Friary Family trip to Ireland, Sean MacEoin , Hibs and Scotland!

I am now in Edinburgh staying at my parents after spending Easter with them and my sister in County Monaghan visiting our irish family.
I am pictured here in Clones and my dad is by Tea Pot Row in Rockorry where he used to live around 60 years ago and worked on the farms and in the flax mill.It was great to meet lots of family and travel around Monaghan , Longford and Sligo.

I have known for some time about a family member on my mother's side, Willie Angus VC who played for Celtic before winning a VC at Givenchy where he was wounded 40 times rescuing Lt James Martin. He survived and lived to a ripe old age and his VC is in the military museum in Edinburgh Castle.
More at:
http://kerrydalestreet.com/page/Willie+Angus
and; http://www.forvalour.com/

I now find that my Grandfather in Ireland was a direct first cousin to General Seon MacEoin the "Blacksmith of Ballinalee", close frind of Micheal Collins and one of the founders of the Irish Free State. The picture here is of Sean MacEoin and Michael Collins at his wedding.
He fought with Collins in the IRA was injured and captured by the

British, tried and sentenced to death for treason in June 1921. In the meantime he was elected to the Second Dail for Longford-Westmeath, released eventually at Collins insistance and nominated Eamonn De Valera for President. During a long political career he was Ministere for Defence and Justice and twice stood for the Irish Presidency against Sean O'Kelly in 1945 and Eamonn De Valera in 1959. He retired from public life in 1965 and died living in the Longford area in 1973. Quite a character! And I thought that I was the first (and best!) politician in the family!! More at http://www.ucd.ie/archives/html/collections/maceoin-sean.htm

Meeting of the Pro and Anti Treaty officers at the Mansion House, Dublin on 8th. May 1922 (from Left to Right) : Sean MacEoin, Sean Moylan, Eoin O'Duffy, Liam Lynch, Gearóid O'Sullivan and Liam Mellows

Although I watched Monaghan draw with Dublin at Gaelic football, lost at Ibrox against Rangers to drop down to 4th in the SPL they apparently played well enough to go down 2-1 and still look good I think for the 3rd spot!
Scotland play Croatia tonight with George Burley's first game in charge so it will be interesting how they do against a very good Croatian team?

I attended a Homeworking Club Awards Ceremony organised by the The Educational Alliance Africa and handed out Certificates to children who had acheived over the past year, a really positive initiative and I hope to work closely with them over the next year to develop the Homework Club and other intiiatives in Camberwell Green Ward.
Today is St. Patrick's day hence the shamrock and I am not drinking any Guiness tonight as I have the Camberwell Community Council tonight but will make up for it when I spent 5 days in Ireland over Easter!

More possible bad news on the horizon as I recieved a letter with proposals to close the Job Centre in Camberwell! I will of course object but I really put the blame squarely at the feet of this disgraceful administration who have made it clear that they want to strip out Camberwell and clearly the news has spread!

Hibs won 2-0 against Kilmarnock to go third in the SPL so all still on track and I feel reasonably comfortable that we can hold on to the UEFA Spot until then end of the season.

Scotland ended not with a bang but a whimper after the Calcutta Cup win losing to Italy in Rome! Frank Haden must be pulling his hear out at such performances this year after a few years of progress and a reasonable World Cup.

Of course all congrats to the Welsh and a brilliant Grand Slam only months after a poor World Cup. Like football Rugby is a funny old game!!

Nunhead Labour Party Pub Quiz, "Calamity Clegg" in a mess, "tough love" from the Tories and Hibs and Scotland have contrasting fortunes!

I am all ready to done my Quiz Master hat on again this Thursday for the Nunhead Labour Party Pub Quiz in the Nuns Head at 7.30pm.
I have been scouring the internet for enough tricky and obscure questions for the well informed Nunhead Party Members and hope that we can raise lots of funds for the local party.

Hapless Lib Dem Leader Nick "Calamity" Clegg is trying to patch up the damage that he has already inflicted to his ramshakle party last week and it is easy to see why he has been labelled "Cameron Lite" as like Cameron he is a vacuous non-entity making up "policy" on the hoof without a seconds thought and then getting into trouble with his party afterwards! I cant believe he got into a mess over, of all things, Europe! The only hope for the Lib Dems is a hung parliament with them holding sway and to be honest I would rather have to live with a Tory majority than have that lot excercising any power at a national level!! Not that I look forward to a tory government with anything other than absolute horrer especially after hearing Osborne on the Politics Show yesterday talking about "tough love" for welfare recipients and I think we all know what that will mean!
Hibs went out of the Cup Replay 1-0 to Rangers but it looks like another good performance from us with Rangers defending desperately at home in the closing part of the game. Defeats against Celtic and rangers of course are not the problem we need to keep winning the other matches to clinch that 3rd place and a UEFA Cup spot.


