Leicester Mercury political correspondent
David MacLean
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Posts by David MacLean
++SOULSBY ANNOUNCES CABINET++
May 9th
Peter Soulsby, Rory Palmer, Vi Dempster, Ted Cassidy, Manjula Sood, Piara Clair, Sarah Russell and Mohammed Dawood
Former cabinet member: “This was the most closely-guarded secret in city politics.”
ALSO: Labour group elected internal positions on Saturday morning. Patrick Kitterick becomes chair; Rita Patel is deputy; Steve Corrall is group secretary, and Barbara Potter remains as chief whip.
Peter Soulsby hits the ground running
May 9th
He’s back.
Sir Peter Soulsby won a landslide on Friday, and it was clear long before the official announcement at the Tigers ground that he’d won big.
But Sir Peter, eager to make changes in the city, appeared to be frustrated that election rules meant he couldn’t start work until the official result was announced at close to 9pm.
“I just want to get started and get things done,” he told me at 7pm on Friday, “but I can’t talk to officers in a city mayoral capacity until the results are announced.”
It underlined how eager he is to make his mark.
He’s under immense pressure to make a big difference in the city, of course. The creation of the all-powerful mayoral position, a new cabinet, and a Labour council with just two opposition members means there’s no excuse for failure.
The slate has been wiped clean, the blood-letting is over. The way the position came about was murky, but the election result itself couldn’t have been any clearer.
A page has been turned in Leicester’s political history. The Mercury made clear in its Saturday edition that the paper is here to ensure the city is the best that it can be, and that we will support Sir Peter in taking Leicester forward. But with such a small opposition group, our scrutiny is more important than ever.
The power of such a strong administration must be balanced with openness and transparency. Executive authority must be balanced with deference to the people on major issues.
The Big Debate
Apr 19th
Last night’s mayoral debate wasn’t a classic, but it was toughest grilling of candidates hoping to run our city so far.
De Montfort University’s vice chancellor Dominic Shellard did a fine job. All candidates got a fair say, and they also got the opportunity to challenge their political rivals on various issues.
Ross Grant clashed with Peter Soulsby over his previous council reign, and Sir Peter then locked horns with Rick Moore over where he lived.
Things got a touch shaky towards the end. Dominic perhaps tried to cram in too many questions, which meant that some were put to just one or two candidates.
But overall we build up the most coherent picture yet of the candidates themselves, if not their exact blueprint for the city if elected.
Sir Peter’s passion and conviction bubbled over to anger at one point, Gary Hunt turned out to be more right wing than anyone realised, Rick Moore shook off the Nixon-esque facial awkwardness of the Beeb debate, and Ross Grant opted to play the man – rather than the ball – a few times with Soulsby. Make of it all what you will.
As for the more fringe candidates the audience appeared to warm to David Bowley until he alleged that the Labour party was racist, Mohinder Farma and Geoff Forse struggled to make an impact, while Lee Sowden was a touch more impressive than he’d previously been.
Mu-Hamid Pathan is by no means the finished article as a political voice but he’s already impressive. Sir Peter said he’d urge people to back Pathan as their second preference. Personally, I can’t see Mu-Hamid remaining as an independent for long. He’ll be snapped-up by one of the local parties, my guess is Labour, in time to stand for a city council by-election some time soon.
Highlight of the night for me? An audience member plugging my blog was helpful (hits spiked last night), and the Twitter chatter was great to follow and join in with. We became the top trending topic in Leicester during the debate. Thanks to everyone who helped make The Big Debate a success.
I’m off for a week now. I’m heading back to the north east. See you next Tuesday.
Do we need cabinet meetings anymore?
Apr 12th
Could we see the end of the cabinet meeting in Leicester?
When the cabinet system replaced the committee system, the government originally planned to allow councils to hold cabinet meetings behind closed doors.
It relented in the name of openness, but despite the final rubber stamping exercise taking place in public the decisions and discussions still go on behind closed doors.
The city council’s cabinet meeting yesterday took more than an hour, but other than some indulgent speeches from councillors who are unlikely to be in the cabinet beyond May 5, there was little to report.
That’s because, like all councils across the country, the big decisions are still made privately. The decision-making cabinet members then assemble in a token gesture twice a month to make those decisions official.
Peter Soulsby was there as a spectator. The bookies reckon he’ll be chairing this meeting as mayor in just a few weeks, but it isn’t a prospect he’ll relish.
