Libraries or logos?

One of the first lessons I was given in civic finance was that when times get hard it is libraries, community centers, dial-a-ride and services like that which are targeted for the first cuts. These guarantee front page news and interviews with the poor, downtrodden and disadvantaged people who will be worst affected. The same level of public concern would not be generated by slashing the printer cartridge budget or moving down to 70gsm paper from 110gsm. It would hardly be front page news if heartless government was forcing Council to use thinner paper and only print in black and white.

Targeting high profile services over backroom savings also means that should the Mayor manage to “find” the money to keep the services open then this generates more headlines about how caring and sensitive he is and how hard he is working for the town. It is unlikely that the public would applaud the Mayor’s hard work in re-instating full colour printing in the civic centre!

How times have changed, just two years ago a "working group" spent months “refreshing the corporate image” of Hartlepool Council by adding a new wave under the logo. How much did all that cost and how long would it have kept a library open? Of course in those days money was no object and those in power thought the good times would continue for ever. Unfortunately the money is now all gone and the bills are coming in and it is the people of Hartlepool who have to pay them!

Politics is a dirty game!

I have been galvanised into action for my first blog post of 2011. My good friend and former council colleague Geoff Lilley called me yesterday to ask for my advise before he surrendered himself to the local police to face allegations of "cyber bullying" I told him to "Say nothing without a Solicitor present"

The Hartlepool Mail briefly covered the story here

Geoff had also been told to bring his laptop computer with him, I recommended he didn't hand it over without a warrant! His wife was told the Police just wanted a "quick look at it" and that if he brought it in then they wouldn't need to keep it. However, if the Police had to get a warrant then the lap top would need to go away and he might not get it back for months. He therefore handed it over, guess what? The police have kept it and he might not get it back for months!

So I have written to the local rag, whether they publish or not I will wait and see.....


Dear Editor,
Politics is a dirty game! The Labour tactic of standing a candidate called John Marshall in St.Hilda ward last year illustrated that. However, it got even dirtier this week when Councillor Geoff Lilley was arrested and held in custody for several hours over alleged “cyber bullying”

Some may speculate Geoff’s real crime is being an Independent Councillor in a town where the Con-Dems and Labour feel only they are entitled to sit in the Council Chamber? While I was a Councillor I was subject to numerous personal attacks on my character and integrity, all dismissed as “normal cut and thrust of local politics” However, when a complaint was about me I was hauled before the Council’s standards board and ordered to apologize. The Lib/Lab/Con Councilors on the Standards board were ready to tar and feather me and drum me out of the council. I appealed my treatment to the Standards Board for England who reviewed my case and totally exonerated me, saying my remarks were in the public interest and intended to promote debate.

Interestingly Councilor Lilley made a complaint to the Council Standards Board a year ago regarding lack of impartiality from Council Chairman Carl Richardson. I’m almost certain that no action has yet been taken to even investigate this complaint. Of course Councillor Richardson sits on the Cleveland Police Authority and is the former spouse of the Labour Councillor whose complaint lead to the arrest of Councillor Lilley. Nothing should be read into these facts of course!

Stephen Allison
Former UKIP Councillor St.Hilda Ward

Further arrests are apparently expected. The police task force will be assembling to swoop down and round up the rest of the desperate gang of internet villains. Kipperdipp, Caturine, Hier Hunter and several others can apparently expect the dawn raid "knock on the door" at any time! So be braced for the potential news that the Vice Chairman of the UK Independence Party is "helping police with their enquiries"

I'm too busy updating my Facebook status to get any work done!

I go online most days. How anyone survives without e-mail is a mystery to me! I do research look up information, events or activities. I can’t remember the last time I went to the cinema, theater or out for a meal without checking times and reviews and often booking on-line before I leave home.

However, I know how addictive aimlessly cruising the information super highway can be. Facebook, Blogging, E-bay, Discussion boards, etc all take up hours and hours without even noticing how much time is passing. So, I always try to be aware of how much time I waste. Wasted time is easy for me to measure; it’s time I’m not doing anything productive; it’s time when I’m not generating income. As a self employed person I get paid for what I produce and not just for turning up and sitting at a desk. No-one pays me for what I look like I’m doing. I get paid for achievements, not just looking busy.

