LOVING OUR NHS MK

LOVING OUR NHS MK

When someone says to you LOVE OUR NHS or CELEBRATE OUR NHS I would urge you to ensure you do not love or celebrate the NHS as an institution but do so for the front line individuals going the extra mile every day.

I have been a strong and vocal supporter of our NHS for almost forty decades. On the fourth anniversary of my daughter Rebekah’s death I published a book OURREBEKAH A LOVE STORY FROM OUR NHS. Let me share a story from that  book.

Rebekah was in the renal clinic at University Hospital Milton Keynes. She needed the more advanced treatment on offer at Churchill Hospital in Oxford. She was waiting for an ambulance to move her to Oxford. Hers was not an emergency so she had to wait until an ambulance was free, that wait was several hours.

The nurse looking after Rebekah was due to go off duty but stayed on after her shift until an ambulance was free. Stayed on for two hours of unpaid overtime.

The next morning I went into the clinic and took her a bunch of flowers. “You do not need to have done that,” she said. “No,” I replied, “and you did not  have to go that extra mile to care for my daughter.”

When Rebekah died that beautiful nurse came to the funeral.

THAT IS OUR REAL NHS – not an institution but an army of beautiful dedicated people within whom it is natural to go the extra mile.

A senior consultant surgeon once said to me: I DO NOT TREAT MY PATIENTS I CARE FOR THEM.

I am old enough to remember when Milton Keynes did not have a hospital. On the designated site for the hospital to be built stood a giant sculptured question mark with the slogan MILTON KEYNES IS DYING FOR A HOSPITAL. Who remembers that ? Today we have one of the finest hospitals in the country.

I have only been in hospital twice in my life, once to be born and once when I fell off a ladder and broke three ribs. If hospital can be a good experience my time in University Hospital Milton Keynes was a beautiful adventure. There was a problem, I did not want to eat. I just did not feel like eating. Then food served from the kitchens in Milton Keynes Hospital is five star but I just did not feel like eating. The nurses kept telling me to eat and the guy in the next bed to me even gave me some of the food his family had brought in for him to snack on as a way to help me. I just did not feel like eating.

Eventually I did eat a meal. Seeing my empty plate the ward sister came up from behind me and gave me a big hug. Some may say that was unprofessional. Poppycock that was NHS love and that was the NHS treatment I needed right then.

Today our NHS is under great pressure, people are working incredibly log shifts but they never fail to go the extra mile, they never fail t o care for patients and not simply treat them.

When you celebrate, applaud and love our NHS please do so for the people and not for the institution.

IN THE FOOTSTEPS OF SAMMY LEON – an update.

Let me begin by thanking the various Facebook groups which have allowed me to share my initial planning for this piece of writing. The resulting support has been overwhelming with several thousand people supporting the project.

My initial plan was to publish the book in April 2022 but now I am going to postpone this to August or perhaps September. This will take away the pressure and allow me to write at  a leisurely pace meaning I can both widen and deepen the content.

In the New Year I will contact the Leon Family and share planning. Working with the Custodian of Fenny Poppers we will invite a member of the Leon Family to fire a popper on 11^th November 2022 at Leon Recreation Ground, the park which was given to our community by Sammy Leon.

I have an idea I wish t o share with Bletchley and Fenny Stratford Town Council to plant a tree in the recreation ground in memory of Sir Herbert and Lady Fanny Leon. If the council agrees this can take place on 11^th November 2022.

The Leon Estate was primarily within what is now West Bletchley but the heritage is very much focussed on Bletchley and Fenny Stratford. Within this my thinking for footsteps include:

An INTRODUCTION: Time To Get Our Walking Shoes On

Then moving to: Fenny Poppers – The Last Thing They Do Is Pop

Sammy Leon was instrumental when it came to erecting the Fenny Stratford War Memorial after The Great War. I have undertaken extensive research finding the people behind the names on both this memorial and the one at Saint Mary’s. I have been able to locate the addresses of many who lived within the area known to the Leons.

I will then go Back To Leon Recreation Ground which those who gave their lives in the war knew. I want to walk around and reflect on the park as they knew it.

Leon The Name Behind A School This is the area where I have received the most support. In 1991 I published IN SEARCH OF THE LEONS which reunited the Leon Family with their ancestral home.  Sir John Leon 4^th Baronet of Bletchley Park wrote the introduction. It was Fanny Leon and not Sir Herbert Leon who was heavily involved in education so it is a bit strange that the present-day school takes the name Sir Herbert Leon Academy. I will be looking at the school under Headmaster Bradshaw who originally gave the name Leon to

the school and under Headmaster Abbott who took the name forward.