Of course the best sporting result of the week was not the FA Cup giantkillers of Barnsley and Cardiff but Scotland's Calcutta Cup Victory against England at Murrayfield!
Not a great game to watch but the result was right and was needed after 3 straight defeats and has done something to salvage Scotland's season!

Campaigning in Camberwell with Val, Lib Dem Hypocricy (again!!) and Hibs lose to Celtic!

We had a really excellent campaigning session in Camberwell Green on Saturday with Val Shawcross on a beautifully sunny day!

Again we had a really good response on the doorstep with 60% of out contacts supporting Labour, this in an area which is not by any means our strongest. This follows on from extra sessions in the week that we are now running which are again giving us a very good, almost surprisingly good, response!

Eight of us were out and covered a lot of ground in the 2 hours and still managed to get back for most of the football!

Lib Dem Executive member was caught out by us and the SLP this week by lobbying for a new children's Centre in Lambeth (her hopeful new constituency!) less than a week after voting to close the Livesey Childrens Museum in Southwark!!

Crass cynical hypocricy from the Lib Dems should come as no suprise to anyone and there is really no point highlighting to the Lib Dems as they just dont care!! they are quite unbelievable at times and a quite disgraceful excuse for a political party!

Even on a national scale they are in a complete shambles over a Referendum on the new Treaty to such an extent that they will be abstaining on the vote today!! What a joke both nationally and locally!!

Hibs winning run came to an end against Celtic on Saturday but watched miost of the match on Setanta after campaigning and thought that they played well and just ran out of steam a bit at the end. they look comfortable at the moment and stronmger at the back so I still think the 3rd spot is ours for the taking!

Arsenal has a really excellent win at the san Siro last night and the possiblility of 3 English teams in the last 8 of the Champions League a real possibility. I fancy a Man U v Arsenal Final in Russia!

Spineless Liberal Democrats and Hibs win 5 in a row!

Southwark News picked up a couple of good stories this week the most unbelievable is the one on the proposed new Fisher stradium in Southwark Park.

When the 9 local Lib Dem Councillors, including the Council Leader Nick stanton, were asked for an opinion 5 were apparently unable to give one!! Talk about spineless!! In fact Stanton was so inept that all he could say was "Hard to comment since I dont know what it is!" Surprising since it was the front page story of the SN last August!!
The SN also reports plans to sell of the Corporate Training Resource Centre at Cator Street one year after spending £1M pounds of public money refurbishing it!! What an appauling waste of our money and this at a time when they have just closed the Livesey for a fraction of that money!!

Hibs 2-0 away win over Falkirk last night was the fifth straight win in the past 3 weeks and has moved them up from 8th in the table to fourth and two points away from the 3rd place UEFA spot!!
A real topsy turvy season with a long unbeaten run at the start followed by a complete collapse and now a long winning run again.
The 3 men pictured Fletcher and new boys Rankin and Nish really are playing well and Ian Murray relly has fitted straight back in and looks as goods as when he left us for Rangers 3 years ago. in truth mixu has them palying with a lot of flair (perhaps a little less than with Collins) but has tightened up the defence and we look an all round stronger and more balanced team and are now favourites for the 3rd place spot. Celtic at home is the next match, dad will be there and I will be watching on Setanta!

Libs Dem/Tory Coalition set Tory 2006 Budget in 2008!

Wednesday night's Council Assembly of course went as expected with the budget agreed, the Livesey museum to close, Meals on Wheels to increase by 50%, social care removed from the elderly but never mind £2M agreed to pay Consultants to tell us how to move to an expensive new building!!!
Whilst the Lib Dem?Tory line was all about the poor Government settlement the Southwark News cleverly spotted that the budget proposals were very similar to the budget put forward by the tories in 2006!!
As SN writing comments it does make you wonder who is running the Council? We all know of course that the Tory tail is wagging the Lib Dem dog and Southwark Council has for the past 6 years been under Tory control! Well spotted Southwark News!
Best comment of the night goes to Ian Wingfield who said "I have always advocated consensus working but noone has ever agreed with me!" and strangest comment goes to Toby who said that this Government settlement was "the worst in local government history!". I really had to remind him about Margaret "there is no such thing as society!" Thatcher as I really think that he had forgotten about her!!!


I took Shauna and "boyfriend" Oscar to see Pinnochio yesterday for the half term and they behaved well and I sang along with the songs!
The picture is of them on the bus to Catford!