I was therefore interested by reports of a “secret” audit of internet use at Waverley Council. This revealed Facebook was the most popular site visited by Council employees during working hours! Not far behind were E-bay and a gaming website. One unnamed worker averaged 90 hours a month on the internet!

Waverley Council now hope to save £100,000’s by restricting inappropriate website access from Council owned computers. I wonder what savings a similar “audit” at Hartlepool Council would produce? Staff on Facebook or close a Library? What would you chose?

£2 Million Pounds at risk of being lost!

Hartlepool Borough Council, with funding from the Environment Agency, is carrying out a study to develop a scheme to improve the existing coastal protection provided by the Town Wall. The Town Wall provides protection from coastal erosion and coastal flooding to the highway, residential and business properties behind the wall, but is itself at risk of significant damage due to coastal erosion.

The first stage of the study was to determine the existing condition of the wall, and the ability of the wall to withstand future storms. The results of this first stage of the study were presented in a public consultation event held in the Borough Hall in July 2009.

The second stage of the study looked at a range of options to deal with the risk of flooding and coastal erosion at the Town Wall. Each option was evaluated on the basis of the storm protection provided, the environmental (including historic nature of the wall) and visual impacts and cost. As a result of this option appraisal process a preferred option was then selected.

A consultation event was held on 24th August 2010 in the Borough Hall to provide local residents and other interested parties with information regarding how the preferred option for the scheme was selected and to obtain feedback from local residents with regard to the acceptability of the preferred solution.

Over 200 invitations to the consultation event were sent to interested parties by post, and 300 invitations were distributed by hand to local residents in the area considered to be at risk from flooding in the future. These invitations were supported by press releases and public notices.

Only twenty-five members of the public attended the consultation event. Those attending were asked to complete feedback forms to enable Hartlepool Borough Council to gauge the level of support for the proposed solution, and seventeen forms were returned. Of the seventeen members of the public who returned the forms, eight were broadly in favour of the preferred solution, while nine were not in favour of the preferred solution.

A description of the proposed solution and timetable for future events is attached for your information. This solution was selected as the most advantageous scheme and has the highest chance of receiving funding from the Government. There are other possible solutions but analysis has shown that it is extremely unlikely that they would be funded. Copies of the presentation and posters provided at the August 2010 consultation event can be downloaded from www.hartlepoolcoastal.com/townwallfeedback.aspx or viewed at Bryan Hanson House.

The benefits of the scheme are that erosion / deterioration of the wall is dealt with in a manner acceptable to English Heritage and the standard of flood protection to the properties is significantly increased. This will secure the future for residential and business properties in the current flood risk zone.

The limited feedback from the consultation event shows a fairly even balance between support for and opposition to, the proposed solution. Unless further support for the scheme can be demonstrated from the local community, there is a real danger that the £2m funds currently allocated to the construction works will be redistributed nationally and the opportunity to implement improvement works lost.

In order to determine whether further support for the scheme exists within the local community, the Council are therefore asking the residents of the Headland to complete the Feedback Form by the 31st December 2010.

The Town Wall is an important part of the history of Hartlepool, particularly the Headland area and plays a key role in the every day lives of the residents of the Headland. It is therefore essential that the Council are able to gauge local opinion with regard to any decisions relating to the future of the Town Wall and that local views are expressed and taken into consideration in the decision making process. We would therefore urge you to complete the Feedback Form.

Hartlepool Council Crisis Response

I read an interesting article in the Public Service News (http://www.guardianpublic.co.uk/crisis-management-training) this week that was based on the premise that crisis-situations appear to have become the norm in today’s society as opposed to the exception.

The list is fairly impressive, from mad cows, avian flu, fuel blockades, climate change, predatory paedophiles, feral hoodies, economic collapse, terrorist plots, volcanic eruptions, etc, etc. and it is impossible to avoid the conclusion that politicians and their officials are generally ill-equipped for dealing with the non-routine challenges, threats (and even opportunities) provided by crises.

