The "Funky Clock" scam.

The photo above shows the Cross Keys Centre as it looked on Friday lunchtime. The new sign lettering was being fixed to the frontage of the magnificent, sympathetically restored Victorian building. When I took the shot, the final "S" had yet to be fixed in place on the fascia - the worker installing the lettering had gone off for his lunch; now the sign is totally complete, and looking good. Parts of the building are already in use as office and meeting room space, both for the owners, Anglo - American management consultancy The Aleff Group, and for small local companies that need a certain amount of office and touch - down space. As previously mentioned, I have been an advisor to The Aleff Group for a couple of years now, and it is really gratifying to see the former run - down and very scruffy pub take on a new lease of life as a business, social and community centre for the area. I was there for a meeting with some business associates who are creating a new start - up company. Suffice to say that's all I can say on the subject for now, but in the months that come there will be some very interesting, creative and involving news to report. Watch this space. Whilst I was in the Cross Keys Centre, I was called out of the meeting room I was in, with a cryptic message "There's someone you might like to meet". Who should the person be than the power behind food delivery service Got Breakfast, local businesswoman Bukky Alabi. Although we have corresponded at some length, it was the first time that we had actually met face to face! The Cross Keys Centre is already fulfilling its objectives of becoming a hub where local small businesses and social groups can meet to exchange ideas, network and socialise. 

At this time of year, so many people seem to carry around a bottle of water; when the weather is hot, this seems like a sensible move. What I find very hard to understand is that rather than carrying an individual bottle containing up to half a litre, I see many people carrying 1.5 or even two litre bottles of water. Are they really planning on drinking that much? What will happen when they need to use the loo, and as we know, the number of public toilets in the UK has been cut back to almost nothing. Prime Minister David Cameron has pledged to do more to save Britain's dwindling number of public lavatories. The Prime Minister said he would examine the case for lifting thousands of pounds of taxes from them every year to try to save them from closure. The search for public toilets in towns and cities has become more and more desperate in recent years because the number of lavatories has fallen markedly. Campaigners say that many have had to be closed because of councils have to pay onerous business rates on them. The British Toilet Association has estimated that 40 per cent of local authority run public conveniences have disappeared in the last decade, taking the number down from 12,000 to 6,000, in part because councils have to pay business rates on them. The Daily Telegraph reported earlier in the week that Public toilets have traditionally been liable for business rates in the same way as non-domestic premises such as shops and offices, while churches and premises used to care for disabled people are exempt. Raymond Martin, managing director of The British Toilet Association, said: “This is a public facility. People have to go to the toilet. We have to do five things in life – we have to eat, sleep, breathe, drink and we have to go to the toilet. Failure to go to the toilet we get sick, we get disorientated, we have high blood pressure, we can have strokes – this is a health and wellbeing issue. It is about equality, social inclusion and bringing more older people into town. The reason that toilets are closing is councils do not get any financial support from government to do it, so they have to sit down and look at costs. I have calls coming into me from councils saying ‘how do we close down all our toilets’. Councils really want to provide these facilities, they really want to have them but commercially and economically they can't afford to do it. The fall in numbers of public lavatories meant more and more shop owners are complaining about people urinating in the street, and worse".

Once again this week, the News Shopper report on yet another incident involving Gravesend RNLI being called to an emergency on the River Thames at Erith. This time a person was found trying to enter the river at 2.30pm on the 31st July - I must admit that I was working from home on Friday, and i saw the Police helicopter flying along the river from the window of my home office. I did not immediately realise that it was a person in trouble. A person was found on the shore and taken into custody. We are now getting an average of one river related incident a week; I seriously think that we need a permanent RNLI presence in Erith - as I have written before, the former Port of London Authority hut directly adjacent to the Erith Jetty (as seen in the photo above - click for a larger view) would be an absolutely ideal base for the sub station - what do you think? Leave a comment below, or Email me at hugh.neal@gmail.com. incidentally, if you check the photo of Erith Pier in the News Shopper piece, you will see that it is an ancient shot from back in around 1978, when the pier formed an integral part of Erith Deep Water Wharf. How they managed to dig up such an historic relic, I really don't know. I could have easily supplied them with an up to date shot of the excellent refurbished and very popular pier as it stands nowadays. 

