Leicester Mercury political correspondent
Archive for March, 2010
Mistaken identity
Mar 19th
Never let it be said that city Tory leader Ross Grant lacks the common touch.
On arrival at the Mercury building this week, clad in t-shirt and jeans rather than his usual sharp suit, he headed to reception to announce his arrival.
But the leader of the opposition’s status was lost on one of our receptionists, who asked him: “Are you here to fix the toilets downstairs?”
Not his area of expertise. The only experience politicians have of plumbing is plugging leaks…
Google is always watching
Mar 16th
Spoiling themselves
Mar 16th
“If professional politicians can’t fill in ballot papers then what hope do the general public have?” quipped one opposition politician after reading that two Labour leadership papers were spoilt at Monday’s selection meeting.
But we all know that spoilt papers in party selection meetings aren’t usually simple mistakes, they’re more often a defiant statement.
So who were the pair who thumbed their nose at colleagues and effectively said “I can’t put my trust in any of you. I’d rather give up my chance to vote than give you my backing.”
Want to make a confession? Call me in confidence, and tell all…
Leicester political gossip – now on the iPhone
Mar 16th
They can’t get enough of this blog…
Outgoing city council leader Ross Willmott reads it, city opposition leader Ross Grant comments on it. Newly-selected Labour leader Veejay Patel says: “Everyone’s reading it.”
Up at County Hall, officers and politicians alike keep up to date with political maneuverings and gossip here.
But it’s not always convenient to log on. If you’re not near your laptop it can take an age to load this website on an iPhone.
Never fear. I’m always looking for new ways to engage folks with the local political scene, and now you can log on in double-quick time.
Visit the blog using your iPhone at the usual address and you’ll get a simple interface (right) which takes seconds to load. The content is still the same.
Away at a seaside conference? Down the pub after committee? Log on using your iPhone – same address, just quicker.
Colin Hall scoops them all…
Mar 15th
Labour leadership night in Leicester, and what a serene affair it was too.
With a clever system of self-nomination, and a closing date well in advance of the meeting, you avoid nasty surprise challenges come party polling day.
Done and dusted in 60 minutes. I barely had time to finish a late night scotch egg and cup of coffee in the office before the Labour councillors were filing out.
I spoke to some councillors for their reaction, but we already had the results, of course, courtesy of Colin Hall‘s Twitter account. Keep on going like that and we’ll be out of a job…
Three contenders. Veejay Patel – front runner, Mary Draycott – the challenger, and Manish Sood – throwing his hat into the ring. In the end he got one vote. What on earth was he up to? I still can’t figure it out. Veejay won the day, and Mary put in a fairly respectable showing. There were two spoilt ballot papers. Wonder who.
Other party positions were dished out which have little relevance to those outside the party, but are interesting nonetheless.
Barbara Potter was nominated as chief whip. One councillor gave me a call after the meeting and growled: “One of the most outspoken critics of the council on issues like market policy and road conditions is suddenly in charge of maintaining order in the party and a united front. I can’t decide whether it’s genius or madness.”
Piara Singh Clair had dropped out of the chief whip race at the last minute. “Must have been offered a cabinet position,” winked one wag on leaving the meeting. We’ll wait and see. The cabinet will be selected on March 23.
One other point, it was confidently predicted by those closest to Coun Patel last month that he had 27 cast-iron votes in the bag. He ended up with 24.
So who are the trio that deserted him at the final hurdle, and why?
Veejay and Vi
Mar 10th
It’s five days until Leicester’s Labour councillors select a new leader.
Veejay Patel is still the apparent front runner. He has, after all, got current deputy Vi Dempster by his side, he was first out of the traps to launch his bid for the leadership, and he also wants a transparent vote to show the party how much support he has.
Normally during a leadership election political reporters are inundated with calls from potential candidates hoping to boost their profile in the run-up to a vote. But not this time.
Is the match-up between Vi and Veejay too powerful to contend with? Would challenging them be a political kamikaze act? Is it still, as one member was quoted in the Mercury as saying, the Dream Ticket?
We’ll know by Monday.
