Convicted murderer to visit Epsom schools

A convicted murderer will be visiting schools in Epsom and Ewell to discourage young people from getting involved in crime.

Mick Hart served 26 years in prison for murder and now works for Southampton based charity The Door UK.

He will be visiting around 1500 children aged 14 to 18 to give a series of talks during the tour which starts in March.

He will warn them about the consequences of crime and show them a video he has produced of life inside which includes interviews with prisoners.

"No hesitation"

The tour, which is now in its third year, was organised by Epsom and Ewell’s Youth Affairs Officer PC Kevin Gargini, and funded by the Crime and Disorder Reduction Partnership (CDRP).

PC Gargini said: “The presentation is aimed at 14 to 18-year olds which can be a difficult age group to engage with.

“They are at an age where some young people might think it makes them look cool to commit crime and behave in an anti-social manner.

“However, I defy anyone who watches Mick’s presentation to think it is ‘cool’ to offend.

He added that the talk should discourage young people from getting involved in crime and antisocial behaviour.

“Mick comes across very well to the young people and quite clearly wants the best for the youngsters. I have no hesitation in recommending this presentation to all young people.”

Sam Blackledge
First printed in Surrey Advertiser Online

Piglets born during college class

Students at Guildford College’s Merrist Wood campus had some unexpected arrivals last week when a litter of piglets was born right in the middle of an animal care lesson.

New mother Gloria gave birth to seven rare kune kune piglets during the practical class, and the students named the little bundles of joy after themselves.

Gloria’s sister Gaynor has since given birth to three more piglets, leaving farmer Luke Gates to take care of all 10 of them.

“The students were very excited that it happened during the class, and they will get to see the pigs grow up over the next few weeks,” he said.

Sam Blackledge

First published in Surrey Advertiser Online

Stills by Steve Porter for The Surrey Advertiser

New scheme to improve "chaotic" transport system

Public transport in Surrey is “disorganised, chaotic and confused”, but the county council has pledged to do something about it with a new initiative to revolutionise the way we travel.

The Transport for Surrey scheme has been approved by the council’s executive, with the aim of bringing together the different operators and establishing a central board along the lines of Transport for London.

Consultation with district and borough councils and government agencies is also under way, with tentative plans to introduce an equivalent of London’s Oyster card to Surrey.

The county council’s head of transport, Iain Reeve, said patience was required.

“The transport system we’ve got is disorganised, chaotic and confused,” he admitted.

“It’s fairly obvious that if you wanted to design a transport system, you wouldn’t start from here.

“The system we have got with privatised bus and train services is the result of history. What we want to do is create a single co-ordinated point.

“Eventually what people will find is, a bit like in London, there is a very obvious place to go to get information or to complain about transport.

“At the moment people are not sure who to go to or who is in control.”

A central body would oversee all aspects of public transport services, with designated hubs in Woking, Guildford and Reigate-Redhill being the main focus for development and government investment.

Tread carefully

Bus company Southdown PSV is one of the parties already in discussions with the council.

Managing director Stephen Swain said: “We’re definitely on board. Co-ordinated transport is the way forward. To get people out of their cars, transport has to be attractive and easy to use.”

But Kevin Wilde of Leggs Travel, another bus firm, said the partnership should tread carefully to begin with.

“If they’re trying to set up a Transport for London-type thing, in one way it’s good because of the co-ordination, but on the other hand there is a danger of it becoming a beast of bureaucracy,” he said.

Plans to establish a single card to cover all major bus operators are a long way off, but the council said it was definitely a possibility.

Mr Reeve said: “The beauty of something like an Oyster card would be to stop the fragmentation of the industries and bring everything together."

Councillor David Munro also admitted the current set-up was “uncoordinated”, adding: “It would be fantastic to have an Oyster card for the whole of Surrey. The technology is there, it’s just about the will.”

The first step for the project is a conference bringing together all the relevant parties on February 22.

Mr Reeve stressed that the scheme would not come at a cost to the taxpayer, as the council’s annual transport budget of £70m would be added to money from the private travel companies.

Sam Blackledge

www.surreyad.co.uk

Two paramedics who saved the life of a peer with a method of treatment they had never used before have been hailed as “unsung heroes”.

Howard Newlan and Kevin Cover – both Surrey-based paramedics with South East Coast Ambulance Service (SECAmb) – were called to Shadow Defence Minister Lord Astor’s Kent home when he began complaining of chest pain on New Year’s Day.

He suffered a heart attack, and Mr Newlan and Mr Cover had to shock him with a defibrillator before trying what was for them an untested method.

Known as thrombolysis, it involves administering a “clot-busting” drug which works to reduce damage to the heart muscle.

"Enormously relieved"

Mr Newlan said: “When we arrived he was in some distress, so we sat him down and calmed him down and started doing our routine checks and procedures for what turned out to be a heart attack.

“Those initial few minutes were very important. If we had been any longer, it would have been much harder to get him back.”

The paramedics were thanked by 61-year-old Lord Astor when they met at the ambulance service’s headquarters in Banstead on Tuesday.

He praised their quick response and said he owed his life to the two paramedics.

“I remember feeling enormously relieved when they arrived,” he said.

“Straight away their consummate professionalism inspired a lot of confidence.

“They saved my life and I am very grateful to them. I feel that ambulance clinicians are the unsung heroes of the NHS.”

Difficult recovery

Thrombolysis has been used by SECAmb since 2006.

“There is a very small risk that because you’re cleaning blood it could cause a stroke, but the benefits far outweight the risks,” said Mr Newlan.

He added that Lord Astor would take a while to recover from his ordeal.

“The guy has been through a lot,” he said. “He’s a fit man, and to have a heart attack can have a huge emotional and physical effect on your life.”

Lady Astor echoed her husband’s praise for the paramedics, and is relieved that everything turned out well.

“I was very calm in a crisis, although the ambulance journey was one of the roughest rides I’ve ever had,” she said.



Words and video by Sam Blackledge.

Picture by Steve Porter for The Surrey Advertiser.

First posted in Surrey Advertiser Online.

the death of journalism?

The Guardian came over all self-pitying and masochistic today.

On Comment is Free,Martin Bell believes that newspapers and TV networks are "retreating into a comfort zone of celebrity stories, consumer news, sport, health-scares and crime...the coverage is mawkish, exploitative and highly speculative."

In MediaGuardian, Nick Davies goes one better, suggesting that the media is involved in the "mass production of falsehood, distortion and propaganda." Journalists have become "passive processors of unchecked, second-hand material, much of it contrived by PR to serve some political or commercial interest," he says. "Not journalists, but churnalists."

While it is frustratingly true that much of a journalist's work nowadays involves wading through a sea of PR guff, most of the reporters I have met over the past year seem to be in it because they care about issues and want to tell the truth. If the Murdoch empire and increasingly media-savvy press departments block the way occassionally, then we'll just have to find another way around.

S