Beyond the UK there are a host of centers of excellence, like the European crisis management agency and the Australian and New Zealand School of Government, that specialises in preparing politicians and officials from all levels of government for the challenges of governing under pressure.

Participants are placed in a central control room and fed snippets of information from a variety of sources using live video streams, email, faxes and a variety of other real-time tools. As the pressure builds and the information becomes more complex the group is instructed to prepare a number of briefings for the council leader. As the information coming into the control room changes so do the demands placed upon the teams.

Scenarios often include appearing in front of the media at very short notice in a full press conference in which they feel the full force of a media feeding frenzy. The most significant and valuable element of this exercise is the manner in which it provides a fairly raw but incredibly valuable insight into how crisis leadership demands a quite different set of skills and assumptions than are commonly honed in day-to-day 'normal' politics.

There's a paradox here the frequency of major emergencies is set to increase because public services are under greater pressures, but we still fail to train decision-makers in the art of governing in a crisis. There is a huge difference between 'coping behaviour' and 'crisis leadership' and it is exactly this fact that makes this kind of project so important.

I wonder how Hartlepool Council would perform in a major emergency? Something really significant like the pies running out at Victoria Park or Drummond getting stuck in the WC? I would have thought the first response weapon in Drummond’s Crisis kit is give Paul Walker another pay rise, no doubt followed by another council re-organisation and a press release urging calm but re-assuring the people of Hartlepool that the Tall Ships will be returning soon!

Snowfalls are now just a thing of the past!

As I sit in my office looking out of the window, watching the white flakes drifting higher and higher I am worried that I'm having some form of hallucination! The country can't be paralysed due to the weather because snowfalls are now just a thing of the past! I know that's a fact because I read it in the Independent nearly 10 years ago!

Snowfalls are now just a thing of the past was the title of an article by Charles Onians, published in the Independent on Monday, 20th March 2000. According to Mr Onians Britain's winter ends tomorrow (21st Match 2000) with further indications of a striking environmental change: snow is starting to disappear from our lives.

He then went on to write.........

Sledges, snowmen, snowballs and the excitement of waking to find that the stuff has settled outside are all a rapidly diminishing part of Britain's culture, as warmer winters - which scientists are attributing to global climate change - produce not only fewer white Christmases, but fewer white Januaries and Februaries.

The first two months of 2000 were virtually free of significant snowfall in much of lowland Britain, and December brought only moderate snowfall in the South-east. It is the continuation of a trend that has been increasingly visible in the past 15 years: in the south of England, for instance, from 1970 to 1995 snow and sleet fell for an average of 3.7 days, while from 1988 to 1995 the average was 0.7 days. London's last substantial snowfall was in February 1991.

Global warming, the heating of the atmosphere by increased amounts of industrial gases, is now accepted as a reality by the international community. Average temperatures in Britain were nearly 0.6°C higher in the Nineties than in 1960-90, and it is estimated that they will increase by 0.2C every decade over the coming century. Eight of the 10 hottest years on record occurred in the Nineties.

However, the warming is so far manifesting itself more in winters which are less cold than in much hotter summers. According to Dr David Viner, a senior research scientist at the climatic research unit (CRU) of the University of East Anglia,within a few years winter snowfall will become "a very rare and exciting event".

"Children just aren't going to know what snow is," he said.

The effects of snow-free winter in Britain are already becoming apparent. This year, for the first time ever, Hamleys, Britain's biggest toyshop, had no sledges on display in its Regent Street store. "It was a bit of a first," a spokesperson said.

Fen skating, once a popular sport on the fields of East Anglia, now takes place on indoor artificial rinks. Malcolm Robinson, of the Fenland Indoor Speed Skating Club in Peterborough, says they have not skated outside since 1997. "As a boy, I can remember being on ice most winters. Now it's few and far between," he said.

Michael Jeacock, a Cambridgeshire local historian, added that a generation was growing up "without experiencing one of the greatest joys and privileges of living in this part of the world - open-air skating".

