James Frankcom, who used to be a Tower Hamlets Labour party official, writes for that strange phenomenon, East London News. He has a curious writing style, but his account of last Wednesday’s Tower Hamlets Council meeting is enjoyable and informative. He has asked me to publish it as a guest post, so here it is:
By James Frankcom
Those of you who have never been to a council meeting need to know one thing above all others; Tower Hamlets is not a ‘normal’ council and the behaviour you will find in the council chamber is not typically what you find in other chambers of local government in this country.
The full council meeting on January 25th had all the elegance and profundity of a squabble in a school dinner queue. The issues discussed were rarely, if ever, things the council could actually do something about or ones with real relevance to the lives of the people outside the debating chamber. Worse still, with embarrassing regularity the meeting descended into a cacophony of vicious bickering as allegation and counter-allegation were bandied about.
The meeting began with several motions moved forward in the agenda. A highly partisan Support Ken Livingstone’s Fair Deal For Transport motion was proposed by Cllr Rabina Khan (Independent, Shadwell) and seconded by Cllr Shafiqul Haque (Labour, St. Katharine’s & Wapping) and despite an amendment tabled by the Conservatives – described as “a load of guff and wind” by Cllr Marc Francis (Labour, Bow East) – it was passed by a large majority.
However, what did this motion actually do to help the people of Tower Hamlets? Entirely nothing; neither doing anything to assist Ken Livingstone in his re-election nor reducing the cost of transport for the people of this borough.
Another motion titled Sexual Exploitation, which righteously condemned the trafficking of people “for the purposes of sexual exploitation, forced labour, domestic slavery and organised crime” was proposed by Cllr Rania Khan (Independent, Bromley-by-Bow) and seconded by Cllr Ohid Ahmed (Independent, East India & Lansbury).
It resolved to “express support” for a charity “promoting the rights of children” and “acknowledged” that more people will enter the UK during the Olympics and some of these may be the victims or the exponents of this vile trade.
All very noble, but what does this actually do in real terms for the people of Tower Hamlets struggling with the worst economic circumstances in eighty years? Arguably, not a lot.
There was a motion condemning the Dow Chemical’s sponsorship of the Olympics (as if anyone from the IOC even opens letters from LBTH) and then yet another motion about the London mayoral election.
Good politics as these issues are I could not help wonder in what tangible ways did their discussion in this forum make the lives of Tower Hamlets residents any better.
During a debate where everyone took turns to say how much they hated racism (usually more so than the last speaker) and what little the council can do to combat it, Cllr Ohid Ahmed, the Deputy Mayor, shouted “by true Labour – not like them in front of me!” implying the Labour Group were not serious about fighting racism, or worse, were complicit in it.
Given that the context of this discussion was the racist murder of Stephen Lawrence this was an extremely serious allegation to make.
Cllr Josh Peck, the leader of the Labour group, immediately took issue with him and raised a Point of Order condemning the “unacceptable allegation” he had just made.
Peck, waving a piece of paper in the air containing what he called “a weak three line apology for the last time he [Ahmed] made similar remarks”, the Labour leader duly demanded that the Deputy Mayor’s comments be recorded verbatim in the official minutes.
This proposal was seconded by Cllr Peter Golds, the Conservative Group leader, who also called for action to be taken against the recalcitrant Deputy Mayor should an apology his “outrageous slur” not be forthcoming. As he spoke howls of derision erupted from the public gallery from people Cllr Golds eruditely described as “the bussed-in Lutfur fan club”.
I then watched with a mixture of depression and disbelief as councillor after councillor berated their neighbour in bile-laden vanity speeches and, to be honest, the only party which came out of the meeting with any semblance of dignity was the Liberal Democrats; but that was a relatively easy task because they have just one councillor – Stephanie Eaton – who wisely kept her head down.
By way of contrast, the small and truculent group of independent councillors allied to the mayor repeatedly disgraced themselves by bitterly attacking their former colleagues in the Labour Group with all the hatred and spite of a recently divorced couple arguing over the division of their CD collection. This was a fight made all the more sad, if I may continue the analogy, because the CDs were the well meaning and sincere gifts of friends whom both partners once shared but now each sought to claim as their own.
The Tories, for their part, appeared to take a certain pleasure from goading the Independents in much the same way naughty boys enjoy poking angry cats with sticks. Frequently that evening they rather incongruously supported Labour motions against the Independents in circumstances which reveal far more about Labour’s poisonous relationship with their former colleagues than they do about the Tories tactics in minority politics.