After the meeting he told me: “There must be a better way of doing this. It isn’t an effective way of announcing policy, engaging the public in what we’re doing, or scrutinising big decisions.”
The current way of doing things can’t continue. Benches of officers, many of them on six figure salaries, twiddle their thumbs as cabinet members belt out the latest tractor statistics before approving decisions made days earlier. Something’s got to change.
Wonk mag outs Sheila’s sick leave
Apr 7th
I’ve been aware for some time that city council chief executive Sheila Lock has been on sick leave.
But it’s always difficult to judge how long a senior staff member must to be off work before it becomes a story. We wouldn’t report on a chief executive being off for a week with a bug, for example.
Anyway, the Local Government Chronicle – the trade publication for council wonks – has broken the story on its website today.
It links her absence with the intentions of Peter Soulsby to “review” senior staffing at the council if he becomes mayor. He won’t comment directly on Sheila’s position, but it’s widely known that he wants the chief executive’s powers.
I’m torn on this one. Soulsby’s well within his rights to set out which powers he wants on taking office, but it must be pretty stressful for anyone to know that their new boss wants to neuter or delete their role.
There’s no love lost between the two and it’s not clear how the situation will ultimately be resolved.
One thing is clear. Clashes between political leaders and executives usually end in one of two ways; in a tribunal case or in a quiet payoff.
If the mayor does decide to get rid of the chief executive it’s going to be difficult to pitch it as a money saving exercise.
The Labour manifesto
Apr 7th
Sir Peter Soulsby outlined his vision for the city in today’s
Mercury.
There was plenty of detail and some genuinely new ideas contained in there. But as the article made clear this was a preview of the manifesto, rather than a copy of the manifesto itself.
I didn’t like that. Yes, there’ll be a launch at some point next week but once a document such as this has been ratified by the party then I believe the press have a right to scrutinise it as a matter of urgency, rather than waiting for a week. Particularly considering his frontrunner status.
I got my hands on a copy yesterday. But I didn’t have time to update the entire story. I’ve now copied it with my iPhone camera and uploaded it. You can view it in full here.
I’ll be doing the same for the other two mainstream parties as soon as I am in possession of their manifestos.
We’ve had a fairly decent era of openness from the council over the past 12 months. Let’s not blow it now.
Tory trio take-off
Apr 7th
Last Sunday Nicholas Bryars, chairman of the City of Leicester Conservative Association, sent a message to local supporters. It read:
Dear supporters,
As some of you are probably aware our candidates in Stoneygate have pulled out en-masse. If anyone knows of anyone who might be prepared to stand please contact me on ***** *** ***.
This raised the question of what sparked the walkout of three candidates.
Despite having a full slate of candidates for the first time in years, I wanted to know whether there’d been some kind of policy disagreement or clash of personalities.
The reason given, if true, is farcical. “Just one candidate pulled out,” I’m told by Nicholas, “but he’d promised to get two people he knew to stand alongside him.
“I didn’t know their names or who they were. So when he pulled out obviously we were left without any candidates at all for the three seats.”
“I didn’t expect this email to be leaked to the media,” he added.
Welcome to local politics, Nicholas.
Blind item
Apr 3rd
Which Leicestershire-based political official has received threats of serious violence from individuals all claiming to be loyal to the same politician?
I’m assured that the victim is doing everything possible to bring it to the courtroom.
There’s no evidence that the politician has played any part whatsoever in the threats. But the unprecedented situation should never have arisen in the first place. The fact that political allies of an individual are willing to engage in such dark actions will always reflect badly on the individual concerned.
Their judgement in associating themselves with such people must be called into account.
The phrase “If you lie down with dogs, you will get up with fleas” comes to mind…
A Forse to be reckoned with?
Mar 31st
As questions go, perhaps it was a low blow.
While interviewing Green party mayoral candidate Geoff Forse over the telephone yesterday I was glancing through his party’s press release on his candidacy.
It listed the elections that he’d previously stood in, and when a lull in the interview presented itself I saw the opportunity for a zinger.
“Geoff, you’ve stood in three general elections, two European elections, and every local election for two decades. How come you haven’t won any?”
Sorry Geoff.
More power to the mayor? Good.
Mar 29th
A few different sources have told me recently that Peter Soulsby plans to have a “small” cabinet if he becomes mayor in May.
By small, we’re talking about five people – including himself and a deputy mayor – instead of the current ten. This would, in effect, mean even less councillors would have direct influence over city politics.
