Gung Ho Tories in Tyne and Wear Let Down by their Own Governments Actions

 

Tory confidence in Tyne and Wear heading up towards the Local Government elections has waned considerably yesterday as the announcements from their Chancellors Spring Budget sinks in.

 

Right across Tyne and Wear metropolitan council areas the Tory spin machines driven by top Tory strategist, Northumberland’s Councillor Richard Wearmouth have been working flat out to decry any failings caused by almost 12 years of Conservative austerity packages being rained down on North-East Councils as the fault of the Labour Party. Bullying, lying and rubbishing Labour Councillors as they try to trample their way towards victory in the forthcoming elections.

 

Their spin machines ground to an abrupt halt yesterday as the National Press even those most loyal to the Conservative Party shattered their dreams by coming out against the damaging effects of Rishi Sunaks budget which will be unbelievably damaging to people, communities and businesses across the whole of Tyne and Wear as the Government failed in the words of the Joseph Rowntree Foundation to “Throw the poorest People a Lifeline”.

 

Yesterday, UK Media gave out clear information that the problems facing both poorer and middle class families in the North have not been caused by the war in Ukraine but by over a decade of mismanagement with living standards for over 75% of people in the North-East slipping back to 2008 levels by October 2022 and that with only £2Bn to spend on levelling up in comparison to the £45Bn promised to pay for research and development projects to ensure shareholder profits are retained by those investors its clear that it will take 20 years plus to get the problems of the North-East resolved. 

Mixed Messaging has left Blyth Valley ‘red wall’ voters adrift from their MP!

In his most recent press statement the Conservative MP for Blyth seems to have hammered the final nail into his coffin with the public of Blyth Valley many of whom have complained about his lack of effort inassisting them and his inability to respond to letters and messages sent into his office. 

 

With constituents left waiting for at least a response or recognition that their question or request has been seen by their MP, many have taken to social media to criticize his lack of action.

 

In this week's press statement he is advertising his party’s local by-election candidate, a former UKIP supporter in an article entitled ‘MP Column County’s response to war should come as no surprise’.

 

The link below shows where his interests lie and it's hard to really find his personal response to war in Europe or any link with the Camlington Group of Conservatives who used to support him to the bitter end. Now his name doesn’t seem to enter their communication vocabulary.

 

What's gone wrong? He may tell us in the future, but don’t hold your breath.

 

 

https://www.northumberlandgazette.co.uk/news/politics/mp-column-countys-response-to-war-should-not-come-as-a-surprise-3615545

 

NCC Cycling and Walking Consultation ‘Are they starting in the wrong place?’

We have noticed in recent weeks whilst the Government is ramping up on blaming the war in Ukraine for the slashing of benefits, the forcing up of Council Tax and petrol prices, the three pronged new payments to ‘save the NHS’ the deliberate stripping of workers rights through the laziness or is that corrupt glance away from anything Trade Union linked, that Northumberland County Council has begun a consultation on ‘Cycling and Walking’.

 

Some may see this as good timing as oil based fuel is at an all time high through the Government's lack of a proper energy policy in case it affected shareholders profits, but others are highly critical on social media and more recently Councillors in the press, regarding the disproportionate amount of time roads are closed whilst considerations for cyclists and walkers are installed or created, damaging businesses and stifling trade possibly leading to a further rundown of our Town Centres, and we here at Murky believe they are right to criticise and point out that road closures to remove a few planters and create short time parking spaces in any other Town than Blyth around the Council would be fitted in during the evenings and Sundays and not take 48 weeks where shoppers can’t reach their destinations.

 

But enough of that and back to cycling and walking: The aim of the County Council through this consultation is to ‘Fundamentally change the way you travel’! Sounds great doesn’t it, or does it?

 

Don’t think by any means that we here at Murky are set against Cycling and Walking in any way at all but fundamental change sounds like a new set of restrictions of our freedoms and living under a Government where the majority of its residents and citizens are getting poorer through the Conservative Government's fundamental change of everything we hold dear, desire or dream of then this statement from a Conservative Council has to be a considerable worry to many.