Labour, in all this, appear to have found themselves in a situation made all the more bitter by having lost the power which once seemed so assured to them and now reduced to contriving ways to frustrate the Independents, and failing that – just heckling.
Indeed, at one point during the meeting Cllr Bill Turner appeared to ‘take one for the team’ by apologising to the Speaker for his heckling during a rambling speech by Cllr Shahed Ali.
Things became especially fractious during a recess when an ignoble exchange of words took place between Cllrs Rabina Khan and Peter Golds. This was later regurgitated by Golds in the form of a Point of Order wherein he claimed she had called him “a sexist”.
Throwing any dignity to the wind Rabina Khan erupted in the way you would expect a teenager to respond to someone throwing chips at them on a school bus. In a worryingly aggressive ‘yeah-but/no-but’ style tirade, Little Miss wagged her finger, rolled her eyes and quite ridiculously proclaimed she felt “threatened” by the ageing Conservative councillor.
Indeed, throughout the entire meeting the pugnacious Rabina Khan behaved quite appallingly; spitting self-righteous venom and dragging the council chamber down with her as she repeatedly bickered, hectored and swaggered with all the dignity and restraint of a guest on the Jeremy Kyle Show.
I look up during one of her repeat performances and my eyes momentarily catch those of an ashen faced, sad older man at the side of the room. I look down and read his name plate – he is Commander Ludgate, the Deputy Lord Lieutenant and Her Majesty’s high representative to the borough.
Now all but a relic from a bygone era of civic duty and national service he has, without any compulsion, come to observe these dismal proceedings and I cannot help but wonder what thoughts are going through his head. I return to my note-taking suspecting his private thoughts are not enthusiastic ones.
Sharing that same dais was Lutfur Rahman, Mayor of Tower Hamlets, whose countenance during the meeting was quite different. For he observed all this with the self-satisfied smile of man watching a fight between two people he doesn’t like over a rumour he started.
Indeed, at the only point where his participation was really needed, nay expected, he made the astonishing decision to refuse to answer almost all the questions put to him by councillors – questions actually printed in the order of business and which he would have had ample time to prepare for.
This risible decision which strikes at the heart of formative democratic accountability was weakly defended by the legal assistant on the basis that to force the mayor to speak would “breach his human rights”.
This bizarre excuse, when announced, struck all as an absolutely extraordinary thing for an elected public official to proclaim and thankfully not an excuse either David Cameron at PMQs or Boris Johnson in City Hall has ever used.
Responding to the Mayor’s obvious act of distain, Cllr Motin uz-Zaman asked him directly why he would not reply and was told, “because you’re just a councillor and I’m the mayor!”
Not very long after this, the Mayor completed his snub by wandering out of the council chamber and disappeared for nearly 15 minutes without an explanation or by your leave.
However the abiding memory for me was the pantomime of the Independent Group proposing an Emergency Motion – written in pen like motions are at a joke student union conference – that “condemned the Labour and Conservative Parties for their time wasting tactics and blatant disregard for the public who have come to listen to council business that affects their lives”.
The motion was quite predictably defeated so then the Independents decided to do some really special time-wasting of their own by raising of point of order after point of order and amendment after amendment all of which were defeated and thus further delaying any council business from being made.
Eventually the Labour Group with the tacit support of the Tories moved a procedural motion to speed things up but this was of course opposed by those erstwhile opponents of time-wasting and the moribund meeting finding its life unnaturally extended staggered on until almost midnight.
It would be very unfair to condemn all the councillors alike. The names which stand out among the few who can walk away with any notion of pride were Rachael Saunders (Labour, Mile End East) and the harassed Speaker of the Council, Mizan Chaudhury (Labour, Bethnal Green South); both of whom remained calm, eloquent and dignified throughout.
Many other councillors maintained their dignity by hardly speaking at all and despite their best efforts very little useful business was given much discussion that night and examples of excellence in local government were instantly inundated in the squelching ordure of hate-filled political fractiousness.
As for the “public” who had come to “listen” to “business which affects their lives”, it is fair to say a substantial portion of this public were a political rent-a-mob who happily encouraged the bluster and vitriol in the chamber by heckling from the gallery but a minority of them, myself included, left that place saddened and troubled, wondering why anyone really bothers to vote in local elections at all.
