8.00 a.m. and a meeting at Government Office North West which I'm attending as Chair of the Regional Housing Group. The meeting is chaired by Deborah McLaughlin, currently Director of Housing in Manchester, but here acting as Regional Director of the Homes and Communities Agency, a role she formally takes up on December 1st, and the purpose is to see what we can do in the field of housing to address our current economic woes.
It has been a busy and in many ways a productive week, but what ever it is I think I've been doing this week for the benefit of Manchester, it is put into perspective by the horrific murder of two young children in our midst.
First up this morning is a meeting with Edward Pysden, newly appointed interim Chair of the Board of Manchester Airport Group. Manchester Airport, whatever ones views on the very real environmental issues around aviation, is a key element in the economy not only of the city but the whole of the North of England. High fuel prices and the credit crunch are having an impact on airlines like every other retail business, but I am confident that Manchester Airport (alongside other airports in MAG) is sufficiently robust and well-run to weather the economic storm.
Bonfire night and the American electorate has just made a massive bonfire of one of its biggest historical prejudices by electing its first African-American President and I want to add my congratulations to Barack Obama on his amazing achievement.
Some big things in Manchester last week not least the finalisation of the Transport Innovation Proposals that will be the subject of a referendum beginning later this month. This is a package. We can't cherry pick. It's either £3billion pounds of investment in public transport, investment on an unprecedented scale, partly funded by a peak-time, Monday to Friday, one-way only congestion charge... or nothing. And nothing means nothing for a long time. On Friday last I was regularly asked what is plan B. There is no plan B, but those urging you to vote No don't even have a plan A.
Yesterday's diary went regeneration, equality, culture, waste, culture, higher education, culture interspersed on a regular basis with housing and inevitably the Transport Innovation Fund.
Today is Executive Committee where items for consideration include redevelopment prospects for various parts of the City Centre including the complete replacement of the awful Ramada block on Deansgate. As I've said before, it's even more important in the current economic climate to maintain momentum, and the Ramada proposal is also a reminder of just how long it can take to bring major projects to fruition as the redevelopment of this corner of the City Centre is one of the outstanding parts of the 1996 post-bomb masterplan.
Last week I promised to return to accounts of boring meetings but I'm going to have to renege on that, as so far this week everything has been pretty interesting. Well I think so.
Next week I'm going to return to those accounts of the seemingly endless and tedious sounding meetings I spend lots of time attending but today I have one of my more interesting regular meetings plus a very much lighter event (apart from the impact on my waistline).
Yesterday was our 8-weekly meeting of the full Council. Any observer with the misfortune to be sitting in would have spent a couple of hours blissfully unaware of the global economic crisis or would have assumed that Manchester was somehow immune from it as we meandered through a number of remarkably parochial debates. Fortunately away from the excitement of the Council Chamber the Council isn't ignoring the gathering economic gloom and on Tuesday we had a regular meeting of our version of an economic emergency committee, and yesterday another group met focussing particularly on the housing market's woes.
The blog of the leader of Manchester City Council, Councillor Richard Leese.