It’s also then very likely that the compliant remuneration panel will bump their salaries up due to the increased workload.
Now, let me shock you – I think it’s a great idea.
Both Mary Draycott and Roger Blackmore have recently bemoaned the fact that backbench councillors have less clout than ever before. I admire them both, but they hark back to an era of endless committee meetings where every councillor had some sort of influence but decision making was hamstrung by delay and drift.
Cabinet governance reduced that influence and effectively meant that ten people ran the city. Councillors whose treasured influence was sapped by the change disagreed with the move.
There are some genuine talents on the council, but as with many other authorities there are also placemen, cronies and chums.
Some cabinet members, for example, have roles of genuine importance – environment, education – and a workload to match, but some are all but anonymous between cabinet meetings.
By moving from the committee system to the cabinet system, and now the mayoral system, I believe that we are acknowledging that supplementing a team of scores of well educated and experienced officers with 54 laymen is a relic from the past.
I believe the number of councillors should be halved – which would give back bench councillors more clout individually – but that’s for another day.
The new mayor will get even more powers when the localism bill goes through. Great. It’ll help end the paralysis caused by squaring every decision with a political group and a a large council cabinet.
Power should be decentralised from government to local government, but more centralised within local government if it’s to be of any use.
A mayor with a guaranteed term and a cabinet of five, working full time, will speed up decision making, and it means we know exactly who to blame or praise when things go right or wrong respectively.
I have different reservations and concerns about each of the candidates in the race, and do worry about whether unprecedented power in one person’s hands could be abused.
And I still disagree with a six-figure salary for an elected mayor no matter how many powers they’re handed. It is, after all, senior officers who do the sums and the detail, while politicians choose which direction the council heads in.
But under the new system it’s up to the mayor to decide how to weild power, committees and the press will still scrutinise their actions, and at the end of it all the public will judge them. It’s democracy in action.
Gill says bye – why?
Mar 24th
It was trashy of Lib Dem HQ to try and bury their bad news under budget mania yesterday.
It didn’t trouble the Mercury, however. We placed the story even more prominently than the budget coverage. The novice spinner in Cowley Street who thought that plan up needs a new job.
The real reason for the Lib Dems replacing Gill with new man Zuffar Haq still isn’t clear. This Guido Fawkes post says it’s because of election irregularities, allegedly discovered by the Lib Dems themselves, in the run up to the 2005 election, and high expenses in Parliament six years ago.
The document mentioned was widely circulated.
It doesn’t fully explain why the party was quite happy for him to stand in a seat which was – at the time at least – seen as a Lib Dem/Labour marginal, just ten months ago.
Yesterday’s event appears to be a combination of factors rather than a single “smoking gun”.
By-elections are high profile, and the Lib Dems can’t afford another epic defeat like the one in Barnsley just a few weeks ago.
A twice-beaten candidate doesn’t inspire confidence from local campaigners. A candidate who let his Labour opponent buck the national trend and increase his majority is even more of a liability.
He also refused to sign a letter, on behalf of city Lib Dem councillors, to distance himself from the toxic tuition fees issue. Leicester South, of course, has a large student population. The Mercury was due to run a prominent story on this decision.
Take the fact that many saw his ten months in Parliament as an expensive but very low profile affair, along with the election document which poses many questions, and you’ve got the makings of the situation where Cowley Street simply had to make a clean break from the past.
All is not well
Mar 22nd
Politicians “close to blows”, a cabinet member in tears, other serious allegations flying around like confetti.
After a birthday meal with my girlfriend I retired to a nearby bar for a couple of drinks tonight. Instead I stumbled across a group of Labour party councillors who were buzzing with anger after the latest Labour group meeting, followed by another angry faction in the next bar I arrived at.
A row between a local councillor and a political figure came close to the pair landing blows on each other because of the intense fury, a cabinet member claimed.
Meanwhile a different cabinet member, it is alleged, was left tearful after witnessing the “bullying and arrogance” of one Labour faction. “I can’t put up with this for any longer,” they were heard to say.”
Other claims were made which, even if published as blind items on this blog, would stray into dangerous legal waters.
All are claims made by senior and experienced members of the party.
All are claims which can’t simply be swept away by the local Twitter rapid rebuttal unit with the usual “look over there” line. A single dodgy-looking Conservative deselection (which I’m probing) is a walk in the park compared to some of the detailed allegations I heard tonight.
All is not well.
