Hi Jeremy,
I was out cycling this morning with the Farnham Road Club. It was a beautiful sunny day, perfect to be out cycling the lanes and roads around Farnham, Elstead, Godalming, tea and tea-cakes at Abinger Hammer and back home. On the ride I made a note to tell you the roads are a mess – potholes everywhere, sunken manholes and drains. (I’ve reported some of them to fillthathole.org.uk). Then I came to a great stretch of road that actually had a cycle lane, with a really nice section of tarmac – which got me thinking.
How about combining your role as Health Secretary and your legacy of the fabulous London Olympics, and promote Surrey as the home of English/British cycling. All we need is a cycle lane (a painted strip 2 foot in from the left of all roads and lanes in Surrey). Then a decent strip of tarmac within this lane to ensure the safety of cyclists, surface level manholes and drain covers (cars don’t see potholes until the cyclist ahead swerves to avoid them). You would be protecting the cyclists from serious accidents. This is going to cost money you say, wait I have another idea.
This week I read an article in Time magazine (1st July, ‘Can Service Save Us’) about returning US war veterans and how the majority of them have post-traumatic stress, what is helping them is getting them involved in projects helping their local communities. Which brings me to my point, we also have lots of soldiers returning from warzones, some of them will be laid-off, they will need help re-adjusting to ‘normal’ life. We need projects to ease them back into civilian life. The ‘adopt a cycle lane’ project might be one of these projects.
Similarly we need to get our kids, who have no jobs, doing something useful, acquiring skills, painting and maintaining roads is probably not suitable for them, but helping farmers develop or maintain their farms may be more appropriate. Visiting and helping elderly folks paint their homes, maintain their gardens, collecting their shopping, etc. Life skills. How about helping reclaim our fields, forests and meadows, helping with building new homes, flood-proofing homes, the list goes on.
The government needs to take advantage of all the brain power in the UK, I propose you encourage the voluntary establishment of ‘think tanks’ across the country, where folks can gather and provide ideas for solving problems. Use a web site to coordinate these ‘idea incubators’. Encourage local MPs to participate in regular, monthly?, meetings. The ‘prize’ for a good idea is the government will sponsor its implementation. Many ideas can be implemented by the community with no government involvement. Let’s get Britain doing what we do best, innovating and volunteering to help.
By the way, thanks for all the great stuff you are doing for us.
Keith Black
32 Oakland Avenue
GU9 9DX
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