Warmer winters have significant environmental and economic implications, and a wide range of research indicates that pests and plant diseases, usually killed back by sharp frosts, are likely to flourish. But very little research has been done on the cultural implications of climate change - into the possibility, for example, that our notion of Christmas might have to shift.

Professor Jarich Oosten, an anthropologist at the University of Leiden in the Netherlands, says that even if we no longer see snow, it will remain culturally important.

"We don't really have wolves in Europe any more, but they are still an important part of our culture and everyone knows what they look like," he said.

David Parker, at the Hadley Centre for Climate Prediction and Research in Berkshire, says ultimately, British children could have only virtual experience of snow. Via the internet, they might wonder at polar scenes - or eventually "feel" virtual cold.

Heavy snow will return occasionally, says Dr Viner, but when it does we will be unprepared. "We're really going to get caught out. Snow will probably cause chaos in 20 years time," he said.

The chances are certainly now stacked against the sortof heavy snowfall in cities that inspired Impressionist painters, such as Sisley, and the 19th century poet laureate Robert Bridges, who wrote in "London Snow" of it, "stealthily and perpetually settling and loosely lying".

Not any more, it seems.

http://www.independent.co.uk/environment/snowfalls-are-now-just-a-thing-of-the-past-724017.html

I wonder if he might just have been wrong?

Hartlepool State of the Borough Debate

I often say to people that you can tell how busy I am by the amount of blogging I do. When I'm busy the blog takes a back seat. So as you can tell by the month long absence from the bloggosphere I have been very, very busy recently. However I just had to make a comment about the forthcoming Civic Event in Hartlepool. Thursday sees the annual "State of the Borough Debate"

To use the word "debate" in anything connected with Hartlepool Council is totally erroneous. There is no way Mayor Drummond will engage in any form of "debate"

On Thursday Drummond will make a speech telling everyone who bothers to turn up what a fantastic place Hartlepool is, what a huge success the Tall Ships was, how lucky Hartlepool is to have such a great team of Officers running their town BUT hard times are ahead because the dastardly Tories and their poodles the Lib-Dems are going to take away the money Drummond has been spending like mad for the past few years. Drummond will then take a few questions from the floor and read out the answers he has previously prepared (or had prepared for him).

THIS IS NOT DEBATE.

Debate has proposition which is proposed and seconded and has people speaking for and against. There is rebuttal and summing up followed by a vote.

Mind you, there is no debate in the ordinary council meetings. The rules don't allow debate! There are a series of speeches and forgone conclusion in the Civic Chamber.

There is no chance for any rebuttal of points made and there is no summing up allowed against the motion, only the proposer is allowed to speak more than once (although it has been noted that under the Chairmanship of Cllr Richardson the "one speech per member" rule has sometimes been "one speech per member unless you are Labour then you can have another go if you like").

No-one who knows what the word means would recognise what goes on in the Hartlepool Council Chamber as "debate"

Gordon Brown goes on a visit to Israel

Gordon Brown goes on a visit to Israel. While he is on a tour of Jerusalem he suffers a heart attack and dies. The undertaker tells the British diplomats accompanying him, “You can have him shipped home for £5 million, or you can bury him here for £100.” The diplomats go into a corner and discuss for a minute. They come back to the undertaker and tell him they want Gordon shipped home.

The undertaker is puzzled and asks, “Why would you spend £5 million to ship him home, when it would be wonderful to be buried here, and you would only spend £100? With the money you save you could help pay off some of the deficit, help pay for the Olympic Games, or even help the elderly.”

The diplomats reply, “Long ago a man died here, was buried here, and three days later he rose from the dead. We just can’t take the risk.”

How private and NHS work differs!

My wife runs her own private chiropody practise in the Arches, Park Road, Hartlepool and she works a half day Saturdays,. This morning her first patient didn't turn up and so never one to waste a few idle minutes Sandra logged onto the internet and updated her Facebook status

Sandra Morag Allison is waiting 4 1st patient, 10mins late - a no-show methinks! :-( could have had extra sleep, not happy!

and this resulted in the following reply from one of the people she trained with.....

