Labour’s election reviews….?

Chris Paul is a Labour (sort of) blogger who I usually try to avoid, apart from the fact he can be incredibly frustrating, well….you’ll see what I mean when you read this post of his below – he makes me feel like I’m really not in the loop and living in a parallel universe! I just want to make clear these aren’t my views, I’m simply pasting a post from Chris’ blog because it was rather entertaining…..

Extract fro Chris Paul’s blog:

Wednesday, April 02, 2008

Lib Dem City Centre Round Up: The Clayton Strangler?

Cllr Kenny Dobson aka Dobbo (right) has been a member of most of the running clubs in Manchester down recent years. Starting at the YMCA with what amounted to prescribed exercise and certainly taking in Salford HAC and Sale HAC along the way. After that he started founding his own clubs. Yes, that’s plural as he was apparently thrown out of the first of these – East Manchester Athletic Club – and had to form another, East Manchester Harriers.

Basically Kenny is a more-or-less unemployable corner boy who was refused membership of the Labour and WM Club (i.e. the drinking club) as a spotty youth and huffed off and joined the Liberal Party (i.e. another drinking club) instead. Later he became a councillor (basically for him another drinking club) before being drummed out in disgrace by his neighbours over various unpleasant incidents, heavy suspicions and collossal failures.

Now, I like Kenny alright, and will chat to him about anything but politics when I occasionally see him. So I didn’t hesitate to cover the plot to oust him as a candidate in the City Centre sympathetically.

Even though I must say I think he is highly unsuitable to “represent” this ward and is on record muttering about how much he “hates the bastards” etc. Proper anti-capitalist nihilism really. Not a man to help sort a parking problem for your 4×4. Nevermind impersonate a Culture spokesman, an enthusiast for recycling, or a purple prose newsletter editor.

Kenny defeated the Lib Dem group leadership 4-3 5-4 as the massed ranks of two wards turned out for a close run selection.

The reason given for this attempt to throw him out was that he had pointed the finger at another candidate being up to his eyeballs in debt (c £40,000) and involved in dealing class A drugs. This was deemed uncomradely.

This fellow – who was in fact Chair of Manchester Lib Dems according to this Lib Dem Youth page – had apparently approached the newly Westminstered Cllr John Leech MP at the Town Hall for help with his £40,000 debt, even enquiring about details of Leech’s repeated Chugging of a certain South Manchester pensioner for all his own sponney.

Kenny had warned the pensioner of that risk. He was allegedly put up to his reporting of the alleged nefarious activities by senior members of the group who then turned on him and chose to protect the other fellow – the alleged drug dealer – who was immediately back on their list of candidates, though disappearing (electorally only) without trace.

Anyhow, I digress. Kenny couldn’t organise a proverbial in a proverbial.

In one of his rare “speeches” in Council he demanded new lights at the junction of two roads which do not meet. He rolls in late and out early from official meetings in running gear. Like Dave Cameron he cycles the wrong way down One Way streets. He is never exposed to community meetings or advice sessions solo. And generally he keeps schtum.

His total written reports in one recent council year comprised 24 scribbled words. All but six of them the names of meetings. I have a copy. There ought to have been five two page reports. And obviously he is forever getting into trouble with the running community for his half-arsed attempts at putting on races. Most recently last weekend at Clayton Vale.

A particularly troubling anecdote concerns a meeting a year or two back when our hero was supposed to represent his club at a committee meeting concerning the users of the Athletics Stadium at East Manchester. Kenny was unfashionably extraordinarily late, even by his standards, and excused himself by saying he had been shopping.

This did not go down well with the other representatives. At the end of the meeting it is alleged that he grabbed one ex-Great Britain International by the throat, saying: “Don’t ever speak to me like that again”. By my calculations this hot-headedness was just a few months before he was re-elected to represent the residents of City Centre ward.

In fact the Lib Dems City centre team are a right lot. There’s Kenny the Clayton strangler (right). There’s a woman called Elaine Boyes who has a comparable record – before being slid into what is probably the most middle class, professional ward in the city – of early hours drunken open air cat fights on the Openshaw Village Estate. She works in the NHS (centre).