Leon Dinosaur This was Headmaster Bradshaw’s I idea which he delegated to me to set up and manage. In name it was my project but it was community artist Bill Billings working with Leon School students who made it happen. Sadly the sculpture was moved away from the school and is now located on Windermere Drive. It  is in an horrific stat e of repair. I am campaigning for its dignity to be restored and for a plaque to be erected celebrating the work of Bill Billings and his team of Leon students.

Sausages, Tea Bags, Maggie Thatcher and a bit more. Lady Leon sold off part of the family estate in the Denbigh area of Bletchley for factory development so providing employment for residents. This will be a fun chapter looking at what has happened in the area after the sale.

Leon Bridge I have tried for many years to get proper recognition for what Sammy Leon did to celebrate Denbigh Hall Bridge. This is not just a Bletchley landmark but a landmark right across the rail network. I will not take NO for an answer this time and am determined proper recognition will be afforded to Leon Bridge

Off To The Market I have a photograph of Sammy Leon at the old Bletchley Cattle market, the site of Sainsbury’s Supermarket although today that is defunct. I want to talk about the market and also of the horse drinking trough, now gone, erected by Sammy Leon.

The Bells The Bells Having lived in Bletchley Park myself for three years, NO I was not a spy, I understand Sammy Leon’s frustration with the constant chiming of the church bells. Sammy tried to have the clock bells silenced but the church has been there for centuries, the Leons moved to Bletchley Park in 1883. However, when Sammy Leon died the church silenced the

bells for a day.

Bletchley Park I am NOT a fan of the present-day Bletchley Park FAR FROM IT ! However, I am open to have my mind changed indeed I WANT TO HAVE MY MIND CHANGED. I will walk around the vast housing estate, the college, celebrate Flowers Care Home, discuss the situation and what has become of Bletchley Park Pavilion. I  will even visit the small area which is now a museum. Like I say I am NOT a fan o f the present-day Bletchley Park and think Sammy Leon would stand with me on this matter. But I am open to have my mind changed and I WANT to have my mind changed.

Golders Green When Sammy Leon Died in 1926 and Fanny Leon passed away in 1937 their funerals took place at Golders Green Crematorium. This is a very special place and a landmark in its own right. I plan t o visit the

crematorium and celebrate Sir Herbert and Lady Fanny.

The Ghost Of Bletchley Park When writing IN SEARCH OF THE LEONS the manager of Bletchley Park Mansion was a training centre for Royal Mail Telecoms – no BT back in 1991, told me of a ghost which many people had seen. She believed this ghost was Lady Leon. She was very serious and convinced. I shared the story  with a former Bletchley Gazette edit or who had known Lady Leon, his response was: Put it this was, if she could haunt the place she would !

The History Of Milton Keynes And District When I was writing my 1994 book NOT THE

CONCRETE COWS Lady Markham gave me permission to use her late husband, Sir Frank Markham’s writing and in particular the photographs in his book. I will be referring to this when writing IN THE FOOTSTEPS OF SAMMY LEON. I plan to explain the importance of Sir Frank’s writing and of Lady Markham’s association with Bletchley Park in the early 1970’s  

The New City of Bletchley. When Sir Harold Wilson’s government in 1967 designated an area of land in North Buckinghamshire for building a new city very early planning suggested the New City of Bletchley. However, wisdom decided it would be better to take a name from the centre of the area and not Bletchley at the south of the designated area. Sadly, Milton Keynes has not been awarded a city charter although I am hoping such will happen within Her Majesty’s Platinum Jubilee and I have made my own presentation to Buckingham Palace based on my book MILTON DREAMS THE CITY THAT NEVER WAS but that is another story !  However, one thing is certain, if Sir Herbert Sammy Leon were around we would be living in The New City of Bletchley and not Milton Keynes. I am 101% certain with Sammy campaigning a city charter would have been grated many years ago.

So that is where things are now in December 2021 – January 2022 WATCH THIS SPACE as the FOOTSTEPS OF SAMMY LEON start to walk.

Milton Keynes has a scary drug problem !

COMMENT ON THE NEWS

I agree with what Boris has been saying in regard to drug crime BUT I would invite him and all of his government to pop along to SPECSAVERS so he can see the wider picture.

Before the pandemic I was heavily involved supporting on a personal level homeless rough sleepers in Milton Keynes.  Homeless rough- sleeping and drugs go hand in hand. I know for certain that  if I were in such a tragic situation I would be an addict in order to shut out the horrors of life.