 

This is what's being said:

 

Northumberland County Council wants to hear your views about the provision for cyclists and walkers.

 

They have just launched their Local Cycling and Walking Infrastructure Plans Consultation saying: 'This consultation seeks views on the councils plans to enhance the walking and cycling infrastructure in the county and the proposed walking and cycling networks for our 1 2 main towns (Alnwick, Amble, Ashington, Bedlington, Berwick-upon-Tweed, Blyth, Cramlington, Haltwhistle, Hexham, Morpeth, Ponteland, Prudhoe).

 

These plans represent the long-term blueprint of the proposed walking and cycling network for each town, which we'll use to target our investment to support a fundamental behaviour change to how we travel." "This consultation is the start of our conversation, we are seeking views on the principles we are following when designing these walking and cycling networks and the walking and cycling corridors that have been identified in the main towns.'

 

 The views collected through the consultation will help shape active

 travel in Northumberland over the next 10 years.

 This consultation will run from 7th March 2022 to 15th April 2022.

 The consultation can be accessed at:

 

 https://haveyoursay.northumberland.gov.uk/trans port/local-cycling

 -walking-infrastructure-plans/

 

The question that really matters is how will this affect other road users and bus services, also how will the Council support the safety of pedestrians in shared space, remembering the cyclist is now protected through the highway code when they share space with cars, and rightly so!

 

It's our belief that the Council should begin with a consultation on the safety of pedestrians and although many of them supported the failed Brexit should join in with our near neighbours on the continent and promote to Government the legalisation of section 66 of the highway code as its currently only a recommendation.

 

Rule 66 of the Highway Code states “Let them know you are there when necessary, for example, by ringing your bell if you have one.

 

A motion via the Council to Government to legislate for pedestrian safety through at least cycles having bell's and lights fitted would be a start to safeguard pedestrians as they will be well and truly endangered through the 'let's find something to spend our massive borrowing requirement on from this totally dysfunctional Conservative Council and that's before businesses suffer potential closure whist this process closes road after road for as many weeks as those currently closed in the Town of Blyth.

 

On a footnote, we at Murky expect that the Leader of Council ditches his luxury Range Rover and cycles down from his Country Estate into Morpeth for all future meetings of Council to encourage his potential Fundamental Change!

 

Are Tory cuts to smash the viability of Council's renewable energy schemes?.

In early implementer Council's for energy from renewable sources we have noticed reports and cash sums announced in their draft final accounts illustrating the profits they made from solar panels fitted to Council housing, Council Run

schools and council owned commercial properties, ground source heat pumps and equipment in sports and leisure centres etc., and Council sponsored community backed hydro electric power plants.

Northumberland County Council's leader with a small l, Glen Sanderson, boasted about a profit of £30,000 from the sale of energy from primarily solar panels and ground source  schemes when announcing his huge capital borrowing needs of £307,000,000 and his scheme to grow the Council's energy infrastructure.

The myopia in his announcement and that of other boastful Council Leaders this year was very short lived indeed as the licenses for growth are issued by the Government department with the responsibility for all things tree-hugging, renewable and green, the massively budget slashed Environment Agency, a department starved of cash at a similar level to Council's over the last 11 years of Tory austerity and mismanagement.

They Environment Agency have just announced their marker plan for things to come by attacking with great gusto the minor player in this industry, an industry that's about to be nipped in the bud as it strives to challenge the energy billionaires who fund the Conservative Party nationally and whose major shareholders are invited on a regular and ongoing basis to legal garden parties attended by the Tory Leader and PM of this badly drifting nation as a precursor to receiving their peerages.

The Environment Agency has announced a 10 fold increase in the licences to operate and sell energy from Community Hydropower Schemes.The cost of licences will grow from £1500 to a whopping £13,393 this year, killing off the viability and community gain running CHS's gives Council's and/or communities.

