Nominations open for the vinspired National Awards 2012.  National youth volunteering awards recognises outstanding young people.

Nominations are now open for the vinspired National Awards, which celebrate the brilliant contribution that young volunteers (aged 16-25) make to their communities.

The annual awards offer an opportunity to highlight the positivity, creativity and dedication demonstrated by young volunteers across England every day.  The awards also honour inspiring youth leaders, who are committed to encouraging young volunteers.  And, for the first time this year, will include a category for outstanding National Citizen Service (NCS) teams. If you know anyone in your community or constituency who has made an extraordinary contribution to their community nominate them for a vinspired National Award today at www.vinspired.com/nationalawards

Nominations must be for young people living in England and for voluntary activity carried out in the last year (between August 2010 and July 2011).  Nominations close on November 30, 2011.

The categories: Best new volunteer;  All round commitment to volunteering; Bringing communities together;  Team Activity; Outstanding Contribution by a Youth Worker; Most Outstanding National Citizen Service Team

Finalist for the awards will celebrated at a star-studded awards ceremony in central London in March 2012.  Other famous faces to endorse the event have included: HRH Prince William; The Rt Hon Nick Clegg MP, Deputy Prime Minister; Kevin Spacey; Keith Lemon and James Caan.

Karen Lumley, MP for Redditch County, has written a letter to the Parliamentary Commissioner for Standards, John Lyon calling for an investigation into a potential breach of Parliamentary rules. This follows a Labour frontbencher’s failure to declare properly a donation from the GMB trade union when tabling an amendment to the Legal Aid Bill. Mrs Lumley also posed a related question to the Prime Minister during PM Questions this afternoon (9th November).

Kate Green tabled an amendment to the Legal Aid Bill regarding a public service pension scheme but she is a member of the GMB union and directly received £5,000 in donations in kind from the union to assist her at the last election. However, she failed to declare this financial interest when tabling her amendment and so she has appeared to have breached the House of Commons Code of Conduct. Kate Green has since apologised for her failure in the House of Commons this afternoon.

Karen Lumley MP is supporting Road Safety Week, 21 – 27 November 2011, coordinated by charity Brake, and calling for action to tackle the senseless loss of young lives on our roads.

In 2010, 18 young people were killed or seriously injured on UK roads every day. Road crashes are the biggest killer of young people aged 15 – 24. More young people die in preventable road crashes than from drugs and violence put together.

Age and inexperience combine to dramatically increase young drivers’ risk of crashing. Not only are young drivers more likely to take risks than older drivers, they are less able to cope with those risks because of their inexperience.

Karen is also appealing to young drivers – and drivers of all ages – in the area to have a heart behind the wheel, and make Brake’s Pledge to Drive Safely, committing to always driving slow, sober and secure to help protect themselves and prevent needless tragedies.

Karen said: “I support Road Safety Week because I recognise the devastation that road crashes and the loss of young lives have on families and the whole community. I’m appealing to all drivers to have a heart at the wheel – recognise that you have lives in your hands when you get behind the wheel, and make a commitment to sticking to basic road safety rules, such as not speeding or drinking alcohol before driving, and always belting up. If we all stick to these rules we can help to prevent tragedies in our community.”

Julie Townsend, Brake campaigns director, said: “It is fantastic that Karen Lumley MP is supporting Road Safety Week and helping to get the road safety message out to young people and drivers of all ages in the community. It’s vitally important that we work together to tackle young driver crashes. So many young people are involved in these violent and traumatic events, which devastate families and end lives too soon. Yet these crashes are preventable. That’s why Brake is campaigning and has chosen the theme of ‘Too Young to Die’ for this year’s Road Safety Week.”

Read more about Road Safety Week by visiting www.roadsafetyweek.org.uk

Karen Lumley MP joined many Members of Parliament at the launch of the Silver Star Diabetes Challenge at the Houses of Commons. At the special MPs testing event, held on Wednesday 19th October, Karen took the quick and simple Type 2 diabetes test to help raise awareness of the need for public testing for the disease.

