We are often told how hard up councils are....don't you believe a word of it. Our Council is just about to have to pay out a huge sum in compensation after a co-worker made a lewd comment.
You can read the STEAMY STUFF HERE
A senior accountant on £150,000-a-year and his £100,0000-a-year younger female colleague wins payout from RBK&C council for sex harassment after workmate told colleagues they were having an affair and popping off for amatory activities instead of bean-counting
Tonight, that bastion of Conservatism, Campden Ward, voted for a one time pornstar as councillor in waiting.
Evidently, Lloyd North objects to his exotic past being ventilated in the media.
The question is why? Is he ashamed of his past or is he just concerned some voters might find starring in hard gay porn films distasteful and refuse to vote for him?
His role is to conjure up housing out of thin air for the world and his wife who wants to be in Kensington and nowhere else.
We are fortunate to have Kim as deputy leader.
He is a highly successful businessman. He wears his success lightly. He is unpompous; good with people and has a genuine interest in doing the right thing in the most challenging of circumstances.
Even those in the north of the Borough agree that his motivations are good.
The only pity is that he is not Leader: he would be outstanding.
The Dame ends by picking out a particularly accurate comment
Norland Conservative wrote: "Kim is courteous, knowledgeable and responsive. He is respected by the residents of the wards in the North even if they don't always agree with him. A complete contrast to the disinterested and hardly ever seen Councillor Campbell. You cannot avoid the feeling that Kim is there from a passion to make a genuine improvement to people's lives while Campbell is there for the power kick and her own personal ambitions."
This Is North Kensington(THINK) has launched a devasting critique of the Council leader.
It accuses her of a multitude of mistakes and misjudgments.
It now seems the Leader is casting herself as a sort of spokesperson for London in an effort to get herself a peerage.
But Elizabeth Campbell was a Cabinet member at the time of Grenfell. She must be disconnected from reality to think she would ever be ennobled carrying so much Grenfell baggage,
There would be fury, not just in North Kensington but throughout the Borough and beyond.
The Dame will say no more.She leaves her readers to ponder upon the THINK piece: it should be required reading for all....whatever their political inclinations.
The days when the Kensington Conservative Association could be accused of being staid are in the far distant past.
Having been rejected by the Earls Court voters in the last Council Election Lloyd North is now trying to stand in next year’s Council Election.
Lloyd North took part in the fetish event Mr Leather
Lloyd has starred in a number of gay porn films and was a competitor in the World Mr Leather competition.
It's so good to see the Leader, Cllr Campbell opening up the council in this way. In the image, you can see Councillor 'in waiting' North strutting his stuff in this quaint ensemble.
The Dame warns councillors that the Leader plans to make use of Lloyd's varied skills by appointing him Chief Whip.
That should keep certain out of order councillors in order.
This is Rebwar Ahmed, an Iraqui people smuggler.
He has just received a 31 month sentence at Canterbury Crown Court.
Hapless Priti Patel was gleeful at the severity of his sentence: Mr Ahmed was gleeful too.
He knows he will be out in a year and back in business.
Had he been trafficking in cannabis rather than the lives of people he would have gone down for several years.
One wonders whether Felicity Buchan thinks this sentence fits the crime.
Don't hold your breath.
Felicity is on a mission to become a junior minister and so won't be 'calling out' Patel....what a mad world.
Friends of Cllr Wason tell the Dame the Councillor has little time for Campden people and is focussing his attention on winning over members of the Henley Conservative Association.
It seems he thinks he's a shoo-in for the parliamentary seat and the councillor job a mere stop on the way.
The Association chairman, Daniel Bausor, told a friend of the Dame that Wason was, "all over him like a cheap suit"
Come on Wason....you are a Campden Ward councillor...
Do your job or resign.
They will be back! The Duke of Buccleuch, a major shareholder in Native Land, should be thoroughly ashamed of himself.
He has many friends in the area yet no shame about making the area like the Bullring in Brum.
The Dame will not be inviting this Borders plunderer to her Christmas Ducal soiree.
14 years later and the Council is still spewing out the same rubbish whilst Thames Water ignores it and continues to spew out sewage into peoples' homes and enrich its management and shareholders at our expense
It's enough to make you see RED
Sunday is the quietest day of the week for the Dame's little blog. Despite that over 1000 readers visited.
That should send shivers of fear down councillors who claim no one takes notice of her.