Simon Hamlyn the chief executive of the British Hydropower Association has said:"The Environment Agency is slamming the final nail in the coffin of a renewable energy source which should be a key focus for the Government as energy prices soar".

It looks like he's just learning what we here at Murky have been preaching, that Conservative interests lie in the City and not the nations Communities, its
'profits before people every time'.

Commissioners looking, but at whom?

According to well informed social media pages and sites from the North and West of Northumberland a Government Commissioner, one Max Caller is in at County Hall in Morpeth but who is he investigating in a Commissioning sense; Officers, dysfunctional Councillors or both?

Commissioner Caller is well quoted in the recent sacking of Ms Josie Wragg the Chief Executive of Labour controlled Slough Borough Council for gross misconduct after the Council missed its targets, failed the public and became completely dysfunctional after her plans to correct matters failed.

His talents of sorting the wheat from the chaff is why he has landed at Loansdean in Morpeth to try to find out why the massive Unitary Conservative led authority is hemorrhaging cash through compensation and lawsuits, lost an internationally renowned external auditor, has a dysfunctional administration split into three distinct Tory groups, lost or paid off a myriad of officers and is paying temporary staff enormous sums, housing them in 5* hotels and paying first class travel and flights to try to bring some sort of democracy and openness into an arena akin to Gladiatorial Rome.

It's become a Council which has not achieved best value for its residents for the last five accounting periods with communications closed and so tightly managed that  Councillors from Tory splinter groups, the Labour opposition group and the very opinionated independent alliance are issued confidential papers at Council meetings in which £millions are spent  and given only ten minutes to absorb the detailed data and then asked to vote on the content. Its not only a sign of dysfunctionality, it may be a method used to cover up corruption.

Mr Caller's commission will have to look at why the Council's Chief Executive is allegedly suing the Council for bullying and why the Conservative administration rewrote the Council's Constitution in 2017, in the name of Councillor Oliver of Corbridge, which halved the number of Council meetings, removed the right to appeal 'Regal' decision making by Council Leaders and Deputies, closed down democratic accountability, left open debate with trade unions at a third tier officer level and allowed Councillors to write their own reports that were then presented as evidence to its audit committee then backed up by official releases to the press.

Therefore we here at murky believe that our first question in this article is correct and we need to know if the Commissioner is here to sack officers or dysfunctional
Councillors?

2,222 before life expectancy climbs back to when Gordon Brown left office

 

When the UK government published its much-vaunted   “levelling up”  white paper in February, it set a goal of adding five years to healthy life expectancy by 2035. The health and longevity trends for men between 2009-11 and 2015-17 had implied this would be achieved in 75 years, the Health Foundation said, but the inclusion of data from 2017-19 had dramatically worsened with both experts in the field of public health, and organisations such as shelter and age UK believing and reporting that it will now take 192 years to level up the disparity between the haves and the have nots. With the blame lying fairly and squarely at the feet of the Government.

During 2010 the Northumberland Labour Group reported on how the deprivation gap had closed considerably during 15 of Labour's 18 years in office and praised the final years under Labour with Gordon Brown leading the Nation as life expectancy rose to a new level and the disparity gap was closing faster than in previous years.

That progress which was also national, was used by the incoming Tory Government to raise the pension age, stop free tv licences for the over 75’s and power their austerity, social care charge increases and their flagship benefit slashing agenda.

During 2020 Northumberland Labour Group reported on the first 10 years of damage for most of Northumberland on the changes following a decade of austerity. The increase in poverty levels and the downward alterations to life expectancy were dramatic and Labour Group's leader Councillor Susan Dungworth pointed towards the 10 years of increased life expectancy for women living in Cramlington North the top 'have' ward when compared with those living in Cowpen/Kitty Brewster.

The latest deprivation reports show how at this moment in time 12.5% of the Counties population suffer from problems caused by deprivation and future forecasts expect that figure to double this year with 1 in every 4 residents slipping into the deprived category.

In Northumberland two of the Government's Cabinet members represent the County, Guy Opperman (pensions) and the Russian sponsored Anne-Marie Trevelyan (business). 

