A READER REFLECTS UPON A TYRANT

One who knows writes....

Where does one start? 
For the historical background, one must go back to an exceptionally bright boy of humble origins. 
Oxford University and a golden future awaited. 
A exceptionally short career in the Foreign Office followed(please, let what happened in SA stay in SA, the Dame) 
A very dark cloud indeed arose in the heavens, the details of which cannot be discussed here. 
Years of comparative obscurity followed. 
Then for many years Moylan was deputy leader of RBKC and cabinet member for planning. 
In those days K & C was knee deep in brown envelopes, although no one has ever suggested he was aware of them. Moylan was the Dep Leader, Merrick Cockell's backbone. Tough as nails and a bully to everyone in sight. 
Cockell's star eventually faded as did Moylan's. 
He was sent to Boris to deal with and ended up designing the ill-starred airport in the Thames estuary. 
This was followed by another job: organising the legacy of the Olympic Park. However, it seems his work colleagues failed to appreciate his genius and he left after only 2 weeks. Now Moylan's moment has come at last. A few well-timed television and radio interviews. Performances of jaw-dropping hypocrisy, regretting the need for NPB to resign. Unfortunately, it seems the Government demanded NPB's resignation this morning. 
So Moylan's brilliant acting was rather wasted. 
Never mind. He's determined to get his hands on Horton Street, so he can resume that favourite pastime: bullying of colleagues, officers and residents etc....oh, and collect a much needed £75k a year plus expenses.

LET RESIDENTS CHOOSE

A reader comments....
"It's time for the Government to immediately install Commissioners to run RBKC. It's clearly beyond running itself. No Leader or Deputy Leader and no Chief Executive. It's not a time for the usual RBKC round of musical chairs, where one peculiar specimen of manhood changes places with another. Horton Street's stench of rottenness has at last exploded into the street. Talking of rotten. OMG Moylan is now on Channel 4 doing his sanctimonious best to ensure takes over the Council. He should get an Oscar. Moylan as Leader of the Rotten Borough would be the worst possible result for both the survivors of Grenfell and for the rest of us. He's the ultimate self-serving creep. Anyone but Moylan."


Residents of Kensington & Chelsea...you have endured enough.

The council tax paying resident should be sending a strong message about who they want to repair the self-inflicted damage.

Every past Cabinet member bears collective responsibility and that includes Cllr Moylan who, for many years, was a powerful force in the Council and Cabinet.

His crocodile tears fool no one. 

He hold residents in complete contempt. As he has so often said, " we know best'.

Unless the Council is put into Special Measures you, the resident, will have little opportunity to influence how the council reforms itself.

This is the moment for residents to look at the composition of the Majority Group and decide who is the best of the bunch.

The names being bandied about are anathema to those with any intelligence.

Even the utterly useless Elizabeth Campbell is putting herself forward, despite being 100% responsible for the children's transport fiasco! 

Is she really someone residents want?

This Council needs a leader who can work successfully with the minority parties and represent all residents.

Daniel Moylan despises residents and has views on the EU that make Nigel Farage seem like a Europhile. 

Is he really the right man to man to restore the confidence of residents? 

Most unlikely...

AIRHEAD CAMPBELL

Above and beyond a leader of probity this council needs a first class Chief Executive. It also needs to revert to the Committee System: the Cabinet system is a disaster.

So come on, dear Hornet readers...who do you want to lead our council?

MOYLAN: A CLEAR AND PRESENT DANGER TO RBK&C

Now that Nick Paget-Brown has stepped down the prospect of Daniel Moylan leading RBK&C becomes the stuff of nightmares.

SCHOOLYARD BULLY

MOYLAN SUPPORTER: MAD CLLR PALMER

With no job in hand and none on the horizon, Moylan has plenty of time to employ his troublemaking skills.

There was a very good reason why Moylan failed so spectacularly in his last attempt to gain the support of colleagues. It was down to his reputation as a bully boy.

Do bullies make great leaders? Very rarely, and, at a time like this, a divisive character like Moylan would do even greater damage to the reputation of the council.

As far as colleagues and officers are concerned Moylan is a deeply unpleasant bully.

So who are his supporters in his bid for the £75,000 a year leadership role?

He has just three... his mad fellow councillor, Matthew Palmer; Cllr Julie Mills who managed to screw up the election campaign and Sam Mackover.

Conservative councillors....listen to the Dame. 

If you back Daniel Moylan to replace Nick Paget-Brown you will not just be shooting yourselves in the foot: you will be shooting yourselves in the head.

You will bring the Council ever closer to being put into Special Measures.

If Moylan is income short tell him to get a job in the private sector....if he can!

