Why do the Barnet Tories reward abject failure and despise compassion?

Firstly, apologies. I intended to write this blog yesterday, but I simply couldn't face immersing myself in the sewage that is the behaviour of our local Conservative group. So I had a day off, a pleasant cup of tea at Cafe Buzz, a long walk around Arrendene with the dog and a night on the tiles with my good mate Keith in Blackfriars, discussing football, children and the wedding (his forthcoming one, not all that business last weekend).

Sadly, my blissful day was interrupted by a phone call from Simon Allin at The Barnet Times. My attempts to bury my head in the sand and pretend that everything was fine and dandy in the world was ruined. Simon is the hard working and conscientious local politics reporter for the paper. He suffers all manner of infantile sniping from the likes of disgraced, convicted woman beater and ex councillor Brian Coleman on Twitter, who pedantically relish pedantically correcting Simon on a regular basis, for his lack of understanding of the byzantine ways of Barnet Council.

New mayor of Barnet to be appointed https://t.co/rXeWMcNChO lost count of the number of mistakes in this article. The Mayor is elected NOT appointed. Barnet doesn't have a Cabinet …..

— Brian Coleman (@BrianColeman251) May 21, 2018

It comes as no surprise to me that Coleman was also enthusiastically retweeting the news that Councillor Reuben Thompstone has been elected by the Tory group as the new Mayor. Long time readers will remember that Coleman himself was Mayor in 2009. He has the inglorious title of being the only Mayor of Barnet found guilty of breaching the standards code whilst in office. Coleman revels in being an "ex Mayor", despite the fact that he was undoubtedly the least successful holder of the office and that his subsequent criminal record brings the whole office into disrepute. My own view is that any Ex Mayor who pleads guilty to beating women in court should have his picture removed from the Town Hall wall. There really should be a zero tolerance of such behaviour by the council.

I suspect that one reason that Coleman is so excited about the appointment of Reuben Thompstone is that he knows he may have the title of "worst Mayor of Barnet" wrenched from his sweaty palms. The newly elected Mayor has shown himself to be the most catastrophically ineffective councillor in the history of Barnet. For all his sins, Coleman was at least a mildly competent administrator, when he wasn't falling asleep at the desk or insulting people.

@AlternativeDfT @BrianColeman251 This is him asleep at work at City hall pic.twitter.com/Ou7VzMTGMc

— Paul (@Paulmutantes) February 6, 2015

No one can make such a comment about Thompstone. In 2014 Thompstone was chair of the Budget Overview and Scrutiny Committee. His keynote policy was to cut the budget at Mapledown School ( a highly regarded special needs centre, looking after the most severely disabled children in the Borough). The cut specifically centred on afterschool and respite care, vital for parents with a 24 x 7  commitment to their children. The policy caused outrage. To their credit, three Tory Councillors, lead by Maureen Braun lead a revolt and threw out the cut. As best as I can remember, it is the only time that I've seen the Tories vote down one of their own policies. My blog from the night records the scenes for posterity.

"Councillor Maureen Braun, not a friend of this blog asked Rubes "Who is more vulnerable than disabled children". Rubes tried to string a sentence together, but failed. Braun had summed up the general feeling in the room. Rayner had sensed early on that the Tories were on a loser. He had spent the evening trying to figure out how to extract his reputation from this situation. He clearly didn't want to shaft Mapledown, but couldn't work out how to protect his Tory friend. He moved to a vote and to the amazement of all, Salinger and Braun, to their great credit voted to send the report back to the cabinet. In short a Tory Committee had agreed that the Mapledown cut was unfair and unjust and needed review.
Rayner realised that with an election looming, this presented a constitutional issue. He tried to get a council officer to help him out but no one really seemed to know. Rubes, a large man, seemed to have shrunk and seemed to resemble a demented leprechaun. He looked totally gutted."

