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| £ 1 MILLION BONFIRE OF THE VANITIES |
When criticised about the vast £25 million cost of Exhibition Rd Cllr Nick Paget-Brown excused it on the grounds it was planned and agreed before the financial meltdown.
This
Council’s lawless spending is only paralleled by some of the more extreme Labour
and idiotically run Lib Dem councils….
So you would
think, having faced an onslaught of criticism over this utter waste of £25 million there would be some trepidation about adding insult to injury? Not a bit.
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| A WELL ATTENDED 'EVENT' FUNDED BY THE MILLION POUNDS |
A Freedom of
Information Act request reveals the Council spent £1 million on a series of
‘events’, with Exhibition Rd as the centrepiece, during the Olympics.
The total
cost breaks down as £771,000 with another £132,000 coming from an unspecified
grant….source unknown…..
The Council
projected that between 10-15,000 visitors a day would traipse up down the oil
splattered road looking at the various third rate ‘manifestations’.
The projection was 100% out!
The projection was 100% out!
Instead of the 90,000-135,000 visitors projected only 60,000 turned up:in other words each visitor was subsidised by the RBK&C taxpayer to the tune of £17 per visitor
There are
soup kitchens operating in the Royal Borough manned by Christian, Muslim,
Jewish and Sikh faith groups. They say they are struggling to keep the poor fed.
One wonders how these groups feel about a
Council, seemingly existing in a parallel universe, wasting a million pounds on a total farce.
As a Conservative I feel deeply embarrassed.
Conservatives should feel shame: this is not how we are
ReplyDeleteThey are completely out of touch with reality, whoever was involved in this should resign or be sacked. It is unacceptable.
ReplyDeleteI hope Dame and readers that you are all keeping a Chronology of the disasters financial and otherwise that are at the feet of these councillors and officers, what is the total waste so far this year?
In the real world the leader would take responsibility........ where is he now?
At least that spendthrift Tot Brill is leaving at last, as announced at the last Council meeting. The 'tributes' were interesting to say the least. Lots of jokey comments about her hair, little of any substance whatever. Lots of talk about 'damned with faint praise' at the dinner afterwards.
ReplyDeleteIt would be funny if she hadn't been responsible for so much waste. While religious groups are busy with soup kitchens and food banks in the Royal Borough, Nick 'Marie Antoinette' Paget-Brown is looking for more money-burning projects.
WHO WILL STOP HIM?
There is something very Home Counties nouveau riche about Pooter Cockell. From his low grade career as 'commodity trader' to his now closed down, faux public school, Frensham Heights
ReplyDeleteHis obsession about being driven around in a new Bentley and his obsession with a peerage says much about his character. So spending huge amounts of other peoples' money on vulgarities like Exhibition Rd and Holland Parke School are par for the course. He and Moylan make a good team: they are both as common as muck
The Leader of the K&C Council, Sir Merrick Cockell should be deeply ashamed that he is failing his residents, failing his Party and failing his Office by continuing to splurge council tax on his ego driven vanity projects. It is a scandal that a democratic system, controlled by Conservatives in Kensington Town hall, is failing to get rid of this tin pot Dictator. The Tory Councillors in turn are failing their residents, failing their Party and failing in their duty
ReplyDeleteMost organisations have a "special one" who is of no practical use to owners, customers and fellow workers. But there are private reasons why it is more convenient to find work for them. These people are usually easy to spot in organisations. Sometimes their "job" is a cover for something else. Perhaps a spy. Sometimes it is carrying a fellow traveler. Perhaps a Mason. But whatever it is,it is good news that Ms Brill has moved on
ReplyDeleteTot Brill is a spook? Give us a break
DeleteTot Brill started her career making puppets....so possibly we can assume she is 'Mr Myers's puppet.' Maybe she taught him tennis lessons??????
Delete£1 million is chicken feed in the overall budget of the Royal Borough. It does not even show up in the "rounding". A tiny amount to spend in celebration of the Great Olympics and the jubilee of our Sovereign, Elizabeth Regina. And what better setting could there be than historic Exhibition Road? The kill joys on here should crawl back into their holes
ReplyDeleteCouncillor Palmer....The Dame understands you have never been gainfully employed. How wise
ReplyDeletethe awful Sugar was to have booted you off his show....he clearly saw you for the total business idiot you are! And what are all these stories of Australian phone calls? We need to be told....