If this keeps up 30,000 a month. Felicity has some catching up to do!
Cyron
Before the inevitable..."The Dame is beastly to Conservative councillors" is heard let the Dame preempt the whiners....She will be looking at some of the councillors we can be proud of.
Those committed to their residents.
They include names like Cyron, Will, Lindsay, McVeigh, Pascall and Addenbroke and on the other side Blakeman, Atkinson, Henderson and Press.
John Betjeman remarked come the end of the world he would like to be in the haberdashery department of Peter Jones, "because nothing bad could ever happen there."
The Dame has that same feeling reading Felicity Buchan's weekly catch-up. Her constituents can claim to be pretty clued up about life so may the Dame offer you some advice, Felicity?
Your government is a mess incapable even of protecting our coastal borders. It is bogged down in sleaze and has rapidly alienated its core support base.
How about confronting these concerns rather than pretending we are all in Peter Jones's Haberdashery Department?
Residents of Courtfied have read the blog about absentee Weale and Wally in Brompton and Hans Town. They have been on the Dame's 'blower' moaning about Quentin Marshall.
They say that he is rarely to be seen and doesn't enjoy 'casework'.
But there is a far more important reason for pondering whether he is 'fit and proper.
Like Weale and Campbell, he was very much entwined in the Grenfell Tragedy.
And Like Weale and Campbell he should be stepping back until the Inquiry resolves the complete back story to the fire.
Campbell feels that expensive men with wigs will get the Council off the hook. That remains to be seen.
Marshall should focus on his job, his polo and Ferrari.
Brompton and Hans Town Ward has three councillors: two are an insulting waste of space.
Cllr Weale is never seen in the Ward.
She leaves all the heavy lifting to the highly intelligent and resident-friendly, Sof McVeigh.
If residents have a problem they immediately call up Sof.
Sof has had an excellent year as deputy mayor and needs to be given more responsibility (on that point, anyone who has ever had 'business dealings' with Cllr Faulks would soon realise she just doesn't have a clue about business)
What a great ambassador for the local business community Sof would make. She and her husband have had highly successful business careers.... unlike Faulks.
The less said about Cllr Idris the better: she is just hopeless and indolent but one supposes her £17k allowance helps pay the household expenses. Come on Cllr Idris, you may not be a brainbox but you can make more effort to do Ward work.
So, it really does beg the question as to whether there are just too many councillors doing non-jobs?
Here's Cllr Woodger wearing his show biz hat and singing a song that reminds the Dame of her 'tripping' days in '70's Chelsea. I hope Maxwell has not been 'dropping tabs'?
This greasy looking fellow is Camden Cllr Ian Wason. To the Dame, he looks a bit of a bounder! A sort of 'pleased with himself' accountant made good.
Wason follows in the footsteps of many a 'colonial'. Having made a fortune in South Africa he returned to the UK with plans to enter politics and throw his weight around here.
Wason made his dough flogging debt consolidation programmes to debt-stressed Africans. He calls it a 'social initiative' so at least he has a sense of humour.
Wason has invested part of his fortune buying a spread in Henley on Thames and playing 'Squire Wason' before making a bid to get selected for this safe seat.
Citizens of Henley...beware!
Wason is a thoroughly unlikeable piece of work which makes him highly suitable for a career in politics.
Infesting our streets and blaring out loud music rickshaw drivers have been immune from control.
They infest the area around Harrods and in the West End cluttering the streets and promoting crime.
They target tourists ripping them off huge sums of money. When they can they tout for business on behalf of brothel owners. Most are probably in this country illegally.
At long last, the hard-working MP for Cities of London & Westminster, Nickie Aitken, has introduced a Bill to ensure that these nuisances are regulated for public safety in much the same way as the black cab trade.
Residents of Kensington owe Nickie a debt of gratitude for keeping our streets safer. Hopefully, the legislation, if correctly enforced, will banish these predators
The one-time leader of our Council, Sir Merrick 'Pooter' Cockell, never forgave the Dame for exposing his massive expense claims and first-class travel. He claimed the 'old bitch' (as he rudely calls the saintly Dame) had cost him a place for his ample backside on the red benches of the Upper House.... plus a handy £40,000 a year attendance allowance.
It now seems that our current leader, Cllr Campbell believes that she too will be robed in ermine!
No one is quite sure why she should feel so entitled.
She has possibly seen how Pooter has built up a lucrative bunch of sinecures and feels she too should have a slice.
