7 April - The Rumour Mill. Or is it?
Not too much credence can be given to stories that land in the Bonkers’ Inbox without any evidence but when they come from known good sources they cannot be so easily dismissed.
One such fairly recent story concerns the Conservative decision made three years ago to
abandon monitoring of the CCTV system. £225,000 staffing costs were saved but maintenance,
which costs almost three times as much, has continued. It seems
a bit crazy whichever way you look at it and
a major part of the Labour Group’s
May 2018 manifesto is the promise to restore the CCTV service.
From deep inside the organisation that ran it comes a suggestion, a pretty firm
one, that the Business Improvement District(s) offered to fund the staffing
costs but Bexley’s Tories turned the offer down.
Could that be true? Does anybody know and would it have been town centres only,
maybe for restricted hours?
Other stories should probably be treated with more caution but they are not
anonymous and name names. One is an allegation of historical child sex abuse and
it being dropped by Bexley Police because the ‘offender’ is now a Conservative
Councillor. Sounds plausible, there is a reluctance to prosecute Councillors as Kent Police
has been intent on demonstrating. On the other hand my journalist
daughter has looked into several such high profile allegations and concluded
long before the infamous Nick was discredited that too many people make
allegations in the hope of a fast buck.
Another tale suggests that a large sum of money flowed from Bexley Council to a local business the owner of which just happens to be
a good friend of a very well known Councillor. All the names are given together with supporting web links and I am
asked to investigate further. Far too complicated for me, Bexley Council would most certainly block a Freedom of Information Request
and a major problem is that the whistleblower would be exposed and endangered.