8 August - A one sided conversation. Anonymous messages
It’s been said before that allowing anonymous messages via
the Contact page
is a mixed blessing; if the subject matter doesn’t get an airing here because it
is judged to be of minor interest it risks alienating the sender and perhaps not
getting something important on a later occasion.
Rather too often, plausible stories come without supporting evidence and there
are limits to what can be put on line unchecked and sometimes senders appear to
be a little upset if a modicum of poetic licence is employed. I confess to sometimes
not being entirely honest with the stated sources in a possibly lame attempt to
protect them from identification. If someone claims to be in the thick of the action and choses to
blow the whistle I am not likely to reveal their position. Firstly their claim might not be true but
when the likelihood is that it is absolutely so it becomes even more important to fib about sources.
Anyway here’s a little round up of a selection of fairly recent anonymous messages, those that I
can remember. Apologies if yours has been missed. I’ll start with one that did come with supporting evidence.
Post Offices
Councillor Richard Diment has a bee in his bonnet about
Post Office closures and
somebody needs to have one. I’m sure that closing so many of the borough’s Post Offices
is a serious inconvenience to many although I am perhaps too typical in not
having the need of one since I bought my last lot of Christmas stamps. Maybe
closures are a good excuse not to send any more.
The anonymous informant wished to remind me that Bexley Council actually owns a Post Office and the evidence
can be seen in the Asset Register. They bought it for a reported £925,000 a
year ago, seven times the price the previous owner paid. There will be some strategic property wangling going on.
Members Register of Interests
The Councillors’ Register of Interests
went off line five months ago. I
complained to the Council about it and I asked my local Councillor to enquire
but nothing came of either. It’s illegal not to have it available so one would
think that Bexley Council would sort the problem out quickly.
Eventually I forgot about it.
An anonymous correspondent says that the Register has just come back on line. He also says that Councillor Wildman
whose addresses both before and after election
has posed a minor mystery is still at 12 Embassy Court; but he has changed his job.
Companies House says he changed jobs in September 2018. This is perhaps getting close to trivia!
Council Accounts
When Bonkers relied on a small band of helpers this one would have come up long
ago, but now there is no time for it.
The message says that the reserves went down by £15 million last year which is
three times as much as in the previous year. The author blames it on recruiting
a Finance Director from the Socialist Republic of Newham but I’m not sure that is
entirely fair. My recollection is that he came from the jointly operated
oneSource, the dysfunctional organisation which made such
a mess of
billing me for my aunt’s respite care. He may even have gone there from Bexley in the first place.
The message sender worries about future Council Tax rates as do we all but maybe
accounting will be in trouble before then because he alleges that Bexley’s auditors failed to meet their 31st July deadline.
Draft Accounts.
It was probably mentioned at the recent Audit Committee meeting but I didn’t go. Usual excuses apply.
Homes in Multiple Occupation
Maybe I shouldn’t cover this one, it needs to be referred to an earlier blog
which I cannot find or maybe never got around to writing. However my correspondent
again refers to more than a dozen similar house
purchases (Band A three beds converted to flats) all being completed on the same day and all at the same price,
well two different prices actually but still suspicious. He points his finger at
Bexley Council going about its business of forcing up house prices and making a
fortune from the additional Council Tax. But it may be no better than an informed guess.
If I ever find the missing info I may expand on this.
Former Council Leader Ian Clement
He misappropriated Bexley’s cash and did the same to London Mayor Boris Johnson’s, what’s he doing now?
https://champions-speakers.co.uk/business-motivational-speakers/politics/ian-clement. Not a word about his
suspended jail sentence.
Thanks for an anonymous message backed up with hard evidence.
“That pair of shits”
Someone was talking about
the goings on in Thurrock again. Not sure I learned anything
new from that message apart from allegations I dare not publish. I suppose it is
a fair enough description when so many children have died both north and south of the river.
The same correspondent alleges that from 11th July 2016 Thurrock’s Director of
Social Services was also a Councillor for the same authority having been
appointed by their Monitoring Officer. Again no evidence that I have been able to track down.
Out in the open - Just
I’m
ending on something which is not anonymous but the writer didn’t want me to see
it. Bonkers is blocked from following his Twitter Account and I missed it.
Someone I know well came to the rescue.
After the row in Council last month over the criticism the Local Government Ombudsman directed at Bexley, the
Conservative’s propaganda machine had to be cranked up to full speed.
Their main effort was directed towards an unreachable goal, that is to blame the
Labour Group for their misapplication of the law or failing that, at the very least,
to obfuscate the truth.
More than one of their attack dogs said that Labour Leader Daniel Francis should
apologise for making three misleading statements.
I have listened to what Daniel said several times and I would accept that a case
could be made, albeit a not very conclusive one, that he overstepped the mark once
during an impassioned statement - but three times?
I haven’t a clue what the Tories are rabbiting on about. Does anyone or has
their spin machine have no scruples at all?
I think that some of their authors are such accomplished liars that they no longer know when they are doing it.