But then it occurs to me – it is precisely because most people don’t bother to vote in local elections that we get what we’ve got – a substandard charade at local democracy containing aspects of a non-specific Carry on Film where at any moment a fight might break out or someone’s trousers might fall down.
Quite frankly, the people of this borough – a borough which has produced true working class heroes such as Millie and George Lansbury, Nellie Cressal and John Scurr – deserve much better. All of the aforementioned were councillors on Poplar Borough Council and were jailed in 1921 for defending East Enders against unfair local rate hikes – and for the record while imprisoned one of their number died.
So I recommend you come and watch your councillor at work and then make an informed choice at the next elections about who to vote for because there are fifty-one of them at Tower Hamlets and, excluding expenses, each of them is paid at least £10,000 per year from our hard earned council tax contributions – that’s more than half a million pounds. Are you angry yet? I know I am.
Trial by Jeory 
Well said. It sounds like TH got exactly what it deserved.
Is it his intention to antagonise everyone.
Third-world politics at it’s best.
Who has the power to step in and clean up this disgrace?
Tim.
What is it with you and your disparaging remarks about Bangladeshi’s and now your refering to the political bickering in the council chambers, which incidentally is no different to that of the goings on in the Houses of Parliament, to third world politics?
Roll on the day it becomes mandatory for all Council Meetings to be recorded on film, broadcast online and available for all constituents to see – then we might start seeing a change in the voting patterns!
I was left nonplussed by the comment about the dignity of the Speaker
Isn’t it normally the responsibility of the Speaker/Ceremonial Mayor/Chair of the Council (whatever his correct title is) to ensure that:
* business is conducted in a proper manner
* councillors of all parties are respectful to one another
* time limits are placed on speeches by members
* proper control is exercised over points of order
It strikes me that it’s been a very long time since ANYBODY ran Council Meetings properly and, as a result, members have been allowed to develop some very bad habits which simply would not be allowed anywhere else.
Could we maybe ask the Speaker of the House of Commons to come and show them how it’s done?
In the meantime – how about if somebody were to invite David Walliams and Matt Lucas to come and watch the next episode of “The Great Tower Hamlets Council Farce”.
It strikes me that the cast (sorry – councillors) could provide them with ample material for an entire satire series……..
’You couldn’t make it up!’’…..but you did
‘’I was left nonplussed by the comment about the dignity of the Speaker’’ You being a Lutfur supporter that was obvious and thanks for confirming
‘’Isn’t it normally the responsibility of the Speaker/Ceremonial Mayor/Chair of
the Council (whatever his correct title is) to ensure that:
* business is conducted in a proper manner
* councillors of all parties are respectful to one another
* time limits are placed on speeches by members
* proper control is exercised over points of order,,
Not normally, but it is the responsibility of the Speaker
‘’It strikes me that it’s been a very long time since ANYBODY ran Council Meetings properly and, as a result, members have been allowed to develop some very bad habits which simply would not be allowed anywhere else’’
Mizan is probably the only person in Tower Hamlets who is doing a great job under most difficult circumstances and most importantly impartially. We all witnessed how Mizan have been conducting council meetings and he ticked all boxes with fairness. Or did you actually mean bad habits such as being paid to attend council meetings on behalf of the elected mayor?
Dear oh dear – I think that maybe you’ve got a bit of paranoia showing. I’m guessing there may be a few regular readers of this blog smiling at the idea I’m a supporter of Mayor Rahman
Read a little bit further on this blog and you will see that my comments are usually confined to contexts where:
* the Council is failing to be properly accountable to its electorate
* the Council is failing to spend taxpayers money properly (ie in accordance with the rules) and in a way that achieves value for money
* politicians are failing to comply with the rules relating to their conduct and behaviour
* Council business is not conducted properly
In other words I’m mainly commenting on a Council which appears, on a regular basis, to have completely lost sight of its accountability to the electorate for the way it conducts itself and the way it spends public money – particularly within the context of extreme economic constraint.
Bottom line – it’s not about personalities (eg Lutfur Rahman or Mizan Choudhury) per se – it’s about whether ANY politician in this borough knows how to conduct himself or herself in a way which does not bring both the Council and Tower Hamlets into disrepute.
