Defiance
Hadley
Road is barely a stone’s throw from the site of Ye Olde Leather Bottle, once
Bexley’s oldest pub and now Bexley Council’s longest standing monument to friends in high places.
While in Hadley Road yesterday I checked to see if there were any
developments following the expiry of
the Community Protection Notice in September which
ordered the site owner to, among other things, remove the rubbish and restore
the public footpath. Bexley Council has already refused to say what it has done
about what looks like an act of defiance and observations suggest they have continued to do nothing
about enforcement.
Diligence
When Labour Leader Stefano Borella
suggested at November’s Cabinet meeting
that the due diligence process on the StoryTeller cinema might have been done
better it didn’t seem to be a contentious statement at all. Going bust within
two years must surely indicate that something could have been done better but the
Cabinet Member said that such thoughts were an insult to his staff.
Never one to leave an opportunity for probing the depths of Council failures, @tonyofsidcup
enquired as to exactly what the StoryTeller’s “very strict and vigorous due
diligence” entailed. Early indications are that nothing exists in written form. Not all that vigorous then.
Stef’s suspicions may well be fully justified.
Divergence
This is pure trivia but maybe worth recording.
Since personal circumstances changed and compelled me to drive to Bromley and
back four times a week, today was the first time there were no diversions in
either direction since the first trip on 17th October. How long will that last?