Following on from my piece a couple of weeks ago, where I discussed the relatively low average house price in the London Borough of Bexley, I have come to the conclusion that averaging prices over the whole borough actually gives a very distorted picture. Houses in Bexleyheath and Sidcup (the “posh” Southern part of the borough) are pretty much in line with other parts of outer London – with the exception of certain parts of West London. The reason the average is brought down overall is that in the less wealthy Northern part of Bexley - Thamesmead East, Abbey Wood, Lower Belvedere, Erith and Slade Green - is very much cheaper that the rest of the borough. The News Shopper have been reporting that more than three quarters of London boroughs, 78.1 per cent, showed an increase in new properties with Bexley the highest at 30.6 per cent. As we know, the Northern part of the London Borough of Bexley has a high proportion of first time buyers – mainly as it is one of the very few areas where first – timers have a chance of getting a mortgage. Sadly, this is already changing, as greedy property developers are hoovering up places as they come onto the market; they are acutely aware that there is about to be a house – price boom, fed by the arrival of Crossrail to Abbey Wood, and the almost inevitability that it will be further extended to link up with the forthcoming Paramount London Theme Park on the Swanscombe Peninsular, which will feature Europe’s largest indoor water park, theatres, live music venues, attractions, cinemas, restaurants, event space and hotels. Allied to the project will be a training academy for the entertainment and hospitality sectors, a new country park, a large science and education visitor complex and the biggest performing arts centre in Europe.  The plans for the park received considerable backing from the British government when Paramount London became the first commercial venture to be awarded Nationally Significant Infrastructure Project status allowing the developers to bypass local planning requirements. The Secretary of State may make a decision on the park's planning application in autumn 2016 – though I seriously doubt any politician would contemplate putting a stop to the project, as it will involve at least 25,000 permanent full and part time jobs in an area which has exceptionally high regional unemployment. An area estimated to stretch between Dover and Greenwich will benefit from the jobs and money that the theme park will generate, and this is inevitably going to push up the local house prices, and the areas such as the North of the London Borough of Bexley are almost certain to be disproportionately affected. If you are contemplating purchasing a property in Erith or the surrounding towns, I would strongly advise you to do it as soon as possible, as prices are set to go through the roof.

The News Shopper is reporting an incident where a motorcyclist with a helmet – mounted camera caught a woman driving a car whilst not only sending a text from her mobile phone, but also eating a bowl of cereal! Personally I don't find this at all surprising; when walking around Erith on a daily basis I see drivers using mobile phones whilst on the move. Only on Tuesday afternoon did I see a man driving a seven and a half tonne box van around the roundabout at the end of James Watt Way, as he headed into Manor Road, and past the KFC drive through; he had his left hand on the wheel, and his right hand holding his mobile phone to his left ear. As he went round the roundabout, he momentarily lost control of the van as his grip in the steering wheel slipped. Fortunately he recovered quickly, but the incident could have easily escalated into something more serious – especially as there are two pedestrian crossings very nearby. What was even more disturbing was that the van was owned and operated by a very high profile local company, who almost certainly have policies in place to prohibit the use of mobile phones whilst driving – in accordance with the law. I will be keeping a lookout for such illegal activity in the future –  the law on the subject is widely flouted, yet it is also one of the most dangerous behaviour a driver can exhibit whilst behind the wheel. What do you think? Leave a comment below, or drop me a line to hugh.neal@gmail.com.

