Danger level split as new team want to share the spoils with new Leader

 

When Cllr Glen Sanderson took the Leadership of Northumberland County Council a few short weeks ago following the controversial sacking of Cllr. Peter Jackson we at murky expected his reign to be very short indeed as the Morpeth Mob who ran the Council with Cllr. Jackson were allegedly plotting and planning the downfall of Sanderson.

The Jacksonites of course weren't expecting that Cllr Sanderson, who is a Peer of the Local Government Association, would use his links with that organisation to outmaneuver the mob and scoop up new friends from the North. 

Gaining friends in politics costs and that cost can come in many ways including allowing yourself to be pulled from pillar to post and being forced to follow lines of governance that in your heart of hearts you know are really the wrong things to do.

Unfortunately for the people of Northumberland Cllr. Sanderson has been dragged down that road at a time when real Leadership is needed he has allowed himself to be exposed by the greedy and needy who couldn’t wait for the dust to settle to get their hands on the rewards that await political (loyalty) or should that read greed?.

Cllr. Sanderson has brought in or possibly bought in the votes of the three Berwick Councillors, one of whom is an independent or is she? He has been forced to commit his Council to spending cash their portfolio holder for finance Councillor Oliver has indicated the Council can’t afford on the development of a new theatre for Berwick an issue leaked to murky from arts readers of the blog from Berwick and a fact that hasn’t been denied by anyone we have spoken with.

Those same North County Councillors have also been making quite a bit of noise in placing Northumberland in level 2 instead of level 3 where the Government has placed it, probably to get themselves into the Counties weekly papers. Councillor Sanderson supported their position on live TV this week.

Living in central Northumberland he must have forgotten how dangerous that this support to keep his team in power over the other 16 Tories is to residents in the rest of the County he is the current Leader of. Councillor Sanderson farms on the edge of the village of Eshott his closest well stocked general dealer shops will be in Widdrington or possibly Hadston a couple of miles away in Druridge Bay Ward. A ward that is carrying the second highest infection rate of Covid 19 in the County. But that doesn’t appear to matter to him.

Small village living does appear to colour ones view of the world at large. Has Mr Sanderson missed the fact that the County is huge and borders  areas managed by other Councils with much higher levels of the virus than Northumberland? Gateshead, Newcastle, North Tyneside, Carlisle, North Durham areas of Stanley and Consett all border the County to the South of his abode and if he has Northumberland placed in tier 2 to suit his allies in the North the residents of those areas will pour in to shop, drink and be merry in Northumberland and if Councillor Sanderson hasn’t realised that then the retention of power must have taken over his personality.

Get some backbone Glen before you have hundreds of your residents unnecessarily exposed to the ‘silent killer’ of Covid 19 and put your new mates into their boxes before its too late.