The Council and its failure of a leader, likes to pretend it is a 'business'. Have you ever come across a business that splurges £1 million on a failure such as this then airily proclaims to shareholders, 'it is chicken feed and just a bit if rounding up.' To bring Her Majesty into your attempt to rationalise this vulgar waste is contemptible: The Queen is well known to set her face against show off extravagance. She would be horrified to know that a sad failure like you, Cllr Palmer, dared to involve her in your silly attempt to justify the unjustifiable.
Anonymous at 19.42 is the kind of Tory that no one needs and wants to know. Out of touch, out of sorts and out of fashion. The Hornton Street Tories need to get their act together and the Local Party Chairman needs to do some mentoring. A change of style is urgently reqired
ReplyDeleteTime for "New Tories"?
DeleteIt is unfair to attack Tot Brill on this one. She was doing what she was told to do and tipped in with her usual energy and enthusiasm. The idea was hatched by Cockell and willing Cllr Paget-Brown quickly created a £1 million budget to please his master.
ReplyDeleteTot Brill was effectively made redundant by the Tri Borough reorganisation and the poor woman has been a mass of stress for the last 18 months clinging on to her hefty salary and pension. Any crazy scheme that is thrown her way (like privatising Holland Park Opera or Olympic parties in Exhibition Road)is a life saver. And she goes for it. Pooter knows how to work the system
It is not always easy for us to do what we are told
ReplyDeleteThe truth is that all the 'senior' tories waiting to take over from the useless Cockell sat by in Cabinet whilst this disgraceful waste of money was approved and did nothing, either because they were too stupid or too concerned about endangering their huge 'special responsibility allowances'.
ReplyDeleteCockell has surrounded himself with the equally pathetic 'Cabinet' who just mutter 'yes good idea Leader' on the occasional times he visits the Rotten Borough when his other little earners give the time to do so.
It is unfortunate that the K&C Cabinet is stuffed with self serving wimps intent on keeping their SRA's. They have approved a terrible list of disastrous projects forced on them by the ego mad Cockell. Chelsea Care, Exhibition Road, Holland Park School, WEDGE, Holland Park Opera, opera at Richmond Theater, interest free loans to property developers..... The list goes on.
DeleteThe Cabinet are too dim to understand what they are getting into and advice from seasoned businessmen that these private sector ventures and economic decisions are crap, all get brushed aside.
And when Pooter is confronted with the list of economic failures he cries "Nothing to do with me. It was a Cabinet decision". Dreadful. Shades of "I forget the name of the person that I took to dinner at the Four Season Restaurant in New York on a Saturday night and charged up to tax payers"
Vermin
If Cllr Victoria Borwick had been in the Cabinet none of this would have happened. Good common sense would have spoken out and shamed her fellow Cabinet members. Cllr Cockell would have been forced to think again. A different style would have been established for taking decisions about tax payers hard earned cash
DeleteMs Leakey ..... I do not think so
DeleteOh do grow up Cllr Palmer...go and get a proper job. Even Conservative cllrs think you are slightly mad.
DeleteOwl, Tot Brill was made redundant because she WAS redundant. We didn't need her. Rather than peeling her off as with other senior officers, she was kept on at a vastly inflated salary and made up title to boost her final pension payment and take the wrap for Marie-Antoinette Paget-Brown's fantasy failures.
ReplyDeleteI could handle that kind of stress.
The redundancy and pension packages given to senior officers who left to get away for the awful tri-borough initiative have been extremely generous and not one of them will suffer financial stress as a consequence; quite the opposite in fact, as they have also received huge lump sums that would not have been paid in the normal course of events.
ReplyDeleteTot leaves K&C as a rich woman. But it was all very stressful for her. And the poor thing was forced to see out her time with some real fag end projects. Dealt a terrible blow to her self esteem
Delete