BURNER PHONES  Boris if you are serious the very first thing you need to do is to shut down

the phone system used by criminal gangs. When mobile phones first became common you could not have a number without it being registered. Go back to that system and you will immediately frustrate the gangs.

A DRUG ADDICT IS A VICTIM AND NOT A CRIMINAL  On an overnight walk across Milton Keynes working with a homeless support charity at 2am we found a rough-sleeper outside the post office in Central Milton Keynes. Talking with him a car pulled up and waited patiently until we left. That car contained a dealer making a delivery.

During the same overnight walk we found a vast drug camp in Campbell Park directly behind The Bus Shelter MK which was the then mayor of Milton Keynes nominated charity. The following year the new mayor chose YMCA MK as his charity. I found a drug camp adjacent to this hostel on what is known as the YMCA bridge. I tried to get the council to engage, I tried to get the YMCA to engage but failed with both.

Originally as a blog but later I included this in my e-book DOWN AND OUT IN MILTON DREAMS. Let me share it with you now.

A TRILOGY OF TRAGEDY  Bob, Billy and Lewis are REAL people. They are human beings but human beings society fails to recognise, fails to respect, fails to value and above all fails to love. These are not their real names but they are REAL people, indeed they are human beings just like you and just like me !

Thursday morning 4am. I was on my way to the radio studio to broadcast Dave's Disco the podcast from which was played on Saturday at the Dreamsai Lunch of Love. I pulled up outside Milton Keynes Council's Civic Offices. I had a letter to push through the letter box, a letter complaining about the council's failure to support a vulnerable adult. I knew I was wasting my time and the ink I had expended on a sheet of paper a waste but you have to go through the system don't you ?  The wind was blowing a gale and it was lashing down with rain.

There I met BOB. That's not his real name of course.

4am, this man was walking along. He turned to walk towards my car then changed his mind and moved off again. I opened the door: Hang on mate - wait - what do you want ?  I fumbled in the dark to find the letter to put through the council's letter box then stepped out to meet him.

Bob was a tall friend, I guess aged around thirty, who was soaked to the skin. I knew what he wanted. Or did I ?

Have you got a bit of change ?  Off to buy some drugs. A homeless rough-sleeper in search of his fix.  NO NO NO !  Homeless and rough-sleeping yes, soaked to the skin yes but he was NOT a drug addict. He was on his way to the all-night McDonald's primarily to be in the warm and out of the rain there to spend the few coins he had on something to eat. Even if he was begging for dug money I would have given him something - an addict is not a bad person but a victim of bad. I gave him money to buy a breakfast.

We then stood in the wind and rain talking for twenty or so minutes. What a lovely, beautiful man. Yes, he was homeless and rough-sleeping. His tent, just along the way from Milton Keynes Council's offices, had blown over. Many of his belongings had blown away, been picked up and stolen. Please do not tell me that Milton Keynes Council did not know he existed.

I talked to him about getting help but he knew the situation was futile. He said he wanted to get to Luton where the council is better at supporting homeless rough-sleepers. Is it ?  I don't know. The important thing is that was his perception.

He had problems with his eyes but could not get any help. He is a non-person. NO HE IS A HUMAN BEING.

NO, he was not a drug addict. I know how to recognise an addict, trust me he was not one. He explained that he had been an alcoholic and went on to say how he was treated and escaped the situation.  He told me how he had become homeless. His grandfather had been contributing £400 a month towards his rent. When his grandfather died the money stopped and the income he had working as a plasterer was not enough to pay for his private rented accommodation. I do not know if Milton Keynes was or was not the local authority - probably not and it does not matter but that local authority said it could not help. I said I did not know if it Was Milton Keynes Council or not, I can actually name SIX people the systems within Milton Keynes Council have in recent months have constructively made homeless. Not all ended up rough-sleeping but had it been left to the council they would have.

With every word of conversation my heart warmed to him, warmed while at the same bleeding. 

I returned to the car and grabbed one of the information sheets I have for Dreamsai on which I list phone numbers of help lines, details of the soup run and food bank locations. These are deliberately laminated so the information is not affected by the rain. I told him about Saturday's Dreamsai Lunch of Love and begged him to come along. He said he would.

As we parted, me off to the radio studio and Bob to McDonald's he kept thanking me, shaking my hand and saying how pleased he was to have spent time with me. When I got to the radio studio I was soaked to the skin. I broadcast my 279th show, if you listen to the podcast you will hear how the friendship we had experienced in the wind and in the pouring rain outside Milton Keynes Council's Civic Offices lifted the show to a happy and I hope inspiring level.

Bob did not turn up to Dreamsai's Lunch of Love. After it was over I went in search of him. I could not find him. Perhaps he had gone to Luton. Perhaps he had died. Who cares ?  I CARE !  I am a human being, Bob is a human being, he is my friend and I CARE !