Together with Cllr Weale she was very much part of the Cabinet whose lack of control of the TMO allowed this horrific tragedy to happen.
The TMO was very much a creature of the Cabinet Weale and Campbell served in.
That sinister 'aristo' Lordly Danny 'Boys' Moylan of Patapong Beach has ousted delicate Cllr Woodger from his perch in Queen's Gate leaving Maxwell in a state of nervous depression.
The Dame is a shoulder to cry on when things go wrong for some of the more sensitive younger councillors.
Few of our councillors have much business experience yet that seems not a bar them being put in charge of colossal sums of money to mainly waste. Moylan and his £30 million Exhibition Rd Folly springs to mind. They are good at splashing the cash; not so good at earning it. In fact, most would never get a job with any sensible private company.
Yet when a good, well-qualified councillor appears on the scene talents are ignored. No successful business operates in that way.
Take this chap, Cllr Adrian Berrill-Cox described by a learned law journal as a 'Master of the Universe' and the winner of a national award LINK
Berrill-Cox should have been a natural chairman of the Oversight and Scrutiny Committee but instead, we are landed with the utterly useless Cllr Rossi because someone felt sorry for her and she needed a £30,000 a year income boost.
Her handling of the Thames Water meeting was an utter disgrace.
Now imagine how different it would have been had a top-flight barrister like Berrill-Cox been chairing the meeting....
Thames Water would not have felt it was 'being mauled by a dead sheep' to quote Denis Healey.
His tragedy was one not many of us could endure...the brutal murder of his much-loved son by evil Kenyan police brutes posing as guardians of justice.
Faced with the obstacles placed in front of him by the Kenyan government and the lack of co-operation by the British government most would have given up.
Nicholas never gave up and Alexander's psychopathic killers now face some sort of justice.
But Nicholas achieved more than justice for his son.
His actions have gone much further and deeper.
Kenyan human rights activists hail Monson. They say he has sent a message to the government that notorious police brutality must end.
Ordinary Kenyans are terrified of their police so Monson's bravery has touched their lives in a hugely beneficial way.
Nicholas once told the old Dame that there was something faintly ludicrous about the hereditary system.
A shame we don't have the determinedly bloody-minded and courageous Monson sitting in the Lords....he would be a breath of fresh air in amongst the puffers and spivs.
Police and Crime Commissioners are an expensive waste of space but imagine how effective Nicholas Monson could be?
The Grenfell Next of Kin planned a rally outside Kensington Town Hall. Those that know say Jeremy Corbyn planned to speak until Emma Dent Coad told him not to.
There are divisions between Next of Kin and Grenfell United but Labour cllrs should not be partisan.
Mason seemed to view the event as an opportunity for political 'platforming'.
This is not what those who perished and survivors would want.
This fuelling of division is despicable.
The word abroad is that Cllr Dent Coad plans to relocate to Notting Dale abandoning Golborne to be 'closer to Grenfell residents'.
She perhaps needs to dilate a little about her role with the TMO at the time of the tragedy...
If true, this moving wards is an act of base political opportunism. Let us hope it is merely a rumour.
Most residents of Notting Dale want her to stay put: she is divisive and factional and harbours grudges against residents seen to be close to Cllrs Blakeman and Atkinson
It seems that the TW treasure chest is bare thanks to vast payouts to the fat cats who have run it into the ground. The Chinese and Arab owners are all at the trough as well. Where does all this leave us, the poor, bloody customer?
Deep in shit.
The leader, Elizabeth Campbell, declined on the spurious grounds it was a 'personal decision' for each councillor-a predictably nonsensical rationale.
Why did she not simply relay the offer to all councillors?
The Dame is a contrary old thing so was disappointed to hear Michael Gove was barracked by certain people when he went to Value Engineering.
The barrackers thought they were being clever: they were not. Like or loathe Gove(the Dame is ambivalent) he braved what he would have known to be a hostile audience to educate himself.
What chance now to persuade councillors to educate themselves at Cameron's expense if they know the same treatment might be meted out to them?
This was a golden opportunity for audience members to engage with Gove post-performance...after all, Gove doesn't shrink from a debate.
A wasted moment in time!
Finally, Emma Dent Coad was highly involved with the TMO pre-Grenfell. Would she have been driven out?
How rude!
The Duke recently resigned from the Tory Party in a sulk over Brexit: he's someone who takes himself very seriously and still rides furiously on the reputation of his ancestor.
