Waning influence of a Conservative activist should bring a shaft of light into a Dark-side Company?

 

The news that one half of the split Tory camp at County Hall in Morpeth are cheering and whooping at the removal from office of the County Council’s Deputy Leader from the chairmanship of the Private company he designed, Advance Northumberland, the other half have gone into the dumps, interests us here at the still socially distanced Murky desk.

The man seen as the ‘Gepetto’ of the Conservatives in Northumberland, pulling string after string to get the Tories into a powerful position now has to sit on the sidelines and watch as his mice and men plans unravel before him.

And what you may ask has brought down such a powerful beast? and will the Mob from his patch protect him? We will have to see but acting outside the rules has brought the man described by his peers as ‘RW’ to his knees.

Being a Councillor in a Unitary Authority like Northumberland County Council means you have rules to follow. Those rules cover the activities of you and your family and how your interests in the real world (after your head is extracted from your bottom) may affect the business of the Council. Councillors at a Unitary all purpose level are paid an allowance to negate their need to use their influence for self gain and Councillors have to declare those interests publically. Most have none to hide and undertake the task with gusto but some appear not to bother because they, like vampires, can't stand the daylight or the scrutiny in public life declarations of interests cause.

Or of course you may think you're simply above the law!

Councillor Wearmouth the Councils deputy leader was self-selected through his influence over the Tory Party, Chairman of the Company Advance Northumberland a company it's said he designed to keep prying eyes away from its activities. That was managed quite well until recently when it allegedly got involved in an £8.5M lawsuit and owed HMRC £1,000,000 on its dealings the secrets then oozed out.

Advance Northumberland on behalf of the County Council, the North of Tyne Combined Authority and the Local Enterprise Partnership is involved in some of the UK’s largest energy projects: the interconnector from Norway to Cambois and the British Volt GigaFactory. Councillor Wearmouth is big in energy as they say, yet you wouldn’t believe it if you look on the County Council website at his declarations but his inability to hide from the rigours of Companies House has let him down along with the news that on behalf of Northumberland Conservatives, ‘Gepetto’ and his party mates took in a huge donation from a Russian energy sector donor on his parties behalf. Those interests compromised his position and really anyone finding themselves in a similar situation would resign from their position on the Council.

A report to the Audit Committee of Northumberland County Council this week shows that the Police are in, investigating who from the Tory Cabinet, as its a single party cabinet as only they get issued with the Cabinet Papers, leaked the confidential Council Papers which appeared on a Blyth social media site and showed the public how badly Council Officers were being bullied by top Councillors surely the Police will be asked to look into the activities of Advance Northumberland to see if the papers were leaked via that organisation or satisfy the public that non-declaration of interests is really punishable by Law?

 

Links

 

https://www.mirror.co.uk/news/politics/second-tory-minister-recuses-herself-24471351

 

https://www.newspostleader.co.uk/news/people/report-raises-concerns-over-advance-northumberland-3147342

 

https://find-and-update.company-information.service.gov.uk/officers/IKYEsygsz9qqHAHbxAVmBE_GcTM/appointments

 

https://find-and-update.company-information.service.gov.uk/officers/N12_fZiRa0qX2RNAgYhlEf9YRuA/appointments

 

 

 

 

Secret Council?

 

No! were simply being vindictive.

Moving into year five of a Conservative administration in charge at County Hall in Morpeth we here at Murky thought it was time we looked at the lack of achievement for people, the false rhetoric poured out as vitriol and the problems caused by infighting among themselves which has destroyed the belief in a Council’s honesty and integrity at all levels.

The e-office conversation at the new style distanced murky desk was brought about because ‘Google’ singled out aFOI title on the open democracy site ‘What do they know and left it for all to see. 

 Clicking on the link from a Mr Owen

Smith, not a contibutor to murky https://www.whatdotheyknow.com/request/treatment_of_exempt_information_30#incoming-1789645 

illustrates how your local Unitary Council for Northumberland (hiding behind the ancient status of County Council) faces up to any challenge to ask about its secretive nature. It uses every excuse to blank out her or his subject matter. In actual fact open democracy isn’t available to Northumberland’s residents, a short look around the site from this link tells all!

 Infighting, the catalyst for the lack of any progress is also linked to the complete disregard for loyalty to the fractured Tory groups rotten core when we look at how the Conservatives treated their former friend and colleague Councillor Georgina Hill. Out of loyalty and trust, she delivered exactly what the Tories required of her as chair of the audit committee they then threw her under the bus when things began to blister and a virtual information fence has been built around her person until one side or the other among the warring clans decides how to be even more vindictive towards her in the future.