Hibs have their 3rd home game on the trot against Inverness Caley and a third win would really put them back in the running for the 3rd place UEFA spot in the SPL!
Dad's going and a full house expected as it looks as if Hibs have turned the corner?

Couple of Mentions in todays SLP, Council Assembly looms, Half Term outings and Hibs on the path to recovery?

I had a couple of mentions in the SLP today one on the plan to ask Housing Associations to pay for the Wardens to patrol which is all sounding a bit deperate and really shows how the Lib Dem/Tory Council have mismanaged a very expensive service costing £6M per year and are now rushing headlong to scrap it! What a waste of money and a wsted opportunity to really have an effective and popular warden service but it is now so discredited that I am not sure many tears will be shed if and when it is scraped which will be a real shame as there are some excellent and commited people working as wardens and there is a very positive contribution that they could still make but I think that the "black spot" is upon them!
The other was on Nick Stanton's stupid comment that the Camberwell Leisure Centre was top of his list for closure next year and it was a good chance to call him an "idiot" on record!



I have had a quieter week at the Town Hall just as well as I am moving office at the University (now complete!) and am taking 6 year old Shauna out to see Pinnochio on Thursday at the catford theatre and Tutankamun at the o2 on Friday!
I missed the Tut exhibition first time around and this will probably be the last time so i am looking forward to seeing it myself!


On the Hibs front a couple of back to back home wins against Gretna (4-2) and more impressively Aberdeen (3-1). Aberdeen are in great form and I saw them demolish us only 6 weeks ago so a real turnaround.
Mixu is now shaping the team with Nish and Rankin both playing well and Fletcher back to his best. Good to see Shiels playing so well as John Collins was always trying to send him on loan or sell him! Hibs now back in 5th place from 8th a week ago but really only a couple of wins of 3rd place and a European place and that must be their target!

Fletcher really is turning into something special and must be in line for a full Scotland cap very soon. Obviously Celtic and Rangers are already hovering overhead but with his new contract they will have to pay big money. Amazingly rumours abound that Real Madrid are interested in him!! I am pretty clear, and infact predicted so at the end of last season, that he will not be a Hibs player next season but will have moved onto bigger and better things!

Lib Dem/Tory Administration use budget scaremongering to speed up the "hollowing out" of Camberwell!

On Tuesday the Executive laid out their cuts proposals after weeks of "softening up" the press including Nick Stanton using Southwark Life completely inapropriately to vent his political spleen !
All the soft targets are there of course including the elderly, disabled and children, a cut in the Wardens with a plan to get HA's to pay for having them cover their area? Hands up those who think that is going to work?
The Livesey wil close and the plans for a Discovery Centre seem as pie in the sky as well Bob Skelly went on about it in the last Administration! Mind you it appears that he will be getting his old Executive job back in May after serving his time for the crime? So that's all right then!
Whilst many of us are working with the local community to encourage investment into Camberwell Leisure Centre Stanton thought it sensible to say that the Centre was top of his list for closure next year! A real boost to the campaign scuppering any chance of a rescue plan! What an idiot!!! This after a Lib Dem Campaign in Brunswick Park not 2 years ago promising full redevelopment!! They have no morality and no shame about anything that they do! They are an embarassment to Southwark!

If that is not bad enough we now hear that the Town Hall will also be sold off stripping pretty much any Council presence out of Camberwell to relocate in Tooley Street! this will have serious consequences for the local economy but as an Executive member reported to us the Lib Dem line is "there are no votes in it for us!" unbelievable and unfortunatley these people are "running" this Council!
Good to know that they will give £2M to consultants to work out how to fit all of the staff into the new offices, money well spent and obviously more important than social care for the elderly!
This selling off the family silver is completely immoral and we will have to take over a Council in chaos and in tooley street when we win in 2010!

They are in for a long night with us next week at Council Assembly but the Lib Dem/Tory deal will no doubt hold firm whilst most of the Lib Dems will sit there in silence putting their hands up when their strings are pulled, a case of lie back and think of the Special Responsibility Allowance! Disgarceful!

A Busy week at the refreshers Fair, campaigning and Hibs get a point at last!

I spent quite a lot of last week at the Refreshers Fair at London Met talking to Students as well as a very hectic week in the Town Hall.
I was hoping for a quiet weekend but got the last of the Calanders out on Saturday and was out campaigning in a Constituency action day on Sunday!
We have Labour Group tonight to talk through the Tory/lib dem budget which looks a real mess, they really are falling apart!!