So why did the Dame write? To try to wangle an invitation to Stratfield Saye? No, she wrote as below.
He seems not to give a damn about sewage flooded basements homes; his only interest is to stop sewage being dumped into those trout streams on the Downs where he likes to fly fish.
Very laudable but how about helping those whose homes were flooded with rats and raw sewage?
As a hereditary peer in the Lords, he's a waste of space and makes one wonder whether hereditary, as well as life peers, are not in need of radical reform.
Doubtless, Wellington preferred chairing Rothmans whose products harm millions rather than coming to the assistance of humble people.
Those of us who know Lordly from his days here will not be surprised at his rebuke to his old master for having a 'sleazy' Cabinet
At K&C we all knew Lordly as an upright man never tainted by any planning sleaze or involvement with fat planning lobbyists like Peter Bingle.
You can read all about the hypocrite and shifty planning lobbyist, Bingle and Lordly HERE
Lordly's hatred of his old master is all down to the fact that Johnson promised him an ambassadorial role that never materialised: wise counsel prevailed and the buffoon backtracked.
Without social media and by just word of mouth close to 22,000 readers visited From The Hornet's Nest in October.
Certain councillors claim the site has no readers nor influence. That is burying your head in the sand.
Just imagine numbers if the Dame went all social media?
Fly tipping on our roads with fridges, microwave oven & amazon boxes has reached epidemic levels.
Six years ago RBKC and Earls Court Councillors introduced paladin bins to our roads (Penywern, Kempsford & Eardley Crescent) as a trial.
As usual, they claimed residents, with no evidence, supported the idea.
It should be noted that every household in the area have bin areas in their basements, we know this because resident associations checked that every household had these available.
There is no lack of space to place rubbish but since the introduction of paladin bins lazy and new residents dump not in the bins but next to, on or in sight of them rather than go down their steps. Paladins have created an anti-social environment encouraging those with a full bladder to urinate on our pavements, night and day!
With the Councils’ claiming 'environmental betterment' of the borough one would have thought they would have tried to limit Suez trucks coming down these roads EVERYDAY to continually empty bins as well as pick up rubbish dumped by inconsiderate residents and passers-by.
Not one person has been prosecuted for fly tipping in Earls Court and one assumes that is the same for the rest of the borough.
Not once have Earls Court Councillors bothered to deal with the constant dumping over the last six years especially when at its infancy wardens rubbed their greasy hands with glee taking the opportunity to fine residents parking near these bins even going as far to remove them from the roads
Paladin bins have swallowed up parking spaces in an area dominated by non-resident parkers.
Paladin bins with Council and Councillors' blessings have also given a green light to tipping anything from mattresses. delipidated household items, washing machines, freezers, gas canisters but as yet no sighting of a kitchen sink!
Even with this bombardment of rubbish and tonnes removed over the years Earls Court Councillors have stuck their fingers in their ears and closed their eyes.
It would be interesting to know how much fly-tipping and rubbish Suez has picked up in the last six years and how much residents have been charged, as all residents pay for the paladin bins on these three roads!
Residents are not asking for much, just for those to do the jobs they are paid for and not to ignore certain situations because they are uncomfortable or difficult to deal with.
If these bins were an attempt to try and change the bad habits of residents it has done the exact opposite.
The truth of the matter is that only thing it has done is enrich Suez and their French owners. Don't also forget it was Suezage who failed to fulfil the gulley cleaning contract contributing to the catastrophic sewage flooding.
Just two of the three councillors live in the ward so one assumes it's a case of it's not in my street so why should I care?
Earls Court Resident
This is Cllr Rossi's letter to Thames Water following the catastrophically bad meeting held in The Town Hall on 11.10.
Not one mention of compensation and much empty talk of TW giving 'assistance' to residents. What could that be, Cllr Rossi?
No doubt Thames Water are quaking in their boots.
Mr George Mayhew
Corporate Affairs Director
Thames Water
20 October 2021
Dear Mr Mayhew,
I am writing to you in my capacity as Chair of the Overview and Scrutiny Committee to set out the conclusions and recommendations of the committee members after the extraordinary meeting of 11 October 2021. I would like to thank both you and Mr Hagger for attending.
The meeting was arranged to give residents the opportunity to ask questions and share their experiences of the flooding on 12 July 2021. Representatives from Thames Water and Ofwat were invited to attend the meeting to hear from residents and councillors. I have set out below the recommendations of the Overview and Scrutiny Committee.
