This service is vital to those without there own transport and unable to use public transport to the RUH Bath

Councils are democratically elected. We can hold politicians to account and kick them out if we don't like them. Externalising services weakens democratic control. The people can't sack an ALEO or private company board. Cutting terms and conditions of council workers is unjust, unwarranted and will be counterproductive. Removing flexi time will have a disproportionate impact on women. We need a Council that will defend and improve Council services, protect jobs and seek to make East Dunbartonshire a better place to work.

Mental health in the UK is in crisis. As it's seen as an invisible problem, cuts are being made across the country in the hopes that the public won't notice or care. But most people will experience, or will have a family member or friend experience, mental health problems - this is in fact an issue that touches us all. We need to fight for our vital services. We need to fight for Winterbourne Therapeutic Community. The Winterbourne therapeutic community (TC), a large part of the Berkshire Complex Needs Service, is due to end in November 2015. The TC has been operating for almost 50 years and is highly-respected among therapists who work with TCs. This is a therapeutic model that works by bringing people together, all of whom suffer with longstanding emotional problems, and turn them into a community. Members’ experiences include abuse, neglect, trauma, deprivation and loss, particularly early in life, which leads to an inability to take care of themselves and form healthy, sustained relationships with other people. The fact that members are able to form a community is a huge testament to the hard work of both the members and the therapists. Winterbourne TC offers its members therapy of 18 hours a week for 18 months. Every member joins knowing that TC offers no quick fix, but is extremely successful when hard work and commitment is applied. In today’s world of cuts and demands for immediate results, it’s no wonder that therapeutic communities are unpopular and at risk across the UK, despite their efficacy and cost-effectiveness in the long-term (http://www.scie-socialcareonline.org.uk/…/a1CG0000000GTAxMAO). TC can only operate with full openness, which is why it’s particularly disturbing that there has been a lack of this when communicating about the future of TC. Members, both current and former, were only informed about the imminent closure of TC this month, September, meaning we’ve had very little time to organise and get a campaign plan going. Ex-members were invited to a workshop regarding ongoing psychological services provided by Berkshire Healthcare NHS trust at the beginning of September. As there was no context, and it was held from 3.30pm til 5.00pm, people who were working didn’t attend, whereas they would have made special arrangements to have attended had the workshop’s purpose been clear. The official reason for the closure of Winterbourne TC, given by Cathy Saunders, a spokeswoman for the Berkshire Healthcare NHS Foundation Trust, is that the site has recently been deemed “unsuitable for use” (http://www.getreading.co.uk/…/patients-outrage-over-closure…), without further detail. There had been signs for some time that the TC was under threat for financial reasons: for a long period of time prospective members have been hard to find, despite the fact that previously TC was in such high demand that there was a waiting list. Additionally, this year the number of therapists in each ‘small group’ has decreased from 2 to 1. Small groups consist of up to 6 members of the community, where psychotherapy and discussion can take place in a more sustained, detailed way. Therapists are an integral part of the small groups, so this cut has been sorely felt. Winterbourne TC is incredibly special. It operates through a “living-learning” experience, which includes tasks like providing a meal for all members and therapists, teaching members how to get on with the ordinary business of living. For the incredibly hard process of leaving, a leavers’ group helps members think about life after TC, professionally and in terms of their own welfare. It also provides 24/7 support – outside of community hours, members telephone each other for support. Physical support, when telephone support just isn’t enough, can also be arranged, where members of a community come together to offer support and love during what can feel like the very darkest hours of all. This community has kept people alive. It has taught many people how to live, not just exist. This petition calls for this invaluable service to be kept open - it has been a literal lifeline to so many people. A member's story - Samuel: I would wake up every day and within seconds I’d be crushed by the disappointment that I was still here. Every hour I was conscious my time would be consumed either by unhealthy coping mechanisms or fantasies of suicide. I attempted suicide multiple times before the age of 22. Had I not been referred to Winterbourne Therapeutic Community in early 2014, I likely would be dead or dying by now. I am 24 years old. In September 2015, I completed my treatment in the Therapeutic Community and barely recognise the person I was when I started. During my time there I developed confidence, self awareness and a desire to live. I learned the skills required to leave my parents’ house and live independently. I made friends and made plans for a better life and made peace with my past and my decisions and my pain.

Sign this petition to ensure the public an opportunity to respond to these outrageous proposals and a full enquiry into how the council have been allowed to enforce gagging orders on council employees to prevent them from speaking out. Our children's future is at stake. I am one of many parents in the area with a child who has additional needs. The proposal to remove support within schools affects all children. There maybe as many as 5 disruptive children in a class of 22 with the teacher expecting to deliver the curriculum without any assistance. The whole system will collapse. And this is just the BEGINNING of the cuts.

Hackney has its eyes on growing land values in this fast gentrifying London borough. It plans to demolish three primary schools and carve up the plots, building private homes for sale on designated education land - selling off the playgrounds and digging up the trees to build luxury flats. The new schools will be rebuilt on a fraction of the original sites, some with twice as many pupils squeezed in. The number of private luxury flats crammed in doesn’t leave room for much else. At the first proposed school, the play spaces are on the roof, in permanent shadow of the towers. The residents will be able to look right down on top of the school. As for the classrooms, there aren’t many windows. The corridors are internal, artificially lit rat-runs. The first proposed school is opposite a park, but south-facing, high-rise residential towers will block all the natural daylight. Ironically, residential towers on this site were demolished 20 years ago as a sign of progress. My son’s current school, Nightingale Primary, is not perfect. But it has dignity as a school, and room to play: There’s a grassy hill with enough bushes and trees for a game of hide and seek, plus a bee hive, kitchen garden, football pitch and three surfaced play areas, one for nursery, one for reception and one for everyone else. All of this will be sold off to build flats that likely will be sold for 'investment' - it may be that no one actually even lives there. Children spend 30 per cent of their life in school, with profound effects on their health and development. A 2007 Danish study showed that fresh air ventilation rates are linked to pupil performance. In a study of 2,111 Spanish schoolchildren, time spent in (not near) green spaces reduced behavioural and emotional problems, reducing hyperactivity and improving ADHD scores. A six-year American study on 905 Massachusetts elementary schools found pupils in schools with more ‘greenness’ scored higher in standardised tests. Chinese scientists discovered a 23 per cent reduction in shortsightedness among children who spend an additional 40 minutes in the sun. In a wealthy city such as London, there is no excuse for such poor stewardship of a land asset that, once sold, will be gone forever. With the shortage of school places, we will need education land to build on. We once battery-farmed hens until it was found to be too cruel. Are we going to battery-farm our children? Please help us stop the Hackney Learning Trust.

