“Power is always dangerous. Power attracts the worst and corrupts the best.”
Edward Abbey
All In It Together?
Another week and some priceless quotes from down in La La Land. Consider this from the spectacularly useless Cllr Slater, Deputy Head of the Gravy Train.
Firstly, an article concerning proposals on budget cuts might have alarmed the reader. Those still hopeful that we really are “all in it together” may have raised an eyebrow.
Black and minority ethnic communities could bear the brunt of Council funding cuts claimed the article. Several years into austerity, this suggests that the cuts to date have had more bearing on ethnicity than fairness.
…projects such as cook and eat sessions, exercise classes, breastfeeding support, sexual health, stop-smoking work, cancer awareness, healthy lifestyle education and teenage pregnancy work would all cease.
Of course there are people that will always be less well-off. However, at some point, adults have to take responsibility for many of the issues above. The Nanny State is broke and cannot wipe bottoms anymore.
Cllr Slater, a season-ticket holder on the gravy train said it was “about all of us stepping up…we actually are ‘all in this together’.” She continued: “…when we had that snow…I found it very difficult to get out of my drive and turn round.”
Do these people think before they open their mouths?
Here is a summary from the Statement of Councillors’ Earnings detailing what her annual season ticket costs the public.
2007/8 – £28,498
2008/9 – £29,863
2009/10 – £30,187
2010/11 – £27,695
2011/12 – £34,861
2012/13 – £40,486
2013/14 – £40,411
2014/15 – £39,766
2015/16 – £41,172
Just think of the grit we could buy just by getting rid of her?
If you can’t get out of your drive this weekend you can contact Cllr Slater at the following address which appears somewhat remote from her Royds constituency.
Correspondence address: 19 Lady Lane, Bingley, BD16 4AG
Email: [email protected]
By the way, this is not a party political point. I simply make the case that if some useless windbag wants to lecture us then better be whiter than snow. Or drive a 4×4 if you live high on a posh hill miles from your “people”.
But as quotes go this one is definitely worth a reprint. I give you another stellar figure from the gravy train, Councillor Alex Ross-Shaw.
“By 2020 Bradford Council will be half the size it was in 2010…” So why the same number of deadbeats still hanging on like the rush hour in Mumbai?
Get Off The Train. Get On Yer Bus!
As I wrote only a few months ago, plans to close two community swimming pools continue to attract controversy. Laughably, hopeless Cllr Hapless came out with this gem last weekend.
People behind the campaign to save Queensbury Pool…were stunned by Councillor Susan Hinchcliffe’s suggestion that they go to neighbouring Calderdale.
“…communities have alternative facilities available which are on bus routes…the easiest swimming facility by bus from Queensbury would probably be Halifax Pool which is a 15-minute bus journey.”
The fact that sixteen primary schools currently use Queensbury seems lost on Hapless, not least the logistical and cost issues.
As I wrote – see Beneath The Waters – the decision to build a new pool in the Toller ward is hugely questionable given it will be within four miles of four existing pools.
Using the same hapless logic; is the bus not an option here as well rather than blowing millions on a political gesture?
Consultancy Land
It has become noticeable that, ever since Hapless had a makeover to her bunker, sightings have been thankfully rarer. Cue her stool pigeon Cllr Ross-Shaw, wheeled out at a moment’s notice for a photo and an instant battering on the message boards.
Reviving a Bradford tradition of tall tales, young Alex fronted exciting plans for an underground railway station. This despite having had a hole in the city centre for the best part of a decade when nobody thought to connect our two stations overground.
Exclusive cried the local rag anxious to fill a few pages with other than drug dealers, colour-blind VW Golf drivers and Lewis Hamilton wannabes.
The consultancy industry is salivating again as our elected idiots seek guidance.
Those of you old enough will remember a long list of doomed initiatives that would have been laughable had they not mopped up so much of our cash along the way.
Remember the plan to turn Odsal into the Wembley of the North?
How about the Goitside redevelopment?
Or architectural parasite Will Allsop’s Masterplan with a consultancy frenzy coming to nothing.
The inescapable reality is that our Council has proven itself only in being able to be led by the nose.
Concrete Ineptitude
On more than one occasion I have suggested that our Council is not fit for purpose in the face of the national housebuilders – see Save Idle Moor and many more.
It is unreasonable to expect a bunch of people with limited business experience to contend with the might of public companies. Consequently, certain parts of our city are now at the mercy of the builders’ diggers.
As a last line of defence we are fed promises of S106 payments “negotiated” by the Council to pay for infrastructure improvements. Now we know – credit to the local rag here is due – that these are nothing like originally promised.
Hot on the heels here also comes advice from the Government that the Council should scrap the replacement for S106 payments – The Community Infrastructure Levy (CIL). This is based on an assessment that developers will look elsewhere than Bradford.
The size of the levy depends on how profitable it is to build…Bradford Council had been planning to charge a nominal £5 per square metre for homes built in Bradford or Keighley…rising to £100 per square metre in affluent Wharfedale.
Down the valleys they will doubtless be delighted to see community centres shutting as the CIL monies roll back to La La Land.
With another national housing strategy announced this week, only the most forward thinking of councils will cope but ours is barely more competent than the local bowls club committee.
Lies, Lies And More
Politicians have always lied through their teeth and the public’s view of them is as low as it has ever been. Recent evidence also shows excessive usage of the soundbite.
Take one T. Blair – “Things Can Only Get Better” – which they did, for him at least.
Or D. Cameron and his Big Society. So concerned about wider society was Big Dave that he jacked it all in for a life on the consultancy and after-dinner circuit. Neatly he followed the same T. Blair.
So when Mother Theresa talks about those just managing you wonder whether she really could understand the reality of ordinary lives.
That is where localism really matters. A local councillor should live in the ward they claim to represent. Only then could they fully understand real local issues.
Instead they seek a safe slot in a ward miles from their leafy suburbia where it snows.
One Hundred Years Ago
More tales of another age including:
The magistrates at the Bradford West Riding Police Court on Monday ordered four Shipley boys each to be given six strokes of the birch for stealing. And Sir James Roberts, who presided, warned the mother of one of the boys who had previously been before the Bench and whose father is in France, that if he came there again he would be sent to an Industrial School.
The boys in question are William Henry Wright (9) and Lewis Wright (10), of 35 Dale Street, Hargreaves Square; Lionel V Harrold (12), 99 Union Street, Hargreaves Square; and Ernest Hoyle (12), 104 union Street, Hargreaves Square.
Steal a car, deal drugs and drive like a lunatic…that’ll be three hours community service and don’t you dare do it again!
Trumped
The Kings Arms
Good luck to all concerned with the Save The Kings Arms group, hoping to save the 200-year-old pub of the same name. News this week that they have been able to submit a bit so fingers crossed for people power at it’s best.
Visit their website here if you want to become a shareholder in this bold venture.
And Finally
More evidence of the cuts biting re this piece. There will be many more similar and, like it or not, we will all have to pay more for things we value, even for breast-feeding classes across town!
A note though to Cllr Sunderland (Lib Dem) – I know you’re reading – re maths especially as I believe we share the same old school.
“We are doing a rent review. We have arrived at a price for a formally constituted group, which is £15 an hour, and which is a slight increase.”
The old rate was £10 and 50% strikes me as a bit more than slight. It probably helps not to be too precise with numbers as a councillor but thank God I was not in her class.
Meanwhile, in another postcode a few miles down the road it seems money flows?
Have a good weekend.
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