In case you are confused – as I was – by HIS comment on MY comment about the duties of the Chair I will try again
* The post which used to be called the Mayor is now identified in the budget as the Ceremonial or Civic Mayor (ie in order to distinguish the post from the Executive Mayor ie Lutfur Rahman) and is the person who is wears the chain of office. This post is filled by Councillor Mizan Chaudhury
* In the Council minutes however ANOTHER TITLE is used and the post is referred to as the Chair of the Council – and this post is also filled by Councillor Mizan Chaudhury
* the person holding the title Chair of the Council should be doing what it says. His primary role is to chair the meetings of the full Council. This individual is completely in charge of the conduct of the meeting and should be applying the rules of Conduct for Council meetings (eg what business can/should/must be processed) and should also exercise the rules of conduct for Councillors in relation to the conduct of all Councillors at all times. As such the role is like the Speaker in the House of Commons – and the Chair of any other meeting of any other organisation up and down the land.
So could you please explain what problem you have with my previous comment about how the business of the meeting should be conducted and why you should think I am a Lutfur supporter?
Tell me Bosh or Mizan or whoever you are!
1) Are you saying that the content of the account of the conduct of the meeting – as quoted above – is wholly inaccurate?
2) Can you explain to me why every time I ask somebody for the views of how a Council meeting went, they normally start with the comments “It was a farce….” and usually also comment on how badly chaired the meetings are given the way the very poor behaviour of the Rentamob in the public gallery and the behaviour of some Councillors goes completely unchecked by the Chair. It’s not just one person commenting like this – I rarely hear anything else.
3) What do you know about the reports that I’ve seen on the web about the Council leaning on the East London Advertiser to censor (ie withdraw) the online report of the last Council meeting – specifically with respect to the fact that the Elected Mayor refused to answer all but one of the 25 questions put to him – in public. All of which I understand he had notice of in advance. This sort of behaviour is farcical and strikes me as showing complete contempt for the meeting of full Council as part of the machinery of accountability. The absence of any online report in the ELA about the last meeting of the Council is certainly extremely unusual. Doubtless a sanitised version (approved by the Chair?) will emerge in the paper publication in due course?
4) Have you ever attended a proper Council meeting at another Council and seen how business is conducted in a Council which does know how to conduct Council business properly and in a manner which is respectful of all councillors and the electorate to whom they are ALL accountable? I think you may well be surprised……
5) Do you understand the meaning of the word “accountability” and why holding meetings in public is important, why the conduct of those meetings is important and why holding Councillors to account for their behaviour is also important?
6) How well do you think Tower Hamlets Council is doing in being accountable to the electorate in its conduct of full council meetings?
7) Do you still think I’m a supporter of Mayor Rahman?
What a nutty article. That was surely the one day of any Mizan could not be described as dignified by any one other than his Arselicker in Chief who frequents your fine blog, Ted: he was in the Evening Standard spending £900 a time on taxis because a Prius wasn’t good enough for him.
‘’What a nutty article. That was surely the one day of any Mizan could not be described as dignified by any one other than his Arselicker in Chief who frequents your fine blog’’ How much did Lutfur actually pay you for this comment? Mizan is the only principled person in Tower Hamlets who is brave enough to challenge the wrongdoings of the mayor – there is money to be made here from Lutfur by anyone who denies this – you should take advantage of this in the current circumstances
…’’Ted: he was in the Evening Standard spending £900 a time on taxis because a Prius wasn’t good enough for him’’ A Prius was never offered (do an FOI and you will have the real facts not paid ones). And taxis costed so much due to removal of the civic car by Lutfur, so he could plot against Mizan with high taxi fares – he succeeded in that, but the truth will one day come out – hopefully soon.
One low point missed was one Independent councillor dangling the keys to his porsche to all and sundry with a big grin on his face.
God almighty, Ted. No wonder he asked you to publish his piece. It looks like his own paper wouldn’t print it – and commissioned an entirely different write-up! Did James write both?
http://www.eastlondonnews.com/labour-and-tories-keep-up-attack-on-elected-mayor/
Sideburn, you were obviously in the audience but you need to go to Specsavers.
What Shahed did actually hold up was a toy car – the only Porsche he has. You didn’t get the joke obviously. He never bought a Porsche. It was a Facebook joke with a photo from Google Images that Gullible Gilligan believed. Serves him right for snooping, the idiot. That was why Shahed got so much laughter and applause. Check your facts before you opine in future
Gullible Gillian, ha ha ha, that’s a good one!
http://blogs.telegraph.co.uk/news/andrewgilligan/100125926/lutfur-rahmans-tax-avoiding-cabinet-member-buys-himself-a-porsche/
Here, Here
Although I call him Fish Gills the smarmy slippery git.