The DAB debate which started a decade ago, and which I have covered in the past has been brought back to life by BBC Radio 4, with the results appearing to be somewhat familiar. Ten years ago listeners complained of poor reception on DAB, with either no audio, or audio sounding like it was being broadcast from under bubbling water, and BBC Radio 4’s Today Programme has sparked a debate resulting in listeners complaining of exactly the same thing today. On Monday morning, James Cridland and Laurence Harrison appeared on the Today Programme to defend DAB, and talk about the possible ‘end of FM’. Both provided facts and figures about DAB listening and a multi-platform world, but listeners reacted by complaining of the lack of reception which still blights many areas in the UK. The problem is down to a number of factors; the DAB standard used in the UK is the oldest and most basic type, which has been superseded; newer DAB+ which is currently either being rolled out, or already in use in much of mainland Europe uses a far newer and more sophisticated codec, which enables better sound quality at lower bitrates – meaning even if the signal is poor, you have a better chance of actually hearing something intelligible. The other side of the coin is that the FM broadcast band in the UK has been incredibly successful, and stations such as BBC Radio 2 and BBC Radio 3 have extremely high sound quality when listened to with a decent receiver – and the signal coverage is generally far more complete than DAB. To be honest, DAB has several advantages, but in my opinion these are outweighed by the disadvantages. DAB coverage is not the only issue; sound quality is poorer (don’t let the “Digital” tag fool you – a low bit rate DAB signal sounds far worse than an equivalent analogue FM signal). As I have mentioned before – analogue radio signals exhibit a phenomenon known as “Graceful Degradation” - a form of fault tolerance – as the signal strength at the receiver reduces, on AM the audio from the speaker gets quieter, and on FM the amount of hiss increases. Eventually the signal will get so poor that no audio is intelligible at all, but for quite a long time the listener can “get by” even though the sound is less than perfect. With DAB and other methods of digital sound transmission the degradation is somewhat different. As the signal level drops, the receiver will start to “burble” as if the audio is being under water; there will be sudden silences, a few farts and blips, then nothing. There is no period where the listener is able to make out the audio as the signal drops – it is “all or nothing”.

Southeastern rail bosses have taken a bit of a slippering recently; A public meeting was recently organised in Sidcup for local commuters and other train users to attend and give feedback to the managers of the rail company; I understand that it was what the armed forces refer to as “a meeting without coffee”. The meeting was chaired by Old Bexley and Sidcup MP James Brokenshire. One of the most common complaints about the Southeastern service is that trains are comprised of too few carriages – especially in busy times of the day. Apparently Southeastern don't have any more carriages to enable them to run longer trains, even though they extended many platforms on the North Kent line before the Olympics, to allow twelve carriage trains to run on the line. The only problem back then was that trains could not stop at Woolwich Dockyard station, as the station platform has tunnels at both ends, which only permit ten carriage trains to stop, meaning that the first and last carriage on the train would be left in the tunnel when the train stopped – a similar situation to the DLR station Cutty Sark for Greenwich, where passengers have to move to the middle of the train to get off. The way the travel planners worked things during the Olympics and Paralympics was they just closed Woolwich Dockyard station for the duration of both competitions – ostensibly to prevent visitors “getting confused and alighting at the wrong station” – this had a side benefit that Olympic visitors were somewhat shielded from seeing what a terrible dump much of the area around Woolwich Dockyard station is. The upside was that they ran twelve car trains for the duration of the sporting festival, but reverted to the shorter trains with a maximum of ten carriages directly thereafter.

I have been contacted by a couple of long – time readers who had some questions and concerns about a couple of websites that they had encountered; knowing my background in I.T, and my special interest in online security, they asked if I could investigate. They had rightly become suspicious of a website which claimed that one could legally purchase a brand new iPhone 6 for the price of £1. The website advertising this has links from the tabloid newspaper website The Daily Star, and several other reputable (!) locations. When one followed the link, you were presented with what appeared at first glance to be a page from the BBC News website. It included a story about how people in the UK could get a brand new iPhone 6 for £1. Upon reading the story, alarm bells started to ring; the writing style was nothing like BBC News standard, and there was a problem with the links on the page – they all led to the same website – this is a common trick carried out by scammers – create a fake “honey trap” site to redirect web traffic to another website. The so called "BBC" site was nothing but a fake. The second site is called “Funky Clock” which runs “special offers” amongst “skill and speed” competitions, where participants purchase credits to use to play games, the winner of which supposedly wins an iPhone 6. When you sign up for the “free” service, you are prompted to enter your bank details “for verification purposes”. What is only displayed in microscopic text is that the “free” period only lasts for three days, and that after that Funky Clock will debit your bank account by £74 a month, from now until the end of time. No cheap iPhones, no deals – the whole thing is a massive scam. It would appear that many Internet Service Providers, notably including Virgin have been duped into forwarding “Genuine offer” messages from Funky Clock to their subscribers, thus giving a veneer of apparent respectability to the confidence trick. This is a classic case of “if it seems too good to be true, it generally is”. Be warned – treat anything that says they are giving away high value items for next to nothing as a con until it can be verifiably proved otherwise (a very fat chance indeed). Unfortunately the criminals will continue such scams for as long as there are vulnerable people to fall prey to them. You have been warned.