Billy is a regular visitor to the Dreamsai Lunch of Love, we always have a little chat and a laugh but it is always small-talk.

At the lunch Bob failed to turn up to I overheard Billy, again that is not his real name, saying: If you are a drug addict Milton Keynes is NOT the place to find help.  If you have mental health issues and need help you will NOT find it in Milton Keynes. If you are homeless do NOT look for support you will NOT get it in Milton Keynes !

I approached Billy and pushed myself into his conversation. He suggested we step outside and speak in private. We talked for ages and ages, or should I say that Billy talked for ages and I listened.

Billy said he had had a brilliant life so being homeless and rough-sleeping was not what his life had been about and did not matter. As we talked it became clear his anger a frustration with the "system", an anger and frustration I share was not for himself but for others.

No, he is not a drug addict but watches every day the way criminals prey on and manipulate homeless rough-sleepers. 

I am wondering what Billy did earlier in life, I wouldn't mind betting he was a Professor of Philosophy in a major university.  He did not just talk about the failings of government, government covering decades -  indeed centuries, of the multiple failings of Milton Keynes Council but gave his insight into the causes of those failings.

Take a chicken, Billy said, hold it up. There is a LEFT WING and there is a RIGHT WING which never meet. Both fail to understand that there is a heart beating in the middle !

My way of regarding this level of failure is to say that the right wing is totally oblivious to the existence of REAL people. The left wing knows real people exist but thinks they are only there for them to play politics with. A politician, particularly at local level, will play to the gallery waving at those in the expensive corporate boxes but never look down to  see REAL people sitting in the stalls.

Billy talked about how criminal drug dealers groom vulnerable people, particularly children. His insight and passion was both deep and intense. He blamed a society where life revolves around a smart phone. I hate smart phones and refuse to use one. I think a smart phone is the world's worst invention. Billy explained how the younger generation today is being destroyed by the damn things.

Did you know, I said, there is a Class A drug dealer working out of YMCA Milton Keynes where he is living. This is something I was told and something I put into Crime Stoppers for the police to investigate.

You are wrong !  I was told by Billy. There is not one class a drug dealer operating out of YMCA Milton Keynes, there are TWO !

Billy told me there were one thousand people making money from the illegal drug trade in Milton Keynes. My immediate reaction was to say that was a gross exaggeration but I fear it may not be.  If you want to buy illegal drugs I know that North Ninth Street adjacent to Milton Keynes Civic Offices is a good place to be. Another good place is Campbell Park named after Lord Campbell of Eskin, the Chairman of Milton Keynes Development Corporation. What a way to celebrate the achievement of this man !  There is, of course, what is known colloquially as The YMCA Bridge, that's an excellent place to buy drugs. many times I have told Milton Keynes Council of the drug came located there. Many times I have wasted my breath.

Billy knew the names of local politicians, departments within Milton Keynes Council and could explain at length his perception of their failure to recognise that in the centre of left and right wings there is a beating heart, a beating heart of a real person - a human being. Sadly a human being that counts for nothing.

Lewis IS a drug addict. He has been an addict and homeless rough-sleeping for a number of years. I have known of the existence of Lewis for some time but I met him for the first time during our taking food from Dreamsai to homeless rough sleepers after the lunch.

The weather was harsher even than when I met Bob earlier in the week. Lewis was in a desperate situation. To avoid the storm he had slept in a covered private car park. No, he shouldn't have done that but do you blame him ? The security had chased him away and thrown all his few belongings into a skip. What little he had he had lost. I saw his shoes, the soles were falling off and so his feet were wet. He was hungry and he was cold.

I began by verbally attacking the security guards for which I am now embarrassed, then backed off, apologised profusely and recovered Lewis's property. We all parted friends. Lewis and I are now friends.

With the wind blowing and the rain lashing we walked along to my car so we could sit and chat. Trying to hold his wet sleeping bag and his bits and pieces Lewis's trousers kept sliding down his legs revealing his underpants. He was so skinny and he did not have a belt to hold his trousers round his waist.

Talking in the car I wish there had been a camera to broadcast the conversation to every television network in every country of the world. What an incredible man yet to so many he is sub-human and worthless. 

Our conversation covered three areas.

Lewis knew Jimmy  Owens who was found dead in his tent in Milton Keynes. Jimmy was one of my former students from when I was head of year at Leon School. It was Jimmy's death that first moved me to become involved in the lack of love for homeless rough-sleepers. 

