Spiral Notebook: Lutfur Rahman - here comes the new boss, same as the old boss?

COMMENT

By Giles Broadbent

Racked by weariness and relief, the new Mayor of Tower Hamlets wept. He was hurt, he said, by accusation that he was racist, that he was a disciple of division.

Spiral Notebook: Red tape empires strike back

Before the Olympics, there were dark mutterings that, once councils had gained their Stalinist powers, they would not easily surrender them.

And so it has come to pass. The parking lockdown, says Newham, "proved such a success" that, hey, here's a random, crazy thought, how about formalising the restrictions into a permanent regime?

Royal Docks has never had a particular parking problem because there's nothing much there but the council sees a land grab, an excuse to build up a department and a new revenue stream.

Let me inform our good burghers what will happen using the example of my development.

Yes, the public parking was occasionally abused by outsiders but when my friends came to stay they could generally find a slot.

During the Olympics, visitor parking was essentially banned, the spaces chained and padlocked. Hey, say the estate managers, that worked well. Let's keep it.

The result is that visitor parking is now paid for, pre-booked, bureaucratic and, because of this, the spaces are, er, always empty.

The shops the estate supports are denied drop-in traffic and the sum total of parking spaces is reduced. Presumably not the desired end.

However, money is made, pointless work is created, inconvenience is subcontracted to time-poor residents. So, in fact, job done.

■ A related domestic matter: The nearby Gallions Reach junction is complex. It is also a roundabout that is self-regulatory.

But, self-regulation is the arch-nemesis of bureaucracy, which demands projects to undertake, empires to protect, admin assistants to employ, flow charts to crayon.

So, for the longest time it has had traffic lights, turning a 10 second roundabout journey into a crazy, stop-start ordeal.

Just before the end of the financial year, the traffic lights disappeared for maintenance or replacement.

Someone, somewhere presumably had money left in their budget, which was better spent on Mr Sheen than returned to residents in the form of lower taxes.

For the duration of their absence, traffic flowed freely, the junction worked smoothly and self regulation prevailed.
The traffic lights returned last week along with the inefficiency, congestion and frustration.

■ Another related domestic matter: A couple of years ago in this column I made a point about a broken manhole cover on the new Jubilee Greenway in Royal Docks and mentioned how months before people had put a cordon round it, but had never actually replaced it.

And it has stayed that way. Through the Jubilee, the torch procession, the Olympics, the rain, and snow and sun.

That's because self-perpetuating bureaucratic imperialism is the name of the game, not, you know, dull old public service.

Where there is competence, may we bring clipboards; where there is urgency, may we bring indolence.

The mantra of tax-funded nest featherers everywhere.

Interview: I'm in medal form says Aggar

Paralympic rower Tom Aggar says he's feeling fitter and stronger than ever before and is "training to win gold".

The reigning Paralympic and World Champion in the single sculls said: "I'm not expecting it to be easy. People will think they can beat me and I've just got to make sure that they don't."

The engaging 27-year-old is one of the Paralympics' brightest hopes for a gold medal and he's working hard to ensure he doesn't let down the legion of friends and family who will be in Eton Dorney in late August to cheer him on.

He said: "It's been the best year I've had in terms of consistent training. The number of days I've missed through illness and injury have been minimal so the preparations are going really well. I'm the fittest and strongest I've been."

He was talking to The Wharf at the London Regatta Centre in Royal Docks, a familiar place and familiar water for the man who played first team rugby for University of Warwick before an unrelated accident changed his life.

He took up rowing in 2006 to boost his strength and represented Royal Docks Rowing Club in his early career.

He said: "I guess this is still my affiliated club. This was the first place where I went on the water and I trained here for about 18 months before I went for the trials for the Paralympic team."

He was back last week as a brand ambassador for Games sponsor EDF which is running the EDF Community Rowing Challenge. Five east London schools were pitching for a place in the final.

It was a rare break away from the training regime.

Tom said: "I guess there's been a real big push since January. The coaches like to make sure we're getting the most of us and you go home each evening with nothing left.

"We're training six days a week, two or three sessions every day. Most of our training is aerobic training so when the weather's rough we're on the machines. Whenever it's not rough we're on the water in the boats either doing long slow stuff or time pieces.

"I'm feeling confident, I'm definitely better placed to win it this year than any other year.

"I guess the mentality is you don't want to get there and have any regrets, you want to get there and know that you've done everything you can and do the best you can.

"If I go to the games and produce a personal best performance or a performance that I know is at my limit then hopefully that will be good enough to win a gold."

As for the whole Olympic bandwagon itself he said: "I think it'll be great to have support from the British public and friends and family. That will be completely different to Beijing where it was just my Mum and Dad.

"Right now you get the sense that something big is looming. You have competitions to concentrate on in the months in between but now the Games is here you have to make every day count."

© First published in The Wharf