XXXX XXXX Interesting how private and NHS work differs! A no show first thing is my idea of the perfect start to the working day.... bring on the second cup of coffee!! Hope you're not working all day? :(

Says it all really!

Shame Councillor Brash wasn't "angry" earlier!

I was very interested to read that Councillor Brash was angry at the shortfall in the funding for the Tall Ships race and his demands that someone be accountable. Well in my opinion a fair portion of the blame should be laid squarely at Councillor Brash’s own door as leader of the Labour Group on Hartlepool Council.

While I was a Councillor for St.Hilda Ward I spoke out many times about the costs of the event and even specifically warned that it was folly to rely on the park and ride scheme to fund the Tall Ships. It was obvious to me that the event was going to end up considerably in the red and cost Hartlepool residents a great deal of money unless the project was very tightly controlled and monitored. I remember Councillor Brash having some fairly pointed things to say about my “doom mongering” at the time. It is a shame Councillor Brash refused to listen to what I was saying, preferring to go for party political point scoring rather than taking action to control the overspend. It's all very well being "angry" now it's too late to be of any use.

Hartlepool Councillors had years to question the way the Tall Ships event was being organized but they failed to do so. As almost a lone voice of caution I was told I was being pessimistic and talking Hartlepool down. I take no pleasure in being proved right about the spiralling costs of the event but I think it is wrong of Councillor Brash to now say he is angry about something he and Hartlepool Councillors, especially those who were on the Tall Ships Management Board, all failed to prevent.

Stephen Allison
(Former) Councillor St.Hilda Ward

Socialism, great, in Theory!

An economics class was discussing alternative economic models and how they worked. Several members of the class insisted that socialism was the only fair economic model and that it worked because no one would be poor and no one would be rich, a great equalizer.

The professor said, "OK, we will have an experiment in this class on socialism. All grades would be averaged and everyone would receive the same grade so no one would fail and no one would receive an A.

After the first test, the grades were averaged and everyone got a B.

The students who studied hard were upset and the students who studied little were happy.

As the second test rolled around, the students who studied little had studied even less and the ones who studied hard decided they wanted a free ride too so they studied little.

The second test average was a D! No one was happy.

When the 3rd test rolled around, the average was an F.

The scores never increased as bickering, blame and name-calling all resulted in hard feelings and no one would study for the benefit of anyone else.

All failed, to their great surprise, and the professor told them that socialism would also ultimately fail because when the reward is great, the effort to succeed is great but when government takes the reward away, no one will try or want to succeed.

Could not be any simpler than that.

A defeat for democracy

According to the BBC News the people of Stockton have decided against an elected Mayor.

They have chosen a leader and cabinet system which I actually think is even WORSE than having a directly elected mayor.

The people of Stockton will end up with someone with all the powers of an elected mayor and with the four year term of an elected mayor but whom they have no direct role in choosing. This puts power directly into the hands of the party groups. A victory for the political class and a defeat for democracy! Mind you, as only 19% bothered to vote then democracy is pretty much dead in Stockton anyway!

http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-england-tees-11295057

PS 13,445 opted for a council leader with a cabinet system, and 12,513 for a directly elected mayor with a cabinet. I wonder how many spoilt papers there were?

Which party is ukip closest to?

I have been following a very interesting debate on another message board about "What is UKIP" and which of the main parties is it closest too. The exchange has been spoilt somewhat by one idiot who seems to think insults are a substitute for reasoned debate. However that is a usual tactic of the losing side, if you can't win the argument just resort to accusing the other contributions of being racists!

Anyway, UKIP has its own policies and its own views. It is definitely noticeable that UKIP was ahead of the curve on many things. Nuclear Power for example which UKIP has supported for many years and which is now Labour and Tory Policy. Controlled immigration which UKIP also advocated for many years and which is now accepted by Labour, Lib-Dems and Tories, (they of course want controlled NONE EU Immigration but UKIP just want controlled immigration), and now the re-introduction of Technical Schools, which was also part of the UKIP pro-grammar school policy, has been advocated by the Tories. So it's difficult to pigeon hole UKIP as right/centre/left since UKIP has elements of them all. Basically UKIP want what's best for Britain and don't care whether that is left/right/centre ideas, there are no bad ideas, its putting them into practise that's the problem. The European Union wasn't a bad idea, it was a great idea as a free trade block, a "Common Market" as it was originally sold to the people of the UK, I am myself 100% behind that. However, what that common market has grown into is an example of a bad implementation of a good idea! The European Union is not what I signed up to when we went into the Common Market!