Jimmy, I knew him as James, was a happy go lucky teenager with a great life ahead of him. As Lewis described him he had not changed. Lewis said he was always cracking a joke and larking about. Jimmy died three and a half years ago, DO NOT believe the lies  and fake news in the media !  His death DID NOT spur Milton Keynes Council into action. If it had then Lewis and others like him would not be in their current situation.

Throughout those years Lewis has not been able to get any help. We talked and he said he was trying to get ID. ID aint going to put dry warm clothes on his body. ID aint going to put food in his belly and stop his trousers falling down all the time. ID aint going to find him somewhere warm and dry to sleep. ID aint going to give him the love he needs.

We talked about drugs. If you want to end criminal drug activity in Milton Keynes then Lewis is the man to take advice from. His philosophy is if drugs were decriminalised, as they are in certain enlightened parts of the world, and sold under licence as is alcohol and tobacco it would no longer be cool, cool is the word he used, to take drugs and they would fade into a background of insignificance. Given that never happening he knew exactly how to set up a support system, a support system which currently does not exist in Milton Keynes.

Lewis believes in the death penalty for some serious crimes but he also firmly believes that petty crime and anti-social behaviour associated with drug addiction MUST be punished with community service orders so offenders can give back constructively to society. Those community service orders must be  a positive experience for those engaged in them and they have to be part of a larger programme of support and reform.

He talked about the lack of support for addicts which means the situation in Milton Keynes is and always will be on an upward spiral.

We then talked about my hobby of writing and my ambition to engage people like Lewis in writing stories. It could be fiction or it could be their own autobiographies. Autobiography means SELF - LIFE - WRITING.  I see it as a support mechanism for the victims and a way to grab hold of those like Milton Keynes Council which fails to recognise human beings.

When we parted Lewis kept hugging me and thanking me. I got into my Jaguar and drove home to my warm home and something to eat. Lewis bundled his belongings into his wet sleeping bag then set off in search of somewhere to spend the night.

I see that the leader of the labour party has been shouting his mouth off following Boris’s announcement. Let’s see just how he shouts his mouth off at this !

A senior member of Milton Keynes Council, a labour member, was making press announcements saying how the council wanted to reduce knife crime. Well that reduction did not happen did it ! How many stabbings, how many murders have there been since then ? I wrote to her asking if we could meet and for me to pass on the knowledge I had from the vulnerable people I worked with. SHE IGNORED MY LETTER. I wrote again – SHE IGNORED MY LETTER. I wrote for a third time SHE IGNORED MY LETTER. Kier Stammer how are you going to shout your mouth off about that !

BUT there are three rings in Milton Keynes Council’s political circus. I was contacted by a former member of the conservative ring asking for help. I wanted to help but numerous e-mails and communications sent by myself and those forwarded by this ex-councillor to the leader of the Milton Keynes Council conservative group were ALL IGNORED. Boris Johnson what have you go to say that that ?

Yes Boris I agree with what you are doing but  go to Specsavers and drag along all those who would seek to shout their mouths off – look at the full picture then rid out country of this evil organised crime.

I will not be holding my breath as I wait for a reply !

Milton Keynes London's Thirs Airport !

Here is another chapter from my 1994 book NOT THE

CONCRETE COWS

No Airport Here:

Season travellers of the Airways will be familiar with the coded baggage tags that ensure one’s suitcases arrive via the same aircraft with their owners and at the same destination.

LHR -  London Heathrow SFO - San Francisco LAX - Los Angeles  JFK - New York Kennedy   LGW - London Gatwick

But what about LMK - London Milton Keynes ? Daily flights to New York, Cairo, Rome, Bombay and one hundred other far away destinations ?

Don't smile because this was very nearly the case ! If the now infamous Robert Maxwell, one-time Labour Member of Parliament for our area, had had his way intercontinental jets would be constantly roaring overhead.

Thirty years ago advanced planning was calling for a new airport to relieve the strain that anticipated demand would place on Heathrow and Gatwick in the next century. One of the best options looked to be building London’s third airport at Cublington just south of the area designated for the construction of a new town.

Within the triangle of roads between Stewkley, Wing and Cublington is the site of a former

World War Two airfield from which the Royal Air Force flew against the might of the Third Reich. It is up on this site the proposed airport was planned, only six miles from Milton Keynes. But the project intended extending to a staggering seven and a half thousand acres, bulldozing flat everything in the way. The destruction would have included obliterating the entire village of Stewkley, claimed to be the longest village in England, and rehousing it's eleven hundred residents.