You see the damage has already been done, he wrote that piece and many of his blatant racist supporters have read it, spewed their views on it, then spread it….. but does Gills write a correction note… no his ego, the same size as his bald head will never allow him to.
Having said the above, I think Labour has to take a huge amount of blame for allowing the circus at Town Hall to take shape, they never had a clue on how to take Lutfur on!
Ted, your article has raised much venom and bile, mostly directed out, but I notice that no one has yet denied the content.
Steve – No, I didn’t write both. Actually, I resigned from the voluntary position I held at that paper last week.
The version posted on the ELN website was written by Jenny Fisher – the new editor.
Sorry to hear you’ve left ELN James. Seems a bit sudden given your wholehearted plugging only a few days ago. What went wrong?
I don’t want to comment about that save to say the new editors personal style together with her unhealthy political views dictated my decision.
James, does the new editor have any background or training in journalism?
Unhealthy? What is she, BNP or something?
I know you don’t want to say much about your departure and I’m not asking you to. But seriously, if an editor of a local paper has unhealthy views it is your duty to make us readers aware of them.
That name’s familiar. Is that the same Jenny Fisher who used to be Secretary of Poplar and Limehouse Labour Party, and following the creation of Tower Hamlets Labour Party unsucessfully stood for the Chair position for about 5 years in a row (against David Edgar initially then against me)?
[I believe she is no longer able to make that challenge as she’s banned from holding office in the Labour Party following a disciplinary inquiry into her involvement in the election campaign of the succesful independent mayoral candidate in 2010.]
If it is, I really have to question the integrity of a so called newspaper (I’ve never seen a printed copy, and the website is a shambles) that is now edited by a Labour Party member who supports the incumbent executive mayor!
Does she have any journalistic background, particularly in libel and contempt laws? Does anyone on that newspaper? If not, then surely it is worthy of Lord Leveson’s attention. And I suspect it already is.
If that is really the case then I will worry. I look upon the ELN as being a (relatively) sensible news source, and a counter to the absurdity that is East End Life.
If ELN is destined to go down the same paan then what is there in terms of un-biased local newspapers?
Tim.
Are you confusing the East London Advertiser with East London News?
Confused about an issue raised at this Council meeting that is now being reported in the ELA: the proposed closure of the Rushmead One Stop Shop. Isn’t this the same site identified in 2007 for an Idea Store? It was ‘Part of SITE 5 (The LBTH Rushmead Housing office) and was omitted from the transfer for the provision of an IDEA Store” as “THCH is committed to work with LBTH to develop proposals for a 3,500 sqm ‘IDEA Store’.” Details here:
Click to access 403175-Page-3.pdf
extension=.pdf&page=3&id=403175&contentType=application/pdf&location=VOLUME4
Isn’t the Rushmead Housing Office and the Rushmead One Stop Shop the same ‘SITE 5’? So they have decided to go ahead with the Idea Store next-to-Tesco in Bethnal Green, as first pushed by then Leader and her Idea Store Strategy of 2007? Why then are Labour councillors fighting this now?
Try again – 2007 application for Rushmead (Site 5) to become IDEA Store:
http://194.201.98.213/WAM/doc/403175-Page-3.pdf?extension=.pdf&page=3&id=403175&contentType=application/pdf&location=VOLUME4
Ah, so it was March 2007, when Lutfur was in charge of Idea Stores…
…and it appears from that document that it was then a Housing Office and not a One Stop Shop, which is a bit different isn’t it?
Nomouse, do you agree that the One Stop Shop should be closed down?
Nomouse….that link doesn’t seem to work; could you please re-post it.
I’d like to know more about the context of that 2007 decision and how they proposed to relocate the One-Stop services at that time. I’d like to know whether it really is relevant to the current choice. A lot has happened in five years, such as the credit crunch, recessions, rising unemployment, increased demand for One-Stop services (and a realisation that the Idea Store Strategy was, what Iain Sinclair would describe in not exactly praiseworthy tones, a ‘Grand Project’).
And when in 2007 was this proposal developed? Until May 2007, Lutfur was in the cabinet…as the lead member for culture (and Idea Stores).
Rushmead is not my local One Stop Shop so I don’t know what happened; looking about it though it appears that the Housing Office was revamped in 2009 to become a One Stop Shop. That wouldn’t stop it having another revamp though as Watney Market is getting a combined One Stop Shop and IDEA Store, isn’t it? (Again, not my local.)
