Sunday 24 January 2010

More in sorrow than anger

It appears that the newly selected Labour candidate for Longbridge has decided that as Labour has nothing positive to say they will embark on a negative campaign by attacking ourselves. We have always tried, as stated in this blog to concentrate on what we do as Councillors and we will continue in this vein.
However when what we will call "mistakes" appear in other fora we may respond with a correction. For instance, our opponent alleges that we persuaded the Frankley Parish Council not to deliver our local MP's Parliamentary Report with the Neighbourhood news. The truth is we had no say in that at all. It was the PC's decision, we were not consulted and would not expect to be.
The Parish Council did, as in the past, deliver our Council produced Christmas card. It is then made to appear that an insert from Keely was with these. The truth is that no inserts were delivered with the Neighbourhood News. In all other parts of Longbridge we delivered the cards and inserts ourselves as we are entitled to do.
We have always treated the Parish Council as a non-political body as they themselves wish to be treated and this policy will continue
We can only hope that the days of Labour spin are coming to an end. This is something we have been working for over the last few years and at last our goal in in sight. Roll on May 6th and let's be rid of Gordon Brown, Alistair Campbell, Damian McBride et al. Let's bring back truth and honesty to our politics.

Tuesday 19 January 2010

Blowing the whistle

Peter Watt has been all over the news lately with his book "Inside Out" about his time as Gen Sec of the Labour Party.
One of his revelations is about the "Election that never was" when Brown became known as The Bottler for calling off a snap election, he said at the time that he never intended to call an election at that time. Watt now claims that the Labour Party spent £1.5m in the 2 weeks before and had a fleet of limousines waiting to whisk ministers off on electioneering duty.
Keith posted about this at the time but here is a little reminder of those events.
As Cllr Steve Bedser was unsure if he would be back from Bournemouth in time, Keith was asked to chair a meeting of the MG/Rover Consultative Group. Just before the meeting started in bounded Steve and Richard Burden MP both with big grins on their faces looking like 2 young Labradors let off the leash after a period of confinement. Steve gleefully enquired if I had paid for a full week at Blackpool, the venue for the Conservative Conference, as I would be wasting my money and would have to return for the General Election. They were absolutely certain that there would be an election and no doubt everyone who had been at their conference would have been just as certain, only for that certainty to be dashed by "Bottler Brown". How galling for them all to see the polling figures today and think back to those halcyon days before we all came to know Mr. Brown so well.
Incidentally Mr. Bedser has now decamped to Kings Norton for the local elections in May. Perhaps he doesn't fancy going up against Sue this time after Ken defeated him in 2008.

Saturday 16 January 2010

Everlasting raffle prizes.

This is not Keith's daily ration but the winnings from a raffle. These bottles will probably not ever get drunk but will flow endlessly on the raffle circuit going from winner to the next raffle, on and on endlessly. They will probably raise hundreds of pounds before someone breaks the pattern and broaches a bottle. It is the same with most raffle prizes.

How to win a raffle

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Green Bus

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Helping Lord Adonis

Yesterday Keely and Keith met Lord Adonis, a government Transport Minister. He was in Brum to launch a new "Green Bus" being piloted for children travelling to Dame Elizabeth Cadbury College. Keely is a Governor there and brought young Katy along to take a look at the bus.
Keith was in the Council House and met Lord Adonis by chance. He is a very charming man, Lord Adonis that is, and Keith was delighted to escort him down to the bus where a photo opportunity beckoned. Along with Lord Adonis is Gary Clarke, Chairman of the West Midlands PTA, the school's headmaster and a representative of West Midlands Travel.

The Team

This photograph shows one of the reasons why we have been so successful in winning seats in Northfield over the past 6 years. We are all friends as well as colleagues, we socialise together, are all obsessed with politics and work together for the betterment of our residents.
Here we are at Wem in Shropshire for the New Year celebrations. As well as Ken's wife Barbara there is his mother, daughter and Barbara's brother. Adrian Delaney from Weoley is also there with his two children.
We all had a great night with good food, great entertainment and, as you can see, the occasional libation.

New Year's Eve

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