North Buckinghamshire is already on the North Atlantic route with dozens of heavy jets passing overhead everyday but these are all well on their way to their initial cruising altitude, flying sufficiently high to be relatively unnoticed. Had the airport come here instead of Stansted then living in Milton Keynes would have been akin to residing at the bottom of the runway. Perhaps Milton Keynes would have become a replica of Crawley to the south of Gatwick. Instead of a multi-industry the city would have been almost entirely dependent upon the airport for its employment. It is estimated that fifty thousand people would have worked at the airport.

It was the most efficiently organised public protest since the anti-coral Corn Law League of 1839 the saved us. The outward manifestation was a host of signs reading NO AIRPORT HERE. They sprang up overnight along roads and adjacent to the railway between Bletchley and Leighton Buzzard. But the organisation went much deeper.

The Wing Airport Resistance Association was under the chairmanship of Desmond Fennell, later to be Justice Fennel and head that Kings Cross enquiry, and Evelyn de Rothschild, from the family of merchant bankers, as treasurer, the local population  banded together to prevent at all costs and airport being built on their doorstep. Many other famous names like Johnny Dankworth, Cleo Lane and Roald Dahl, who all lived in the area, through in their unqualified support. (Robert Maxwell, millionaire publisher and MP, joined in but history now shows that his motives and intentions were decidedly unclear.)

They knew only too well but they had an uphill task ahead of them for in every way Cubblington/Wing was the best site for the airport. Had it come to North Buckinghamshire, London Milton Keynes International Airport may not have become London's third airport at all but the countries first airport ! There would have been no need than for Luton, Birmingham or even East Midlands airports and much of the traffic would have been stolen away from Heathrow.

I recently spent a pleasant evening with WARA executive committee member Dennis Skinner in his Whitchurch home, enjoying his hospitality about a roaring log fire, as he explained the airport perimeter fence had been planned for no more than one hundred yards away from where we were sitting.  It is his belief that Milton Keynes would have needed to expand south to meet the airport, swallowing up everything as far as Leighton Buzzard. The resulting conurbation, some planners saw it is reaching right down to Aylesbury, would be little like the city we know today.

On another evening I chatted with Farmer Morris and his wife from Manor Farm, Hoggeston realising we were right in the middle of where the main runway would have been. Their family has farm land in the village for ten generations dating back to the 1700’s. What a personal tragedy it would have been to fall victim to a compulsory purchase order.

Eighty year old Raptor of Dunton, the Reverend Hubert Sillitoe, brother of Sir Percy Sillitoe head of wartime MI5, preached hell, fire and damnation against all airport planners. He was a popular character, if a little eccentric, and achieved fame in The Sun newspaper who dubbed him a modern-day Elijah. They quoted one of his speeches ... This damn sacrilege we will fight on the door steps of our homes, in the fields of our farms, at churchyard gates and church doors ! A later edition of the paper had on its front page a picture of this campaigning cleric setting fire to a giant copy of the government's report and reprinting his prayer ...that these inhuman and sacrilegious proposals be so absolutely rejected and reduced the flames of fire shall reduce this copy of the Roskill Report. The reporter went on to describe how the flames leaped upwards as a brass band played the funeral march. But others attracted less favourable media attention. There were those who thought the best thing to do would be to load up their tractors with manure and dump the lot on Downing Street. Mr Justice Roskill, detailed by Harold Wilson's government to study the various sites for the airport, actually received death threats. Some of the protest posters and cartoons in the national press made no secret of the intention many had of actually turning the campaign into a literal fight if talking failed !

I asked Mr Morris if he thought people would have really engaged in hand to hand fighting with bulldozers. A mild mannered man himself, he doubted if he would have actually been involved but were certain others would. WARA not only had to tackle the politicians and bureaucrats but also to disassociate themselves from any threats of violent activity activities if they were to maintain credibility.

The membership of Robert Maxwell was also hardly an asset to the group. Maxwell, as recent events now only to clearly show, was a past master when it came to playing one person off against another. He played WARA off against his own political party and the local community against the planners but never failed to keep his own business interests uppermost. It was reported in the Guardian on 15th of June 1970 that Maxwell said to Bletchley factory worker Let's get Milton Keynes first if we can have the airport as well so much the better !

Three days later he lost his seat to Bill Benyon, so ending his parliamentary career, and he subsequently left the executive committee of water.

Dennis Skinner is convinced it was the election of a Conservative Government, under Prime Minister Ted Heath, but finally saved the day. Wing was the best, but also the most expensive option, in his opinion the Wilson Government had little regard for the costs. Tories, on the other hand, weighed finances with a rather with rather more care and eventually went for the cheaper Stanstead project.