It is interesting to note that the two councillors who had the guts to stand up for disabled children have gone. Salinger retired and Maureen Braun was deselected, much to her surprise, before the recent election. Reuben Thompstone is a big friend of the arch Tory plotter Daniel Thomas and it is pretty clear to me that this was payback.

But what of Thompstone (or Rubes as we lovingly call him). What did Big Rubes do next? One may have thought that having made such a monumental cock up, the Barnet Tories might have learned? Clearly not. The man was given the Children, Education and Libraries subcommittee chair (with the big fat allowance that goes with it). Barnet has long had a reputation for good educational services and excellent libraries. What could possibly go wrong? Where shall we start?

As the head of this committee, the first duty of Reuben Thompstone is to care about local children. Given that his former colleague Maureen Braun had noted that he didn't recognise that no one was more vulnerable than disabled children, it is not surprising what happened next. Thompstone embarked on a scorched earth policy with regards to libraries. The library space was halved, with libraries remodelled to create such things as "hubs" where businessmen can drink coffee and access the internet, where children used to read books. Librarians who welcomed people and helped them read were replaced with security guards, who sent them away if they didn't have the right card. Under 16's had access removed, meaning no quiet place for exam revision and no access to books for study. And all of this money saving came at a cost of £14 million. You really couldn't make it up.

That would be a massive scandal in itself. There is currently a challenge going to the secretary of state as there is evidence that it may be illegal. It is certainly discriminatory and many believe not compliant with the Libraries act. However it is dwarfed into insignificance by the failure of Childrens Services. An OFSTED report deemed the council to be failing. Essex County Council were brought in to take over and turn things around. Click here to read the whole sorry tale of woe. It seems that with competent management lead by Essex, things are now improving, but surely the councillor responsible - Rubes - should have been sacked? What organisation on earth would reward someone for such abject failure? The answer is The Barnet Conservatives. Reuben Thompstone has been reward with the Mayoralty. This is normally given to councillors with long service as a reward for doing a fantastic job. The outgoing Mayor was Brian Salinger. He was one of the longest serving councillors, former leader and a man steeped in public services. He was kept waiting nearly a decade for the honour. The difference was that he wasn't mates with Dan Thomas. He wasn't a yes man. The message that the elevation of Rubes sends loud and clear to all of the other Tory councillors is that "failure is fine so long as you put your hand up when we tell you".

Back in 2012 we made a film called "A Tale of Two Barnets". There is a modern update. "A Tale of Two Tories". One, Maureen Braun showed compassion for disabled children. Her payoff? A sneaky deselection. The other, Reuben Thompstone, showing no compassion, cocking up Childrens services and spending a fortune on making libraries less accessible. His reward, the best job in Barnet, a free limo, a big robe and load of bling.

It makes me sick. Over the years, I've always done what I can to support the Mayors Charity. I've given thousands of pounds, logisitical support, attended events etc. I am sorry to say that I will not be doing so this year. Councillor Reuben Thompstone is a complete disgrace and I will not be supporting this vicious charade. It seems I am not alone in this view.

Not ony has the Chair of the Children, Education and Libraries Committee, Councillor Reuben Thompstone, not resigned, @BarnetTories have decided he should be rewarded by being Mayor if they control the @BarnetCouncil

— Julia Hines (@JuliaHines) May 3, 2018

Julia Hines is the former chair of Age UK Barnet.

The Mayor of Barnet is the first citizen of the borough. Reuben Thompstone is wholly unsuited. He failed by leading children’s services to inadequate by Ofsted. Additionally, he oversaw the destruction of our library service. Appalling appointment by Barnet Tories.

— SaveBarnetLibraries (@SaveBarnetLibs) May 23, 2018

I really have only one question for the Barnet Tories - Why do the they reward abject failure and despise compassion?

How do the Barnet Conservatives choose their committee chairmen?