Rory’s Battle of Bosworth
Mar 4th
City cabinet member Rory Palmer took part in the Obama campaign over in America back in 2008, so he’s got experience of working for one of the slickest campaigns of modern times. His Parliamentary campaign is currently ticking all the right boxes too.
He’s taking his election fight to the doorsteps of Bosworth in the run-up to the general election, “it’s where it’ll be won and lost,” he says. Many of his tweets are tagged with #LabourDoorstep too, as part of his online Twitter movement.
Winning an election on the doorstep is better than winning an election on the back of a horse, a stunt that once briefly ran through his mind.
“We’ve dubbed this election campaign The Battle of Bosworth, and I had visions of me riding on a horse through Bosworth in a suit of armour. Now that would have been the election stunt to end all election stunts.”
Quite. Luckily his Obama-campaign pedigree got the better of him.
He’s sticking to knocking on doors for the foreseeable future.
Cash squeeze at the Curve
Mar 4th
Flagship Leicester theatre The Curve went epically over budget, with costs rising from an initial estimate of £26.5m to more than £60m.
Times are tough and costs, of course, must be kept under control. But little did anyone realise how bad things had become there. As I sat with a contact over a cup of coffee this afternoon, it was the music choices rather than the innovative building which left the biggest impression.
A compilation album of ‘hits’ from the 80s and 90s was on loop throughout. Worse than that, my companion observed, they were cover versions. You can pick up these CDs for 99p in Morrisons.
Someone buy them an iTunes gift card…
Spam
Mar 3rd
Over the past day or two I appear to have become the victim of some intense spamming, with lots of it slipping through my filters. I have a fair idea who is behind it, and I’ll get to the bottom of it.
In the meantime, ignore the odd comments trying to flog weight loss pills, hair loss remedies and anti-wrinkle cream.
Unless, of course, you’re a chubby baldy fella with a load of wrinkles…
Suspicious minds
Mar 3rd
More from the parallel universe of press offices.
On Monday I called the press team of a Midlands city council outside my patch. I asked for some information about various details of their council’s structure, as part of a wider report I’m putting together.
They took my name, telephone number and the name of the publication I work for. I then waited for a response, but heard nothing.
I called back yesterday afternoon.
“Oh I’m sorry we didn’t get back to you,” the head of press replied, “we Googled your name and it came up with the Conservative MP. We assumed you were a politician fishing for information so we just ignored it.”
That’ll be Penrith MP David MacLean (pictured) who, incidentally, is one of the most vocal opponents of the Freedom of Information Act in Britain. I use it every day. The irony…
The frustration of press offices
Mar 1st
Some blogging Mercury colleagues haven’t held back their frustrations about perceived obfuscation by press offices locally.
Today, I’m venting my spleen at PR folks further afield. On Friday it was leaked that BBC 6Music and the Asian Network could be axed after mounting pressure from the Conservatives.
Rather than pushing for confirmation – the Beeb had already clarified in the national press that they had no more to say – I wanted to know how many people worked for the Asian Network in the East Midlands, and in particular, Leicestershire.
Here’s the response:
David
I do not have the figures available.
Our statement today, attributed to a BBC spokesperson is: “Work on the BBC’s Strategy Review is ongoing and we are not commenting on today’s story.”
Do you see the disconnect? Do you see the answer to a question I haven’t asked? Do you see a press office on the defensive? And above all, do you see the quite stunning admission that the figures aren’t available?
A publicly-funded broadcasting service which has no idea how many people they employ. Sorry. Don’t believe it.
My response:
Hmmm. So we can say the BBC doesn’t know how many people work for the Asian Network in Leicester?
I was eventually fobbed-off with a tale about contracted workers skewing the figures.
The BBC still wonders why people pester them with Freedom of Information requests..
Transition team
Mar 1st
It’s not easy, changing council leader.
Far from being a case of sitting back and waiting to find out who Labour group chooses on the Ides of March, town hall officers are already hard at work – more than three weeks before the planned handover.
This week, they’re phoning councils that have recently had a leadership change in similar circumstances, and asking them if they can talk about how they managed the transition. “What was your blueprint,” corporate governance teams around Britain are being asked.
It’s hardly the Obama transition team, but every little helps.
