What Became of Brentford's Magnificent Seven?
Brentford West councillor Guy Lambert reports back
Brentford West councillor Guy Lambert
April 20, 2026
My last company car was a BMW 525i. I went to France on business and left it outside my house in Chiswick. My (then) wife rang me and asked me where my car was. I said it was outside our house. She said it wasn't . We reported it to the cops and my business trip was truncated. The cops from Brentford Police Station (this was 2001) first said it would have been stolen to order from Eastern Europe. Then they said they had found it in Slough. I said when will I get it back? They said it's not that simple it has been bought. So what? Caveat Emptor was something I learnt as a student. I tried to contact the PC again but he was never available.
My employer was not interested. Over the years I have checked on this car and even now, 25 years on, I find it is taxed and MoTed until April 2027. How it got taxed is a mystery to me and I suspected something dodgy amongst the police, but I was the only one interested and I was very busy then so did no more. Wrong registration, but the same.
After that I stopped having company cars but had generous ££ to get myself a second - hand Audi convertible to get a suntan (though I had to put the ho od up when I was caught in a snowstorm on the M25)
What does that have to do with Brentford in 2026. Not a lot, but I wanted to fess up after the number of this blog prompted me. I never promised that this stuff would stay on the details of a Brentford councillor's life in 2026, which would be even more boring tha n it already is.
Everything - well most things - are very political at present, whilst I fight to stay in the councilloring and blogging businesses. If I fail, Blog 527 will be the last.
On Thursday I decided to 'go' to Jagdish Sharma's funeral via the web. To me he was an eminent old councillor, once the council leader. A very courtly, dignified and friendly man but I had very little to do with him beyond polite exchanges. I was pleased to see the funeral was well attended but the ones visible on the video feed were all relatives and friends with no councillor to be seen. My friend Sam Christie told me she attended and councillors respectfully (for once!) stayed out of the picture at the back of the Crem in Hanworth where it was carried out.
Later I had a pre-meet - again online - with some people from Hounslow Citizens. This is a non-political outfit which I had not been aware of before, preparing for an in person session next Tuesday at a church.
I think this is an excellent initiative, and I hope to work more with them as time moves on after the election, however that plays out.
On Friday, Saturday and Sunday I was out knocking on them thar doors. It never stops to amaze me how few of them conceal an inhabitant (or at any rate, an inhabitant who opens the door!) But we have a lot of good conversations. Some are Labour till they die. Some are Conservatives till they die. I make a brief effort to put them right, but 99% of people are cordial and I enjoy the conversation. But I see many who say they thought they were Labour till they die, have survived, and now will vote for me and my colleague Rashid. All that is quite rewarding.
I had one particularly touching conversation. A door was opened by a young East European woman. We did not get into her voting intention, but I thought she was a very nice person and a pleasure to briefly talk with. I knocked on her neighbour's door. I vaguely remembered having done some forgotten casework. Neighbour came out again, and said she is elderly and has trouble walking. But she had a key, opened the neighbour's door and called out to her. They invited me in - normally a no-no when canvassing but I made an exception. Elderly lady greeted me w a rmly. thanked me for the casework (was to do with council tax) many years ago and would certainly vote for me. Two people it was pleasure to know.
As a councillor you do a lot of pieces of casework. Sometimes they are complicated and take a long time. Sometimes they are resolved by a single email or phone conversation. After a short time trying to track every one , I quickly realised this was impractical, so my expectation is pretty much that a concern is resolved if I don't hear about it again. I actually encourage residents to nag me if they don't hear. It gives me special satisfaction that something I did - perhaps with a single email - made what seems to have been a big concern for the lady lifted from her shoulders.
Also at the weekend I had my own door knocked by my own councillor - in this case Katherine Dunne. It has been a tension in our friendship because we are now in rival parties (albeit in different wards) and it was reassuring for me to have a friendly conversation with her. Of course we are still rivals, at least for this month, but we still have largely the same views about the way the world works and I genuinely wish her well (especially as we only have one Green candidate in her ward!)
On Sunday evening we had a session with one of our 'paper candidates' who we don't expect realistically that she will win in her ward. Nevertheless, she takes her role seriously and wanted some help preparing for upcoming hustings. A very convivial evening. Plenty of wine flowing because I was slow putting my hand over my glass (how terrible) and this I think honed all of our understanding of the election and what is at stake.
I also joined Katherine and Dan for our last regular monthly combined surgery we initiated in 2022 when there were 7 Labour councillors.
Of the Magnificent 7 only 3 remain as Labour councillors and one (Marina) will be standing in her home ward in May. She will be missed here.
Lara resigned, started her charity, and is now a Green member in Lewisham. Balraj and Rhys have left the scene for different reasons . And I am still here, though I have lost about 30Kg of my excessive bulk and turned a nice shade of green. I still miss Lara, who was a fantastic friend as well as councillor.
