Source: ONS 4 October 2011 (data from 28 March 2011). Licence: Open Government

Micro-business is actually big business in terms of numbers. Mid Sussex is no exception and has the second highest number of micro-businesses in West Sussex and third highest in East and West Sussex combined (excluding Brighton & Hove which is a unitary authority). It looks even better in percentages:-

With 85.75% of business being micro in Mid Sussex, we have a higher proportion of micro-businesses than the UK, England, South East and West Sussex regions. Whilst the big corporates (and there are no Mid Sussex businesses with 500+ employees!) are getting buddied up with Government Ministers, and banks saying they’re not getting many complaints about not lending enough money to SMEs (14.3% of Mid Sussex businesses), the big question raised by Tony Robinson is “what is Government doing for micro-businesses?“ Whilst larger organisations can grow and contract with relative ease due to their larger resource pool (money, time, staff, specialist skills, etc), micro-businesses can only expand (with great difficulty) or fold. Tony estimates that less than 10% of Government initiatives in the last 10 years has been aimed at micro-enterprises and has launched an ePetition to find out what Government is actually doing to support micro-businesses – which will hopefully shame them into action as Robert Craven bluntly explains the difference between SMEs and micro-enterprises.

Micro-businesses make the difference between a community and a “Tesco Town”. Even if you don’t actually own or work for a micro-business, you can still get involved in a number of ways including:-

• Signing the ePetition
• Promoting on Twitter – the campaign uses the hashtag #MicroBizMatters
• Promoting on Facebook – there is a MicroBizMatters Facebook page
• Telling your local micro-enterprises about the campaign – it’s in their interests to sign and promote it

ABBStract is a micro-business providing data and website services aimed at local micro-businesses in Mid Sussex and is proud to be supporting the “Micro Biz Matters” campaign. It’s in our clients’ and potential clients’ interests, as well as our own, to sign and promote this campaign as much as possible. We hope you’ll join in, because Micro Biz Matters in Mid Sussex and across the UK.

Wealden District council is geographically a large council covering Uckfield, Crowborough, Hailsham, Heathfield, Polegate, Forest Row, Wadhurst and Pevensey. The current Wealden seat covers broadly the same area. Under the boundary change proposals, the three big towns (Uckfield, Crowborough and Hailsham) would be represented by three different MPs:-

• Bexhill CC would cover parts of Lewes district and Wealden including Heathfield, Hailsham and Polegate.
• The Weald CC would cover Battle, Hawkhurst, Rother Levels, Cranbrook and Paddock Wood taking on Crowborough, Wadhurst and Mayfield.
• Uckfield CC would take almost half the current electorate of the Wealden constituency and the remainder coming from Lewes district. It would include Forest Row, Hartfield, Buxted, Maresfield, Framfield, Nutley, Newick, Ringmer, East Hoathly, Horam, Hellingly, Seaford, Newhaven and Friston.

The Guardian’s initial data analysis on proposed boundary changes suggests that whilst great swathes of the South East would still be coloured Tory blue, the Uckfield CC would be a lot closer to turning Lib Dem yellow – less than 4,000 votes compared to Wealden’s 2010 difference of 16,000 votes. In comparison, the Lib Dems fight a very serious campaign in Mid Sussex where the difference in 2010 was 7,000 votes.

That’s a pretty big shake-up of the Wealden District. Whilst local authorities don’t always mirror Westminster seats, this looks quite a radical departure and one wonders whether a shake-up of local authority boundaries is in the offing as well.

ABBStract Data Services can provide further data analysis for your specific needs.

As you can see, Chris Hoy comfortably tops our stats table and the oft-talked about Chris Boardman and Graeme Obree are further down the list. So competitive cyclists looking for British role models have a few more names to look at – like Jason Queally and Beryl Burton. You may also consider ordering the Motivational Mind Trainng for Competitive Cyclists audio CD which uses other NLP techniques like hypnotherapy and goal setting to improve your race cycling.

If you’re interested in other datasets, please contact ABBStract Data Services.

Around halfway down the list in terms of population coverage is . . . Haywards Heath!  It could be broadcast using the Heathfield transmitter on UHF channel 29 and the coverage area includes Heathfield and Uckfield. Other possible local TV channels are Reigate (covering most of Crawley), Tonbridge (covering parts of Tunbridge Wells) and of course, Brighton and Hove.

The DCMS are now asking for submissions from companies wanting to operate these channels, so the first question is, what could “Haywards Heath TV” provide? There are 95,000 residents in the coverage area, although aerials may be using different transmitters. A more realistic figure is 64,000 residents – the area where the Heathfield transmitter is the most likely one used, although upgrading to a wideband aerial may also be required to recieve the new channel as well as some other Freeview channels.

Interested in more data and statistics? ABBStract can source, collate, and report data for all kinds of topics in a range of different formats.

In March 2011, the Home Office published their figures on the number of officers in each of the 43 Police authorities in England and Wales.The main figures are a headcount by gender/rank per Police authority, so a caveat to the original Home Office figures is that it does not indicate part or full time officers – just the number that have the authority to arrest people. The figures also do not mention CID, so presumably these figures include detectives. Scottish Government and PSNI figures don’t have a breakdown by rank and gender.

Nevertheless, assuming each officer performs 5 eight-hour shifts per week (which is considered the norm at the Met), and assuming that each shift has the same number of officers, and just looking at sergeants and constables (years of watching The Bill show that Inspectors and above rarely venture out of the station), then the maximum number of officers available for front-line duty in each shift can be ascertained. Again, bear in mind these numbers include detectives, officers providing evidence in court, sick leave, annual leave etc, then you can see why the Met only had 6,000 officers (out of 30,000) after the first day of London rioting – 6,000 is the most they can get on the street at any time at short notice and without compromising the sustainability of providing that level of presence over a prolonged period. The BBC has also reported that 16,000 is 5 times the number that would normally be on patrol – i.e. around half the “front-line” officers during a normal shift are not actually out on patrol performing front-line duties.

Grim reading for other authorities too – Greater Manchester Police would have had 1,450 officers out last night – assuming they anticipated the riots, hadn’t sent officers to London and hadn’t had officers working overtime. It also suggests that normally they would have around 725 on patrol at any given time.

The table below is based on Home Office, PSNI and Scottish Government figures published in March and April 2011 and available under the Open Government Licence. ABBStract can seek out, collate and format all kinds of data for different purposes.

Boasting a large portfolio of projects undertaken over the past ten years, Expectation Landscapes projects include building custom pergolas, building retaining stone walls, building raised terraces, complete garden makeovers and the inevitable water feature, as well as fencing, paving and planting in gardens of all shapes and sizes. They also offer a garden design plan service for those just looking for inspiration from a very experienced and professional landscape consultant.

Expectation Landscapes undertake all types and sizes of garden and landscaping work in East Sussex, West Sussex and in London locations.