I make no secret that I am a big fan of Google; they have turned online search into a verb, they are that good at what they do that to perform a web search has for many become “to Google”. Many of their products such as GMail and Google Docs are excellent and widely used, but they have one product, which many people – myself included, actively dislike and avoid. Google+ was intended to be a direct competitor for social networks like Facebook, but it has never gained the popularity or traction with Google users – and nowadays Facebook is a verb as well. I predicted around a year ago that Google would pull the plug on Google+, and it would seem that this has now begun. Earlier this week, the company announced its most drastic step for breaking up Google+. Google has announced more sweeping changes for Google+ over the next few months as it restructures network into two distinctly separate products: streams and photos. Previously, many tasks within Google products (such as, say, commenting on a YouTube video) required a Google+ profile, but that won't be the case in the future. Forcing Google users to sign up for a Google+ account in order to the use some of the company's other products and services was a clear bid to generate interest in its social network, but it backfired with many users. Google+ claimed 300 million monthly active users in late 2013, although Stone Temple Consulting, a third-party digital marketing agency, pegged that figure at a far lower 111 million this past April. For many users,  the biggest issue with Google's social network is that it just wasn't social enough -- the layout of the site wasn't as inviting or friendly as Facebook's traditional layout has been and we still haven't seen any indication that Google really gets how the social web works – something that Facebook seem to have got right, despite their own illogical and inconsistent user interface – which users don't seem to mind. The move means users will soon be able to use their standard Google account to share content, communicate with contacts, create a YouTube channel, and so on. Unlike your public Google+ profile, your Google account is not searchable or follow able. If you already created a Google+ profile (read: Google conned you into doing it) but don't plan to use Google+, the company says it will “offer better options for managing and removing” your public profile. The changes are meant to strike a balance between the select few who actually like using Google+ and everyone else whom Google forced to sign up for its social network. I predict that Google will keep Google+ for another year or so, then quietly retire it as an irrelevance. What do you think? Do you like Google+ Let me know – Email hugh.neal@gmail.com.

The controversy over Jeremy Clarkson, James May and Richard Hammond may now have finally been put to bed, now that the announcement that their new car show will be hosted on Amazon Prime. Having said that, as I mentioned a while back, there are a number of excellent car shows broadcast on YouTube. One of them, by a chap called Harry Metcalfe is a real find. Harry is thoughtful and quietly spoken, but really knows what he is talking about; he is the former editor of the car magazine Evo, and a consultant to the Jaguar Range Rover group. In the video below, he drives an immaculate 1980 vintage Jaguar XJS V12 over a thousand miles from the UK to Monaco. Harry is either in possession of an incredible insight into the mechanical reliability of the thirty five year old grand tourer, or he has amazing faith in the build quality of the old Jag, built during their ownership by British Leyland, a company not exactly famous for the reliability, or indeed mechanical build quality of their cars. Watch and enjoy the latest episode of "Harry's Garage".

500,000!

The two photos above both show views of the old Erith Library in Walnut Tree Road. The magnificent and imposing building has been closed and out of use for around five years, since the library was relocated to the new block opposite Erith Health Centre in the High Street. The upper photograph was taken by me last Sunday afternoon, whilst the lower one was taken in around 1910, by the look of the clothes on the two rather solemn and earnest looking young men in the shot - thanks to local historian Ken Chamberlain for the use of the photo. Several people have asked me what the future holds for the old Erith Library, which has been left abandoned and empty. Last year, when I was given a guided tour around the new Bexley College campus, directly opposite the old library, I was told in confidence that the college had applied for funding to buy the library and convert the interior into a training centre for the hotel and hospitality industry. Apparently with the planned opening of the Paramount Theme Park, there will be a chronic lack of trained hotel and restaurant staff in the South East. I was asked to refrain from mentioning this, as the deal was far from done. A year later I re - contacted my informant, and was told that the deal unfortunately had fallen through, and will now not be happening. The library remains empty and unused - possibly the most significant old building in Erith that is not in productive use. I will be discussing this in future updates. Any reader who has any insight into this, could they please contact me?