I’m not clear as to what is happening to Rushmead, that’s all …is it to be sold off after closure, or retained by LBTH and converted to an IDEA Store (even one incorporating a One Stop shop)?
And if you are asking, no, I wouldn’t want an IDEA Store in Bethnal Green as last time that meant BG Library was going to be sacrificed – as Whitechapel Library was and Bancroft was again put up for disposal…a ‘Grand Project’ ?!
Ted
It’s a housing office AND a One Stop Shop
usual sneering views with racial undertones from James and his Labour pals. Not surprising that TH Labour Party have managed to alienate so many Bengalis.
Last resort of a scoundrel who has no real answer or argument is to use either the “R” or the “IP” word
Great article – so is it possible to turn up to any Council meeting?
yes.
Ted/Graham Taylor
Apologies – Rushmead was both a Housing Office AND a One Stop Shop in 2007. A better map by architects for THCH in the 2007 application, for this part of Site 5, omitted in the transfer for the provision of an IDEA Store, shows it as a ONE STOP SHOP:
http://planreg.towerhamlets.gov.uk/WAM/doc/Other-405723.pdf?extension=.pdf&id=405723&appid=&location=VOLUME4&contentType=application/pdf&pageCount=1
And it still is. In 2012. And we’re gonna keep it that way.
Good luck with that. They have had the Rushmead/Tesco site earmarked for an IDEA Store for 5 years now. Perhaps you’ll get an “integrated One Stop Shop” within an IDEA Store – as at the new Watney Market IDEA Store.
That ‘freed up’ Cheviot House for sale….and you have a nice library to sell, or surrender to some community interest group. And on and on with the IDEA Store ‘Strategy’.
@ Graham
‘keep it that way’. That is very reassuring knowing you are responsible for NOT KEEPING IT (the publicly funded Bethnal Green Tech, now an academy) THAT WAY!
Ps: Most of the parents of your Academy dont even need Rushmead office as they come from Hackney.
The Sutton Street site has now been vacated and has a “For Sale” sign up already.
Keep a close eye on who buys the site and how much it goes for. It has a listed façade and comes with a large bit of open land that was a parking lot.
Has Cheviot House been put up for sale yet? That is a scandal. Incredible building and will no doubt go to one of LBTH’s preferred partners at some knockdown price. And yield peanuts for the Watney Market IDEA Store it has been sacrificed for.
(Expect Sutton Street will suffer same fate and go to one of the planners’ preferred partners who will build on that car park. Not part of the IDEA Store sell-off – sorry ‘Strategy’ – though is it?)
I don’t understand the issue with Ms Fisher, Graham. Loads of TH Labour Party members support Lutfur Rahman – at least 433 of them, for a start.
What’s your beef?
http://www.economist.com/node/21543528?fb_ref=activity
James Frankcom mentions Commander John Ludgate. The antics of TH councillors at full council meetings are not the only thing leaving him ashen-faced, when the “Trinity Square Gardens Project/TSG Project”, has caused far more public embarrassment, especially during the City Status bid (Shuma refers to this bid above.)
The Trinity Square Memorial Gardens party venue fiasco went very public, rightfully so, and you covered it here too Ted. This was incredibly embarrassing to residents and the Queen’s representative – and a sickening proposal and scandalous waste of money by Tower Hamlets officers. Have you heard of this shady Trinity Square Gardens Project, Ted? This is what Cllr Peter Golds found out at last full council:
So TH council officers twice visited “the site” (the Sea of Remembrance Lawn?) for the party marquee and had two further meetings at unspecified locations. That explains why your FOI into hospitality from Moving Venue enjoyed by Stephen Halsey and his Arts and Events Team didn’t get a result, Ted. The officers did all the ‘negotiating’ with Moving Venue on our money…but wouldn’t that be ‘expenses’?
Cmdr John Ludgate DL, Tower Hamlets RD RNR was a Patron of the Merchant Navy Day Commemorative Service and Reunion in 2009. Perhaps he is still a Patron. Perhaps he was at this full council meeting to hear further on the “TSG Project”.
Perhaps you should update us with another post on this, Ted?
Selina’s been jailed
Is she actually in Holloway Prison now?
WRT Shelina Akhtar – I believe those in elected positions should receive an additional 6 month sentence when found guilty of a criminal offence. They are in positions of responsibility, and are supposed to be role models to society. It is disgusting to think so many of our politicians and councillors are corrupt thieves.