raising money to fund small projects, locally, can be bureaucratic, something of a mystery, and arguably, undemocratic. It always leaves questions as to where the money went, was it really a good […]
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