• At the meeting residents described their experiences on the evening of the flood, the days afterwards, their current circumstances, and the state of their homes. I consider that it is essential for members of the Independent Review to hear those residents to understand the full scale of the flooding and its dreadful impact on them. I have included below the link to the recording.
Extraordinary Meeting of the Overview and Scrutiny Committee on Flooding - 11 Oct 2021 - YouTube.
The timeline for the Independent Review Report was raised by residents and councillors and, at the meeting, you suggested this would be the end of April 2022. I would like you to confirm in your response to this letter that this is indeed the end date. However, I consider that it is not acceptable for residents and businesses to wait until the Independent Review outcome to get assistance from Thames Water. Thames Water should consider any assistance that they require following the flood.
• The Committee would like you to provide an update on the progress and initial findings of the Independent Review for its meeting on 16 December 2021. Thames Water will be invited to another meeting of the Committee early in 2022.
I look forward to receiving your response to these recommendations.
Yours sincerely,
Cllr Marie-Therese Rossi
Chair of the Overview and Scrutiny Committee
The return of Sam Mackover will be interesting.
Apart from Kim Taylor-Smith the leadership team is heavyweight light.
Residents funding the £1.3 million plus a year councillor allowances budget are entitled to demand the leadership team is the very best of breed.
This means bringing Mackover on board. Don't hold your breath though. Highly intelligent free spirits like him spook mediocrities.
Mackover has over 20 years of experience in the banking industry advising companies on client management strategies, merger integration and operational efficiency.
He has had strategic planning and management experience working from offices in NY, Frankfurt, Zurich and from his London base.
Importantly he has covered the governmental sector and spent considerable time on policy development work in Whitehall and Brussels.
He also advises pro bono educational charities.
This is a very grown up CV....
Dear Dame,
It is entirely legitimate for a local authority to obtain Counsel's opinion on Thames Water Plc denying liability for the losses RBK&C residents suffered so those residents have an objective opinion as to whether the law provides a remedy to Thames Water's Negligence.
Councillor Rossi's response is typical of a Tory-run council's light-touch approach; carefully husbanding the few thousand pounds that a Barrister's Opinion would cost the Council.
I remember Kensington and Chelsea's light-touch approach to Nicholas Van Hoogstraten's harassment of tenants in the 1980s until those affected by the harassment demonstrated that the Council was empowered by legislation to act.
If Counsel's Opinion indicated that the residents were in a strong position to pursue a claim in Negligence against Thames Water it would put Thames Water under pressure to come to the table to negotiate in good faith; something that I do not believe they are doing at the moment.
In civil litigation, the conduct of the parties to a dispute is taken into account when determining costs.
Thames Water would be running a significant risk if it sticks to its guns of denying liability until legal proceedings were issued.
The Council decided to "carefully husband" its resources and penny-pinch over the Grenfell Tower cladding.
Whilst I am opposed to Labour Party style profligacy, it would be prudent for the Council to change tack over the Thames Water situation and support those who pay the Council Tax.
After all, Council Tax payers help to keep Councillor Campbell in her £60,000 a year and Councillor Rossi and every other stipend drawing Councillor (Labour, Tory and Lib Dem) in the life of luxury to which they are accustomed courtesy of RBKC residents.
Whilst on the subject of Grenfell....there are just two members of what was known as the Cabinet at the time of the Grenfell tragedy. Both are still around in the Leadership Team. They are councillors Campbell(£65k a year) and Weale(£47k a year). The pompous leader at that time was Cockell. Cockell loved to draw parallels between his Cabinet and the national Cabinet. That means an acceptance of collective responsibility. I wonder what view the Inquiry will take in respect of collective responsibility of the Cabinet of that time for TMO?
These Tory politicians do not like situations where they are seen to be supporting a private sector company being sued.
These Tories bleat on about it being for individuals to take legal advice and act on their own agency in the full knowledge that many of the people affected by this situation do not have the resources to take on a utility company.
However, if those affected by Thames Water know that they have a reasonable chance in Court, they would probably be able to band together to take on Thames Water to obtain justice.
We all know that big business is generous to Tory Party Central Office with donations and, I wonder if this is foremost in the minds of some councillors?
Yours pointedly, Dearest Dame
A THAMES WATER VICTIM