Monthly Archives: February 2011

Praise be Pickles: Pity about your party activists

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eric pickles- the bloggers friend; Pic courtesy cyclingsilk.com

 

Lynne Hillan- Barnet Tory leader- Queen Canute rather than Iron Lady. Pic courtesy: Barnet Times

Normally I don’t approve of the judgements of Eric Pickles, the  communities secretary, the man Westminster jokes is so much larger than life that he can be spotted on Google Earth. However in a  blog for Conservative Home last week http://bit.ly/i1cKAV the scourge of local government  bureaucrats penned an article backing the idea that councils should open the doors to bloggers and citizen journalists who should be able to tweet and film  to their heart’s content. He of course cited outrageous Labour councils who had banned this. He also praised the work of Maidenhead and Windsor council .

 He wrote: ” Conservative-run Windsor and Maidenhead recently decided to allow members of the public to video local meetings. This week, I wrote to councils encouraging them to follow suit, opening up public discussions to all forms of multimedia. Citizen journalists have as much right as anyone to attend and to share their views, and council ‘monitoring officers’ shouldn’t hide behind bogus concerns about ‘data protection’ or ‘human rights’.

He goes on to describe this new freedom right back to the Blessed Margaret Thatcher who introduced the right  of the press and public to attend council meeting way back in 1960.Isn’t it then doubly ironic that tomorrow night (March 1) Barnet Council, whose citizens returned the former Tory leader to Westminster, should be doing the very thing that Eric Pickles deplores.

 This Tory controlled council has banned videos by the public of the public council meeting saying it is ” against the council’s constitution” and I am told people can be ejected if they are caught tweeting , even though councillors are free to do so.

Indeed bloggers are not welcome at all. Lynne Hillan, leader of the council,  told the Barnet Times:

“The only thing we will do is consider responsible media requests, and they are the only thing we would allow at this stage. If we had a request I would expect an officer to approach me about it. I do not think we would consider a request from bloggers . Only respectable media would be considered.”

This dinosaur attitude from a Queen Canute  is breathtaking. Her ignorance about how the modern world works is absurd. Presumably her next step as Barnet leader will be to table a motion condemning Lady Thatcher for allowing the public by law to attend council meetings.

The best riposte to her comes from the mouth of Eric Pickles himself. ” When councils make these sorts of petty decisions, at best they look foolish and out of touch; at worst they look like they have something to hide.”

 Need I say more. You can. E-mail her with your views at leader@barnet.gov.uk or phone her direct on 0208 359 2059. Her fax is: 020 889 7464.

Update: Barnet kept its word in blocking bloggers and filming at the council last night by employing some rather heavy looking security guards to limit who could get a seat to hear the council introduce cuts and higher parking. According to Mrs Angry, a blogger who did get in, they appeared to be able to overrule local police officers. See her report and pix of  the heavy bouncers employed by the Tory council on her blog at http://bit.ly/i13ngn 

Armchair Audit: David Cartwright Boris’s bon viveur fireman

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Bon Viveur Tory: From CND to East India Club Pic- courtesy London Fire Brigade

Boris Johnson’s reform of the London Fire Brigade is going to rely heavily on the views of David Cartwright, one of the least known of the Mayoral appointees. This looks into his background.

David,61, is a former assistant commissioner of the London Fire Brigade , a fire consultant, vintner and chairman of  the East India Club, a gentlemen only club dating from Britain’s colonial past and a favourite watering hole for well-connected public schoolboys. He once wore a CND badge: he is now a card-carrying Conservative.

HIS INCOME

From the taxpayer

Mayoral appointee allowance as member of London Fire Brigade                                                                                                                                                       £7750

Firefighters pension ( paid since 1999 retirement at the age of 50,  indexlinked from 2004 )                                                                                                                                                       £37,500 +

Total:                                                                                                                                                      £45,250 +

Private Income:

Consultant to Eurocopter, subsidiary of Dutch defence contractor, Eads

Co-owner of Cartwright Brothers Vintners Ltd

Director, Viaduct Enterprises Ltd who partly own Bedales deli and wine bar in Borough market

Chairman, East India Club (unpaid)

EXPENSES

Commendably Nil.