Some leaks have filtered through to the public as the stench of bubbling vitriol seeps from life’s cesspit at County Hall and the exposure of bullying and deceit towards employees led to the Councils then leader, Peter Jackson being ousted from office but the leaks were quickly stemmed as the patchwork of mobs and clans were said to have taken advice from their MP’s and have quietened down to become even more secretive than ever and the former press speculation about the Company Advance Northumberland has been cut back enormously as its new board of directors have few links with the former team, a very Mussolini like practice indeed.

But we here at Murky would like to know if that was an MP thing or a cash donor matter? The press revelation that the MP for Berwick recused herself from questions about an energy matter because Northumberland Conservatives had taken in a donation from an energy magnate, Ms Trevelyan said: "I am unable to answer any of (Ms West's) questions as I have recused myself from all matters to do with the Aquind Interconnector because Northumberland Conservatives received some funds from one of the owners of the company."

Is it strange that the largest task left over from the last Labour administration was an energy interconnector from Norway to Cambois in Northumberland and that the Councillor in charge of that work through the Company Advance Northumberland, Richard Wearmouth is also director of a number of energy companies and it has been said by members of the other side of the rift that he also handles the cash holdings of Northumberland Conservatives.

 We don’t expect any answers to any questions or secrets raised in this article as although it seems to be something the press haven’t cottoned onto, but the disgraced Councillor, Peter Jackson has been placed in charge of the audit committee in Ms Hills place.

Hey Ho!

https://www.mirror.co.uk/news/politics/second-tory-minister-recuses-herself-24471351

 

 

Tories to change Blyth Town Centre into ‘what you don’t want or expect’

 

Altered Labour Plans will lead to travel chaos on our streets?

 

The long suffering public of Blyth have at last received the news that the Boris Johnson Government has decided to steer a limited amount of cash towards a Blyth modernisation project to improve its high street’s popularity.

Projects to improve Blyth have been planned for decades in some cases in order to deliver a greater both day and night time economy to give the Town the boost it needs and requires.

Labour were planning to develop a new Leisure Centre on the bus garage site, a new Phoenix Theatre on Dun Cow Quay and a Cowpen Road bypass to help speed traffic into the Town Centre through extensive signage and regular advertising. Linking the whole town together as one through a number of well designed cross town highways.

These prime changes, largely ignored since 2017 when the Tories gained hold of the projects rudder, were required to ensure that the lifetime of Blyth as a commercial Town centre was extended and not become another catalyst for the further commercialisation of Cowpen Road, a ‘High Street’ much preferred by wealthy business conglomerates due to the ease of drawing in ‘outsider’s’ from the the A189.

Possibly made much more attractive as money chases the travel potential of the new battery plant being planned for the river Blyth peninsula at Cambois, as Blyth residents who may be some of the 8000 workers required to meet the wider battery industries requirements place Cowpen Road in their personal travel to work plans, hardening in the new ‘High Street’ as the place to be.

Since 2017, year seven of the national Tories fiddling with planning laws, we have noticed a growth in homes of multiple occupancy in and around the Town Centre area which is leading towards further degradation of the Town as a place of interest to mobile shoppers who can travel anywhere to shop.

And also there has been a growth in the number of planning applications on Cowpen Road for night time economically viable food outlets that will further suck the life blood out of the traditional Town Centre. These have struck a chord with us here at the murky desk, but the biggest mistakes with the current and about to be hoisted on the unsuspecting Blyth traditional shopping public of the Tory Town Centre plan is the changes to bus routes required to deliver traditional shoppers into the about to be redeveloped as the Tories ‘look what we have done for Blyth’ project.

Without a Cowpen Road bypass and with a potential widening of Laverock Hall Road on page 10 of the Tory storybook, (designed to pollute the South of the town bringing it line with Cowpen and Kitty Brewster), without a planned growth in the development of an increased night time economy other than a Art Centre that looks on paper much like another Community Centre reliant on room rental for survival and without the retention of a Bus Station, it appears that sympathetic travel planning has been written out of the former Labour plans for the Town of Blyth. 

All of this when looked at with the reopening of the AB&T Northumberland Line on the Tories regular story list at the same time as the Town Centre is being remodelled, we believe this new Tory plan will ensure Commerce will want to move even further out of Town to build two new commercial centres at South Newsham and Bebside and have the Tories asked residents their feelings on these major changes, NO THEY HAVE NOT! and they haven’t told the unsuspecting public which residential street the new out of town busses will travel on as the traditional town centre plan dwindles and the heart of the town as we know it pales into insignificance.

Tory lies about ‘fixing care’

 

Give Councils the power and the cash to ‘fix it for you!’

Over the last 11 years of Tory rule over the nation we have seen Care for those in greatest need slip into the doldrums.

Labour’s Angela Rainer, a former care worker herself has repeatedly asked the Government to stand by their promises and using the words of the ever spouting fountain of crap he learned from the disgraced Tory supporter Jimmy Saville, Boris Johnson’s constant ‘We will fix it’ has not materialised.