Some time last Sunday afternoon, a couple of hours after the last Maggot Sandwich update was published, I checked the blog dashboard, and discovered that the Maggot Sandwich has just received 500,000 unique page views. That is not the total number of blog hits (which is far higher), rather it is the total number of different people who have ever  come across the Maggot Sandwich at some point or another. On a normal week I average around 22,000 page hits worldwide. Thanks to all who have made this possible.

The following press release was sent to me earlier in the week by Dana Whiffen - the Chairman of Bexley Borough Neighbourhood Watch Association:- "Bexley Neighbourhood watch and Bexley Police have made history by being the first London Borough to achieve 2 wards with 100% coverage of NW. In January 2015 we announced that St.Michael's Ward in Welling had 100% NW-Coverage and now we are pleased to confirm that the neighbouring ward of East Wickham can also boast full coverage, that’s every street in these wards now have at least one registered NW member (coordinator). We are looking to see that the crime stats in East Wickham fall to the low levels of St.Michael’s where there has been zero domestic burglary since that was announced earlier in the year. This is due to the hard work of the police teams and NW-office staff in ensuring all these new members are registered, are aware fully of what they need to do and have their street signs put up, have their introduction letters and street signs. SAYING YES TO NW ALSO SAYS NO TO CRIMINALS

Dana Wiffen

Chairman/BBNWA"  

Shoppers in Erith Morrison’s had a bit of a surprise on Wednesday and Thursday this week; scenes for the new advertising campaign were being shot in the supermarket. On Wednesday the action mainly involved filming in the main part of the supermarket, whereas on the Thursday the film crew concentrated on the large bakery the store has. Both video and still footage was shot, and signs outside of the entrances warned shoppers that they might be filmed, though it seemed that many did not see the notices, and were surprised to see the film crew. I have no idea when the adverts will be released, and I very much doubt that it will be possible to identify the location as specifically Erith, but I suppose that it is worth keeping an eye out for anyway. I was quite surprised to see the Erith branch chosen as a location; most video production companies are based in London’s West End, and generally the staff dislike going South of the River Thames. If anyone has more information on the filming, please either comment below, or Email me directly to hugh.neal@gmail.com.

Back in January this year, I wrote about the problems the emergency services were having with their ancient and very out of date Airwave TETRA two – way radio system. You can read my original posting here. As I predicted, the issue of replacing the emergency services communications technology with something more suitable for modern conditions did indeed get “kicked into the long grass” until now – after the general election. The £1.2 billion emergency services contract which I flagged up as a disaster waiting to happen six months ago has now, as predicted, collapsed. After a year-long bidding process the government had whittled the tenders down to two companies: EE and O2. Now O2 has pulled out as a result of Telefonica selling the network to Three’s parent Hutchison Whampoa. The network is supposed to start replacing the creaking Airwave TETRA radio system used by the emergency services next April, but that date is now in serious doubt. There are huge question marks over the suitability of 4G mobile technology for this with the necessary standards for device-to-device communication and control of groups still in the planning stages, and even bigger issues over equipping emergency services with mobile devices that rely on 4G for push-to-talk communications (like an analogue walkie talkie) when 4G phone coverage is so patchy around the country. The other problem with using digital I.P based communications is latency – there is a delay between pushing the transmit button, and the audio arriving at the receiver. With analogue radio equipment, there is no delay other than the constraint of the speed of light. Mobile phone push-to-talk systems are rarely like this. You press the button, it switches to the right app, fires it up, makes an IP connection and then starts the communication. This is not instant. Indeed, using such a system where you can see and hear the other person is un-nerving, with a significant delay that is more than an echo. Even a traditional 2G or 3G voice call has a little latency which you can hear if both people are in the same room. Push-to-talk latency isn't a problem in the “it might replace SMS” scenario the mobile industry once envisaged for it, but it is in an emergency. The classic example the Armed Forces give is to imagine a commander who has a team of snipers on a roof pointing at a target. He gives the command: “Don't shoot”. Unfortunately, in a cellular, IP based device, it takes a fraction of a second for the app to fire up and make a connection – a fraction of a second which is just long enough for the word “Don’t” to fail to make it into the message. Obviously this is just not good enough in a critical situation such as a terrorist attack. The other problem with any emergency communication system using 4G technology is that coverage of the country is patchy and uneven, with some areas having no signal whatsoever. Even if the emergency service personnel can get a 4G signal, you can then add to this the problem that with 4G there are other users on the network: ordinary customers, who, given that they are in the middle of an emergency, will want to call their mum or post a video of the incident to YouTube. There are systems in place to give emergency services priority, but network congestion is still going to affect the ability of the back - end infrastructure to cope. All in all the situation is a mess, and could not really have come at a worse time. Back in February, James Brokenshire, the MP for Old Bexley and Sidcup, who at that time was also Minister for Security and Immigration, said the Mobile Services tender process had “produced some impressive technical bids combined with the prospect of significant cost savings for the taxpayer”. Unfortunately these are now looking like hollow words. Any communications system relying on 4G coverage in the UK will have problems, as the UK officially has the worst 4G service in Europe, according to a recent independent survey. The testing company gave the UK networks scores out of 500 and said: While the best UK operator achieved a score of 366, the top performers in Germany, Austria and Switzerland scored in a range above 440; and even a score above 470 was achieved in the last years. The lowest values in those countries were above 325, which would still be enough for the second place in UK. The survey company showed that EE has the best service, puts Three in second place, and places O2 marginally ahead of Vodafone, in a disappointing fourth place. This will be bad news for Vodafone, which has been shouting about significant capital investment in their network, but which does not seem to be showing much improvement after the expenditure.

