The Friday Roundup - 2/3/2012 - Salacious stories, lazy Tories and Jackanory

The Barnet Eye weekly Roundup

Welcome, one and all, to the Barnet Eye Friday roundup. There are two good news stories about Barnet in the Hendon/Barnet Times online edition today.

The first is the calling in of the decision to close Friern Barnet Library. This means that local Tory Councillors have recognised the worth of the library and the loss of amenity to local residents if it shuts. There is plenty of mileage left in this story, but at least it shows the council is starting to listen to residents. The Hendon Times covers the story here :-


http://www.times-series.co.uk/news/topstories/9565503.Campaigners__thrilled__library_closure_referred_back_to_Cabinet/

The second story is that Award winning film director, Ken Loach, has given a resounding thumbs up to A Tale of Two Barnets, the documentary film made by US Director Charles Honderick about Barnet.

http://www.times-series.co.uk/news/9564591.Barnet_film_given_thumbs_up_by_Loach/

You can check out the film website here - http://ataleoftwobarnets.yolasite.com/ - You can see a rough cut of the Ken Loach interview on the Gallery page here - http://ataleoftwobarnets.yolasite.com/gallery-and-trailers.php - well worth a look.

And on to the Press group of newspapers. Their big story is the fact that Councillor Brian Coleman is YET AGAIN up before the standards committee. Yet again he has failed to treat people with respect and yet again he's been sending people insulting emails. This despite the Standards committee ordering him to have training, which he has not done, to learn how to write polite emails to taxpayers.

http://www.edgware-today.co.uk/news.cfm?id=7859&headline=Standards%20committee%20set%20to%20rule%20on%20councillor%E2%80%99s%20conduct

Perhaps the saddest story is that of Ryoji Ogi, 35, from Finchley, who was convicted of using a shoe camera to film up schoolgirls skirts. I took particular interest in this story, because a friend of mine apprehended a pervert doing this on a local bus last year. The person in question was filming girls of primary school age. I personally would like to see Mr Ogi get the harshest sentence possible for his crime. It is clearly pre-meditated and I believe it is a violation of innocent youngsters for the sickest form of personal sexual gratification. The longer Mr Ogi is kept away from vulnerable younsgters, the better.


http://www.edgware-today.co.uk/News.cfm?id=7798&headline=Shoe%20camera%20pervert%20guilty%20of%20filming%20up%20skirts

So on to the blogs of Barnet.

Broken Barnet has found yet another dodgy arrangement, a year after the Metpro Scandal and the assurance from Barnet council audit department that there were no other such contracts.

http://wwwbrokenbarnet.blogspot.com/2012/03/friday-joke-one-year-after-metpro.html

Mr Reasonable talks about the One Barnet project and the "preferred bidders" for it, BT and Capita Symonds. He notes the high quality of debate on items of huge financial importance.

http://reasonablenewbarnet.blogspot.com/2012/02/hello-bt-and-capita-what-barnet-expects.html

Citizen Barnet is also delighted with the news about Friern Barnet library. She reproduces in full the the letter of thanks from the Friern Library Campaign. This pays tribute to everybody's favourite Conservative Councillor, Kate Salinger. Kate is universally respected on all sides for her honesty and integrity and her willingness to engage with local people and groups, such as the library group. We need more councillors like her on all sides (Mrs Angry even pays tribute to her in the film A Tale of Two Barnets). Kate's integrity and high esteem has been recognised with her appointment as Deputy Mayor. Mill Hill Councillor, Brian Schama has got the job of Mayor. Brian beat me to the job of Councillor in the Mill Hill Council election, two years ago. He's a top bloke and I'm pleased at his selection. He's one of the good guys.

Labour Councillors, Barry Rawlings and Pauline Coakley-Webb are also mentioned.

http://citizenbarnet.blogspot.com/2012/03/real-lifeline-thrown-to-friern-barnet.html

I was also going to list the latest exciting story from the Barnet Bugle, Ex Councillor Daniel Hope's pro Barnet Tory blog, but lazy old Dan hasn't bothered to post anything since Theresa Villiers fell off her bike on January the 26th. Mind you, compared to Councillor Robert Rams, he's a workaholic - Sheepsjacksie hasn't posted to his blog since December the 22nd - http://robertrams.wordpress.com/ sadly, Councillor Ramsbottom would never make Jackanory with the standard of his prose and appreciation for the English Language - If you are interested in the Barnet Tory point of view, I'd suggest you follow Daniel on Twitter. His tweets are absolutely fascinating, here is this weeks finest example :-

https://twitter.com/#!/barnetbugle/statuses/175290871753871360

KFC in Muswell is no more! Don't rejoice just yet... it's now become "Kennedy Chicken".

Retweeted by The Barnet Bugle Ltd

And finally from our roundup, the best of the week. Mr Mustard exposes a Barnet Council secret paper. Sadly, the paper reveals nothing at all. As to why it's secret, I've no idea whatsoever, apart from the fact that Barnet Council has an overbearing secrey culture, which is to the detriment of a well run organisation.

http://lbbspending.blogspot.com/2012/03/why-was-this-dpr-top-secret.html

Before I sign off, here is a call to arms for everyone in Barnet with a story to tell.  As someone who has seen first hand the power of guest bloggers, I can give testament to the value of telling your story. I subscribe to "Metropolitan Lines" the Guardians online newsletter for London. This arrives every Friday. They are asking for Londoners to contribute their stories. Metropolitan Lines is edited by Dave Hill, who has been a staunch supporter of this blog. - Here is what the Guardian want.

Coming up: special announcement
From Monday for two weeks the Guardian will be inviting its readers to participate in a unique crowdsourcing project about London and its forthcoming mayoral election. Each day at Comment is free and my London blog I'll be inviting you to contribute policy ideas to our very own Manifesto for a Model Mayor, which will be published in e-book form by the end of the month. 

An article telling you more about this exciting exercise in Guardian open journalism will appear on Sunday morning at 11.00. The aim is to paint a picture of a dream mayoral candidate and the policies to bring his or her vision for the capital to life. What sort of London do want a mayor to help build? Get thinking now. We need your help!

You can sign up for Metropolitan Lines here - http://www.guardian.co.uk/politics/signup/2009/may/08/london?CMP=twt_gu