HOME

Joint owner with wife, Kathyrn of detached home in Mottingham, London SE9 with outstanding mortgage from Bank of Scotland.

LIFE

Son of pacifist Anglican priest,supporter of CND and educated  at Colfes Grammar School 1961-67,. then voluntary aided boys school now public school. Became a fireman rising through ranks to assistant commissioner.Under Ken Livingstone,progressively followed policy of recruiting black and (after qualms) women firefighters. Full interview given to Modern Communications at http://bit.ly/gZoIv2 .

He has growing outside interests. He is consultant to Eurocopter, who are based at Oxford airport in Kidlington and are engaged in leasing helicopters to police forces and ambulance services. His connection with them arose when the London Fire Brigade considered using helicopters in the 199os. See article in Flight International,http://bit.ly/f9ZEng.

On this he says: “The London Fire Brigade have no helicopters and I have not tried to sell helicopters to the London Fire Brigade. ..I have acted properly in this matter and took formal advice from the Clerk to the Authority before I took up the post of Mayoral Appointee.”

His more jolly appointments include his directorship with his brother,David and nephew,Richard, of  the City based vintner Cartwright Brothers. Unfortunately for him the business is more in the red than laying down more red. Its last accounts show losses of nearly £200,000 despite raising £100,000 share capital. Its directors have borrowed over £100,000 from the business between them. He says:”It has not been easy and I sincerely hope it is now turning around, but the recession has not helped. I am optimistic! ”

He has an interest but no management responsibilities for a popular wine bar and deli in Borough Market called Bedales – set up by market traders. But sadly that will eventually be bulldozed to expand Thameslink rail commuter services.

He is chairman of the  male only East India,Devonshire and Public Schools Club, whose  5255 membership dates back to Prince Albert and the colonial East India Company and is based at St James Square,London. Membership depends like the unreformed House of Lords  on the male hereditary principle (father can propose son) or on recommendation from public school heads. Women can come in as guests and David Cartwright has managed to improve the dress code so they can wear smart trousers and are no longer forced to dine on Brown Windsor soup and indifferent meat. You can get a flavour of the club on its website http://www.eastindiaclub.com/ . Past members include Denis Thatcher ( Maggie could only enter as a guest), Randolph Churchill, and Austen Chamberlain. Current members include Lord (Sebastian) Coe, UKIP leader Nigel Farage, Robert Halfon, Tory MP for Harlow, ex West Midlands police chief, Lord ( Geoffrey) Dear and industrialist Professor Colin Seabrook.

Cartwright defends the male only status quo: ” This is entirely within the letter and the spirit of the law. The members can vote to alter this at any time, should there be a sufficient number wishing to do so. Currently there appears to be no desire to do so”

According to the  latest report members consumed £1.2m of food and drank and smoked their way through £661,000 of  alcohol and tobacco. The club has laid down port worth nearly £400,000 and vintage wine worth £335,000.

No wonder one of the guests entertained there twice by David Cartwright was London fire brigade chairman Brian Coleman, never knowingly undernourished at other people’s expense.

VIEWS ON FIREFIGHTERS

Has distanced himself from Brian Coleman’s view about firefighters being ” thick and thugs”.

” I am fiercely proud of the London Fire Brigade, with two serving sons on the uniformed side. I am also proud of my service to London in this regard. 99% of firefighters are honest, decent loyal and committed individuals who provide a unique service to London, often in the face of personal danger. I hold them in the highest regard. I believe the Chairman, Brian Coleman was referring to some of the hotheads on the picket line – some of whom I understand were not actual firefighters.”

Barnet’s new pioneering Tory policy: Curb free speech

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Anthony Finn-permission to speak ,sir? Pic -courtesy Barnet Times

Barnet Council already notorious for cuts as a no frills  Easy Council  – is about to make dubious history as the first borough to curb free speech.

New proposals now sent to a committee  will take away most councillors right to speak at future council meetings unless the Tory mayor, Anthony Finn, gives his permission.

The proposal is part of  a plan to “streamline” debate and procedures  by the ruling Tory group so presumably councillors will have little opportunity to protest at the growing number of cuts and increased parking charges residents have to face.

The Tory group also wants to bar discussion about the work of the Cabinet at the full council and change the scope of debates.