On Monday I took a trip to the tip. I have always been puzzled by the reluctance to book a time at the tip. I have always favoured the one in Mortlake because it is much nearer than Feltham. It takes a minute to book. I used to arrive at the end of a queue which sometime s stretched half a mile. Now I arrive more or less on time. No queue. Man knows who I am because he knows my car number and waves me in. It works perfectly and I am on my way in 10 minutes. Why people worry about booking (and why Hounslow are experimenting with suspending it) is a mystery, though if I was back in my Cabinet job I would be arguing against the 'requirement' to say what you are bringing. Nobody takes any notice anyway, unless you are dumping some contraband (like rubble!) A lot of paper, clothes (now too big for me 😊 ) a defunct toaster and microwave go the way I hope a few politicians will be soon (to recycling of course rather than incineration ). F ormer senior councillors with limited skills end up as consultants for developers they met in Cannes or some similar junket.
On Tuesday I had a lengthy online interview with an aspiring journalist. He is a political journo in the making. A young man with I think a first degree behind him and another ongoing. Likeable and gives me a lot of rope to pontificate on matters of interest to me (and him) which are recorded for posterity. I did not (I hope) reveal any secrets other than my (never secret) opinions on many matters which in the wrong hands could come to haunt me. I don't really care: better to be sincere than always in line with whatever the policy is!
On Wednesday a coffee with my friend Edwin - author, musician, and man of many talents. He is keen to publish a kind of autobiography I have written with him. He has a fascination about 'Real Lives' and has published one with a friend of his called Alfie, known as The Real Alfie.
I bought a copy of this from Edwin more as a favour rather than with high expectations . But I took it on holiday with me last summer and couldn't put it down and Edwin talked me into doing similar. But my life is crushingly boring compared to Alfie. I asked a friend (in the trade) to read it and she came back basically saying 'learn to write'. Fair enough, thou gh I do have an English O-level. Edwin thinks this is no handicap so we will decide what to do after the election.
We went to Gail's (not my first choice) and was amazed how busy it was. Went upstairs on the basis it would be quieter, but every table was taken by someone with a laptop. Digital Dock eat your heart out: I always thought is should have a coffee offering, though it does have steady customers now. Edwin and I went outside where the weather was OK and there were not too may ambulances or Police sirens to remind me of my dodgy hearing. He treated me to a Soho bun, which was a new one to me.
Later I sat in on an online discussion between people who live in Bond House on Baltic Avenue. They are leaseholders with A2Dominion and I have been trying to assist them for a couple of months. They had a lot of big cheeses on the call and I didn't add a lot of value, but I hope they appreciated me sitting in and it was good to see some useful learnings being apparently taken by the landlord (unjustified charges, allegedly).
After that I was out knocking in Albany Road, the home of (at least) 3 of the many derelict Goddards vans which enliven (?) our town. This one is officially off road and did have an MoT. It did expire in Jan 2022 but I suppose it still might come in handy.
Other highlights of this week: another lovely flytip around the police station. This is of course on private land so Hounslow Highways won't deal with it. Many times over the last decade I have raised it with the then head of development who would usually after a few requests and copying it to Steve Curran would then persuade the landlord to clean it up. They never put up the hoarding as they do on every other development site, but to be fair they have only had about 15 years to get around to it. Of course, a developer is too sensitive to be confronted by the prospect of £1000 fine, unlike the nurse in Feltham, the 5 year old in Harrow, or the 2 Brentford residents (neither of these in my ward) recently threatened with imprisonment despite not having flytipped anything. They go with the half dozen I have previously had rescinded or the business in Chiswick who wrote to me today (already cancelled, probably thanks to Jo Biddolph ). I am ashamed to b e associated with the council in this 'enforcement'.
Other fun in central Brentford. I took this picture on 6th Feb .
This pothole was reported via FixMyStreet later in Feb (not sure what I did at the time). Then it got windy, and the barrier was blown down. For a while just a cone on top of it. Hounslow Highways said 'not us guv, take it up with the people who own the manhole'. How is anyone supposed to know? Later blue barriers were added. Fix My Street says updated 2nd March 'action scheduled'. I suppose it still is. It is a hazard for all of us, takes out a big chunk of a lane on the High St and upsets buses. This stuff used to work. Not now.
On a more positive note: Boston Manor Park looks stunning I'm told they will soon fix the boiler in the house so the restaurant may be able to reopen at some point. I must say that Salman like only one or two others can be relied upon to follow up on these things, but really shouldn't require action from a C abinet member.
Perhaps only 2 of these to come. Treasure them or (better) vote for me - pretty please .
Councillor Guy Lambert
| Brentford West Candidates - 7 May | |
|---|---|
Name |
Party |
Bob Ayres |
Reform UK |
Joe Bourke |
Liberal Democrats |
Radhesham Chauhan |
Conservative |
Husna Hashmi |
Labour |
Scott Anthony Warren Illman |
Brentford Independent |
Guy Lambert |
Green Party |
Jeremy Christian Larsson |
Conservative |
Craig Owen |
Labour |
Gary Sydney Padbury |
Liberal Democrats |
Gordon Turner |
Reform UK |
Rashid Wahab |
Green Party |
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