ITs. important because the BBC is now having to make up the shortfall in income from the over 75s instead of the government, so more cuts in the BBC services to meet this cost. Many pensioners are strong supporters of the independent and wide ranging services provided by the BBC and many could easily afford the monthly DD of about £12.

High speed broadband internet and mobile networks connect people, they spur economic development, improve education, health care, and environmental sustainability. Without this kind of infrastructure, many rural and under-served communities and their residents remain at a disadvantage, unable to access the benefits or opportunities available to already “connected” communities. Broadband and mobile reception in some areas of Suffolk is as good as non-existent. Even checking emails for some people is an almost impossible task. This stifles business growth, disadvantages our educational institutions and disconnects our communities. By 2017 we are promised that both poor downloads speeds and the phenomenal inequality of those who are connected and those who are not, will be things of the past, and that 95% of the country will have access to superfast broadband. Please don't let vast swathes of Suffolk be within that remaining 5% not-spot.

Writers who are not white men have contributed hugely to our understanding and appreciation of poetry, and it is unforgivable and unrepresentative to exclude them from a national celebration of poetry. Women and people of colour have been consistently ignored, sidelined and poorly treated in academic and arts circles, often not being taken as seriously as white men doing the same things as us to a similar or even lower standard. As TV licence fee payers, we have a right to be fairly represented and to see ourselves - and a true reflection of the arts world - in the programming we pay for.

The East Kent Hospitals University NHS Foundation Trust (EKHUNHSFT) is responsible for five hospitals across East Kent. In a recent meeting with the interim CEO of the trust, Chris Bown, 38 Degrees members learned that A&E and maternity services were at risk of closure. He stated that “current provision is unsustainable in East Kent”. He warned that there will be proposals released early next year that will be "radical and substantial". He added that the proposals will be "politically controversial" and that he fully expected public protest. A&E and maternity services were highlighted as particularly vulnerable. Chris Bown’s previous six month appointment at Stafford Hospital resulted in the loss of the hospital’s A&E and consultant led maternity services. He has been given a twelve month contract at EKHUNHSFT to carry out similar cuts. It would be totally unacceptable to close or cut any of Kent’s A&E departments in Ashford, or Thanet They serve a large and growing population and the closure of one, let alone two, would result in greatly increased journey times leading to unnecessary deaths. Likewise, retaining the existing consultant led maternity services at all sites is essential for the safety of mothers and new born babies. Closure of any of the existing services will place unmanageable strain on the rest of East Kent’s health provision. The safety of East Kent residents cannot be allowed to be compromised in this way.

The establishment of the West Midlands Combined Authority is the most important change in regional local government in the last 25 years. The new authority will have a budget of many billions of pounds. There are genuine concerns about the extent to which members of the new Combined Authority will be democratically accountable to local people in the control of both policy and finance.

Labour is launching a ‘Better Buses for Littlemore’ campaign. “It’s a scandal that Littlemore residents don’t get the same standard of bus service as people in Blackbird Leys or Rose Hill”, says Labour councillor, John Tanner. “With the number 16 only turning up every half an hour, and the T2 every hour with nothing on Sundays, it’s no wonder people get in their cars, adding to traffic on the roads”, says John. “More people are moving into Littlemore and we need a much more frequent bus service”. This petition calls on Stagecoach and Oxford Bus to dramatically improve the buses in Littlemore. “We need a regular 15 minute service with routes serving the centre of Oxford, the Cowley Shopping Centre and the Littlemore Science Park”, says John.

This petition is highly important to myself and my family, our friends and the local community. This is because on 6th September 2015 my cousin Jarrad Joseph Grainger took his own life, he was only 21 years old. I am starting this petition on behalf of my auntie Nadine West - Jarrad's mother. We are wanting to stop this from happening to more people as this is an all to common occurrence these days. We need help in reinstating 24/7 care for Child and Adolescent Mental Health Services in Kingston upon Hull. Vulnerable patients do often need 24/7 care and sometimes need to stay in units for anywhere between a few days and months at a time, the closest unit to Hull is approximately 42 miles away meaning that when children/adolescents need to stay in the units they are kept many miles away from their families making it hard for them to visit making them feel even more isolated. We need to improve the care that Hull and East Yorkshire currently has to make it ALOT better than it is, patients need better care and for it to be more accessible. People searching for help who contact these Charities are often left for days or weeks without a reply to the shout for help, we need to change this urgently! The stigma surrounding Mental Health and Illness needs stopping, we need to raise more awareness about this to give people a better understanding, the more people that know about Mental Health/Illness the better chance we have at helping those in need. We couldn't help Jarrad and we lost him, we were too late. So we will do this in his memory, we will help those we still can. We will improve the services in Hull and East Yorkshire and we will prevent people deteriorating from Mental Health/Illness and we will save them. Jarrad Joseph Grainger, Forever Young - this is for you xx