Thursday, 18th August, 2016
Double blind
I was recently interested in a press release issued by the Carmarthenshire and Pembrokeshire Liberal Democrats.
They’ve elected Andrew Lye to become the party’s local branch chairman.
“Who he?” you ask.
As well as a Lib Dem activist he’s also a founding member and party president of the Pembrokeshire Alliance.
My interest in the press release on Mr. Lye’s Lib Dem promotion may need some explaining – particularly for those unaware of the Pembrokeshire Alliance.
The Pembrokeshire Alliance formed in November 2013 as a contender for county council seats, hopeful that disaffected ruling ‘independent’ party councillors – or any councillors for that matter – might find solace under their new banner.
It was set up with platitudinous objectives and guiding principles nobody could argue against.
The hackneyed manifesto doesn’t seem to have worked so far as the Alliance still hasn’t attracted a single defection, and consists of the same trio of councillors as its launch day.
It was supposed to be a party which accepted anyone from any political affiliations and none, to come together for the benefit of Pembrokeshire as supporters, candidates and, ultimately, councillors in the hope that it may one day have enough elected to form an administration.
There was, at one time, even speculation the PA may field candidates for the county’s Welsh Assembly seats.
But the mask slipped in an early chapter when it was discovered that, unknown to the Pembrokeshire Alliance’s rank and file members, its leader was angling for a grubby deal with the council’s deeply unpopular ruling Independent Plus Political Group (IPPG) – the political party of so-called ‘independent’ councillors.
The terminal revelation that the Pembrokeshire people’s party’s leader – Cllr. Bob Kilmister – had been in ‘coalition negotiations’ behind its supporters’ backs knocked the PA’s already slim credibility, especially as opposition to the IPPG was, ostensibly, their main tenet.
Amid the ensuing outrage the poisonous pact never materialised, but had it gone ahead, the plan was for Cllr. Kilmister to be slipped into council leader Cllr. Jamie Adams’ cabinet as his deputy – which would have allowed Bob to trouser a near 35 grand special responsibility allowance.
Soon after its formation, Cllr. Kilmister was at pains to point out that the PA was not to be another pseudo-independent power-grabbing cabal but a bone fide political party to be formally registered with the Electoral Commission.
One of the early explanations for their delay in doing so was said to relate to unforeseen issues creating a bank account.
That was in 2014.
At the time of writing no record of the Pembrokeshire Alliance’s registration with the Electoral Commission appears online.
One rather convincing theory has that Bob was hoisted by his own petard.
Having pledged that the Pembrokeshire Alliance would welcome members and candidates from all political bents, his own background as a Liberal Democrat – under whose banner he was the sole councillor returned in the 2012 council elections – caused a problem.
This was thought to be the national Lib Dem rule prohibiting elected Lib Dems joining another party.
So, the pledge to formally register the Pembrokeshire Alliance with the Electoral Commission – in competition with the Lib Dems, of which Andrew Lye is also a long-time member – was forgotten about.
Indeed, Bob stood in the north Pembrokeshire constituency earlier this year as the Liberal Democrats’ Welsh Assembly election candidate. Attracting a 5.9% share, he barely scraped enough votes to retain the party’s deposit.
Back to Andrew Lye, who we might reasonably expect to be recruiting and supporting Pembrokeshire Alliance candidates to stand in next year’s county council poll here in Pembrokeshire.
He was quoted in the Pembrokeshire Herald – wearing his Lib Dem hat, remember – saying:
“But we are already planning for the 2017 County Council elections and ensuring that we have candidates lined up.”
Aside from the glaringly obvious conflict of interest, let’s make the wild assumption any Lib Dems win election to PCC next year.
Does the Pembrokeshire Alliance intend to form a group by poaching these and other successful candidates post-election, outside of the knowledge of voters, and if so, what differentiates them from the IPPG?
Answers on a postcard.
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When I was president of the Pembrokeshire Alliance, which was very short lived, it was a well known fact that the party would go Lib in order to get funds from the Lib Dems in order to fund the campaign!
The rationale for the setting up of the Pembrokeshire Alliance, it would seem from your explanation Jacob, is analogous to that of a blanket and its propensity to attract s*!t to it.
Thus it is incredibly difficult to understand, given its base of operations, why it has failed so miserably to justify the basis for its very creation.
With Cllr Bob Kilmister in the dual role of leader of the Pembrokeshire Alliance and Lib Dem candidate for the Assembly elections, it is fair to ask whether the Alliance is nothing but a front organisation designed to hoover up the votes of people who would never consider voting Lib Dem.
And the failure to keep its promise to register as a political party only serves to make a mockery of its TICK logo.