Not quite as bad as “Peter” one of her Lib Dem ex-councilloring neighbours who was taken away in handcuffs at least once.

Oh and there’s Marc Ramsbottom (left) (the Rambo archive), the one who is up this time round. A right old hypocrite on flyposting. Suspended on full pay for more than a year over allegations of financial irregularity. Eventually resigned in mysterious circumstances.

Yet still the Lib Dems have him as their Finance spokesman! He’s the one that reassured Council in his alternative Powerpoint Budget that there’d still be £90 in reserves after he was done.

Actually believable given what the Audit Commission found (or did not find) in the coffers of Lib Dem Liverpool. “£90? Chance would be a fine thing”, commented Mike Storey’s puppet Fireman Bradley.

On May 2 Rambo should be gone. Dobbo and Boyesy will soon follow.

I’ll be back to add the links and possibly a full P&P. Can anyone tell me whether that is necessary? Me, here, supporting Labour.

UPDATE: The allegedly offending candidate no longer has a place in the run down at Rambo’s pages. Perhaps he is in jail? Or sleeping with the fishes? Luckily I have some screen grabs of the shady character in previous incarnations. No candidates are mentioned for Bradford Ward, Hulme Ward, Ancoats and Clayton Ward, or Moston Ward which are part of the constituency that Rambo is “parliamentary spokesman” for.

ENDS

Manchester’s Golden Legacy from Olympic Bids

I spent the weekend watching the most amazing live sporting spectacle at the World Cycling Championships at Manchester’s Velodrome. One of the very few truly world-class things we have as a city, it surely is the best Velodrome in the world.

Initially it was built as part of Manchester’s Olympic bids 14 years ago, and was initially called a white elephant. My background is in cycle racing, I was an Elite ranked cyclist, have raced on many tracks around the world, and am confident none is finer than ours. This is in part responsible for the incredible results over the weekend, with Great Britain achieving 9 gold medals – a record – putting to shame much bigger well established cycling nations such as France, Italy and Australia. The other major factor is the Lottery funded World Class Performance Plan. 

Pre 1997 the Velodrome was one of a number of World Class elements Manchester gained, such as Bridgewater Hall for example dating from 1994. When the term world class is used too freely in Manchester these days it was great to be somewhere genuinely World Class and reflect on what that means. Our excellent sporting and cultural status in Manchester should inspire us to try to achieve the same level of attainment no-matter what the arena, and not simply settle for lip service for this aim of a World Class city, its just such a shame that in the last 10 years some of those dreams have been abandoned, and seeing the empty plot of land opposite where the Casino site would have been a stark testament to the stalled momentum with bigger projects for our city, such as the vacant Metrolink sites nearby.

 

Chinese Ambassador Speaks in Town Hall

Tonight I attended a visit by the Chinese Ambassador who gave a talk in the Town Hall. The Chinese community in Manchester is an incredible section of the city, and one of the most dynamic and cohesive parts of our city centre, and business and community leaders flocked to listen to her.

I have personal experience of trading with China, and have found the Chinese to be fantastic business partners, and produce work to the highest level (important string instruments). Its an amazing country that has been changing so rapidly, and relations should be going from strength to strength with China, however recent events have affected public opinion strongly. The ambassador attempted to put a different spin on recent events, and used economic arguments to illustrate how Tibet is subsidised by other regions of China, but I suspect this will do little to quell protests when the Olympic flame arrives in London next week.

It was an interesting insight into some of China’s changes and plans for the future. The figures associated with China’s growth are always going to be staggering, however its just so immense, its as if we’ve lost our ability to be amazed at it any longer. It was also very interesting and welcome to hear of China’s plans to tackle social, cultural and environmental issues – the country produces 5.5% of world GDP but 15% of the world’s pollution - clearly green issues need to come to the foreground. The best expression of these challenges was the idea that China would concentrate on the ‘quality’ rather than ’speed’ of growth from now on.