Karen was also issued with a Silver Star Pedometer to measure the amount of steps taken during a Parliamentary Week as part of the 50 day challenge. The public can keep track of their MP on the Silver Star website and the winner of the 50 day challenge will be announced in February 2012. The key to preventing diabetes is physical activity and a healthy diet.

The NHS spends £1 million per hour on diabetes-related illnesses and it is estimated that more than one million people in the UK are unaware that they have the condition.

Karen said ‘The diabetes test was so easy. It only takes two minutes and can save lives. I hope my constituents will also take the test and I am looking forward to finding out the results of the pedometer challenge in February.

Special Guest Hari Dhillon, Dr. Michael Spence on BBC’s Holby City, joined in the effort to highlight the problem of diabetes worldwide.  He said, ‘The evening was a triumph and I was delighted to contribute to such a worthwhile cause’.

Silver Star, launched in January 2007, is a registered charity campaigning to raise diabetes awareness. The Charity runs Mobile Diabetes Units (MDU) that carry out important diabetes testing. They seek to promote culturally sensitive healthcare, with particular regard to the high prevalence of diabetes in the major towns and cities of Britain. The Units travel to local community centres, schools, work places and other organisations. The Chairman of the Trustees for Silver Star, Dr Modhwadia said ‘The diabetes test is so quick and simple. I am delighted that so many MPs decided to take the test and be part of the Challenge. It will help raise awareness of this largely unseen health condition”

Karen Lumley MP for Redditch County welcomes doubling of the pupil premium and hails plans for more!

Karen has given a warm welcome to the government’s announcement that the total amount paid out for the pupil premium will double next year, that there will be an immediate increase of £58 per pupil and that schools in Redditch have already received almost £1 million to target spending on more deprived pupils.

Karen, who has campaigned for many years for a fairer system of school funding, advocated a pupil premium before the general election and welcomed its inclusion in the Coalition agreement. She has spoken in Parliament to support it and to congratulate Ministers on finding extra money for it as well as extending the scheme to service families and looked after children.

Figures from the Department of Education show that 1958 pupils in Redditch are eligible for the full pupil premium and there are 13 service children eligible for the service child premium. Across the County there are 9,398 pupils eligible on the basis of deprivation, 67 service children and 352 looked after children who will benefit from a total £4,771,000 funding. England’s most disadvantaged pupils are set to benefit from an extra £58 each after the Department for Education announced this year’s Pupil Premium will increase to £488. Schools receive the extra cash for every child eligible for free school meals (FSMs). The money has been released because fewer-than-expected children have registered for FSMs this year.

Children’s Minister Sarah Teather said: “The Pupil Premium will benefit poorer pupils, providing extra money directly for those pupils who need it the most. We know that just 27 per cent of pupils on free school meals get five good GCSE grades compared with 54 per cent of non-free school meal pupils. This extra funding will help tackle this inequality and enable schools to provide the extra support they need to reach their full potential.”

News of the extra cash comes after Ministers recently announced that the total funding available for the Pupil Premium in 2012-13 will rise to £1.25bn, double the amount this year. Deputy Prime Minister Nick Clegg also recently announced a new £50 million Pupil Premium summer school programme to help the most disadvantaged pupils make the transition from primary to secondary school. The scheme will help up to 100,000 pupils per year. They will benefit from two weeks of additional teaching through the scheme.

Karen said, “I am delighted to see from government figures published that schools in the Redditch area are receiving close to £1 million and across our county almost £5 million in pupil premium payments this year, that those payments are increasing as from this week and that next year’s payment will be even more substantial. As I have said before, for far too long Worcestershire schools have been poorly served by a complex and wrong headed funding formula, this cannot be allowed to continue. I am continuing to actively campaign to have that formula reformed but the impact of the pupil premium is a big positive step forward in addressing the balance. Even in such difficult economic times, and I’m sure many would agree, that it is essential that the government should invest everything it can afford in the future of young people and the pupil premium is an excellent way of making sure those most in need of help receive it.”