It seems the problems of deprivation in Northumberland can be directly linked to both of these Government posts yet they are still talking up the raising of the pension age further and still not helping business by opening up better road links with Scotland to improve the lot for all working people in Northumberland to make better use of the whole borderlands region and the Scottish nation as a market place and not just leaving Northumberland locked into the Tyne and Wear conurbation.

Northumberland Conservatives accused of taking the County Council into special measures!

 

The photo of the Conservative puppet leader of Northumberland County Council with his candidate for the Seghill with Seaton Delaval byelection doesn’t quite tell the story set by the 'Other voice of the North' the Murky blogspot facebook page, which brought a scoop to the fore this week with a revelation that the County Council is in so much trouble that it may be put in special measures, this is what was reported:

 "The tragedy of Glen Sanderson ..Northumberland County Council Leader, Glen Sanderson, is destined to go to down in history as the Leader who brought NCC into special measures.

 As recently reported in the press, Local Government enforcer, Max Caller, is on the case.

 Glen is a long-standing JP (Justice of the Peace), respected Councillor and Local Government stalwart.

 Glen looks the part, sounds the part, has a glint in the eye and the ability to charm and bring people together.

 If the peak of his career and ideal age to enter parliament had not coincided with the Tories being on a downer in Northumberland he would, most probably, have

ended up an MP.

Murky understands that despite pleas from his own side and others, Glen has spectacularly failed to deal with the “Morpeth Mafia” and his shadowy deputy. 

As such, NCC is paralysed and the “Morpeth Mafia” are preparing to throw Glen under the bus.

A tragic situation indeed, both for Glen and residents of Northumberland."

Regular readers of this blog know the reports put out by our team has been openly critical of the current administration but the Murky Blogspot appears to be much closer to the Conservative centre than we are and an accusation of special measures show that the Council is in a much worse condition than we as observers thought.

The Seghill With Seaton Delaval byelection is being fought by the Tories with an ultra right wing former UKIP supporter vying for local fame against Labour's moderate candidate Christine Savage.

It's noted by us that the Cramlington Group of moderate Tories have not been turnin gout to door knock and that Glen appears in the photo issued by the ' Morpeth Mafia' group to be distant from his candidate or is he concerned that its better to lean towards the centre right at the moment before any interview by
his national party officers?

Budget set: Government pulls back from support for clean ups and energy costs.

 

Financiers and analysts have warned all purpose Unitary Councils that the change of heart from Government in the shadow of massive military growth required to fulfill its promises to ensure the defence of the nation is bolstered, they have backed off supporting Unitary Council's with the costs of clean ups after the recent massive storms and the huge rise in energy costs.

The very large Unitary Council, Northumberland County Council, will be hit hard, with it reporting that in October 2021 a 42% increase in gas heating costs on public buildings and a 10.5% increase in electricity after taking into account its income from solar panels and a small hydro plant into consideration, with the expansion of its ground source heat pump project halted in 2017 when the Conservatives gained power across the County the planned changes required to reducing the Council's reliance on the nations energy grids have slowed considerably and this short sightedness will cost residents dearly in both service reductions and increased costs.

Unless the Government works more closely with Gulf states to increase production of oil for export as a matter of urgency, Council's like Northumberland with huge mileage costs will also be pressurised to reduce work on the ground that residents want and need in order to reduce the miles covered to undertake repairs and maintenance of grounds and highways to attempt to balance their books.

With the well documented spend of Northumberland's reserves on compensating staff who have been either bullied or forced from their jobs over the last five years when added to the pull back of promised help from Government, will place huge 'stress' on the County Council's revenue income reserves with the budget papers illustrating a borrowing requirement of an additional £307m taking the debt of the Council well over a £Billion and that debt also has to be serviced using the revenue income of the Council.

It's time some sanity is brought
back to halt the mismanagement of the County and sensible senior advisers brought in to guide the Council, expose the serious actions against the public purse and get the current leaders to accept responsibility and resign.