The vast majority of Conservative voters in the London Borough of Barnet are decent, honest and hardworking people. They vote Conservative because they associate with the following values :-
Giving people more power and opportunity over their lives
Raising standards in schools
Building skills in the job market
Decentralising power
These are keynote policies on the Conservative Party website. There's just one problem for Conservatives in Barnet. Their local party believes in NONE of these things. Let me give you a few examples :-
Giving people more power and opportunity over their lives - The local Conservatives decided that it would be a good idea to get rid of wardens from the various sheltered housing complexes across Barnet. They conducted a "consultation" with the tenants to see if they liked the idea. The results were remarkable. 85% said no. They hated the idea. Did the Barnet Conservatives (lead by Lynne Hillan on this fatal policy) give those people power and opportunity over their lives? No, they totally ignored them. They thought they knew better. Worse than that though. They hadn't even bothered to properly check out the legality of what they were doing. One of the tenants, 78 year old David Young, decided to ask his solicitor to check out what was happening. The result. A High Court judge has called a halt to the whole process. Just to make matters worse, when David Young took "power and opportunity" himself, how did they react? They launched a complaint against his solicitor with the Law Society. Like most of the other legal cases Barnet launches, they lost. I don't believe that a single normal Conservative voter would find this anything other than repugnant behaviour by their party.
Raising Standards in Schools - Fiona Bulmer who is the Tory responsible for education standards, does quite a good job, I wouldn't criticise her. Sadly Matthew Offord, the Candidate for Hendon has muscled in on her responsibility and took the portfolio for investment in education. He has brought his usual reverse midas touch to the role. The result. Chaos, kids in portacabins. Offord doesn't want to take the rap, because he knows it will damage his chances in Hendon, so he's wheeled out Fiona Bulmer to take the heat.He was happy to take the headlines when new schools were announced and the cash was rolling in. If you click on the link on his name above, you'll see that he's been moved sideways, where he can do less damage, as Borough Safety officer. That is how Offord behaves. Get a job, take the plaudits, then leg it when it all goes wrong.
Building skills in the job market - Barnet has a huge project called Future Shape. This is all about "outsourcing" local jobs. Rather than giving work to local people in hard times, the jobs are exported to other boroughs, other parts of the country or to call centres in foreign countries. Of course there is one area where they excel at "building skills". Yup, you guessed - for their mates. Vanessa Gearson has had various roles in the local Tories. She was a Councillor. She's stood as a candidate. She wanted to stand in Finchley, but Mike Freer got the nod. Knowing what she's like, Mike gave her a great consolation prize. She's now the head of communications at Barnet Council. You may wonder what sort of a person she is. Now I've no idea, but click on this link and see what the Tories own website says about her. I've no idea what her salary is now, but apparently it was £60K per year before her promotion.
Decentralising Power - There are 220,000 people in Barnet. Do you know how many selected Mike Freer to be Leader of the Council? Well at the last Council election, a guy called Brian Salinger was the Leader of the Conservatives. He lead them to an increased majority. Immediately after, Brian Coleman proposed a motion of no Confidence within the Tory group and he was ousted. Freer stood against him and was selected. 23 people decided. Many decisions which used to be made by full council are now made "in cabinet" - ie behind closed doors.
If I was a real Conservative living in Barnet, I'd have nothing to do with this sleazy bunch. Clearly no sane Tory would vote for Labour with Gordon Brown in charge, but locally? I've been to a few Couincil meetings and the man who talks real sense is Jack Cohen and his Lib-Dems. The only way that Barnet will ever clean up it's act is a thrashing, when the National party does well.
If you don't follow my advice, don't complain when the Council Tax goes even higher. Barnet Taxes have rising far quicker than just about every Lib Dem Council anywhere over the last 8 years.
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