Is it true that some county councillors had summer jobs in Rio as judges and referees at the boxing?
I believe this was a work experience gig as they will be trying for positions with FIFA and the IOC after next year’s elections.
Can anyone confirm this rumour?
Jacob, your point is well made if the whole text is read. The problem is most of the Pembrokeshire electorate won’t absorb or even read a message of this length, myself included.
It would be better understood if the matter was reduced to say a single sentence eg: “The candidate is laying a smoke screen, in order to feather his own nest”.
I think that should be understood by all, (if they don’t already know).
I was an early member of the Alliance in the hope that there could be an opportunity to vote at an election for a councillor who had agreed to sign up for a party or group with a pre-election manifesto.
Both Jacob and Mike have been at the forefront of the necessary task of pointing out and pursuing deficiencies in the administration of our council. Much against the opposition of officers it must be said. But where are the positive non-officer promoted policies proposals from councillors coming from?
Only Labour, through Paul Miller, and the Alliance, through Bob Kilmister put up any alternative budget proposals for 2016/17 by way of formal Notices of Motion. The administrative machine (officers and councillors) made sure these got nowhere. The majority of councillors as usual were silent, presumably with no ideas to pool.
We now have rounds of officer-led proposals for reductions to our service levels, discussed behind closed doors at member-only seminars before we are given the opportunity to comment on broad based “Consultations” aimed at achieving the preferred outcome.
I note that a consultation on leisure and other services has already been reported in the 2016/17 budget, with a claimed 55% (308 people) being in favour of a Cultural Service Trust and 51% (269 people) being in favour of a Leisure and Cultural Service Trust, (page 283 of the 2016/17 budget).
Has anyone seen the Pricewaterhouse Coopers “blue print” for reductions which cost us £75,000? As far as I can see, this report provided the basis for council approving a £3.5m “Transformation- invest to save reserve” at 31 March 2016, planned to increase to £6.0m by 31 March 2017.
There does not, by the way, seem to be any indication of how much this “investment” will save, nor any proposals for monitoring its achievement, which one hopes is rather more than the initial investment.
Is that the same Andrew Lye, who when first came to live in Pembrokeshire, wrote to the WT to complain that ARAF on the road confused him and put his concentration off? And why should the signs be in Welsh as well?
Who is he? Whose he?
Jack I have to tell you it’s definitely not – ‘Who he’!
Pembrokeshire speak – perhaps!
Al, “Who he?” was intentional – and not Pembrokeshire speak, to my knowledge.
Your second question should be “Who’s he?” (as ‘whose’ is the possessive of who) and my name is Jacob, not Jack!
Touché from you then Jacob – well done.
Excuse my ignorance, but I thought I’d happened upon the script for a Monty Python sketch.
Now where is the Pembrokeshire People’s Popular Front?
Yes I know…he’s over there…
Yet another example of how well our representatives sell their soul in order to continue feeding at the trough we fill.
John Hudson, £75k for a report? That’s a lot for a simple exercise, who sanctions this spend?
Referring to John Hudson’s £75,000 report, the consultants have merely regurgitated ideas which have already been considered by other authorities and been publicised in the press.
Since we are told repeatedly that we have to pay the most to get the best directors, I can’t help wondering why the county council’s management team couldn’t have come up with similar proposals without employing consultants.
The legal department was strongly criticised in the recent past for frequently seeking outside advice and incurring unnecessary expenditure – I hope this is not spreading to other departments.
Welshman 23, the need for this arose out of a 2015 Wales Audit Office corporate assessment report, which concluded that Pembrokeshire County Council could not provide adequate assurance that its arrangements are capable of delivering its priorities and improved outcomes for citizens.
The report went on:- the council is in the early stages of developing a new corporate strategy and organisational principles, as it recognises the need for fundamental culture change and a new strategic approach in order to deliver its service priorities within the financial constraints it faces.
The council has appointed consultants PricewaterhouseCoopers (PwC) to provide the additional expertise and capacity necessary to drive forward a transformation agenda.
(You can draw your own conclusion about the in-house standard of member and officer expertise).
A lack of clarity in relation to key governance roles and responsibilities within the council is weakening accountability, and aspects of the governance arrangements in place do not support consistent transparency in decision-making. Currently there are not effective arrangements in place to help identify and address these weaknesses.
The 2016/17 budget (page 106) included the commentary that:
My view, for what it is worth, is that if these transformational cost reduction/efficiency exercises continue chipping away at the edges of our services, at the end of the rolling exercise there will not be much left worth saving.