Redditch County MP Karen Lumley has added her name to a plea from the six MPs for Worcestershire for a fairer deal for the county’s schools.  The MPs have today sent in a detailed response to the government’s  consultation on a fairer funding formula for schools, putting the case for the government to deliver swiftly on its promise of a fairer system. The joint response from all six of Worcestershire’s MPs, drawn together by  Worcester MP Robin Walker, calls on the government to deliver its reforms without delay and to start their implementation as swiftly as possible.

The government’s consultation raises a number of detailed questions about the way a fairer funding formula should work, how academies, free schools and the pupil premium should be affected and asks respondents how  quickly it should be implemented and the extent of smoothing to make sure that no school sees too sudden a change to its budget.

Worcestershire County Council and the f40 group, which campaigns on behalf of the lower funded local authorities have also made their own responses to the consultation all pushing for swift implementation of reforms and a more activity based approach. Robin will be speaking at f40’s conference on the new funding formula next week.

The joint letter says:
We wish to reiterate our commitment to a fairer funding formula and put on the record our determination that it should be delivered as swiftly as possible.  We hope you will bear in mind that local authorities such as  Worcestershire have been underfunded for too long under the old formula and that year after year of using “spend plus” methodology has made that underfunding more entrenched.  As such we believe it is essential that this Government, which is so committed to fairness, move forward swiftly with the changes that will make the formula fairer and more transparent.

Karen Lumley commented, “This serious issue has been a problem for our area for far too long – I feel it is imperative to give the children in Worcestershire the best education possible.  The last government had the chance to do something about this and failed.  The new government is moving firmly in the right direction and I sincerely hope our representations will encourage ministers to do the right thing by Worcestershire.”

Ipsley, Kidderminster, Milford and Redditch are included in latest phase of BT’s £2.5 billion super-fast fibre broadband programme.  Another 34,000 homes and businesses in the West Midlands are set to benefit from super-fast broadband, BT announced today.

Ipsley, Kidderminster and Redditch Old Town in Worcestershire and Milford in North Staffordshire are among the latest places included in BT’s £2.5 billion roll-out of fibre broadband. The latest upgrades are due to be completed by Autumn 2012 and will take the number of homes and businesses in the West Midlands able to access the technology to more than 855,000.

BT’s local network business Openreach expects to make super-fast fibre broadband available to two-thirds of UK homes and businesses by the end of 2015*. It is building the new network using a mix of fibre to the cabinet (FTTC) and fibre to the premises (FTTP) technologies. Both provide much faster speeds than those previously available to many UK homes and businesses. FTTC, delivered to street cabinets, currently offers download speeds of up to 40Mbps and upstream speeds up to 10Mbps. Openreach is planning to roughly double these speeds next year. FTTP, where the fibre goes directly to homes and businesses, will offer speeds of up to 100Mbps.

John Dovey, BT’s West Midlands regional director, said: “BT’s roll-out of super-fast broadband is marching on at a rapid pace. Residents and businesses in these latest locations can look forward to choosing a high-speed connection over a network offering an unrivalled choice of suppliers, which keeps competition thriving and costs down. “Our latest investment in the West Midlands will propel internet users at home and at work into the 21st century fast lane, and marks another milestone in the development of the region’s next generation communications. We have plans to take super-fast broadband to two-thirds of the UK by the end of 2015 but we don’t want to stop there. We have long said reaching the largely rural and remote ‘final third’ will require a partnership approach and we welcome the fact that the UK government has recently allocated funding of hundreds of millions of pounds for next generation broadband initiatives for these more challenging areas. BT has the strength and the commitment to deliver large-scale broadband projects and we want to play a leading role in bringing faster technologies to our rural communities. As today’s investment demonstrates, BT is playing its part in delivering faster broadband across the UK – but there needs to be a collective effort to ensure no part of the West Midlands is left behind.”