WARA attack the finances of the proposal on every front. It strived all along to avoid becoming a political body, something that frustrated Robert Maxwell, but to truly represent everyone who was against the airport. This included Buckinghamshire County Council, the Milton Keynes Development Corporation and just about every living soul within twenty miles of the proposed airport. There was little to be gained by stressing the environmental issues which carried no weight in the swinging sixties. Instead the organisation employed professionals to undertake their own investigations then question every facet of the government's Roskill Report.

Their arguments were presented to every member of parliament whose final decision found against Wing. While that managed to convince them but the costing was wrong, indeed it was. Nearly a quarter of a century later it has become clear that a London Milton Keynes International Airport, as well as handling more than its fair share of business and cargo traffic, would have developed into the nation's number one holiday resort. Nobody in the 1960’s quite foresaw such an explosion in leisure travel.

There was a victory torchlight procession from Stewkley Church on the 26th April 1971, a tree planted in the churchyard at Whitchurch proclaims:  This tree is planted to the glory of God and in thankfulness for having been spared the third London airport 26th of November 1972. Buckinghamshire County Council planted the spinney at Cubblington upon the site originally intended for the terminal building.

Little now remains of the actual project, the signs have been taken down, the graffiti that once adorned motorway bridges have been sponged off but in the barn at Manor Farm where many of the rallies were held there is still a mural demanding NO AIRPORT.  When I saw it a couple of weeks ago a herd of beef cattle ambled about in their winter quarters oblivious of the fact that they could have been jumbo jets.

But would Milton Keynes be a better place at double its size and serving one of the world's major airports ? Perhaps, perhaps not.  It is difficult to say. During the campaign the activities of WARA cannot have escaped the notice of teenager Richard Branson, then a border at Stowe School near Buckingham. Would it be better if Virgin Atlantic, together with British Airways,  American Airlines and all the rest, brought their vast needs for employment to the area ?

Next time you are sitting in the traffic on the M25 as you head off on holiday by way of

Heathrow or Gatwick you can weigh up the advantages and disadvantages then decide yourself.

I hope you enjoyed that. I'll share some more another day

The windmill that never turned

My book NOT THE CONCRETE COWS published in 1994 contains some of the weekly features I wrote for The Milton Keynes Citizen. Within these were a number of follies. Here is one, it  is actually the very first feature I published in the Citizen. Have a read and see if you remember the windmill that never turned.

Focus on the follies starting with the windmill but never turns:

We are all, no doubt, familiar with the follies of English architecture, those enigmatic towers and castellated edifices erected in the grounds of many a stately home the former Duke of Buckingham's estate at Stowe is positively littered with them.

The Oxford English Dictionary describes a folly as a costly structure which is totally useless. Perhaps that is a little unkind for many a folly was built in harmless fun and thousands every week derive innocent amusement by visiting those now preserved by the National Trust.

But what of the follies in Milton Keynes, nothing pre twentieth century in this purpose built city of the modern age?

No, I do not mean the concrete cows !

What I had more in mind with some of the landmarks we have come to love and hate, often in the same breath, for their eccentricities and impracticability of design and purpose.

Some are amusing, others are downright frustrating. Some, in their time, aroused much public controversy while others climbed onto the back of our landscape almost unnoticed.

I have chosen the follies that come instantly to my mind but let me make it clear it is not my intention to be cruel or unkind, simply to bring each to attention in what I regard to be the true spirit of a folly.

My first choice of folly is the windmill that never turned. Well it's not a windmill exactly but a wind powered generator. Located at the junction of Watling Street and Faraday Drive this folly is a feature of Energy Park, an estate of purpose designed and built energy efficient homes.

But the trouble is this folly is one of the most inefficient articles in the entire city.

To return to the dictionary definition, goodness only knows what it cost to put up and certainly it is quite useless.

In Denmark I have seen entire hillsides covered with these generators, like farms of cultivated giant objects from a science fiction nightmare, all gently turning in the breeze.

But their junior emulator in Milton Keynes has failed to learn one important lesson from its mentors. In order to generate electricity the blades of the windmill have to turn around ! Those at Energy Park remain steadfastly static and have done so for many years.

Perhaps the mechanism is rusted up, surely the inactivity cannot be blamed upon a lack of wind. No, for unless my memory is seriously failing me, I remember the blades once revolving. Presumably the dwellings it was designed to serve now received their electricity from less environmentally sound sources courtesy of National Power and Powergen.

It is rumoured the windmill was constructed ahead of its planning permission. Perhaps that is true, nobody seems to know for certain, it's one of those legends that tend to grow up about follies. At least no official in a pinstripe suit a so far demanded it be torn down.