Councils who have massive experience of running care can fix the problem and due to the massive pressure on staff, care workers and local Councillors every day of their working lives they would love to do so.

Therefore how did the nation get into this position and how can it get out of it in order to help those who need help the most.

Since 2010 the Tory Government's ‘Austerity Cuts’ have removed £16Billion from the care element of Council funding leaving Councils to manage a service on 40% of their former budgets. Despite inflation over the last 11 years being extremely low the value of the real figure they now have to manage the service is 31% of where it sat on May 1st 2011.

Through these drastic mind boggling cuts most Councils had to abandon employing direct labour on the ‘Care Coal Face’ and farm out personal care to contractors who pay the minimum wage.

Councils have no control whatsoever over the business element or the pay levels used by Contractors even though most now have portfolio holders to look after business, their largest spend by far, care contracts are completely ignored through the lack of powers they have vested in them through the Local Government Acts. In Northumberland County Council’s case its Councillor Wojciech Ploszaj who is responsible for the Council's business interests. But not for its largest business, will they ever be able to deliver best value for residents whilst that is the case?

This leaves Care Workers exploited, undervalued and without a voice other than the Labour Party as many of these contractors do not allow Trade Union involvement in the workplace.

The turnover of staff in care work is massive through the need for Councils to accept the lowest tenders and the Contractors being pressured by their shareholders to make a profit from care on their behalves, leaving staff unable to pay their household bills and travel costs between clients.

So to this Government before rolling Austerity 2 out onto a now ‘suspecting it to happen public’ move forward and modernise the local government acts to give control over the health and safety and pay levels of the Contractors workforce to the Councils and refund those same Councils so that their largest business can be encompassed into Councils long term future funding plans and not left as the Cinderella in a home infested with rats as they have already ate the pumpkins and the mice!

Cramlington will suffer most from New Conservative Stealth Tax.

 

Lord Bethel, the conductor of what is claimed to be a predetermined consultation on extending the £9.35 per item prescription charge beyond the current age 60 cut off point for free NHS prescriptions to catch out those from age 60 to 66.

Publicly known as the ‘Johnson’s stealth tax on the sick’ Lord Bethels plans are expected to hook in £300M per annum to help bolster the Conservatives Treasury ‘War Chest’ election coffers by 2026.

In Northumberland the economy of the counties second largest town Cramlington, will be hit hardest over the next decade and beyond as it is home to the largest group of people in the about to be unfairly attacked by stealth, those in the 60 to 66 age group and the two age groups below the rip off age who will catch up over the decade.

Lord Bethel an old harrovian hereditary peer is said to be a close friend of the proven disloyal lothario and now ex-health secretary Matt Hancock and has links to Milford James who is under investigation for issuing a ‘lovers security pass’ to Matt Hancocks moll Gina Coladangelo.

Johnson MP is using this sector of his ‘nasty party’ to attack those preparing for retirement by reducing their spending power prior at an age when they should be saving to spend later in life in order to grab spending headlines at a later date in his administration. 

How this will affect the economy of Cramlington is yet to be seen but affect it it will and were sure Conservative supporting businesses will want to hear from their Conservative MP Ian Levy on whether he supports a medium term run down of cash circulating in the local economy or not?

Where are the Tories on New Build

Estate Adoption v Service Charges?

With the news that large new build housing developers are forcing buyers of new homes on their estates to use Broadband supplied by them and have stopped competitors from even thinking about supplying services to new housing estates as they aren’t being allowed to cross the land of the new build housing developer Barons to supply the necessary infrastructure to give you choice over who supplies e-services to your very expensive new home.

This is just one of the ways in which housing developers are becoming the new controllers of large swathes of society and they are getting away with their huge money making schemes.

Large developers see your new home as a long term income stream and not just as in the past, a saleable item. The growth of service charges to tidy the estate you live on and cut the grass and pick the litter that you may have thought prior to purchase that the Council would manage on your behalf out of the Council tax you also still have to pay is information that seems to be missed when you appear at an estates sales office. Solicitors, in the conversations reported to us here at Murky by residents of estates such as South Shore in Blyth, Northumberland, as an example don’t appear to impress on their clients strongly enough, that service charges, whether you're a freeholder or a leaseholder will negate the responsibilities of your Council and bleed you dry into the process.

Service Charges are a relatively new phenomenon that has grown rapidly since 2010 although some did exist to clean stairwells and small estate grounds maintenance and management of blocks of flats prior to that date the growth of this long term after sales income stream has increased rapidly throughout the last 11 years of Tory Governments.

These new barons have their income, a good proportion of your income, nailed in for life and as they also supply about 10% of the cash the Tory Party needs, almost  £1,000,000 each and every year in donations we can see why the current Government is forced to support the money spinning activities of the developers.