But the most controversial proposal comes from former Barnet Tory mayor Brian Coleman which limits the right even to speak.

His motion says: “To amend the Council Procedure Rules to grant a reserved express right to only the Leader of the Council and the Leader of the main Opposition Group or their spokespersons to speak on Motions, Policy Items and Committee reports at the Council meeting. All other speakers would be called at the discretion of the Mayor.”

The plan from a £128,000 a year  council allowance man  keen to become the new Tory Taliban  follows his humiliating climbdown last month (see earlier blog) when Boris Johnson slapped down his proposal to ban questions to the chair of the fire authority,one Brian Coleman.

Then he was exposed by blogger,Adam Bienkov. This news comes courtesy of another blogger, Mrs Angry, whose Broken Barnet website http://bit.ly/i13ngn  regularly reveals the calamitous state of affairs in the borough.

The proposals mean  as Labour is the official opposition, the government’s coalition partners, the Liberal Democrats, could be denied a voice in the borough as could any dissenting backbench Tory. One extraordinary result is that Monroe Palmer, a recently ennobled Liberal Democrat councillor, could have more rights to express himself in the unelected House of Lords than as an elected Barnet councillor.

All this is hardly in line with David Cameron’s promise of more transparency and proper debate.

Barnet Council’s head of media, Sue Cocker, said: ” The council cannot comment on the substance of the report as these proposals have come forward from the Conservative Group. ”

“A review group will be considering the issues and will report back any proposals to a future meeting of special committee (constitution review).”

Richard Robeson, spokesman for the Conservative group on Barnet, would not enlighten people on the proposed curbs. The Facebook friend of Brian Coleman said tersely: ” We do not talk to bloggers or journalists “. If you can do better than me try him at work on 0208 359 2004.

You might ask what is going on by emailing the mayor at cllr.a.finn@barnet.gov.uk.

In future there may be a better way of protesting. The council under legislation will have to provide soon a facility for e-petitions from residents raising issues. How about tabling a motion calling for the council to restore free speech for its own elected councillors.

The Boris appeal: Please give generously….

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Boris launches appeal Pic: courtesy anorak.co.uk

 

Boris Johnson recently told the London Assembly that he simply could not afford to give a 4 per cent pay rise to the lowest paid staff at City Hall because “everyone is feeling the pinch.” He may yet be forced to make an appeal on his own behalf. This is how it might look.

These are hard times. Everyone is feeling the pinch. But it is much worse for those at the top who now face crippling taxes  while having horrendous responsibilities for clearing up the mess left by those nasty Socialists..

What you don’t seem to realise is how badly off I am. Don’t you realise thanks to Dave’s dodgy decision to keep the 50 per cent tax rate which is driving my mates away from the City, I am having to pay MORE in extra tax  on my £400,000 a year than some of you will ever earn in a lifetime.

As mayor I need proper time for r and r and this doesn’t come cheap. While only on New Year’s Eve I needed to shell out over 35,000 rupees a night- £501 in British sterling if you must know – for a camping holiday in the middle of  the Indian scrub.

And while lying in my tent I was about to be upstaged by a load of Russian oligarchs with oodles of cash arriving from Amritsar in a private jet! Fat chance of me travelling from London in the same style, even if I could hitch a lift from Lord Ashcroft. And that was without the cost of flying out by bog standard passenger jet and the prices for big fat Havana cigars and loads of Scottish malt whiskey which any Mayor has to consume to keep up public appearances.

Indeed I was forced to jump back into my personal hot tub to avoid indignity of being outspent by those Russians. Thankfully there was decent Chinese air com and an Italian espresso to calm my shattered nerves.

As you can see from the web brochure, http://www.the-serai.com/the_serai.html, it was a modest place, at least for a mayor.

Fortunately back in Blighty my good friend Fraser Nelson allowed me to recoup a little cash by writing  about my holiday trip for my old  magazine, The Sextator, sorry Spectator. You can read all about it at http://bit.ly/gbhGlx and my views about the Piccadilly line are thrown in for free.

 But this extra cash is not going to be enough. I will need more money to keep the r and r I must have while I battle on. You can help me by contacting me by e-mail at mayor@london.gov.uk . Do give generously. As I told the London assembly everyone is feeling the pinch.