19 April (Part 1) - Dirt. Diversions. Development. Dishonesty and Dames. (Pantomime Dames)
Bexley
councillors may choose to wallow in dirt but its residents may have
little choice. A correspondent from Sidcup reports how he sat in the park at
Sidcup Place surrounded by empty crisp packets and discarded beer cans when the
‘litter man’ came by, so he asked why the park was so filthy. The man (a Serco
employee presumably) said “to save money a full litter pick of Sidcup Place will
now only happen once a week”. No cuts to councillors’ allowances or fat cats’ pay of course.
Another Sidcup resident complains about the constant disruptions in Station Road
and the idiocy of closing off St. John’s Road, Craybrooke Road and Church Avenue.
Craske gets an unflattering mention but the madness in Sidcup predates his
arrival on the scene. Complaints about Sidcup and its roads are nothing new of
course and it is remiss of me not to have got there with my camera. Keyboard
bashing has become my major occupation unfortunately.
The council has announced that it plans to buy the old Woolwich Building Society
Headquarters and develop a new Civic Centre there and allow Tesco to have the
existing ‘Town Hall’. How much money was wasted on consultancy fees before someone
with a bit of common sense backed down and did what many local residents will prefer? See
the council’s announcement.
Someone, referring to Bexley council, asked me yesterday “Why don’t they just
start telling the truth and be honest with people?” Good question. Not such
an easy option if you’ve done neither for many years and have so many skeletons to keep buried.
Finally a female well-wisher sent me a parcel. In it was a copy of
Citrine’s ABC of
Chairmanship marked three shillings and sixpence and apparently bought at a boot
fair for slightly less than twice that. Perfect condition and complete with dust
jacket. If I have interpreted the Roman numerals correctly it was published in
the year of my birth. So it started life when the population was fighting a
tyranny in jackboots and in its seventh decade it finds itself engaged in
fighting tyranny again. The female donor wasn’t mayor Val Clark.
I shall return to weightier matters later today.