23 May - A pretty good day outside of Downing Street too
You wait four whole weeks for a Council meeting to report and the webcast
falls into an audio pothole after 55 minutes never to be heard of again.
Never mind, the important bits went out OK and we learned that Sue Gower (MBE,
JP, MA, PGC,E QTLS, GDPRP, FCIM and probably more) was to be elected unopposed to
be our new Mayor with Lisa Moore her deputy. A former Mayor had told me more than a month ago “You
will approve of the new Mayor” and he was right, I do.
Some Councillors are always friendly and some are most definitely not. Sue is in
the former camp and I have corresponded with her on and off for more than ten
years. I wrote a blog entitled Superwoman in March 2014 and to this day wonder
how she has managed to fit so much into her life. If you want to feel a little
inadequate take a look
and if that is not enough there is another.
Oh, let’s go the whole hog and splash the web space cash on 15 megabytes of Councillor Janice Ward-Wilson’s
informative words…
Sue’s Deputy, Lisa Moore,
is another Councillor who reached out in my
direction before her election and has maintained friendly relations ever since; not
constantly but a a long way from another who both reports me to the police and
blocks me on X thus ensuring a bad press whenever the opportunity arises. Why
Bexley’s many decent Councillors tolerate her Leadership I have no idea.
On the other hand the calibre of her Cabinet has improved over the years, Peter Craske left
last year followed by another step in the right direction last night. No more Philip Read,
another Councillor who has been a little too fond of making malicious trips to the Police Station.
Mayor Sue Gower’s thanks.
Councillor Steven Hall then thanked the outgoing Mayor Ahmet Dourmoush for his “amazing” year in which he officiated at more than 700 events
and raised more than £37,000 for charity. Ahmet is another Councillor who always
went out of his way to be friendly with me and no doubt many others. Labour
Leader Stefano Borella was similarly effusive in his appreciation of Ahmet.
Ahmet thanked everyone for their support, after which the audio feed cut out.
I donְ’t think there is another Council meeting until well into June. Sorry to be vague but Bexleyְ’s website has
followed the website audio into a black hole. Will there be any politics to report in the interim period?
The website is back up. Next meeting is Children’s Scrutiny on 19th June.