• Michael Harris, for public service
• Dr Felicity Harvey, Director of medicines pharmacy and industry group, Department of Health
• Timothy Stephen Gbedemah, for public service
• Deborah Goodwin, for services to the community and to education
• Diana Grahame, for charitable services
• Ian Talbot, for services to drama
• Martin Mills, for services to the music industry
• Revd Amy Powell for services to the community in Wandsworth
• Mrs Pauline Rayner, for services to sport

Wandsworth is getting a significantly above inflation increase in its health budget next year; with the extra money being targeted at the public's priorities: cleaner hospitals and extending GP practice opening hours among them.

An extra £23 million is being pumped into Wandsworth - that's a 5% rise. As a result, by the end of the year no-one in Wandsworth should have to wait more than four months from referral to the start of treatment. If that figure doesn't sound especially radical to you, it's worth remembering what things were like just five years ago.

Then, 1,126 people were wating more than six months for an operation - today no-one waits that long. And 2,328 were waiting more than thirteen weeks - that had been reduced to just 434 by May of this year. Under the Conservatives, far more patients were waiting even longer.

Since 1997 when Labour was elected, London now has:

• More than 15,000 extra nurses
• 500 more dentists
• 500 more GPs
• Almost 3,000 more Hospital Consultants
• 1,000 more Midwives
• And more than 3,500 extra doctors in training

And locally Queen Mary's Hospital in Roehampton has been rebuilt and re-opened; Putney Hospital on Putney Common is on the verge of its very own rehabilitation and a new medical centre for the Southfields area opened a few years ago, to name just the three biggest NHS improvements locally.

But don't take my word for it - here's what local GP Dr Tom Coffey says: "I am impressed that the government is putting its money where its mouth is and providing us with the investment we need."

Click here to read more

Baroness Sayeeda Warsi, the Conservative and Muslim peer who, along with Labour's Lord Ahmed helped free British teacher Gillian Gibbons from a Sudanese jail earlier this month, has today written a piece in the Sunday Telegraph emphasising that Christmas is a celebration for everyone in Britain regardless of religion.

She says: "Christmas is a time to recognise the contribution that Christianity has made (and continues to make) to the nation, even if one does not share the religion. For too long, multi-culturalism has ignored the majority culture, which still is Christian."

As someone who has, personally, been disturbed by the attempts by a handful of, I suppose well-meaning but completely misguided people and institutions to not mention Christmas presumably to avoid offending Britain's other religious (and indeed non-religious) communities, I very much welcome Baroness Warsi's comments. As she points out:

"The annual campaigns to downgrade Christmas are rarely spearheaded, or even supported, by Jewish, Muslim, Hindu, Sikh or other religious groups."

Multiculturalism appears to have been warped by some into requiring everyone to observe some bland atheism that is both oppressive and zealous.

In that vein, a very happy Christmas to everyone in Putney, Roehampton and Southfields.

You can read Baroness Warsi's article here.

• Roehampton Co-op
• Regenerate.com
• Eastwood Nursery School
• The Right Plaice Fish and Chip shop, Danebury Avenue
• Roehampton SureStart
• Roehampton Veterinary Clinic, Roehampton High Street
• Roehampton NewPin

The headline says it all really. On any measure be it:

• The excellent job our boys and girls in blue do, day-in, day-out
• The fact that the practical difference between 2.5% (the full rise they're getting from the end of this month) and 1.9% (the amount they've received since September) is insignificant in the fight against inflation
• The damage out of all proportion to the issue that is being done to the government by digging its heels in over this issue
• That coming on the back of a bust-up with the military over its commitment to our armed services, the last fight the government should be picking is with our Police
• That 1.9% is less than inflation and is, therefore, a de facto pay cut
• That the Police - especially in London - have delivered significant drops in crime
• Or, simply that the government's just wrong and should be big enough to admit it...

At the next general election, boundary changes will come into effect that will see just over 1,000 Putney voters transfer to the Battersea parliamentary constituency in the area closest to Wandsworth town.The roads affected are:

• Chesterton Close
• Cromford Road
• Ericcson Close
• Mexfield Road
• Oakhill Place
• Oakhill Road from No.37 upwards on the odds side and No.42 upwards on the evens
• Putney Bridge Road between Wandsworth High Street and the railway line, including Bush Cottages
• Santos Road
• West Hill, between Mexfield Road and Putney Bridge Road

Labour supporters in these streets will get the chance to vote for Martin Linton, Battersea's excellent Labour MP for the past ten years rather than me.

Parliamentary boundary changes take place every decade or so mainly to even-out population growths and declines around the country. In our case, however, the change is because council ward boundaries have been redrawn since the last parliamentary review, as part of which these streets were moved from East Putney into Fairfield ward. Parliamentary and Council ward boundaries have to align and Fairfield is a Battersea constituency ward, hence the transfer.

Click here for a larger version of the map above.