25 February (Part 3) - Bexley is in “a very sad place”
And so we come to the final part of the report on
last week’s Cabinet
meeting. Labour Leader Stefano Borella voiced my own view of the 2023/24 budget with;
“Members opposite know very well that their government has let them down and is not
funding demands. They know that; they may not want to say that at a meeting but
they know it extremely well.”
He then drew attention to Page 211 of the Agenda.
Extract from the Children’s Scrutiny meeting Minutes allegedly written by the Deputy Leader of the Council.
“Bluntly, these comments are a lie” said Stefano. Exactly why is uncertain
because as a quick summary they are, as I recall, in the right ball park but
“nothing to do with” is probably something of a stretch.
The Labour Leader went on. “They were a lie and a distortion of the truth and that is true.” He
asked how the Deputy Leader had the time to write the Minutes of the Children’s
and Education Scrutiny meeting which is a fair question to which I might add,
why is he allowed to do it? “It is disgraceful and he should apologise. There has been a failure of process.”
The Cabinet Member has apologised to the two Labour Councillors and the meeting Chairman so he must
have accepted that he went too far. Council Leader O’Neill said that Councillor
Leaf was “trying to be transparent” and warned Stefano to be “very careful with what he said”.
So David Leaf is less than 100% accurate in reporting a meeting, Stefano Borella said
the variance from the truth amounts to deception and a lie. David feels an apology is in order
but it is Stef who gets the warning. There must be a job somewhere for Teresa O’Neill in the Metropolitan Police.
I approached the Labour Group for a fuller explanation but none has been
forthcoming so one might assume that it could be another piece of political theatre.
For the record this blog has never been able to use the word lie against David
Leaf and doubt I will ever have to. The same goes for Stefano Borella. I regard
David Leaf as a competent Deputy Leader but I had no idea that he doubled up as
Committee Clerk. A man of many talents that go far beyond verbosity.
Councillor Daniel Francis (Labour) reminded the Cabinet that they had form for
rewriting critical comments from outside bodies so they better suit their
political agenda. “Is it common practice?” he asked. He then stated clearly that
taxpayer’s money had been used by Bexley Conservatives to repeatedly libel a
Councillor with things she has never said. Nonsense had been taken by the
Council from the handwritten notes of a Cabinet Member which were
based only on an interpretation of why a Labour Member’s head had silently moved
“This Council is in a very very sad place.”
We have the highest budget gap in history and the responsible Cabinet Member has
spent his time running round rewriting Minutes.
Teresa O’Neill said he hadn’t rewritten the Minutes, he had amended them. The
real question is what is he doing anywhere near them?
For the record, quotations can be difficult. Comments within quotation marks on BiB
are not always verbatim. They will often drop redundant words and repetitions
and may draw together two time-separated comments as if they were one. What look
suspiciously like quotations but without quotation marks will be my own summary of a much longer statement.