UKIP NEC

Thank you to all the UKIP members who voted for me for the NEC. My first meeting is on September 2nd. Full result will follow tomorrow, but here are the seven first places.


Steve Allison 2275
George Curtis 1849
Hugh Williams 1748
Jill Seymour 1696
Mick McGough 1604
Elizabeth Burton 1548
Julia Reid 1491

http://www.ukip.org/content/latest-news/1831-chairman-welcomes-new-nec-members

I love this Doctor!

I love this Doctor!

Q: Doctor, I've heard that cardiovascular exercise can prolong life. Is this true?
A: Your heart only good for so many beats, and that it...don't waste on exercise. Everything wear out eventually. Speeding up heart not make you live longer; it like saying you extend life of car by driving faster. Want to live longer? Take nap.

Q: Should I cut down on meat and eat more fruits and vegetables?
A: You must grasp logistical efficiency. What does cow eat? Hay and corn. And what are these? Vegetables. So steak is nothing more than efficient mechanism of delivering vegetables to your system. Need grain? Eat chicken. Beef also good source of field grass (green leafy vegetable). And pork chop can give you 100% of recommended daily allowance of vegetable product.

Q: Should I reduce my alcohol intake?
A: No, not at all Wine made from fruit. Brandy is distilled wine, that mean they take water out of fruity bit so you get even more of goodness that way. Beer also made of grain. Bottom up!

Q: How can I calculate my body/fat ratio?
A: Well, if you have body and you have fat, your ratio one to one. If you have two bodies, your ratio two to one, etc.

Q: What are some of the advantages of participating in a regular exercise program?
A: Can't think of single one, sorry. My philosophy is: No pain...good!

Q: Aren't fried foods bad for you?
A: YOU NOT LISTENING! Food are fried these day in vegetable oil. In fact, they permeated by it. How could getting more vegetable be bad for you?!?

Q: Will sit-ups help prevent me from getting a little soft around the middle?
A: Definitely not! When you exercise muscle, it get bigger. You should only be doing sit-up if you want bigger stomach.

Q: Is chocolate bad for me?
A: Are you crazy?!? HEL-LO-O!! Cocoa bean! Another vegetable! It best feel good food around!

Q: Is swimming good for your figure?
A: If swimming good for your figure, explain whale to me..

Q: Is getting in shape important for my lifestyle?
A: Hey! 'Round' a shape!


Well, I hope this has cleared up any misconceptions you may have had about food and diets.

And remember:

Life should NOT be a journey to the grave with the intention of arriving safely in an attractive and well-preserved body, but rather to skid in sideways - Chardonnay in one hand - chocolate in the other - body thoroughly used up, totally worn out and screaming "WOO-HOO, what a ride!!"

AND.....

For those of you who watch what you eat, here's the final word on nutrition and health. It's a relief to know the truth after all those conflicting nutritional studies.

1. The Japanese eat very little fat
and suffer fewer heart attacks than we do.

2. The Mexicans eat a lot of fat
and suffer fewer heart attacks than we do.

3. The Chinese drink very little red wine
and suffer fewer heart attacks than we do.

4. The Italians drink a lot of red wine
and suffer fewer heart attacks than we do. And:

5. The Germans drink a lot of beer and eat lots of sausages and fats
and suffer fewer heart attacks than we do.

CONCLUSION:

Eat and drink what you like.
Speaking English is apparently what kills you.

Judge people as people

Some comment are being made on the UKIP Members Forum about the age of the NEC Candidates and the need for a “younger” NEC. The youngest candidate is 40 and the oldest 73 (although two of the lady candidates have not given their ages, preferring to say OAP and Retired) giving an average age of 57. So as a mere 50 year old there are 9 candidates younger than me, 1 the same age and 26 older than me.