I did see Hibs play Dundee United on Setanta on Saturday and they were lucky to go in at half time only a goal down to a very impressive Dundee utd team. They played better in the second half without any great fluency and should have won it in the last few minutes with 2 wasted chances!
Hibs look really poor disjointed and struggle at the back but Ma-Kalamby is playing well as is Murray who looks something like the form he was in when he left us in 2005! Nish and Rankine looked good and beuzalin had a good game in midfield but i think that it will be a long hard season for us and dont think we will take 3rd place as Dundee Utd and Motherwell are just playing too well at the moment although we have better players1

A Busy week in the Town Hall, Trip to Ireland and Hibs have Cup Replay with Rangers!

It is a busy week for me at the Town Hall with the Shadow executive and OSC last night, where Borough Commander Malcolm Tillyer discussed the future plans for policing in Southwark. My guess is that the Lib Dems saw an opportunity to make political capital over plans to close 3 stations in the borough but the rationale behind it all of course makes sense and we all agree that consultation on future uses for the buildings including some level of community use is essential!
We have the Camberwell Community Council this evening where we will be saying farewell to Sargeant David Gywther from the Camberwell Green SNT . He has been outstanding and will be sorely missed but I of course wish him well in Greenwich in his new Inspector's role. On Wednesday I Chair the Childrens Services and Education Scrutiny Sub Committee with feedback from early visits to Youth Clubs which I think of all of us have found really positive and useful.

On Thursday there is the Camberwell Branch Labour Party AGM and I think that we can reflect on a very positive year with our campaigning and successes across the two Wards. I am looking forward to a well attended and very positive meeting ahead of the Election Campaign.

I am going to Ireland with my parents and my sister for Easter to visit the family in both the North and South and visit our family's "home" towns of Sligo (in the case of my mothers family) and Longford where my dad was born and which is apparently the home of the Friary Family so it should be interesting? We shall of course see lots of our family in and around Monaghan and have booked a house in the village of Rockorry where many of my family live and which I last visited when I was 8 year old! I intend to sample lots of Guinness over the 5 days!
I watched the Cup game on Setanta on Sunday and was depressed at half time as Hibs were being completley outclassed by Rangers! Only a very on form Ma-Kalamby kept them at bay along with some desperate defending!But talk about a "game of two halves" we controlled the second half and were really unlucky noit to sneak a win. Fletcher and Sheils both were excellent and new boy, Inverness Caley, Rankin also impressed. So a replay to come at Ibrox where we beat them 3-0 two years ago!
I was full of expectation for a Scottish victory against France in the opeing game of the 6 Nations with France making so many changes but could not have been more wrong. It was a good French performance to win 27-6 but a really poor Scottish team and not a lot to look forward to this year it appears which is a shame after a pretty good World Cup only a few months ago?

Council Assembly as bad as ever and Hibs face Rangers in the Scottish Cup!

Last night's Council Assembly was a really miserable affiar with the Lib Dem/Tory doing a really crass "softening up" process blaming Government for a harsh settlement ahead of no doubt swinging cuts in leisure centres (including I reckon the closure of Camberwell Leisure Centre!) , ending the wardens scheme and more worrying huge cuts in Youth Service and Social Services care ! They will nowever spend over £2M on Consultants to tell staff where to sit in the new enormously expensive Tooley Street building!

They used Leader's diatribe, questions and motions to build up their "case" for the "slash and burn" that they are going to inflict on the residents of Southwark in a few months.
Of course non of it is their fault, even the huge hole in the decent homes budget, but is of course the Labour government and Labour Mayor's fault for everything! There wer 5 Motions last night on really serious issues which wcould easily have had cross party backing but they conspired to ensure that non of them did and the meeting was a total farce.
What upset me what Stanton's childish approach to politics which after 6 years as Leader shows that he has learned nothing and in fact is getting worse. His incomprehensible ranting is absolutley ludicrous in the extreme and never gets beyond everything good is Lib Dem everything bad is Labour and it really is impossible to deal with him on any rational basis.
In the Decent Homes debate we offered cross party working to come up with a solution and after much waffle finally got the truth out of Kim, he does not trust us to "keep our mouths shut"!!
Well what can you say or do after "leadership" shown by the gruesome twosome like that?
They really are fiddling whilst Southwark burns and god only knows what wreckage we will have to clear up in 2010 when we finally get rid of this pathetic bunch!!

It looks like Hibs have got Colin Nish but perhaps only for next season when we need him now so hopefully a deal can be done to get him now?
We also tried to get Riordan back on loan but were turned down as Celtic want shot of him so we will have to buy! he really should have stayed another year or taken up the offer of going to Spurs as Celtic have once again ruined an exceptional player!
Where is Chris Killen now! He and Riordan top scorers in the SPL with Hibs where are they now?
It is Scottish Cup weekend with us facing Rangers at Easter Road on Sunday. On the face of it and on current form we dont really have much of a chance but I do recall the Cup match 2 yeasr ago when we played them at Ibrox and beat them 3-0 so I suppose it is possible and with some of our injured players back we should at least give them a game?

