Upcoming meetings regarding the UKCMRI medical lab in Somers Town

A letter from the developers of the proposed medical lab, the UKCMRI, behind the British Library contains a list of four exhibitions (presumably similar to that on the Coopers Lane estate just before Christmas).

These are at:

* St Pancras Library, Argyle Street (in the council complex on the Euston Road near King’s Cross station), Monday, March 8, 2-5pm

* Surma Centre, 1 Robert St (in Regent’s Park), Wednesday March 10, 2.30-5pm.

* Somers Town Community Centre, 150 Ossulston Street, Saturday March 13, 9am-1pm

* St Pancras Community Association, 30 Camden Street, Wednesday March 17, 2.30-5pm.

It is good that the consortium is providing more information opportunities, but a pity that only one of these sessions is outside working hours, and then on a Saturday morning, when many will be recovering from the week or have other commitments.

If you want to write to the consortium to suggest an evening session, or anything else, they can be reached through info@ukcmri.ac.uk or 0800 028 6731.

More on the UKCRMI development. (You’ll also find some excellent discussion arising from the development control forum on Michael Edward’s blog.

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Excellent turnout for Save the Whittington A&E march today

The weather was threatening, and TfL had closed practically every transport route it could think of, so it was great to see an excellent turnout for the Save the Whittington Hospital A&E march today.

It was led out by the Camden New Journal (which with the Ham & High did a huge job in promoting the march) and Unison campaigners on an open-top bus (which later served as a stage for speeches).

Estimates for numbers I’ve heard ranged from 3,000-4,000, and practically every organisation you can think of, from pensioners groups to many unions, was there. And also all of the political parties, although you really do wonder how Labour felt able to show its face, given surely all that would have been needed to give us all a free Saturday would be a phone call from Labour Health Secretary Andy Burnham to the North London PCTs. (And I did notice an awful lot of their leaflets, far more than those of others’, dropped on the road.)

It was something of a party reunion, as we marched as a Green Party block, catching up with old friends and new from Islington and Haringey Greens.

The next meeting of the Defend Whittington Hospital campaign is on March 22, 7pm, at the Whittington Community Centre.

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Green Party broadcast on Channel 4

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Speaking at Progressive Women

Had a fascinating time last night speaking at the Progressive Women event in Parliament House.

It was made particularly interesting by the fact that I got to go first – not a usual state of affairs for the Green Party in such circumstances – the chair announcing as she started speaking that she was going by the entirely fair random alphabetic order of speakers’ names.

It set up an interesting dynamic, since I got to present our very progressive policies on minimum wage (more than 2/3 of recipients are female) at 60% of net national average earnings, or now £8.10/hour, on a citizen’s pension of £170 (which would immediately lift recipients, a high proportion of them female, out of poverty) and our new parental leave policy giving each child the chance to have 24 months of parental attention (and strongly encouraging paternity as well as maternity leave).

It is more in sorrow than anger that I add no one else on the panel could match, with their party’s policies, any of these.

But potentially the most immediately fruitful point of the evening came when a Fawcett Society representative asked about rape crisis centre funding and I was able to raise with the Tory representative, Mary Macleod, the failure of the Tory mayor of London, Boris Johnson, to live up to his manifesto pledge on funding London rape crisis centres.

She said that she was unaware of the issue, and would raise it with Boris. I know lots of other people already have, but let’s hope that this “insider” push might make a difference!

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Highgate Climate Action Network evening on “the Five Rs”

Siân Berry, the Green Party Candidate for London Mayor in 2008, and the author of Mend it!, 50 ways to Greener Travel and 50 Ways to be a Greener Shopper, and Prashant Vaze, author of The Economical Environmentalist and chief economist for Consumer Focus, are speaking at a HiCan event on Wednesday March 10, at 8pm.

The topic is the importance of the Five Rs: Refuse, Reduce, Re-Use, Repair, Recycle and other changes we can make to our diets, travel and homes to reduce greenhouse gas emissions.

The meeting is at Channing School, The Bank, Highgate Hill, N6 5HF at 8pm. All welcome.

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