My personal battle with local fly – tippers has taken a new and more serious turn. On Tuesday evening I was alerted by a neighbour that a large quantity of building material had been apparently dumped in a private parking area just off Manor Road. Upon investigation it became clear that the material had indeed been illegally fly – tipped, and not only that, a vast majority of it was made up of broken up corrugated roof panels – the kind in common use between the late 1940’s and the middle 1970’s. The panels are composed of Asbestos which is an incredibly toxic material when it is broken up or scraped – any dust produced when working with Asbestos is highly poisonous. It has been in use for thousands of years, but did not start large-scale until the end of the 19th century, when manufacturers and builders began using Asbestos because of its desirable physical properties:- sound absorption, average tensile strength, its resistance to fire, heat, electrical and chemical damage, and affordability. It was used in such applications as electrical insulation for hotplate wiring and in building insulation. When Asbestos is used for its resistance to fire or heat, the fibres are often mixed with cement or woven into fabric or mats. These desirable properties made Asbestos a very widely used material, and its use continued to grow throughout most of the 20th century until the carcinogenic effects of Asbestos dust caused its effective demise as a mainstream construction and fireproofing material in most countries. However, around two million tons of Asbestos were still mined per year as of 2009, half in Russia. It is now known that prolonged inhalation of Asbestos fibres can cause serious and fatal illnesses including malignant lung cancer, mesothelioma, and asbestosis. Health issues related to Asbestos exposure can be found in records dating back to Roman times. By the beginning of the 20th century concerns were beginning to be raised, which escalated in severity during the 1920s and 1930s. By the 1980s and 1990s Asbestos trade and use started to become banned outright, phased out, or heavily restricted in an increasing number of countries. The severity of Asbestos-related diseases, the material's extremely widespread use in many areas of life, its continuing long-term use after harmful health effects were known or suspected, and fact that Asbestos-related diseases can emerge decades after exposure ceases, have resulted in Asbestos litigation becoming the longest, most expensive class action in U.S. history and a significant legal issue in many other countries. From this you can see that the fly – tipping of Asbestos based materials is a very serious affair. It was bad enough investigating the fly tipping incidents that happened in September 2013 in the James Watt Way council recycling centre, when a couple of villains dumped two and a half tonnes of rotten bananas on pallets at the site; after much investigation be Bexley Council Environmental Crimes Unit, one of the pair was fined, had his van confiscated, and was sent to prison for eight months. Disgusting and noxious as the liquefying rotten bananas were, they were nothing compared to the load of dusty Asbestos that has now appeared in the area. Fortunately the council are arranging for it to be safely collected and responsibly disposed of. I have been in contact with the North End Safer Neighbourhood Police team, and they are increasing foot patrols in the area. We do have a lead on the crime; a witness saw the illegal dumping take place, and has a description of the vehicle and occupants has been passed to the Police for investigation.

