My problems with Ms Geraldine Timlin / McGinley of 60+ "Sixty Plus" I feel that I deserve a good written reference, this reference should not include any details of my project with the Kensington and Chelsea Times. Between October 1993 - January 1994 I distributed information packs about 1991 Gulf War (Quick links)

9th May 1994

This letter is a formal complaint about the quality of service provided by the Director of the Kensington & Chelsea Volunteer Bureau, Mr Christopher Brooks.

At the beginning of this year, I approached Mr John Moore, the editor of the Kensington & Chelsea Times, with an idea that I had to raise the profile of the elderly in this borough.

All of the details of this are enclosed.

Because of the nature of the project, it was heavily dependent on volunteer workers. Consequently, after speaking with Mr Moore, the next port of call was the Director of the Volunteer Bureau, Mr Christopher Brooks. It should be noted that this was at the end of January this year, Mr Brooks was approached well in advance of the project being launched. He agreed to provide the volunteers, has ample time for preparation and was given continuous up-dates on each development as it occured. In fact, he even once remarked that I may have been disturbing him more often than was needed.

Although Mr Brooks agreed to provide the volunteers, no firm head count was ever established or agreed upon. We played with a number of estimates, and certainly agreed that it would take meny more than Mr Brooks actually provided, which was none!

At the beginning of April, I received a message from Mr Brooks via Geraldine Timlin of 60+ "Sixty Plus", that he may not be able to provide the volunteers that I needed. This was presented to me in such a way as to sound like, "no volunteers at all". Ms Timlin also started to talk in terms of "lunch money" for any volunteers that I may have been able to recruit on my own. Hence my mail shot to over 50 councillors in the Town Hall, I also started putting posters up all over the place - copies of these are enclosed.

After speaking with Mr Brooks again, it turned out that what he had meant to convey via Ms Timlin, was that he may not be able to provide "all" of the required volunteers and that I should also try to recruit some myself. This I did, with very limited success. But then again, the recruitment and allocation of volunteer workers is not my chosen, full-time paid occupation. Nor do I have any previous experience, resources, or a network of contacts, both individuals and groups. Mr brooks on the other hand, is a very different matter.