The background noise on these matters has grown into a crescendo over the last decade plus, and in order to placate backbench Tory MP’s and Councils who are under pressure from residents the Government in the shape of the PM announced that all leaseholders can buy the freehold of the property they live in. Nice you may think, but it's a complete blind when it comes to service charge extinction as Robert Jenricks new changes to planning law do not support adoption of estates by your Council they instead talk of freeholders having to create estate committees to manage estates. Those committees would still have to make service charges to undertake the work and probably admin charges to cover their running costs. 

Also no one from Robert Jenricks department has explained what would happen if some residents couldn't afford to buy the freehold and how mixed tenure would pan out if adoption by your Council is to become a reduced option. We suspect that the cost of running estates would spiral out of control as developers will want long term security for their shareholders at your expense unless the law is changed to help.

Both Labour and the LibDems have grasped the nettle. They are campaigning on the issues and state they are both prepared to change the law on equality and equity grounds so that all homeowners can become part of their local Councils corporate plans and not subject to exhorbitant service charge arrangements.

It would be nice to hear from Northumberland Conservatives on one of their social media platforms to see how the new Leader of Council, Glenn Sanderson, a true blue farming Councillor will handle the matter or does he even understand the argument from an overpaying residents point of view? 

Tory Planning Changes?

 

Communities need a new stepping stone to stop intergenerational jealousy getting out of control.

The Housing Scandal:
With TV investigation programs estimating that at any one time at least 100,000 tenants of private landlords are living in substandard homes well below the regulations covering decent homes 1, that's the basic standard for social rented and Council housing in England and Wales. 

Many others living in short term residency in homes of multiple occupancy feel insecure and without hope of ever owning or even living in a home they can call their own and with average house prices outside of London costing between 12 and 14 times local average salaries people are concerned nationally about the rise in intergenerational jealousy.

The Tory Party are hanging their hats on Robert Jenrick MP’s plans to change the planning process and develop more homes for sale, 300,000 each and every year, allowing developers to build homes in the places which will give them the most profit. This change is a Government blind to cover up for the fact that they can't escape a system designed during the Thatcher era which was devised to make people aspire and an innate belief that those aspirations along with the manipulation of constituency boundaries will keep the Tories in power for ever more. They have recently lost a by election to the LibDems in their own heartlands due to the breakdown of their historical aspirational policies and they can't get their heads around where they have gone wrong.

As Tories they also believe they are the Government able to manipulate the press and avoid public scrutiny best but we must remember those manipulations are paid for by rich donors and 10% of those rich donors are Housing Developers who over the last year donated £900,000 into the Tories coffers.

The hypocrisy of the Tories on housing issues is felt very much in Northumberland as their two faced manipulations are openly thrown at an unsupecting public who believe what the press prints on their behalf, we will give some simple examples. Their disgraced Leader, Councillor Peter Jackson told the press in a speech to the North of Tyne combined authority that he wanted to develop ‘Inspiring Places’ after he had removed the Council's core strategy planning document from inspection by Government to stop an agreed inspiring development on land next to his own taking place. He also announced the development of a policy which would deliver 1000 Council homes, none are yet to appear. But he did make a speech to the wood panel industry supporting development of timber homes just before he started a wood waste storage company to handle their waste. So we can only presume that his Council, currently guided by his hand yet run in Tory puppet Councillor Sandersons name would support the ‘trailer park’ homeless units being built in Cornwall complete with huts of multiple occupancy for up to four people and not the development of cheap bed and breakfast hotels in South East Northumberland Towns to house the future homeless? Both are dismal options!

But where is this tale of those who have and those who don’t have leading?

Its leading towards the panacea for local Labour Parties, the knowledge that many people and most communities really want security of tenure and nice homes to rent owned by their Council or a Local Housing Association some as a gap stop until they can aspire to buy a new home but most which will ensure people and families from all age groups can have a quality home over their heads and the management of those homes will ensure their mental health is valued and they can dwell in communities where they are known and feel safe.

Northumberland Labour Group, hold a similar view to most local Labour Parties which is a completely different view to the Tories. Their rapid change from ideology to pragmatism has been guided by the survey they ran during the recent Local Government elections. We have been informed that over 50% of the returns cited the need to develop more Council Homes across Northumberland as the prime issue and that the new leadership of Northumberland Labour Group led by Councillor Scott Dickinson fully support the development of quality Council housing in a similar vein to the last Labour administration at County Hall who developed over 300 new high spec Council homes in places of need over their last four year tenure!

NOTES:

https://youtu.be/aO5G09nkcRQ

https://www.chroniclelive.co.uk/news/north-east-news/northumberland-peter-jackson-council-lugano-15457003

https://www.cornwalllive.com/news/cornwall-news/cornwall-council-announces-ambitious-plans-5556819