Internet users with a fibre broadband connection can do much more online, all at the same time. For instance, a family could be downloading a movie, watching a TV replay service, surfing the internet and playing games online. A music track can be downloaded in about two seconds, a whole album in 30 seconds and a feature length HD movie in 10 minutes. Upload speeds are the fastest in the UK, allowing large videos and data files to be sent almost instantly and activities, such as uploading hi-resolution photos to Facebook, to be completed in seconds. Unlike other companies, Openreach offers network access to service providers on an open, wholesale basis, supporting a competitive market. For further information on Openreach’s super-fast broadband programme visit www.superfast-openreach.co.uk

Karen Lumley, MP said “I am delighted to hear of the new Superfast Broadband program from BT. I’m sure that this new technology will have a positive impact on home owners and businesses alike in the area allowing them faster access to Broadband and all the benefits associated with this – A fantastic step forward for the area”.

Local MP, Karen Lumley was keen to visit her Redditch B&Q to learn more about their Forest Friendly achievements and about how the UK’s leading home improvement and garden centre retailer works.

Whilst being shown around the store, Karen was told the great news that B&Q now only buys timber from proven, responsible, legal forests and is supplying its customers in Redditch with sustainable timber products, at no extra cost.  She was also told about B&Q’s 16,000 different products which contain timber which can be traced back to legal forests and that no other retailer of its size is even close to achieving this.

Karen was particularly interested to hear that the retailer was placed 18th in The Sunday Times Green Companies List earlier this year, one of only four retailers in the top 50. This was due to changes to the way stores operate which has reduced their carbon output. For example all stores now have roof shafts to increase natural light into the store which in turn has reduced electricity consumption.

As well as this, Karen learnt about the company’s diversity policy, which means a quarter of B&Q’s workforce is over the age of 50 years, with a similar percentage under the age of 25.   She was delighted to meet Lawrence Smith aged 84 and Danielle Armstrong aged 16, the store’s oldest and youngest employees.

Employees told Karen how they are being skilled up. B&Q has invested more than £1 million into nationally recognised apprenticeships and City and Guild’s qualifications for its staff nationwide. Karen was given the opportunity to see what this means in Redditch when she met with employees who have recently received their Retail NVQ.

David Ponting B&Q Redditch Store Manager says: “We’re really proud of our timber achievement and are delighted that Karen was keen to visit our store and hear all about our Forest Friendly programme. It’s been a 20 year journey for us to reach this milestone but we now want to let all our customers know that all the timber we sell is ‘Forest Friendly’ and when people buy timber products from us, they can be assured that their purchase isn’t contributing to deforestation.”

Karen added: “It was great to meet so many enthusiastic and positive staff at B&Q today and to learn about why buying only Forest Friendly timber is so important.  It’s good to see a business working hard to operate more sustainably and I hope this inspires other companies to follow their lead.”

Karen is pictured with Dave Ponting B&Q Redditch Store Manager.

Karen Lumley, MP for Redditch County said:
“I am extremely disappointed that a community scheme like this has been abused in this way.  I visited Hewell Prison a few weeks ago and met with prisoners who were doing great work in the community, and indeed with Redditch Borough Council, and I know from them how valuable they found the experience. I find it very sad that this scheme has now been suspended, but hope that with stricter guidelines it may continue in the future. I also hope that the Batchley Support Group who also do a fantastic job look closely at their procedures so they are not brought into disrepute.”

Karen Lumley MP recently spent time with staff at the Alexandra Hospital.

Karen took time to quiz staff in the hospital’s catering department as well as spending time on the maternity unit and viewing the operating theatres.

This visit was part of a series of regular meetings Karen is planning to have with both staff and senior officials in the local hospital.

Karen said of the visit, “I am getting to talk to staff at the coalface, not just with senior management, and I get to hear their experiences of what is going on.  The message coming back from the staff is they are very proud of their hospital and are doing the very best job they can and are striving to improve.”

Karen Lumley is shown with hospital director Frances Martin and head of human resources Julia Cross.  (Courtesy Redditch Standard)