I was right.

Obviously these aren’t direct ‘approval’ or ‘satisfied’ questions, but using the results of elections to do sums that aren’t relevant to anything. It’s complicated because in Wandsworth council elections people have three votes and it’s not possible to work out exactly how they are cast. Some people will only vote once or twice, some will split their votes between parties. My recollection is that about a third of the votes cast this year were not for the straight party slates.

However, taking an average of the votes cast for the party candidates (the greens only fielded two), then working out a percentage and then subtracting the proportion against from the proportion cast for us brings me to an ‘approval’ rating of 6.2%.

Like I said, nowhere near as good as even the worse GP. What’s worse, it’s dropped. The same calculation was 10.1% in 2006. Given that I was the council’s exec member for regeneration and community safety in that period I suppose it’s possible that some people blamed me for the recession and rising crime.

Totally meaningless. Unless to serve as a reminder (not that I need one) that pretty much whatever I do, there’ll always be about half the people of Shaftesbury who think someone else can do it better.

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They are seeking what seems a fairly minimal application, basically an extra hour on Thursday night, extending alcohol sales from midnight to 0100, and extending ‘late night refreshment’ from 1230 to 0130.

You can make representations until 24 September. They need to relate to the four licensing objectives:

• The prevention of crime and disorder
• The prevention of public nuisance
• Public safety
• The protection of children from harm

The council’s licensing pages provide more information.

If you wish to make an observation you can do so by writing to:
Head of Licensing
Licensing Section
London Borough of Wandsworth
PO Box 47095
London
SW18 9AQ

or by emailing licensing@wandsworth.gov.uk

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This map is a (not very good) attempt at showing which GP practices have the highest ‘approval’ in the borough. I did it largely to see if there was any geographic patterns, and there don’t seem to be any, so a bit of a waste of time. Basically the darker the blue the higher the approval. If there’s any pattern at all probably that there’s a correlation between deprivation and what people think of their GP, but not much of one.

The data are from the GP patient satisfaction survey, and use the most recent results. My interpretation of approval is to basically subtract the percentage of people expressing dissatisfaction from the percentage of people expressing satisfaction. (I’m fully aware that satisfaction if you measured satisfaction with me in the same way it would be much lower.) This also has the effect of increasing the margin of error, but since the results are in line with individual satisfaction and dissatisfaction ratings, as well as the results for a separate question on whether patients would recommend their surgery to others, I’m comfortable that the results have enough validity for a blog post.

It’s worth pointing that that these are based on subjective patient opinion, not on clinical outcomes. It’s entirely possible that some of those negatives will reflect decisions that, while made in the best interests of the patient, were not what the patient actually wanted.

The sample are, to a degree, self-selecting, because they are among the third or so who bothered to reply. And you might also question whether some of the higher scores are just because dissatisfied patients have left!

But I think there is some value in the data. You do not, generally, need to be a clinician to instinctively know if you are getting good care. And while I know, politically, saying anything that makes it seems like advocating a market within the NHS can be dangerous, I have to wonder why patients from Balham Hill (52% approval) aren’t all wandering down to Balham Park (97% approval). If anything it’s an argument that this sort of data should be more public, along with information on how to move. Without making any judgement on the individual surgeries or GPs scores, you would think that when it comes to health people should be looking to be satisfied rather than staying put with a GP practice with which they are unhappy.

One of the interesting factors that I think might be at play is that those practices that seem to be scoring really highly also tend to be those that have active and involved patient involvement groups. That’s certainly the case for Balham Park, which didn’t have anyone dissatisfied and has 99% of respondents saying they would recommend the practice (Balham Hill has only get 54%, 31% say they would not recommend it). While there might be cause and effect there, I’ve no idea which way round it goes – is there a patient group because it’s a good surgery, or a is it a good surgery in part because there’s a patient group.

I post it for interest. It’s well worth taking a look the full data on the GP patient survey website. And in the interests of openness, you can download the data I used for the map (essentially the Wandsworth data with a few sums and geographical data added in CSV format).

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1. My approval rating drops
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Yet last night’s Newsnight revealed that this is, in effect, what is happening with chugging. The British Heart Foundation are paying on average £136 per sign-up, but claim that they get £3-4 back.

The industry ‘watchdog’ the PFRA – who, of course, get some of that £136 – were wheeled out to defend the practice along with the British Heart Foundation (to whom I’d occasionally donated in the past, but will channel that money elsewhere in the future) but not, to my mind convincingly.