Both The News Shopper and The Bexley Times are full of the story that Bexley council leader Teresa O'Neill has been granted an OBE on the Queen's birthday honours list, making her the first sitting councillor in the borough to receive the award. Councillor O'Neill, who has been a member of the council for fifteen years, announced on June 12th that she received the news of the award. She has been honoured for serving the community and the local government. That’s the official line, anyway. Anyone who has been reading Malcolm Knight’s “Bexley is Bonkers” blog will know differently. I don't think I need to say anymore, other than in my opinion the award of an OBE to Teresa O’Neill is not merited.

Last week you may have seen my piece on why Erith Pier no longer gets the level of commercial traffic mooring on it that it used to. My former boss at Radio Caroline, the Station Manager Peter Moore is a regular Maggot Sandwich reader. He has written the following piece about the radio station and their experiences with the pier. I had a small involvement with the Erith Pier project (my role was to go onto the pier and photograph new ships when they moored there – as some parties needed proof that the pier was used for commercial mooring purposes). I used the excuse that I was a shipping enthusiast who wanted to get some photos (which also true to a small extent). Anyway, Peter has kindly written the following article, which I think many readers may find of interest:-  "Radio Caroline  ( MV Ross Revenge ) entered The Port of Tilbury in 2004 but after a long period of tolerance the port said that they would prefer us not to be there. We were good tenants and paid all the bills given to us, but they said they were not in the business of storing ships and that they could make more money by using the space we occupied for other purposes. Across the river at Gravesend were two areas of river wall that looked inviting and a couple of local Councillors were very supportive. But the first area was owned by a Pension Fund that had built a retail park on the shore. Their view was that if people parked to come and visit Ross Revenge, the traders would be annoyed and may not pay their rent. The other area was derelict awaiting development and we never could find out who the owners were. Our enquiries stalled when we got as far as the Bank of Ireland and then some Walter Mitty guy came along suggesting that it was his land but then he dropped off the radar. One of the enthusiastic Councillors was promoting the regeneration of the old harbour at Northfleet, hampered of course by the fact that the river wall had cut the harbour off from the river. He drew a futuristic artists impression of the restored port including Ross Revenge laying just outside, but it was never going to happen. Then we looked at Erith Pier, which I guess was restored and owned by Morrisons as part of the deal to have their Supermarket placed just nearby. They were happy for our ship to go there, but the Council said that any ship that stayed in one place for any length of time needed Planning Permission, so we applied. There were objections such as noise and obstruction of the view and a possible upsurge in vandalism and that maybe the leisure fishermen would be annoyed if we took up some of the space, but we pointed out that ships were there most of the time anyhow. Then the Port of London Authority appeared saying that while it may well be Morrisons pier it was their river and they had the final say, so we went to a meeting with them. They said that the presence of the ship may scour the area where it would be placed or conversely that it may cause silting. Then they asked if the ship may ever touch the river mud and we said that it might at certain tides. At this the PLA Environmental Officer joined the meeting and a very attractive young lady she was, but on hearing that the ship's keel may touch the mud she said that this would destroy the habitat of the Tentacled Lagoon Worm which seemingly was a vital part of the food chain of the river. Our marine man who had worked the river all his life said that ships had been 'taking the ground' from time immemorial and that the coasters that visited surely did the same, but this cut no ice with them and the question was raised of whether our presence would hamper these coasters and obstruct what was a temporary mooring place. But Morrisons were perplexed as they said that the PLA were telling them not to let ships tie up. So we assumed, and we do not think we were wrong, that the PLA did not want us there under any circumstances and would just surface objections until we gave up. They also pointed us at the Environment Agency and told us we would need a River Works Licence. We could also see that they could simply price us out of contention even if we complied with each and every other requirement.. Then we saw that our Planning Application had been struck out with the suggestion that it had been withdrawn by the applicant, which was not the case. So we left Tilbury and went right away and the ship is now in the middle of the River Blackwater. I am not suggesting the Radio Caroline would have been a huge boon to the area, but it was interesting and so typical of modern life that with a couple of notable exceptions all parties involved worked their utmost to ensure that a thing would not happen. Further they surely said ' Phew. we stopped that ' and returned to sitting on their bums. I wonder how we ever had an Empire.