Piccadilly Gardens Campaign begins to bear fruit

Following 8 months of our campaign to highlight the problems with Piccadilly Gardens, people such as Manchester Confidential took up the cause and this resulted naturally in other political campaigns in following our lead, as has become the norm for the last couple of years.

A very useful meeting was held and a walk around Piccadilly Gardens followed, with questions asked, some answers given by local businesses such as Kro bar owners, Councillor for Harpurhey Pat Karney, Manchester Confidential’s Jonathan Schofield and a senior representative from CityCo.

Above – Cathedtral Gardens is even worse off for turf!

All my concerns were mirrored and discussed, with differing views on how to move forward. The basic problem with the place as a location is the fact that 18 million people use Piccadilly Gardens as a right of way each year – the same number of people who pass through Manchester Airport in a year. One interesting remark was to note the difference in the level of policing between those two locations with equal numbers of people! In the whole time we were there, (about 2 hours) there were no police to be seen, or any other agents of any description. This, it was agreed, is par for the course.

There were many issues to be taken forward in my opinion. There are many conflicting directions, desires and functions of the area. One such conflict is the issue of the Mosley Trust, which states that a certain percentage of the gardens must be green/public space. I’d love to know how that rule was bent in order to allow the large No1 Piccadilly building to be built on the gardens.

 Main concerns are:

• low level anti-social behaviour. I’ve written about this many times, and it seems the local businesses such as cafe nero even have trouble retaining staff because of it

• It simply can’t be right to replace the turf so frequently, it was only 8 months since it was last done at a cost of roughly £8000.

• The fencing associated with the work is up for many weeks longer than initially declared, it looks dreadful and restricts the use of the gardens, deterring visitors

• The concrete wall is universally disliked – maybe a good piece of work, but simply in the wrong place

• The fountain’s function is incredibly restricted, it has always had problems. Even when it works, its only been on from 10-5, but why not in the morning when people are going to work, and in the evening when people are using place like Kro bar?

• The flaking paint on the bridge is evidence of the fact that the general maintenance of the gardens is poor

Some solutions discussed were:

• paving the area – grand city squares are usually ‘hard’ spaces, not lawns! The area needs a big re-think. So soon after its initial creation, this is a shocking waste of money and a disgrace
• My feeling was that a ‘green’ wall to screen the trams and buses was always better, why not large conifer screens, some kind of evergreen grand hedge could be engineered to be incredibly dramatic, do the job far better that the concrete wall. There are numerous ways in which this could be achieved with the wall there however.
• Greater terracing of the turf, although this hasn’t helped Cathedral Gardens where the problem is, if anything, worse!
• Since complaints have been made, funding has been found for new litter bins, steam cleaning planned for the stone, some replaced flagstones and of course the long awaited filtration system

A very general, but perhaps most important point, is that too many agencies seem to have a hand in this, and a more streamlined system, with clearer accountability needs to be found. CityCo area clearly taking this seriously and looking into many concerns, but this doesn’t seem to join up with coordination from the Police and other essential agencies in order for things to be improved. For me personally, it just makes me sick that anyone could have missed the things that were clear to residents from the start, it should never have been conceived in the way it was, and once again the fact that some things are better then they were simply isn’t good enough for our great city.

The shame of our public spaces

Piccadilly Gardens and Exchange Square are suffering from similar problems – disappearing turf, and a failure of management and vision for the area and its usage.

An expensive filtration system (I was quoted £380,000 for this) was installed in Piccadilly Gardens which has stained the lighting, and the historic statues in the square, making the square look shabby. Combine this with the missing turf, the ‘urination’ wall, and the rarely functioning fountain and its clear the space is barely better than it was in terms of its function as a focal point for a great city.

When people defend the square by saying “well, its better than it was” this misses the point to say the least. The businesses around the gardens are a welcome addition, however we don’t want things for Manchester that are simply better than an eyesore, we want them to be truly world-class. We want a proper park, green space that residents can use, or grand open square – Piccadilly Gardens is none of these things.