And now for something completely different ....

Long time friend and customer of Mill Hill Music Complex studios (my business), Captain Sensible has made a fascinating documentary about the Romney, Hythe and Dimchurch Railway for the Guardian. It is a great bit of very British nostalgia. Well worth a look.



The end piece about the village of Dungness is brilliant and the piece about artists Derek Jarman's endless garden is inspired. The Captain is a brilliant guitarist. It seems he'd make a fine presenter as well.  To make the desolate landscape around Dungness seem fascinating is a sign of a true talent. Maybe we should get him to narrate the post apocalyptic movie we'll make about the after effects of One Barnet ! He'd certainly do  a better job than the other famous Captain associated with Bunns Lane, Captain Useless AKA Matthew Offord MP, who has his offices in Churchill House.

Well Done Cap'n !!!

Is Hendon MP Matthew Offord considering joining the Labour Party?

A rather interesting tweet from Hendon Conservative MP Matthew Offord

HendonMP: Great night at Keith Vaz's party in Soho. Good speech from Blair and Livingstone said how disappointed he was with the GLA result in Barnet

 I hadn't realised what a fan of Ken Livingstone and Tony Blair Matthew was. One can only wonder if matthew doesn't do irony. I am sure Ken Livingstone is absolutely gutted that Brian Coleman lost his seat. At least he seems to have got through the night without thumping anyone. Maybe he feels more comfortable in the company of Labour members?

Captain Useless Special - Who saved all the pies

MP for Hendon (AKA Captain Useless, Souperman, Matthew Leviticus - the scourge of gay couples and Roverman the ex officio minister for Dogs human rights) has claimed yet another famous victory. His campaign to save the pasty has paid dividends. George Osborne has crumbled in the face of Matthews ferocious campaign. Having made a name for himself, early in career by allegedly thumping one of the Tory whips (no one told Matthew that whips are meant to do the whipping) and hurtling around the world as part of the Parliamentary Armed Forces program, taking part in military operations and vanquishing drug dealers everywhere (except for Hendon). Matthew came out, strongly against the pasty tax on his website.

http://www.matthewofford.co.uk/newsshow.aspx?id=4&ref=158

It is believed that the brains behind Matthews highly popular revolt was his chief policy adviser and pet Jack Russell dog, Maximus. Max has on many occasions expressed his strong support for makers of sausage rolls and pasties. He is especially partial to a steak slice. The Barnet Eye contacted Max for a comment, but he was clearly feeling Ruff. Rumour has it that Max and his protoge Matthew may have been overdoing the celebrating of his famous victory. We hope Matthew gets better soon !

Captain Useless is back to his slothful ways

I really don't believe this. Captain Useless AKA Matthew Offord is back to his old useless, slothfull ways. If I'd just won a seat at the General Election, the very first thing I'd have done is update my website and thank everyone. I lost at the council. I was devasastated. I don't have a highly paid campaign team to run my blog,  but I still managed. Sadly Matthew Offord can't be bothered. This screen shot was taken from his website more than 36 hours after the result.  He really is a lazy,ungrateful man. He should remember that the people of Hendon put him there and say thank you. What a lazy slob !!!! read and weep !!!!

Some serious thought

Why do I do it (the Blog)? That's a really easy answer. I've lived in Mill Hill from the day I was born, till today (with a spell of six months in Stockholm in 1981 and a year in Queensbury in 1986/7). My children go to school and I love the place. My kids joke that I know everyone in Mill Hill because I can't walk up the Broadway without saying hello and having a chat. A quick trip to M&S for some plums or Iceland for some sardines will often take 1/2 an hour as I gossip to someone or the other. A night out for a curry invariably leads to a good old chinwag with someone. I write the blog because I passionately believe we deserve better and the best way to get it is to shout from the rafters.Not everyone likes my style of writing. For instance I'm often asked by people why I give people nicknames, such as Matthew Offord who I call Captain Useless. I explain that Matthew Offord has made a big deal of how his nautical exploits have made him ideally suited to "running the ship". He even said so in his blog. I however happen to think he has a track record for being completely useless. I could call him "Matthew Offord, the bloke who reckons he is the ideal choice for Parliament in Hendon, because he sails a boat, but who had a disasterous record as deputy Leader of Barnet Council and had to be moved to a role where his job is to issue press releases advising parents not to let their babies play with plastic bags", but I happen to think "Captain Useless" is more succinct and sums him up equally well. I don't expect everyone to like my style of writing, but it's I write how I think and anything else would be dishonest. I happen to know for a fact that this blog (and the other Barnet blogs) have made a huge impact on Barnet Council and many policy decisions. We've not won every battle, but we're winning more than we are losing. That is why Tory Councillors, Barnet Council employees, The press, residents, pressure groups and tenants contact us and spill the beans on a regular basis. That's why the Guardian, the BBC and countless other organisations link to this blog. I happen to believe that scrutiny makes for better service and I believe that this blog has scrutinised and improved Barnet in a small way, for the benefit of the residents and Council Tax payers.