BOROUGH COMMANDERS

Met Commissioner Cressida Dick really needs to think carefully about moving talented officers from the Borough Commander role before they even have time to get their feet under the desk.
A recent example is that of Borough Commander Tariq Sarwar.

SARWAR AT COMMUNITY EVENT

Tariq was, and is, a highly regarded and popular commander and respected by officers-unlike one or two of his predecessors who shall remain nameless.



This constant shuffling around of senior police officers is neither good for residents or the force in general.

COUNCIL SPOKESMAN SAYS JOURNO'S START PUNCH-UPS!

A HACK

Newgate are a highly respected and very expensive corporate and financial public relations consultancy so is their client listening to them?

To describe 'gentlemen and ladies of the press' as potential trouble makers seems a good start to winning friends and influencing people! LINK TO ARTICLE and link to the aborted meeting LINK

It's difficult to believe a smooth operator from Newgate would make such a claim so it must have been one of hopeless in-house people.

QUIET DOWN, CLLR MOYLAN

The Dame is not Councillor Daniel Moylan's spiritual adviser: she leaves that to other, more stalwart, types.

However, she reminds him of the wickedness of envy....

She understands that Danny has been bitching-to anyone who will listen-of his fury about Cllr Faulks and her elevation to the Cabinet.

Daniel, please stop. It's most unedifying. 
It was decided, for the very best of reasons, that your talents were best confined to matters architectural.
Stick to your last and let the youngsters have a chance.

Old folk, like you and the dear old Dame, need to stand aside for the next generation.

TITANIC MISTAKE

Dear Dame 

You could not make it up as ex Cllr Phelps was wont to say when not circulating salaciously captioned images of young boys on the RBKC server....until you, dear Dame, ended his council career.

Nick Paget-Brown's reaction to the fire is to reshuffle the Cabinet.

The utterly useless Cllr 'Silly Lizzy' Campbell has gone off on a sabbatical helping her hubby organise the America's Cup. 

Will she still be claiming her £40k a year allowance?

Cllr Wills takes over responsibility for Families and Children( one of the few good members)

Catherine Faulks joins the Cabinet, Education,and Libraries 

Mary Weale now in charge of Finance having been 'let go' from her job as an insurance broker.

The £40k a year allowance will come in handy as income replacement.

Cllr Lightfoot is now in charge of Adult Social Care-a great job for a man who likes a tipple! 

You can see for yourself TIPPLED?

And the awful Warrick continues with purchasing when not being assaulted with a dog poo bag. LINK

And the statement “not the right time to change the Deputy Leader” who is working hard!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

The two Tims swap jobs

All of this is hardly believable.

Talk about rearranging the deckchairs...

"your loyal reader"

COUNCIL'S PR MAN DOES A RUNNER!

For years the Dame has been urging the Council to scrap the PR Dept as being expensive and unfit for purpose.
Though she doesn't  generally approve of outsourcing her recommendation was that a smaller agency be retained to manage strategy and high-level execution and a skeleton staff maintained in-house.

The cost of Mr. Fizzy Fitzpatrick's Dept was over £400k a year and the strain of the Grenfell Tower tragedy just overwhelmed him and his team: in fact, it seems that Fizzy has upped sticks and done a runner!

FITZPATRICK DOING RUNNER

The Council has now appointed Newgate to damage limit. The cost? 
Well, the Dame speculates the bill be in excess of £250,000.

LABOUR CALLS FOR HEADS TO ROLL

Labour Cllrs say Leader and deputy must go

 

Labour Councillors at Kensington & Chelsea Council are calling for the immediate resignation of the Leader of the Council and his deputy, who is the Cabinet member for housing and property.

 

‘These two politicians should take responsibility for the Grenfell Tower disaster, which took so many lives needlessly, despite the warnings by residents and Labour councillors,’ said Robert Atkinson, leader of the Labour Group, whose ward includes the tower.

 

‘It is totally unfair to force the resignation of CEO Nicholas Holgate for carrying out  the policies determined by politicians.’

 

Cllr Atkinson added that there is no confidence in North Kensington in the political leadership of the Council. Cllr Rock Fielding Mellen, Cabinet Member for  Housing and Property, and Cllr Nick Paget Brown should do the decent thing and resign.

 

The Labour Group welcomes the criminal investigation being undertaken by the Metropolitan Police and will assist in any way it can.

STOP OUTSOURCING NOW!

There was a time, many years ago, when local government was the pride of British public administration. 
We really were very good at it. 
Council officers were people of talent and integrity....then something changed....
Local Government lost confidence in itself. 
It decided functions it had previously administered so well needed to be handed over to greedy outsourcers. 

