Let us know at noise@bridgeward.org.uk if you hear anything

1.  Southern Cement have fitted on a silencer.  The Council Officers have all claimed that this reduces the noise considerably.

2.  The dust is going to be monitored partly by access to Southern Cement’s close circuit TV cameras

3.  The point was made by many of the councillors and residents that Southern Cement actually hurt their cause and made life more difficult for themselves by refusing to talk to the residents, and councillors.

4.  The Noise Action Group stated that while a silencer was welcome it was too early to declare victory on the noise and the real test will be in spring and early summer when conditions change.

5.  The port focus group leads into the port liaison group.  Yes, it is too bureaucratic but that’s what comes of not talking to residents.  Any way, we’ve elected Peter Evans, one of the founders of the Noise Action Group and by far the most radical of the prominent activists to the Port Liaison Group.

There are other issues which will be addressed later.

Apparently they’ve been chided for their use of contract labour which changes operators regularly.  Looks like they’ve chosen badly this time.  If the operator could speak English at all this time.  They don’t tend to be local, these casually employed operators.

Now, I’m not saying they weren’t doing anything, but if they only talked to the residents – like just about any similar company does – then they would be able to show us what they are doing.  Instead they are leaving themselves to the mercy of telescopic lenses.

Last week I thought I was finally getting somewhere when after a couple of attempts to talk to them by phone they called back and asked me to email them, which I promptly did. So after a couple of reminders I got this response from Barry Neale, their UK manager, on Monday:

“Dear Mr Spencer,

I am not able to enter into discussions with you or your group at this stage.”

…and that’s it.

If they were a teenager they’d have an ASBO.  If they were a family they’d be evicted.

Remember the meeting on Tuesday.

I know there are some in the borough council (who do read this) who wish that this would just go away, but it will not until Southern Cement gets the noise down.

There will also be a meeting between Southern Cement and councillors.  Of course what would be best for both sides would be to meet directly, Southern Cement and the Noise Action Group.

So Uniland / Southern Cement, if you want to meet us then you can reach us at james@bridgeward.org.uk or through your usual channels of communication.  Email us, even if you’re not ready yet, even if you want to explain us why you’re not ready yet.

We’re quite nice really, especially when we’ve had a night’s sleep.

It’s not the refusal of a couple of council officials to meet us that rankles, councillors from both parties are keeping us up to date and the Council Officials will have to meet with residents soon in some form. What rankles is the refusal of Uniland/Southern Cement’s Ipswich manager, Barry Neale, to even talk to us.

This seems more like commercial suicide than anything else.  Who would want to deal with a company that is constantly at risk of being shut down by a private court action, council enforcement or public protest?

What better way to calm down angry residents than meeting them?

Looking further it seems that 11.05% of my web hits are from Spain.  Allow for the fact that this is getting low traffic (it’s a new blog, I say defensively) that’s still abnormal.  You’d expect a few people to be assigned wrongly (1.93% of my visitors are from the Republic of Moldova), but not this wrongly.

So the only people who would be interested are Uniland SA, the parent company of Southern Cement, the most offensive noise polluter in Ipswich port.

So a big Hola to all you Catalan cement makers, and please keep the noise down.