To me it’s hard to see how it’s anything but an incredibly bad way to give money. Half the people who sign up never even cover the costs of the sign-up to the charity they are, supposedly, supporting. Even if the £3-4 return on the sign-up fee is true it still represents and administration cost of 20-25%.

In effect we have a practice that doesn’t really benefit the charity as much as if should, and most certainly doesn’t benefit the high streets where they hassle people.

In Wandsworth we still have an uneasy truce in which the PFRA have, graciously, agreed not to chug in the Tooting Broadway area, but insist they are entitled to go chugging when and where they want. And while the council still has no power to licence or regulate the practice pedestrians in the rest of our town centres still have to risk walking the gauntlet of chuggers when they go shopping.

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The secret to a good council meeting?

I love this story from a New Hampshire council meeting. (The article disappears behind a paywall eventually, so here’s a PDF version.) Essentially protesters against the town rules against street drinking decided to protest by turning a council meeting into a drinking game – having a drink whenever certain phrases were uttered.

About six members of the libertarian Free Keene movement drank in unison from brown glass bottles, soda cans, paper coffee cups and metal flasks every time City Council members or officials said certain words or made certain actions.

Aside from the huge debate underneath the article, the suggestion by the police that they can’t tell if something is alcohol (a sniff, maybe even a swig, perhaps) or the fact that the argument is that blanket bans are often ineffective, what got me was that the council meeting was attended by 50 people!

Even if you discount the people playing the drinking game (6) and the people mounting a counter-protest (3) that still leaves 41 people attending to watch their town’s democracy in action. Given they have a population of around 23,000 if Wandsworth had a proportionate turnout we’d need a public gallery of something like 500.

While alcohol might make our meetings almost bearable, I don’t think it’s the answer, but I’d love to know what they are doing to get so many people along to see how their town is run. What would make you go to a council meeting?

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Ashtar are looking to add to that, and have applied for an extra hour on their entertainment licence and a few hours on their alcohol licence. Their application, if successful, would allow them to provide “entertainment and late night refreshment” until 0300 on the mornings following Friday and Saturday (they currently have until 0200). For alcohol sales they are applying for 2330 on Sunday to Thursday and 0200 on Friday and Saturday (they currently have 2230 on Sunday and 2300 Monday to Saturday).

I have used the venue only very occasionally, so it’s difficult for me to judge. The Sunday to Thursday application seems relatively minor, the more difficult one to judge is Fridays and Saturdays. While its ‘only’ an extra hour for entertainment, it’s a big increase in drinking time and at a sensitive time of night.

If you want to make representations (by 14 September) they must relate to the four licensing objectives:

• The prevention of crime and disorder
• The prevention of public nuisance
• Public safety
• The protection of children from harm

The council’s licensing pages provide more information.

If you wish to make an observation you can do so by writing to:
Head of Licensing
Licensing Section
London Borough of Wandsworth
PO Box 47095
London
SW18 9AQ

or by emailing licensing@wandsworth.gov.uk

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3. The Humble Grape licensing application

I was told by a slightly convoluted route (I understand a complaint by Harrow Council prompted a chain of communication that hopped along at least three intermediaries to me) but I understand that the Met’s issues are mainly over privacy – that victims can be identified by a combination of road and crime – but also that they would increase fear of crime and that detailing the methods meant criminals could use my site to learn new ways of committing crime.

While I disagree I’m obviously not going to continue having been told to stop by the police.

And if I’m honest, I’m not that unhappy. They took a little time to produce and the policing white paper has a commitment to “street level” crime information by February of next year, so it’s not as if this sort of information isn’t coming around the corner anyway.

What’s more, while I have been producing them huge amounts of data have been made available in open formats that just weren’t there at the beginning of 2009. The London Data Store being a prime example, and just looking at the crime and community safety category immediately reveals some interesting looking datasets. I’m looking forward to being able to use the time to start looking at those and, perhaps, sharing some amateurish analysis on the blog.

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Your wish… oh, I'm not, am I RT @amyjcousins: must be great to have a celebrity retweet you #

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Today I accidentally launched it. In much the same way as you accidentally clean a fridge. You start doing a few bits and pieces, then you realise that you’ve got to go through with it.

Hopefully it’s a bit of an improvement. A little more white space and bit more clarity. There are a few rough edges, but I’ve never been one to let perfect be the enemy of good (actually, I usually do, but I’m trying to improve).

Let me know if you spot any problems. It would be good to know your OS and browser if you do. And if it’s Internet Explorer 6, probably nothing will work.

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1. The site's new look