Prison leaders, from local to national, presided over an “abject failure” to provide a safe, decent and purposeful regime at HMP Liverpool, according to Peter Clarke, HM Chief Inspector of Prisons. In a report outlining jail conditions that experienced inspectors regarded as the worst they could remember, Mr Clarke said it was “hard to understand how the leadership of the prison could have allowed the situation to deteriorate to this extent.” Inspectors found squalid living conditions, with dirt, litter, rats and cockroaches, and an environment in which drugs were easily available and violence had increased. Mr Clarke added: “While much of what we found was clearly the responsibility of local prison managers, there had been a broader organisational failure. We saw clear evidence that local prison managers had sought help from regional and national management to improve conditions they knew to be unacceptable long before our arrival, but the resulting support was inadequate and had made little impact on outcomes for prisoners.” HMP Liverpool is a local category B prison serving the Merseyside area. A traditional local jail with “a very strong sense of local identity”, it held 1,115 men at the time of the unannounced inspection in September 2017. It was last inspected in May 2015. Since then, the prison had deteriorated in terms of respect and purposeful activity and these elements were poor, the lowest possible assessment, in 2017. Safety and resettlement work, the two other key inspection tests, were judged as ‘not sufficiently good.’ However, Mr Clarke said, the bare statistics “do not adequately describe the abject failure of HMP Liverpool to offer a safe, decent and purposeful environment.” He identified key issues: Violence of all kinds had increased. Over a third of prisoners felt unsafe at the time of the inspection, and 71% felt unsafe at some time. Nearly two-thirds of prisoners said it was easy or very easy to obtain drugs. Drones carrying drugs and other illicit items were a substantial problem. Staff had recovered 32 drones in the six months before the inspection, more than one a week. Half of the prisoners were locked in their cells during the working day. There were also significant failings in the leadership and management of activities and in health care. There was a backlog of some 2,000 maintenance tasks and it was clear that facilities management at the prison “was in a parlous state.” Mr Clarke added: “The inspection team was highly experienced and could not recall having seen worse living conditions than those at HMP Liverpool. “Many cells were not fit to be used and should have been decommissioned. Some had emergency call bells that were not working but were nevertheless still occupied, presenting an obvious danger to prisoners. There were hundreds of unrepaired broken windows, with jagged glass left in the frames. Many lavatories were filthy, blocked or leaking. There were infestations of cockroaches in some areas, broken furniture, graffiti, damp and dirt. “I saw piles of rubbish that had clearly been there for a long time, and in which inspectors reported seeing rats on a regular basis. I was told by a senior member of staff that it had not been cleared by prisoners employed as cleaning orderlies because it presented a health and safety risk. It was so bad that external contractors were to be brought in to deal with it. In other words, this part of the jail had become so dirty, infested and hazardous to health that it could not be cleaned.” Mr Clarke was particularly troubled by the case of one vulnerable man with complex mental health needs being held in a cell that had no furniture other than a bed. “The windows of both the cell and the toilet recess were broken, the light fitting in his toilet was broken with wires exposed, the lavatory was filthy and appeared to be blocked, his sink was leaking and the cell was dark and damp. “Extraordinarily, this man had apparently been held in this condition for some weeks…It should not have needed my personal intervention for this man to be moved from such appalling conditions.” Inspectors could see “no credible plan” to address these basic problems. Mr Clarke said: “Although there are several change projects underway at the prison, none of these will address the basic failings that were so painfully obvious at HMP Liverpool. I was particularly concerned that there did not appear to be effective leadership or sufficiently rigorous external oversight to drive the prison forward in a meaningful way. This report makes it crystal clear that leaders at all levels, both within the prison and beyond, had presided over the failure to address the concerns raised at the last inspection.” Michael Spurr, Chief Executive of Her Majesty’s Prison & Probation Service, said: “The conditions which Inspectors found at Liverpool were unacceptable and effective measures should have been taken to deal with the issues at a much earlier stage. We are committed to fixing this, have already made changes where we can, and have today published a comprehensive action plan to address the Chief Inspector’s concerns.Following the Inspection we took immediate action to rectify the situation. A new Governor has been appointed and a strengthened management team is in place; capacity has been reduced by 172 places; over 700 prisoners now have a named Prison Officer as their ‘Key Worker’; cleanliness has been improved and the maintenance backlog has been almost halved. Liverpool has a dedicated staff who are committed to providing a safe and decent environment for prisoners. The Governor will get the support she needs to deliver the action plan and make the changes necessary to substantially improve the performance and conditions at the prison.”

Northern Ireland has the highest suicide rates in the UK but 25% less funding. https://www.belfasttelegraph.co.uk/news/northern-ireland/northern-ireland-has-highest-rate-of-suicide-in-the-uk-but-mental-health-funding-is-25-less-36418579.html In fact, in a recent study of suicide rates and reported on by the Guardian (link below) Northern Ireland has had more suicides in the 20 years since the Good Friday agreement in 1998 than in 28 years during the troubles from 1969 - 1997. https://www.theguardian.com/uk-news/2018/feb/20/northern-ireland-suicides-troubles-death-toll We the undersigned find this situation cruel and unacceptable and it has to change. Since Northern Ireland is receiving an extra £1bn in funding we demand that...... 1. The Department of Health commit to an increase of funding to mental health services of at least 10% from the £1bn extra funding for Northern Ireland secured by the DUP after the last General election. 2. The current £7m per year allocated to suicide prevention through the Public Health Agency be increased to £21m per year from the £1bn extra funding for Northern Ireland secured by the DUP after the last General election. 3. An effective, sustainable and long-term suicide prevention campaign to begin at the earliest opportunity

Last year Poole council decreased our bin collections resulting in bins covered in maggots and flies. In the height of summer many of us couldn't open windows or let our children play in the garden. We don't want to endure this again. Bournemouth and Purbeck councils have got theirs, we want PBC to give us ours.

