1 March - Another council meeting
There was another council meeting last night, only a week after the last one,
maybe a contributory factor in eight councillors not bothering to show up. The
main purpose was to discuss the budget. The meeting began as usual with prayers,
which I mention only because of the recent controversy, but careful listening
confirmed they are specifically Christian prayers and not some politically
correct fence sitting exercise. Mayor Sams felt the need to yet again trot out
his message about no form of recording being permitted. “To protect the public”
he said. Quite how an audio recording could harm the public at a meeting where
the public is not allowed to speak is never explained. Some lies are harder to
explain than others.
Leader Teresa O’Neill kicked off by referring to “significant cuts in government
funding” and claiming that the service cuts had “the overwhelming support of
residents” I think the question was along the lines of “should we keep the
council tax as low as possible”. She said the council was currently on track with
its savings but conceded the more difficult targets still lie ahead. Conscious
that the increased parking charges are not popular she said the current charges
were to be frozen for three years. That may well make the deal more palatable
but then she went and spoilt it by claiming that
Bexley had more parking places
than any other nearby borough. She’s never been to Bromley presumably. It
doesn’t really matter whether Bexley has more or fewer than Bromley, what
matters is that we have a council leader who struggles to speak without straying
from the truth. Deputy leader Campbell followed with much the same message and
reminded everyone that Boris Johnson had reduced his precept and councillors’
allowances were frozen for three years too.
Leader O’Neill took up the reins again and told us that Bexley had been given
the lowest public health allocation in London but that Bexley had “the lowest
council tax in the Outer London Rim”. I don’t know how that Rim is defined but I
do know that Barnet, Bromley, Enfield, Hillingdon, Merton and Redbridge
are all on the outer edge of London and all have lower taxes than Bexley. The
average of one fib every time Teresa O’Neill stands up seems to have been
successfully maintained. Her deputy, Colin Campbell, then attempted to cheer
everyone up with the forecast that another £20 million will have to be found
after 2014 and the reserves weren’t good. £5 million when the Conservatives came
into office and only £11 million now he said, adding, “in simplistic terms that
is enough for about ten days”. There is another £3·8m. to cover uninsured losses.
Bexley council doesn’t insure against everything which is probably a good thing.
Why let the insurance companies grow fat?
Councillor Maxine Fothergill breathlessly read from a long prepared script,
which in essence said “Didn’t we do well?” ”We listened” and “We made no
significant reductions in services” were the most quotable quotes. Councillor
Hunt made a similar address but more succinctly.
Meanwhile councillor Deadman (Labour) was chafing at the bit attempting to introduce an
amendment to the budget. The Conservatives had achieved an underspend of
£400,000 which councillor Campbell had quite rightly said wasn’t going to be
blown on end of financial year froth. Councillor Deadman didn’t want it to go
into reserves but instead give a 1% pay rise to staff earning less than £30,000
a year. The idea didn’t go down too well among the Tories. The amendment,
seconded by councillor Munir Malik, was justified on the grounds that most
employees live in the borough and they would spend their £270k. locally thereby
boosting the economy. I wasn't convinced. For a start around a third of the
money would go straight back to central government in the form of income tax and
N.I. contributions which doesn’t benefit the borough one iota and what is left
would be the equivalent of every adult in Bexley making one more visit to a
pound shop each year, or maybe a dozen of them buying a new car. Either way it
is not going to boost the local economy in any measurable way.
Councillor Deadman told us that everyone was struggling with Bexley’s across the
board increased charges and staff should be shielded against that. What about
the residents at large someone should have shouted, but no one did. Councillor
Malik said that all the present financial woes are due to the Con/Dem government
and that Quantative Easing should have been directed at families and not banks.
I’m no fan of the present shower in Downing Street, but I do have a memory that
extends back before May 2010. Maybe Munir hasn’t. The amendment roused the
occasional cheer from the public gallery but not from me.