Peter Moore,

Radio Caroline."

I don't think that there is very much that I can add to that. It just seems a pity that Erith could not have been a temporary home to a ship and radio station that arguably did more to influence British media than anyone else. What do you think? Leave a comment below, or Email hugh.neal@gmail.com. Incidentally, if you would like to hear what I sounded like back in 1990 when I was out at sea on the Ross Revenge, you can now do so; here is an edited recording of my late night / early morning radio show on Caroline. On the day this recording was made, we were in the middle of a Force 9 gale, and things were somewhat on the bumpy side! Give it a listen and let me know what you think. As you will hear, my pirate radio pseudonym was Tony Palmer. You can see an online album of photos taken during my time on Radio Caroline by clicking here. I would be interested in hearing your feedback.

As regular Maggot Sandwich readers will be aware, I am keen to support and promote independent local businesses. Recently a young lady called Bukky Alabi has set up a breakfast delivery service which caters for hungry people in Bexleyheath, Slade Green, Erith, Northumberland Heath, Dartford and Thamesmead. Bukky has written the following piece about her service:- "Got Breakfast was birthed from experience and passion. On a cold winter Saturday morning after a long week at work all I wanted to do was lie in bed all day Saturday but still wanted breakfast in bed without the hassle of getting up and sorting it out and it didn't help that McDonald's round the corner stopped breakfast at 10.30am. For months this feeling continued and one weekend I decided to put this idea and desire into action. Fast forward 11 months after and here we have Got Breakfast, which is a weekend premium breakfast delivery company delivering breakfast to people at home or at work in and around Bexley. It is important to me to support local businesses and in saying that every dish on our menu is made with fresh locally sourced ingredients in and around Bexley. On the menu you can find the typical full English , American pancakes, scrambled egg and smoked salmon pancake. We also offer a healthier option which includes fruit salads, healthy salads, porridge, honey nut granola, and lovely sandwiches. During the week we also deliver breakfast to customers at work, however our office menu is slightly different and consists of sandwiches, salads, pastries, fruits and juices. As well as being the owner of Got Breakfast, I also split myself between  dealing with orders and concerns, helping the delivery team and also making freshly made smoothies when customers order. Got breakfast consist of a team of 4 - myself, driver, chef and our social media guru. Got Breakfast will be expanding in the coming months, we plan to open another branch before the end of year, and also expand the menu. We are currently working on a vegetarian menu and will expand to open during the week also. The response has been amazing so far and it can only get better, from the first day we opened we had orders flying out of the roof. Everyone on the team is passionate about what they do, so this makes the job come natural and easy we put our heart and soul into everything we do and give our customers what we would expect. We aim to make breakfasting in Bexley exciting and easier for people. For more information please find us on www.got-breakfast.co.uk Twitter: @gotbreakfast_ Instagram: @gotbreakfast_"

Following the boarding up of Potion / the former White Hart a couple of weeks ago, the local rumour mill seems to have gone into overdrive. No planning applications have yet been made to the Council (I regularly check the planning application pages of the Bexley Council website). Nevertheless, this has not stopped what I suspect may be little more than wild supposition. I have heard from two separate sources that there are “definite” plans to convert the ground floor bar area into a Balti House restaurant. Whilst I, and many other local residents might welcome this, I find it difficult to believe. The amount of work and money required to completely refurbish the Victorian building, along with fitting a new commercial kitchen, and with a specialised fume extraction and climate control system would cost an utter fortune - a good couple of hundred thousand pounds; also bearing in mind that anyone that takes on the building will have to replace the hideous plate glass frontage illegally installed by the owners of Potion, to be replaced by a facsimile of the original frontage, complete with acid etched glass and green salt glazed tiles. This also will not come cheaply; I get the feeling that there has been a certain amount of wishful thinking going on - personally a local Balti House would be very agreeable, but this does not make it any more likely. Do you know more? Leave a comment below, or Email me at hugh.neal@gmail.com if you have any information regarding this. 

The ending video this week is something quite unusual; it features lots of archive footage taken in and around Erith over the last hundred years ro so, accompanied by a poem about the town, which was written by very long time local resident Pat Watson. The video is courtesy of Lee Ricketts, and his YouTube channel.