Quite frankly the sort of ageist comments I as reading on the UKIP Members Forum make me ashamed to be a member! If the comments were based on race or sex then there would be uproar! Why is it acceptable to dismiss someone on the grounds of their Age but not race or sex!

I know a few 40 year olds who are ready for their pipe and slippers and some 80 year olds who could give people 30 years younger a run for their money! My father for example was born in 1932 so that obviously make him well past it. If anyone would care to look at my Facebook page on my “Ground Source Heat Pump Project” you could see photographs of him driving a bulldozer! Hardly ready for his box yet!

I just did a quick calculation on the average length of UKIP Membership and it comes out at just over 6 years. The shortest membership before standing for the NEC is less than 6 months and the four of the candidates have been UKIP Members over 15 years. I come in right on the average, just over 6 years. On this comparison there are 20 candidates who joined the party after me, 2 at the same time and 14 with longer service than me! So does that mean anything? Looking at age against length of membership shows no significant correlation. The candidate who joined less than 6 months ago is only 54 and there are candidates in their 40’s and 50’s who have been members more than 10 years.

Of course there is a definite need for new blood and fresh ideas, but the benefits of experience shouldn’t be ignored. I remember when I was Head Of Elections I was constantly bombarded with helpful suggestions from new members, all painfully keen and determined to get their country back. Balancing this energy and determination without letting them slam head first into a reality check was always difficult. The standard idea was usually to do with newspaper advertising! “Lets take out full page adds in all the National Newspapers! That will let people know we are here!” Why did they assume no-one in UKIP had ever thought of that? I used to say “Great Idea let’s do it. I know some very good designers and copy writers who could put some ideas together. The cost for a full page in The Times is about £25,000. Will you give me the cheque now or should I just get their advertising people to invoice you?”

The other “idea” was to get on the TV more! Totally brilliant, why hadn’t anyone thought of that before! It’s so simple. The reality there is that you get on the TV through years of hard work, networking, and building relationships. You don’t get on by ringing the producer of Question Time and shouting at them! Which was what some new members have actually done and which has set back years of small gains in a few minutes! All political parties, pressure groups, Z list Celebrities and people looking for publicity for their cause want to be on the TV! You have to make yourself attractive to them so that they come and ask you to be on their program, you can’t do that by calling them names and reporting them to their bosses for bias when they don’t agree with you!

Anyway, that’s off the point. Regardless of how long someone has been a member it is patronizing in the extreme to dismiss people on the basis of their age. It is just as well I’m banned from the Members Forum for the duration of the NEC Election because I would really be letting rip! People who can be so casually ageist make me sick. They are the sort of pathetic, small minded and closed minded, bigots that UKIP can do without. Judge people as people, not by some meaningless criteria like their date of birth!

Get some help! Please

I had a good chuckle today when a “newsletter” came through my door supposedly giving the real story of me and my time as a Councillor for St.Hilda Ward and urging people not to vote for me. Didn't the author realise the elections were months ago? Where had they been since May?

As the elections were several weeks ago; the document’s contents are so outrageous; its claims so laughable; and its "facts" so totally wrong I did consider it might be a very bad (but quite costly to print I would think) joke. However, when I read it a bit closer I realized the anonymous publication is so filled with bitterness and bile that I really think the author has some sort of mental heath problem. I did wonder why the document wasn't written in crayon, after all anything sharp can be dangerous in the hands of people who write rubbish like this!

I don’t normally respond to anonymous attacks, if someone hasn’t got the balls to put their name on this sort of tripe then they are not worth bothering with, BUT, in this case I am so concerned that the author is seriously deranged that I am worried about their state of mind and I must respond by urging them to seek professional help immediately!

The author obviously no longer operates on the same time line as the rest of us, hence the references to an election several weeks ago, and anyone carrying around such a twisted world view, as evidenced by the opinions in the document, is either not taking their medication or needs to review the dose they are on. They are seriously in danger of losing touch with any slight vestige of reality that they may still able to recognise.