SE5 Forum AGM, Brian Paddick responds , Dispatches and Scotland get Burley!

I attended the 2nd AGM of the SE5 Forum and my picture shows Mark Dodds present the Chairs report to a packed meeting.
The organisation has clearly progresd well in it's 18 month life and we heard o the next steps last night to really solidify the position of SE5 Forum in Camberwell. Congratulations again to all those involved and i look forward to working closely with it in the future on the key isssues affecting camberwell over the next few years.


To his credit Lib Dem Mayoral candidate Brian Paddick responded to my Blog and just to clarify I have nothing but respect for Brain's police career and in fact signed 2 on-line petitions in support of him when he was under attack by the Evening Standard and other right wing press!. But Brian has chosen to be the Lib Dem candidate for Mayor, dont know when he joined the Lib Dems, probably joined yesterday candidate today like so many of the Southwark Lib Dem Councillors? Anyway I respect him responding to me and I look forward to the campaign focussed on issues and not personalities, perhaps a forelorne hope?
There is interesting feedback form the early stages of the US Campaign suggesting that Hillary actually lost votes when she criticised Obama and there is a feeling that the dominance of neagtive campaigning over the past 20 years may be coming to an end thank god!

I did watch the "hatchet job" Dispatches programme on Channel 4 and have to say that amongst the periforal stuff there were a numnber of very serious and apparently well researched allegations made against Ken and his administration that he really needs to respond seriously to. I was especially concerned by the allegation that Lee Jasper commissioned a consultant for over £14,000 to develop and run a smear camapaign against Trevor Phillips. I hope that it is not true as it would be a serious breach of his role and if true heads will have to roll!!
I also agreed with issues raised over the process, in particular the weakness of Scrutiny at City Hall and I cant really argue for more at the Town Hall and not do the same at City Hall can !?
I really do loath highly paid special advisers, unelected and unaccountable and who seem to take Executive action and appear to treat elected members with contempt and the sooner that situation is controlled, whether in No 10, City Hall or Southwark Town Hall the better!
Bottom line for me however is that London needs a Labour Mayor and Ken Livingstone has been an excellent Mayor and deserves his third term.

News breaking today that George Burley will be the new Manager which I thing is a good choice and he has enough time to get into the role ahead of the first World cup Qualifiers so good luck to him!

Lib Dem/Tory Exec Scaremongering about Budget, Lib Dem Mayoral candidate Paddick is Embarrassing and Hibs Lose again!

Lib Dem Leader Nick Stanton has used and misused the Press and the Council Web Site to spout out his propoganda whining on about the Government settlement and predicting cuts like closing leisure Centres and massive cuts in social services hitting the elderly and youth projects, always the soft targets for cynical politicians!

His Pravda like rantings on the Council's Web site proporting to be "news" realing show how little respect they have for the democratic process and we can already see in the Council Assembly Agenda stupid motions asking Executive members, especially GLA Candidates, to write letters to themselves criticising the Mayor! It really is quite pathetic!!
The Council is in a real mess with it's finances but of course it is everyone elses fault though I notice toby has had enough and will not be managing the finances after May! The Housing department is is complete meltdown and Senior managers throughout the Council are heading for the Exit faster than the audience at a Ming Campbell speech!


Talking of the Mayoral elections BBC London interviewed all of the main candidates last week and Brian Paddick was an absolute embarrassment! He kept on saying that he was not a politician but I think that we all got that particular message some time ago!

He could not identify a Lib Dem policy if it was tatoooed on his arm and is really just making it up as he goes along including keeping old people off the buses and tubes as they get in the way!!
He kept on getting into a panic when he made some sweeping statment and then was pressed by the interviewer as to whether that was a Policy commitment at which point he went pale and tried to change the subject!!




I had the misfortune to watch Hibs play Hearts on Setanta and saw too really poor sides play out a pretty poor match with us losing by a goal helped by yet another goalkeeping error!

Interesting to see Ian Murray back although David Murphy has gone I am glad he went to Birmingham rather than Celtic!

Hopefully we can get Colin Nish from Killie before the transfer window closes and another central defender would be good. We are now 8th out of 12 after topping the league in October so we really are in relegation form so Mixu needs to trun it around fast or we will not make the top 6 which really would be a disaster for us!
Looks like the Scotland Manager will be named soon and rumours are that Souness in in the pole position?