While these may save the council money, so far most of the cost reduction/efficiency savings result in increased direct costs to service users, that us.
While the accountants and consultants are busy bean counting, there does not appear to be much input from the social benefit side of the equation.
This may be fine, if you are a high rate council tax payer who does not use much in the way of services which are charged according to use.
However, if you, on an average salary, and your family, rely on services where you use it and have to pay for it, you may choose, or be forced to go without.
Ultimately this may lead to a service, of benefit to the broad community, being closed through lack of use.
“Who he?” is Private Eye speak.
Hear, hear! And no finer a publication has written about our rotten borough’s shenanigans!
Thank you John. We should employ people with the relevant skill sets.
Handing out jobs with ‘Director’ in the title, it would seem that some of these people are not suitable to carry out fundamental reviews.
If we had a majority group of council members elected on the basis of a cohesive policy backed by a mandate, then hopefully elected representatives would be in control, and, within the law and grounds of reasonableness, could tell officers what they wanted them to do.
For years it would seem that unelected directors have had to make policy, with our elected councillors running behind to play catch up. Of course, so much time and effort is wasted when the majority of councillors decline to follow, as in the case of the great schools issue.
It would appear from comments above that there are officers in post who are not fit for purpose.
If you are not capable of carrying out your role in private business, you are quickly removed. Why is this not the case in Public Office? Or do the officers exercise some ‘leverage’ over the councillors (the ’employer’ for want of a better word).
At best we are paying twice for the same activity! If the private sector provides a better service (i.e. satisfactory) at actually a lower cost, then why should we accept the number of staff that are just pushing a pen from one side of the desk to another.
Instead of cutting services, remove the unnecessary levels of management, not the hard working staff who are actually doing the task!
But again, I do not have a large pension pot accruing at someone else’s expense…
I am sorry Mr Absalom but do we really need road signs and correspondence from public bodies written in Welsh and English, when as far as I am aware all residents of the UK can speak the English language?
Some time ago I suggested that IPPG stood for Independent Pseudo Political Group.
Today I suggest that TICK promised by the Pembrokeshire Alliance might stand for “Tosticated Isagogic Cyanotype Kainotophobia” or in plain English a “Fuddled Introductory Blue Print for Fear of Change”.
John Hudson has highlighted what I have bleated for a long time – for the council chamber to have a political spec, with a mandate to match.
For too long ‘independent’ councillors have spoken that ‘Pembrokeshire is better off without a political driver’. Unfortunately the last few years have shown up this prophecy.
I would hope all the local political parties are looking at fielding candidates in the 2017 elections and even working together to ensure no ‘independent’ can be returned unopposed.
I’m sure Old Grumpy will be monitoring the election leaflets of all the candidates, most especially the ‘independents’ as to their affiliation post-election. That will be the first question I will be asking my local ‘independent candidate’.. will you be on the gravy train if I vote for you?
Hey Mr Calver – https://twitter.com/heddgwynfor/status/448589226972831744
“Who he” is a note sometimes put in the margin of a journalist’s draft report, which has been submitted to the editor. If the editor does not know the identity of someone appearing in the story, he/she commonly scribbles “who he”.
Other notations include “speak!” or (if the scribbler is unfortunate – “you’re fired/Ed.”)
Many years ago Private Eye Magazine started to insert these phrases to satirise the pomposity of certain celebrities.
The scandal of senior IPG members using our money (or council computer resources) to produce election material for favoured candidates too dim to even produce their own, only came to light because a councillor was a bit miffed to learn that the IPG had been producing election material for a candidate who stood against him (a potential SRA was at stake!)
Jacob was instrumental in outing these election flyers for a number of no name/independent candidates via his website.
Two councillors were investigated by the Ombudsman, David Wildman and Rob Lewis. David resigned from the Council, while Rob Lewis is still there enjoying a Cabinet SRA.
The council’s officers advised the standards committee that there was confusion over the ability of councillors to use council resources and Councillor Lewis was forced to take a two week suspension.
Mike has entertained us with the antics of senior IPGers forming their cosy cabal on the floor of the polling station before inviting voting fodder to “support” it. He has provided us with the invite letters to meetings promoting the benefits of membership of the IPG group.
We can all see the outcomes and achievements of this IPG cabal supported by its followers, and it would appear that we are powerless to change things at the ballot box. We are not in control of our democracy.
Note your comment Robert, I am Welsh like many others in Wales and quite happy to converse in English.
Neil, or even the likes of Mr Calver.
I seem to remember, John, that the two-week suspension of Rob Lewis was the most meaningless, the most cynical of penalties, as the council did not actually sit during his fortnight’s “punishment”.