Having written this blog for well over a year and established a reputation, I ponder what the next thing I should do is. It is clear to me that the current administration running Barnet Council really aren't up to the job. Could I do better? Well I've been pretty successful at the things I've set my mind to in life. I like to think I'm pretty honest and hard working. I'd like to think that I can work with people and get things done. I have a track record for getting the best out of some pretty difficult people and I've made good things happen from some pretty poor starting positions. After the Brian Coleman standards case, many people congratulated me for standing up to Coleman. Many urged me to stand for the Council in the forthcoming elections. I ponder what I could do and what I could add.

In an ideal world, if I was on the group that ran the council, the first thing I'd do is I'd put every scrap of council business (apart from sensitive information such as Child protection issues) online. I'd put all council invoices over £1000 on line (as the GLA do) and I'd publish the results of all tenders for business (in summary). This would make the whole process transparent and I think it would save money.

Secondly I'd make sure that scrutiny committees did their job. These should be chaired by the party in opposition and they should be a complete pain in the bum (in a constructive way) for the party in power. Nothing would make this work better than having a real Tory like "Don't Call Me Dave" Miller or Dan Hope beating us up and makings ure we did our job. Sure they'd grip about some of the policies and we'd ignore them, but if we cocked up, they would spot it and we'd fix the problem. What we have now is a system where the Lib Dem and Labour opposition spot problems and the Tories use their inbuilt majority and chairmanship to ignore valid criticism. I'd spend more money on areas where there would be real benefit for the citizens of Barnet (more trading standards officers to catch rogue traders) and less on politically motivated appointments. I'd sack all of the future shape consultants and concentrate on eliminating waste at ground level. I've got three children of school age. I'd spend more money on recreation facilities, because I believe that the devil makes work for idle hands. My daughter is a national swimming champion and my son is a goalie for a successful under 10 football team. I'd support the volunteers who run these to the hilt, giving small cash grants to help. For example the several thousand pounds Barnet Council spent on their budget simulator for the website, which is a complete joke, could have been parcelled up into small grants of say £200 and bought football kits for all the kids in the borough playing under 10 football who are too poor to afford them. A club such as Watling FC, which my son belongs to could do huge amounts of good with tiny amounts. I would fund all of this out of savings delivered by "open procurement", getting rid of consultants who only ever deliver reports recommending more reports and scrapping all of these money wasting gimmicks such as web budget simulators.

I happen to believe that there are too many stuffed shirts within Barnet Council. They turn up, collect their allowance and do sweet FA. For example, check this website for Brunswick Park Councillors which include Lynne Hillan - who thinks she's the person who should be running the Council. The head of campaigning at Conservative Party HQ said the following 'If you have a website rule no1 is keep it updated' - Checking Hillans website, you have to conclude that they've either done nothing as ward councillors or are too lazy to bother to update their website. Bizarrely, the only item on it is a recipe for Kologassi. From this, can we conclude that all Councillors Tambourides, Rutter and Hillan have been doing is eating dinner. One thing you could be 100% sure of if I was on the Council is that the ward website would be kept up to date!

So what am I trying to say? Well I'm saying that I've given the matter some serious thought. If I thought I couldn't do a better job than the likes of Hillan, Coleman and Offord I most certainly wouldn't bother. I guess though, that the issue isn't whether I think that, it's whether anyone else thinks it.

Matthew Offord - Captain Useless update

Further to my previous blog regarding Captain Useless (AKA Matthew Offord, Conservative Candidate for Hendon). Following a tip off from
"Mike" - Just a quick note to you all. try a quick google search of

"Matthew Offord" Thameslink dispute

You'll see that there's a grand total of zero results for him actually doing anything for us hard pressed commuters - Try it yourself


http://www.google.co.uk/search?gbv=2&hl=en&tbo=0&q=%22matthew+offord%22+Thameslink+dispute&btnG=Search&meta=&aq=f&oq=

How useless can one man be ????????????????????????????