Please don’t just let your bitterness continue to twist your soul and eat you away. You are obviously a big fan of the late Pat Price but that can be addressed by counselling and therapy. You should contact your doctor as soon as you can!

Don't ignore the signs! You need help!

UKIP Leadership and Smoking in public places!

There is a debate currently under way on the UKIP Members Forum regarding the future leadership of UKIP. As a candidate for the NEC I am banned from contributing until after the elections, (a stupid decision in my opinion that shows UKIP to be still in denial about the internet) so even though in several postings I am being mentioned by name I cannot respond! Frank exchange of views? What’s that?

A couple of the posters are definitely not fans of mine and I suppose that by now I should know it’s a waste of time trying to argue with people who have made up their minds. From a posting of over 700 words one person has homed in on the 15 words that deal with his obsession! He's ignored everything else I've said! So, for avoidance of any doubt on my position I will state very clearly my views on smoking:

I think smoking is a nasty habit, but if people want to do it in the privacy of their own homes then that is their choice. However, I don’t want to be made to breathe in their second hand smoke so in my opinion smoking should be banned in any public place, including walking down the street.

According to my fan on the forum;

“this draconian move would totally alienate us from working class voters!”

Quite interesting assumptions here that it’s only working class people who smoke? Actually the person who posted that does appear from some of his other postings to be a bit of a class warrior and it wouldn’t surprise me if somewhere in his personal baggage was a huge chip on the shoulder. There we are, now I’m making assumptions on some flimsy evidence!

Another poster waded in with;

”If he wants to ban smoking in the street then forget him. Will end up just portrayed as another fruit bat from the fruit bat party. We need a leader who knows what the public want, not just push their own crazy ideas.”

He is also making assumptions. How does he know the public want to smoke in the streets? Research I’ve seen shows that people DON’T want smoking in the streets. Many people I speak to think UKIP is the fruit bat party because of its support for smokers! Of course this is one of those no-win situations. The smokers are fighting to protect their human rights to smoke and the anti-smokers fighting for their human rights not to breathe in polluted air.

The fruit bat comment is I think either supposed to be funny or just an insult? What’s wrong with fruit bats anyway?

I haven’t been able to engage in open debate on these points, due to the forum posting ban, but I wonder what the position of these individuals is about the Burka? Should it be banned in public places? Or is it just the “right” to smoke that should be enshrined in civic liberties?

The whole thread is actually pointless because I have no desire to become Leader of UKIP.

A more thankless task I couldn’t imagine! Even if I did want the job I couldn’t afford it. The post is unpaid and you have to cover your own expenses. Anyone without access to a considerable private income, a very good pension or an MEP’s salary and allowances would find it impossible to do the job. I consider myself to be reasonably comfortably off, due to my own hard work, some good investment decisions over the past 20 years (and a wife who has her own business!), but I’m not in the income bracket that allows me to become leader of UKIP, thank goodness!

Reduce the number of councillors

I would like to support Stuart Drummond’s call for a reduction in the number of Councillors. It is high time that some useless, dead wood was cut in the civic centre.

There are 48 Councillors and just reducing this number to 47 could save almost £100,000 a year. How could this comparatively huge saving be achieved from only a reduction of one councillor? Well remember the Mayor is also a Councillor! His basic allowance is the equivalent of over a dozen ordinary Councillors.

Getting rid of 12 ordinary Councillors, who represent the individual wards and town residents, is one option. Getting rid of one Mayor is another. Both will save about the same amount of money.

Of course Stuart is very keen to reduce OTHER councillors but not so keen to see himself get the chop! However I suppose that’s life. When a business is in trouble you rarely hear a highly paid Manager explaining that times are hard so his job is under threat, oh no, its always a dozen minimum wage workers from the shop floor that have to go so the manager can stay!

This is an unusual paragraph

This is an unusual paragraph. I'm curious as to just how quickly you can find out what is so unusual about it. It looks so ordinary and plain that you would think nothing was wrong with it.. In fact, nothing is wrong with it! It is highly unusual though. Study it and think about it, but you still may not find anything odd... But if you Work at it a bit, you might find out.. Try to do so without any coaching!