Friday, February 23, 2007

More "Liberal Democracy" in Southwark Town Hall


It was another frustrating and angry night at the Town Hall on Wednesday.
Lib Dem apologist blogger, Andy Mayer, described me as "excitable" on his wonderfully balanced site! I am sure that if the Lib Dems proposed slaughter of the first born he would describe it as an education efficiency saving!!
Mr Mayer even managed to confuse something said by Cllr. Sandra Rhule (making an excellent contribution!) as being attributed to me? Confusing me with a black women is obviously an easy mistake to make for Peter John's "favourite blogger" (Andy - have you ever heard of irony?)

The main reason, once again for my anger, is the complete contempt and absence of any political principle from the Lib Dems and the Tories and they showed their true colours both at the Executive meeting the week before where they allowed no public questions arising from about 8 deputations and at Council Assembly. I know the numbers and expect defeat at every vote but at least I expect them to treat the process with respect but their arrogance really has taken over, especially in the Stanton/Humphries Leadership!

They would not allow more than 15 minutes debate on 2 Camberwell Leisure Centre motions and referred to Labour Administration plans to close and sell of the Centre in 1998. This is a clear and deliberate lie and I asked for a ruling from the Mayor and an opinion from the Acting Borough Solicitor but was told to sit down and shut up!
I will revisit this at OSC Call-In and through the Standards Board!

Then there was a lot of bluster about the budget with it all being the fault of the Labour Government and the Labour Mayor, so pathetically predictable!!!
What really angered all of us was the issue of the Audit Commitee. I moved an amendment to stop an SRA but that was always going to fail as more Lib Dems may need to be bought off by the Leadership ahead of the annual elections.
I also argued for an Opposition Chair due to the scrutiny aspect of the Committee but that again was always due to fail.

During the discussion Humphries was scuttling around with Stanton and Hubber and suddenly moved Tory Cllr. Lewis Robinson as Vice Chair which was voted for and passed. As well as being completely anti-democratic it was stupid as no member of OSC could Chair the committee and even on that point the Legal advice was pathetic!!
Luckily, one member opposite had some political integrity, Lewis himself, and he then refused the position and asked for support for Richard Livingstone. He also suggested a rotating Chair which i think was also agreed.

Well done to Lewis but it does not hide the shame of the rest of them who were willing to go through with it (I might exempt James Gurling, Chair of the committee, who did look very uncomfortable!)

I am thinking about our new Camberwell Green Labour Rose and think that it may be an Annual Report format. Below is the last Newsletter and the style that we will keep for our quarterly publications.









Meanwhile the Quarter Final of the Scottish Cup takes place on Saturday when Hibs visit Queen of the South. On paper an easy draw but stranger things have happened!
If we get through it the next hurdle is the draw and hopefully avoiding Celtic in the Semi Finals. Anyway one step at a time !





CIS Cup Final tickets go on sale on Monday so my dad will hopefully sort it out for the 18th March at Hampden Park! Cant wait!


CIS INSURANCE SCOTTISH LEAGUE CUP FINAL

HIBERNIAN VS KILMARNOCK

SUNDAY 18TH MARCH 2007
HAMPDEN PARK GLASGOW SCOTLAND
3PM

3 comments:

Andy Mayer said...

John, what a load of rubbish. Aside from a link to one of your prior posts on this blog, the only reference to a Council meeting comment of yours raised in my last post, was the remark

"The matter was raised by the excitable Cllr Friary, who seems to have got it into his head that the Liberal Democrats are going to cut lots of taxes and spending when we form a government"

A entirely dishonest comment you have made previously on this blog where you said "we really have no idea how the Lib Dems would fulfill all their empty promises as well as reduce the basic rates of income tax and cut public spending by over £21 Billion".

As you are aware that claim of cutting spending is entirely untrue and you repeated it in the Council Chamber.

It is regrettable you feel the need to lie about Liberal Democrat policy and then lie about my accurate reporting of you lying.

It's perhaps no surprise then that you attribute your own daft remarks to your colleagues.

John Joseph Friary said...

Andy,

Thanks for the reply!

I do enjoy looking at your Blog and no doubt we can continue to discuss policy over the next 3 years!

John

Praguetory said...

But the Labour govt and mayor has been financially irresponsible - and you accuse Andy of being partisan! By the way, the slaughter of the first born was coined by Alan Simpson and was used to describe Labour MPs. Carry on.