Matthew Offord vs The laws of natural justice

The Conservative candidate for Hendon, Matthew Offord has published a message for his followers on his website. In it he makes the following statement as one of his core beliefs :-

* Our teachers must be free to teach by ability and discipline unruly pupils without fear their decisions will be overturned

So I asked myself, under what circumstances might anyone want to "overturn" a punishment handed out to a child? Well I suppose that the situation Offord is talking about is one where mummy and daddy think little Johnny can do no wrong. Poor old teacher is left in a situation where all those nasty pinko liberals undermine him and Johnny runs riot.

I think back to my own school days at Finchley Catholic High School. I didn't get on with the Headmaster at the time. He had it in for me and he told me so. He told me that he wanted to expel me at the first available opportunity after a spat about my persistent lateness. Shortly after, the opportunity presented itself. A school survey was conducted and someone wrote some lewd comments about a rather attractive female member of staff. They signed my name at the bottom and handed it in as a joke. The school didn't find it funny and I was summoned to the headmasters study. He asked me whos name it was on the bottom of the form. I responded that it was mine. He then said "So you admit that you wrote this?" I replied "No, I admitted that my name was there, someone else wrote it". He replied "So now you are lying as well, this just makes it worse for you." He told me that my parents would be summoned and I was going to be expelled. He ordered me to go to the playground and speak to no-one. I duly went and sat in the rain in the playground. As I sat there, the physics teacher, who I got on with, Mr Shuttler happened to be walking past. Seeing me sitting in the rain, in the playground, he made his way down and asked what I was doing. I explained. He seemed rather upset. He asked if I knew who did the form. I had a fair idea. He asked if I'd tell him, so that he could make amends. I replied that I wouldn't as I didn't want to get anyone expelled.  He said that if I told him, he'd speak to the boys and get them to own up. He'd make a deal with the head, so that if they owned up, they would not get expelled. I agreed and told him the names.

He then went off, explained the suituation to the boys who had done it. They were horrified that their joke had got so out of hand. He then spoke to the headmaster, who had to agree to waive the threat of expulsion. I was summoned back to the headmasters study and he announced to me, Mr Shuttler and the perpetrators "I would have been quite happy to throw you out because you are a troublemaker, but these fine lads have stood up and admitted that they wrote the letter so I'm sorry to say I'll have to let you stay at the school". What would Mr Offord have done if he were John Shuttler? Would he have intervened to get an unjust decision overturned? Of all the teachers who had the misfortune of trying to teach me, I hold John Shuttler in the highest esteem of any of them. Why? because he cared about the boys he taught and he was even prepared to stand up to a very unreasonable headmaster.

Offords suggestion that "Teachers word is final and there is no appeal" is a terrible proposition, it is impractical and it offends natural justice. In short, it is a statement from a man who is completely out of his depth.

Barnet Council's Oddest Press Release Yet

There are many things which you think would concern Tory Parliamentary hopeful and Borough Safety Officer Matthew Offord (AKA Captain Useless). Burglars like this, Gangs like this, Knifemen like this, Dangerous pollution like this, Neighbours from hell like this.

What is his top Concern? That those of us who have a bit of spare Gold to flog, may not be getting top dollar. To quote Mr Offord from his press release

For a lot of people in these difficult financial times selling gold is the only way to keep their heads above water

Sadly all of the people I know who are suffering from the bite of the recession and the huge rise in Council Tax under the Tories don't have too many gold bars under the bed, or even Krugerands on the mantlepiece.

Mr Offord also has some advice on how to get the best price for your tiaras and candlesticks

However, the advice to people wanting to sell their gold items is to shop around first and take time to make sure you get the best price, as the payment offered can vary so much.

This is very good advice, not just for people wishing to sell gold. I'd suggest that maybe people such as Matthew Offord, who commission large projects such as the Aerodrome Road Bridge redevelopment might take this advice when selecting contractors. Matthew Offord used to boast about what a great job he'd done selecting contractors, until it all went wrong and the Barnet Taxpayer was left with an £11 Million overspend. Shame he didn't shop around a bit more.