A second part of the Labour group’s amendment was that parking should be free
for the first hour to encourage trade. Those who were at
Boris Johnson’s
roadshow last July might have expected leader O’Neill to back that idea as she
was in favour of it (albeit only 15 minutes free) while fielding questions with
Boris listening, but it was not to be. Every Tory was against it despite one of
Bexley’s oldest shops (Nuxley Toys) announcing closure last week because of
parking charges. In making his address, councillor Malik fell foul of the petty
minded mayor again. As well as having a wooden hammer to bang, the mayor has a
toy traffic light. Green : you may speak. Amber : you must wrap up. Red :
sit down and shut up. Poor old Munir overran the red light by five or six
seconds giving mayor Sams an opportunity to let everyone know who is in charge.
Councillor Gareth Bacon evidently had the same thoughts as I did. “£270k. won’t
rejuvenate the economy” he said as he dished out the frightening statistics of
just how far the country has travelled along Queer Street.
Councillor Colin Tandy rose to his feet to say that just because there was an
underspend it didn’t have to be spent. “It explains why Labour governments
always fail” he said. Councillor Tandy must be about the same age as me, I too
have seen them all fail; from Wilson in 1964 onwards. On the other hand leaving out
the word Labour would not change the truthfulness of Tandy’s statement. He strayed
from reality when he said Bexley’s car parks are cheapest, “there is no doubt about
that”. Craske’s indoctrination runs very deep.
Councillor Brenda Langstead (Labour) complained about Teresa O’Neill’s
comment at the
last meeting that the free Christmas Eve parking was paid for by strikers. She
indicated it was disrespectful and showed O’Neill’s true colours. It probably
does. She also said that parking revenue had gone down and the statement that
front line services have not been affected is nonsense. A lot of what leader
O’Neill claims is nonsense, just look at the news page of Bexley Conservative’s website.
Councillor Mike Slaughter retaliated by saying car parking revenue is not down -
he has a different version of the accounts to everyone else - and got in a dig
about Labour’s 40% council tax increase. No explanation of why the Tories didn’t
give it back. On the best estimates the recent freezes mean a 12% reduction
given the inflation rate. Where has the other 28% gone?
Councillor Perrior said the Labour amendment was “pathetic” and revealed for the first time
that I remember that she is a business woman and not
an impoverished
single mum as you might believe if you read her letter to the Bexley Chronicle.
A 1% increase was “patronising and not worth having”. All very well to say that
when you are not on the breadline. “The staff appreciate what we are doing” or
so she said anyway.
Councillor Don Massey made cringeworthy patronising remarks about councillors
Deadman and Malik with some reference, which I didn’t quite understand, to
the Olive Oil and Pop-Eye of politics. “You don’t
have a clue do you?” he said to them.
Councillor Ball (Labour leader) said that if 1% is insulting what is 0%?
“£3·50 a week is not an insult to low paid families.”
Councillor Seán Newman (Labour) picked up on the comment about front line services
not being cut by referring to the safer neighbourhood teams and the loss of (three I think
he said) libraries. He was of course referring to mobile libraries all of which
are gone. Bexley council had sneaked through £7·2 million of stealth taxes and
was going to charge £7 a head to visit Sidcup Place.
Leader Teresa O’Neill said the travelling libraries were not needed. Their
biggest customer was schools and none wanted to pay for them. So they had to go.
Does Teresa really believe that not being able to afford them is the same as not
needing them? It’s not exactly a lie but it is disingenuous to say the least.
After that a vote was taken. The Labour amendment was thrown out and the
Conservative proposal was accepted, voting in both cases being absolutely along
party lines. Maybe we could do with some independents on Bexley council, as it
is, meetings and debates could be dispensed with and spare us the spectacle of
Conservative councillors being rude to Labour ones. Just because their economics
may be questionable doesn’t excuse the derision.
The meeting wasn’t quite over at the vote but I had an appointment elsewhere at
21:30 so I headed for the exit leaving a public audience of (I think) four, not
counting the council officials that sit among them.