But then why should it be ? It is not doing anybody any harm is it ?  It serves as a useful landmark on Watling Street and a true folly of Milton Keynes.  Long made it remain.

A 2021 UPDATE:

The estate behind this windmill was an estate way ahead of its time. It supposedly was built containing energy efficient houses. Perhaps we need to bring back our windmill. Bring it back and make it an icon reminding us all how important it is to be energy efficient. Perhaps the windmill may never physically turn but a metaphorical rotation could be a practical reminder.

PS: I wrote under the pen-name of Jonathan Flie back then - as in Fly-on-the-wall. When I stoppoed writing newspaper articles I changed to Max Robinson

Wouldn’t it be sad if every city had a council like Milton Keynes !

Wouldn’t it be sad if every city had a council like Milton Keynes

The good – The bad – And the ugly.

CELEBRATE the good – RECYCLE the bad and make it good – PAINT the ugly and make it beautiful.

It is going to take a very big recycling plant to mend the failure of elected members on Milton Keynes Council. A fleet of tankers will be required to hold all the paint to beautify the folly of Milton Keynes Council.

PLEASE read this case. PLEASE share it. PLEASE help to recycle and to paint this failure as a matter of urgency.

At 11.50am on Friday 3^rd December 2021 I sent the following e-mail to Milton Keynes Councillor Middleton. I copied this e-mail in to every single member of Milton Keynes Council. As of 8am on Monday 6^th December 2021 I have not received a single reply.

Dear Councillor Middleton

I would refer to a recent media report where you say you want contractors to be environmentally conscious. (pasted below) I have to say, given the activities of Milton Keynes Council, I find that somewhat hypocritical.

Central Milton Keynes has a giant carbon footprint and appalling lacking in biodiversity. Such is down to the planning policy of Milton Keynes Council.

When the Milton Keynes Development Corporation was planning our new city a fundamental foundation stone was: NO BUILDING SHALL BE TALLER THAN THE SURROUNDING TREES. Milton Keynes Council trashed that idea and trashes it with every new planning application and construction.

Across Milton Keynes there are twenty-two million trees and shrub bushes. How many are there in Central Milton Keynes ?  How many per square acre compared to the borough overall. Milton Keynes is not particularly biodiverse but biodiversity is a word outside the lexicon of

Central Milton Keynes. Central Milton Keynes where the council’s planners have given the town what is probably the most hideous skyline of any town or city in England. An architectural folly Milton Keynes Council continues to peruse with a vengeance.

Part of Central Milton Keynes high carbon footprint includes a building which Milton Keynes Council allowed to destroy the fundamental ley-line about which Milton Keynes Development Corporation wrote its strategic plan.

While what you are calling for is right and proper if it stands alone it is both hypocritical alongside the folly of Milton Keynes Council as well as being ridiculously too little hideously too late !

Wouldn’t it be sad if every city had a council like Milton Keynes !

Here is the media report my e-mail refers to:

Milton Keynes Council is on the hunt for 'green experts' to help reduce carbon emissions.

Earlier this year, MK Council agreed to look for new contactors to ensure all of its buildings are maintained to high sustainably standards to help it become carbon neutral by 2030 and carbon negative by 2050.

The Council is looking to begin the process of finding contractors to help achieve its climate action goals while delivering value for money for local people. 

A council decision to approve the process is set for 7th December, with contactors appointed from July 2022 as soon as the existing contract ends.

Cabinet Member for Resources, Cllr Rob Middleton said: “We regularly review our

contracts to ensure we’re getting the best deal for our residents.  We want all of our contractors to be environmentally conscious with sustainability at the forefront of everything they do. 

"This helps us provide a better service to local residents, keep bills down and tackle climate change.”

Wouldn’t it be sad if every city had a council like Milton Keynes !

We are not talking here of pot holes in the road, we are not talking of missed bin collections WE ARE TALKING OF THE MOST IMPORTANT ISSUE FACING MANKIND AT THIS TIME. Sadly, within its three ring political circus not one, NO NOT ONE, member of Milton Keynes Council thought my e-mail merited a reply.

Additional irony is the fact that Milton Keynes Council thinks it is green. It is not green when it comes to saving our planet but perhaps it I s green where the word can be used to mean ignorance.

Wouldn’t it be sad if every city had a council like Milton Keynes !

What do you think ? What is your opinion ? Please share such with as many people as you can. Let us together take this BAD and recycle it into GOOD. Let us together pain the UGLY and make it beautiful. Let us end the Lord Lucan Fan Club at the centre of Milton Keynes Council and it s three ring political circuys then return our home to the Red Balloon advert of Milton Keynes Development Corporation.