The Barnet Eye has some advice for the voters of Hendon. Before selecting which candidate to vote for in the election, see how good they've been at their job. Matthew Offord used to be Deputy Leader and he used to be in charge of Transport. he was a disaster, so he got moved sideways. In his bid to improve the Hendon Conservatives, he's opened a new office. Guess where? In Ballards Lane, Finchley. His office isn't even in the Constituency (CLICK HERE FOR DETAILS)

I thought I'd see how easy it was, using the TFL route planner to get from Graham Park, in the Middle of Offord's target constituency, to his office which is well outside?I think that this is an insult to the voters of Hendon

Still what do you expect from a guy who thinks that the answer to the credit crunch is to sell the family silver (or Gold). No wonder Mike Freer dumped him as deputy

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18:57 19:02	Grahame Park / Corner Mead Take the Route Bus 303 from Stop: QK towards Edgware	Average journey time: 5 mins	Grahame Park / Corner Mead
	Mill Hill Broadway Walk to Mill Hill Broadway Station	Transfer time: 4 mins	Mill Hill Broadway
	Mill Hill Broadway Station Take the Route Bus 251 from Stop: F towards Arnos Grove	Buses every: 10  mins Max journey time: 24  mins	Mill Hill Broadway Station
	Whetstone/The Griffin Take the Route Bus 125 from Stop: D towards St.Marys Av College Terrace	Buses every: 10  mins Max journey time: 17  mins	Whetstone/The Griffin
19:51	Ballards Lane		Ballards Lane

The Sun backs Matthew Offord - Hendon's new Reggie Blair !

Exciting news from The Hendon  Conservatives website. The site has claimed that the political editor of The Sun has given his personal endorsement to The Hendon Conservative Candidate Matthew Offord. I'd love to put the nice picture of Matthew Offord and The Sun's Political Editor George Pascoe Watson on here, but unfortunately the Hendon Conservatives don't let me use their pictures. so you'll have to make do with the old Captain Useless one instead.Now clearly this political endorsement is a defining moment in Matthew Offords campaign, so I thought I'd Google "The Sun backs Matthew Offord". Erm, actually no endorsement popped up (except on the Hendon Tories website). It appears that the Sun has endorsed Matthew Offord rather like Lemmy from Motorhead once endorsed my guitar playing. I stood next to him at the bar at Dingwalls during a Vibrators gig. He's a friendly chap and we had a brief chat where I said I liked his music and I played in a band. Lemmy said "Great".

Interestingly enough, the little story on the Hendon Tories website doesn't actually have a quote from Mr Pascoe Watson. Maybe he reads this blog and he knows that Matthew Offord is the guy responsible for organising the contractors at Aerodrome Road, and so was a bit reticent. Here's how Matthew boasted about setting up the Aerodrome Road contracts on the Hendon Conservatives website, before it went Titanic. Sadly, under Matthews leadership, it all went wrong and ended up costing £11 million more than expected. Shortly before the full extent of the overrun was announced, Offord changed jobs and has gone round blaming the new guy in the job, Councillor Andrew Harper.

Another exciting story on the website is about Matthew Offords trip to Old Trafford. Now as a City fan, I find the whole concept of Old Trafford repellent enough without Matthew Offord being there. Thankfully Matthew spared us any of his pearls of wisdom about football, other than than to say that the entire voting populace of Hendon Constituency could fit in the ground. Interestingly enough, should Matthew win the Hendon seat, he'll be the first Conservative holder of this seat since 1935 when Reggie Blair was the MP. Now clearly Reggie Blair was well before my time, but I must confess that the name conjoured up an interesting image. A cross between Reggie Kray and Tony Blair. Can you imagine it "Basically, I'm a straight sort of guy, and if you say any different you'll be sleeping with the fishes"

Lastly on our little tour of Matthew Offord's website, we hear that he's put himself at the forefront of Barnet's campaign to "beat the burglars". Is it any coincidence that there's been a spate of burglaries locally? One of them was at the house of a friend of mine, who lives 2 doors from former Mayor Maureen Braun. Let me tell you a little story about how effective our local anti burglar initiative is. When my friend's house was robbed, we did  a quick search of the fields out the back. of his house We found a B and O TV, worth over £5,000 stashed for collection later, hidded under a coat behind a tree. We also found that 16 homes backing on to the field had been robbed in a 2 week period. We reported the find to the police and suggested that they stake out the area. They responded that we should bring the TV and they'd get someone round to test it for fingerprints. It seems that it was "not practical" to stake out the area. I hope that his plan to stake out the A5 for burglars is a stunning success. From my friends experience, it is not a nice thing to happen. I'd suggest that anyone who is concerned about community safety and burglary contact Matthew. He's a very nice pleasant amenable chap. He's always pleased to talk to constituents, especially the younger members of the community. You can get in touch with any of of your Barnet Councillors through this page. Just click on their name. They are elected to help you and to make the borough a better place and they are all keen to do a good job to justify the allowances they receive.