Did it save us money? No

We have made him a near
billionaire

Did it make local government more efficient? No





Did it enrich Sir Ron Aldridge, the founder of Capita? 
Most certainly.

In fact, Sir Ron, a one time a low grade council employee, has made so much money out of us poor, sodding taxpayers that he has been able to throw back a few million to build academies.
Ron is not alone. 
There are other private sector leeches clinging to bloated and indolent local councils.

Now is the time to halt outsourcing. 
Councils need to get back to what they were set up to do, and perfectly capable of doing,....running services themselves.

At the same time let's can the hopeless Tri Borough experiment: it's been a disaster. 
The only beneficiaries have been Sir Pooter Cockell and Sir Delboy Myers who got themselves knighthoods.

K&C needs to do three things fast...

• scrap the Cabinet system and revert to the tried and tested Committee system
• Cease outsourcing
• Scrap whatever is left of the Tri Borough project

KCTMO AND ITS BUM CONTRACTORS

Dear Dame

When speaking to a local leaseholder, putting an article together about KCTMO negligence, she mentioned most contractors employed by KCTMO go into liquidation once a major job/work is completed therefore removing all guarantees....just wondering if the Dame had any insights on this you could make known.  

Certainly, our last major works contractor (Frencon) went into administration post job and my friend's contractor likewise. 
Lakanal House contractor (Apollo) also, who are now renamed (Keepmoat) and is being employed for major work in the south of the borough by KCTMO!!!

There is definitely a pattern there for serious investigation, it all makes sense, it's a scam and the section 20 notices keep the scam going with the same defunct contractors (Wates Living Space from reading reviews seems to be the exception)

A friend in Finborough Rd says a leaseholder friend of hers explained scaffolding was erected around their small building two years ago by KCTMO and no work has yet been done so who is paying for the rental and who is getting the cash?

Its also been mentioned the only directors on the KCTMO board are residents or elected councillors - the stooges.

You couldn't make it up.  

Keep up the good work and best wishes to the Dame.

Can I please be anonymous....

SIR DELBOY GOES HELTER SKELTER FROM SHELTER

The Guardian reports that Sir Delboy Myers and mate, Tony Rice, have resigned from Shelter.

Delboy is a particularly obnoxious fellow who twisted the none too bright Pooter Cockell around his finger.
How Delboy ever landed the £260k a year job running K&C is a massive mystery considering his own qualification as a mere social worker. 
That these two 'characters' ever got 'K's is a crushing inditement of the Dishonours System.

Thanks to RBKC residents Delboy is the recipient of a massive pension. 
Something smells very bad here. 
The BIG question is whether Delboy and Rice knew each other prior to joining Shelter

SLUG ISH

Two board members of the housing charity Shelter, including its chairman Sir Derek Myers, have resigned amid reports of internal disquiet over the organisation’s allegedly muted response to the Grenfell Tower fire.

Myers is a former chief executive of Kensington and Chelsea council, which owns Grenfell Tower, while trustee Tony Rice is chairman of Xerxes Equity, the sole shareholder in Omnis Exteriors – the company that sold the cladding used in the tower.

On Friday afternoon, Shelter confirmed the pair had resigned from the board but offered no reasons for their departure.

A STATEMENT from Shelter’s interim chief executive, Graeme Brown, said: “Tony Rice has resigned as a trustee of Shelter and the chair of the board of trustees, Sir Derek Myers, has also resigned. The role of trustee is entirely voluntary and unpaid, and we wish them the best for the future.”

Asked subsequently to explain the joint resignations, a Shelter spokesperson said: “The trustees decided to step away from their roles in the interests of the charity. They would not want there to be any unnecessary distraction from the work we are doing to help people affected by the Grenfell fire.”

The Guardian has seen an internal staff email from Shelter union representatives sent earlier this week. It notes that although Shelter’s frontline services had been quick to provide practical help to those affected by the fire, many staff had expressed discontent that the charity “had been slow to speak publicly about the event”.

The email said the reps had raised staff and public concerns over possible reasons for Shelter’s apparent silence to management at a routine meeting this week.

A Shelter spokesperson said it had made several media statements over the past few days concerning the Grenfell fire and the needs of former residents of the tower who needed rehousing. Its website has a four-paragraph press release made on 16 June, two days after the blaze, calling for a full investigation of the fire.

Shelter added that it continued to provide free expert advice to anyone in the country who needed help with bad housing or homelessness, including Grenfell Tower residents whose homes were damaged or destroyed by the fire.

The Guardian say that as far as its aware there is no insinuation of any wrong doing