Thurrock and the surrounding area has a ever expanding population,this Hospital should be retained to provide the NHS Services now in situ and if anything this should be expanded to serve local needs.The transport services that would provide for the planned restructuring now under consultation about changes to our Essex Hospitals are totally inadequate at present and it is time to make your voice heard.Please sign if you wish to a least try to save Orsett Hospital.

Suicide prevention hotlines work incredibly hard every day to save endless lives and the fact they get paid only a little more than minimum wage is terrible.

As human life is important and people who have been about to commit suicide have said that just a few words telling them someone loves them would of deterred them from jumping

Although we have now banned alcohol and tobacco advertising on TV there appears to be no control over the advertising of online gambling casino and bingo sites. These sites are largely endorsed by celebrities and are shown at times when our most vulnerable and lonely are viewing. I know from personal experience, through the death of my brother, by suicide. I was very close to him, but had no idea that he was a secret gambler. Gambling is as addictive as drinking and smoking, and in many ways more pernicious, causing other destructive behaviour. Often it those who an least afford to gamble who do so, people in financial trouble, who in a desperate attempt to pay off debts will gamble their last penny. The only winners are the sites themselves who load the odds against individuals winning. As a Samaritan listening volunteer I often take calls from desperate suicidal people who have become victims of such gambling sites.

Because there is limited parking, during school runs cars are everywhere and destroying the verges and spreading mud everywhere. During the summer when the mud dries it creates dust and mess.

This is so important to me as my beautiful daughter has just had to have two fillings at 6 years old. She has a very varied diet and eats very little in the way of sweets/chocolate as these tend to be given as grandparent treats as opposed to by me. She has always had these 'healthy' alternatives as, like many people, i believed these to be far healthier than they actually are. I, as any parent would be, was horrified that a) she had to have fillings in the first place and b) that i had contributed to this problem in the 'healthy' snacks i had been giving her. Many of these snacks don't have the sugar content on the front of the packet as you would have with sweets of chocolates. This is causing a huge problem with the NHS funding hundreds of thousands of childrens fillings and extractions, not to mention thelong term effects. Something has to change!

Council bullies in solar loo grab! Local residents face a David and Goliath battle with Hackney Council to retain ownership of the community restored Brooksby’s Walk public convenience. The Council plan to terminate the community’s lease on 8th February. Residents re-opened the toilets serving Chatsworth Road, left closed by the Council for 30 years. After a long campaign and formation of the Clapton Improvement Society, they were granted a 5year lease in 2013, with the promise of a 100year peppercorn lease to follow. The Society raised funds from the Lottery and loans from members to renovate the toilets and convert the gents to a café/restaurant to pay for their maintenance. The current operator is David Bez’s Pride Kitchen, a vegetarian café. Altogether more than £40,000 has been invested. Clapton has Britain’s only luxury sustainable solar powered free public toilets as a result. But from the beginning, the Council has made life difficult for the volunteers. Officials raised a series of petty complaints about the works done by local contractors. Building inspectors demanded an expensive sprinkler system and then didn’t issue the certificate after completion of the works. A local councillor raised unverified complaints about the café and persuaded the licensing committee to refuse an extension of hours, which had been granted planning permission after an appeal to the independent planning inspectorate. Now the Council’s estates department is seeking to terminate the community’s ownership on wholly spurious grounds (including not having the building completion certificate) without any plans to keep the toilets open. “It’s an outrage!” says Society secretary Mary Doyle. “ As someone who is wheelchair fast, this is the only local toilet I can use”. “The Council has always resented our campaign to re-open the toilets and provide decent facilities on the street. Now they want to steal our community asset. Far from helping community initiatives as they boast in glossy reports, they undermine, bully and ignore them when they can.” PLEASE SIGN THE PETITION!

We are concerned that the Conservative Government’s under-funding of the NHS has meant: In Reading: • The Royal Berkshire Hospital (RBH) is expected to make additional cuts of £45 million by 2020. • GP appointments are becoming harder to get with many patients having to wait weeks to see their doctor. • GP surgeries, like Circuit Lane Surgery, have been unable to provide good quality care and have been rated inadequate. • A&E departments are unable to cope, with many patients having to wait for more than 4 hours – failing a key target. The Royal Berkshire Hospital has missed this target. Nationally: • Patients are waiting for hours on trolleys in corridors. • Thousands of non-emergency operations have been cancelled. • NHS budgets are not keeping up with an ageing and increasing population and cuts to social care budgets are putting further pressure on the NHS. • The UK spends a lower proportion on health than other EU countries resulting in fewer doctors, nurses and beds per patient. • NHS staff are leaving due to poor pay and increasing workloads and stress. In 2017 33,000 nurses left the NHS.

We do not accept the level of power that is given to the developers of our city. We demand that all new housing developments should have both insulated buildings AND renewable energy. This requirement should not be dropped because of 'urban design'. We do not accept unsustainable development that contributes to climate change; our communities need clean energy, transport links, and schools, doctors surgeries and amenities.