Ahoy Matey's - Pirates to the Starboard, Captain Useless to the rescue !

One of my favourite tasks at the Barnet Eye is keeping an eye on what the competition is up to. Until quite recently, I was under the impression that to become a Tory Councillor, you had to have a lobotomy which made writing interesting blogs impossible. I suspected that Mike Freer and Richard Cornelius had a little room at the back of North London Business Park where the surgery was performed (I must admit that in the days of the sadly missed BARNETSTHIRDEYE blog, written by one of our young whippersnapper Tories, I thought they'd missed with the black and decker and sent the poor young man into overdrive).

Anyway, since he was liberated from the shackles of Deputy Leadership, Councillor Matthew Offord has actually been writing a rather good blog on sailing. The latest entry about pirates is actually well worth the effort. I'd not given any thought to the issues and challenges of actually paying these Somalian pirates a ransome till I read Matthews blog. Anyway, if you have a spare 5 minutes, check it out. If he keeps this up, I'll have to give him a new nickname as Captain Useless seems to be a tad tired (any suggestions - leave a comment).

Also blogging in the Times is a new face - Kim Chechetto - Kim seems to have a keen interest in Childrens issues. I'm glad that the Times have reprised the "community bloggers". I find Kim's postings to be quite interesting. I've no idea at allwho she is or what her background is because unlike my old blog, they haven't bothered to put up a byline, but hopefully they'll rectify that.

An interesting development at Not The Barnet Times. It seems that Don't call me Dave has an apprentice. A couple of blogs have been posted there by Hijacker.

One other interesting blog that has sprung up is Colemansgottago. This is a fan website dedicated to the life and times of the effusive Mayor of Barnet, Brian Coleman. Unlike the Barneteye, which is always fair and objective, this hagiographic site is dedicated solely to telling us all about Mr Coleman, how hard working he is, what books he reads and what a good job he's doing. Anyway, it's good to see some balance.

Probably the most bizarre local blog is Tory Harrow PPC Rachel Joyce. She complains that someone in Stanmore has written to the press compaining that she's running a campaign against the sitting MP. Note to bloke in Stanmore. It's her job to run a campaign against the Labour MP. Note to Rachel. If you get upset about this, you are probably in the wrong job.

Captain Useless - sinking to the bottom of the sea

For those readers new to the blog, Captain Useless is the Barnet Eye's nickname for Matthew Offord, Conservative candidate for Hendon and former deputy leader of Barnet Council. We've been calling him Captain Useless here since one of our mutual friends told me that he was a keen sailor. He's been given a blog about sailing on the Hendon Times and I've had many a merry hour lampooning it for it's vital role as a cure for insomnia.

Well, this blog always prides itself on it's honesty. Just because I don't agree with someone, doesn't mean that I won't dish out the praise where the praise is due. I've got to say that his latest entry is actually rather good. As I read through it, I started to feel rather gutted as there was absolutely nothing worthy of scorn in it. In fact it was interesting and informative. Now not everyone is interested in swimming the channel, sailing and diving, but if you are, then it's worth a read. Doesn't mean I'll be voting for him, but I have to grudgingly admit that when the good captain gets on with the job in hand and sticks to the topic, rather than using it to spout nonsense about local politics, he actually writes quite a good blog.

Well done Matthew, mind you, I'll take all the credit as you've taken my constructive criticisms to heart <| :^)

My Casanova heritage !

I've just realised the secret of my success with women. I've got real Casanova Heritage !

Yup, I once went to Italy for the day at the end of a cruise. We spent a lovely afternoon in Rome. I can see you are impressed. I can see that I've shot up immeasurably in your estimation. I can see that you now realise that I'm gods gift to women !

You don't? Oh dear. Never mind. It was worth a try. Rather like Hendon's very own Captain Useless in his latest blog. This is rather grandly titled "My Naval Heritage". I was expecting to find that the good Cap'n was descended from Lord Horatio himself. What I actually found out was that he went on a school trip to HMS Victory. He sometimes even got a ferry ! He then goes on to state that he gets scared when he visits ports, worried that his numberplate will give him away.

As to my claim to have Casanova heritage, my Dad (an Aussie) only ever gave me one piece of advice about dating girls - "Don't eat spaghetti on the first date as you'll get covered in sauce and look like a twat". Matthew, I don't know what you are up to but stop it. You are starting to look like a complete berk. STOP IT NOW !!!!!!