Last week I attended the Barnet Council audit committee. As I mentioned at the time, I was completely underwhelmed with the performance of the chair of the committee, Councillor Brian Salinger. I wrote a blog detailing just what an awful job Councillor Salinger was doing. Given that audit is probably the most important committee, I had to wonder just how he was chosen. My mind was cast back to the early years of the last decade. At the time I was working in an office near Aldgate. Every day I'd nip down to Sidoli's in Leman ST, a family run cafe, and get a cup of tea from Marge. The cafe had been there since the 1950's and Marge would often tell us how when she started "The cafe was always full of seamen from the docks" (to general myrth). By the 1990's the dockers and seamen had been replaced by yuppies and bankers. Over the road from Sidoli's a lap dancing club had opened. The manager was a larger than life character, who was full of interesting stories.

One day, we were all having a cuppa and a chinwag and he told us he'd just interviewed three new lapdancers. He said that he asked all three the same question. He said "if you are doing a dance in the private booth and when the punter has gone, you notice he's dropped his wallet with £500 in it what do you do".

The first girl said "I'd run after the punter and return his wallet"
The second one said "I'd take the money, put the wallet in the bin and deny all knowledge if asked"
The third one said "I'd take the money and give you half, then put the wallet in the bin"

He then asked me and Marge, "which girl should I employ". Marge said girl no 1 on the grounds she was the most honest. I countered and said "Girl two as she is probably the only one telling the truth and so at least you know where you stand with her. He laughed and said "no you're both wrong". So we asked "so which one would you employ?" He replied "The one with the biggest tits of course".

You may wonder what this has to do with Barnet Council? Well, the manager of the lapdancing club gave an insight into what it takes to run an organisation successfully. Whether or not you like his business, or his answer, he demonstrated that he was empoying the person best equipped to do the job. It isn't a pleasant job and honesty is not a primary requirement for his business.In his judgement and experience, he chose the girl who was best equipped for the task.

Broken bins

The problem with Barnet Council is that there is no such focus. The chair of each committee gets an allowance of over £15,000 for their efforts. This is our money. We pay it in taxes and in return we expect the council to spend it wisely. Sadly in Barnet the jobs are divvied up as political favours, not based on the 'assets" of the individuals. Another important committee is the Environment Committee chaired by Dean Cohen. Anyone who has seen Cohen in action will recognise that he is totally out of his depth.  It is 100% clear that his appointment was purely a dog bone to someone the leadership viewed as politically useful. Since taking over from the disasterous reign of Brian Coleman, Cohen has singularly failed to achieve anything. When he took over, Brian Colemans policy of abolishing pay and display had laid waste to high street businesses. It was clear that the policy should be reversed in short order. Cohen lacked the cojones to do this. Eventually a sort of half way house was established, with a few machines being installed, that took credit cards. Whilst this is better than a mobile only solution, it was so clearly a bad political fudge. There is no leadership and no direction to the environment policy. 

Walking around Mill Hill park this week demonstrated this. Dangerous man hole covers and broken bins. I am particularly concerned about this manhole cover. Many young people frequent the park after dark. This is a highly dangerous feature, which could cause a severe injury. In cold weather, if you broke your leg it may even prove fatal. it used to be the case that local councillors would work with the chair of such committees to ensure that their patch was spotless. Sadly under the reign of Cohen, the concept has gone out of the window and all we ever get is excuses for inaction.

What do the committee do? They most certainly don't ensure that the environment is looked after. I have no idea why Dean Cohen has been chosen, but he doesn't cut the mustard.


Then we have the Children, Education, Libraries & Safeguarding Committee which is chaired by the truly horrible Rueben Thompstone. Thompstone managed the near impossible and forced Tory uber loyalist Maureen Braun to rebel over the closure of after school services at Mapledown School. He is currently overseeing the destruction of the Barnet Libraries network. There is no councillor more popous and condescending in the whole of the council. One Tory councillor who I get oin quite well with joked about Thompstone that there are two types of people those that dislike him and those that haven't met him. I asked why he was chosen for such a role, the repsonse "I suppose it is because he's a teacher". It must be said that he gets on quite well with one person, Dan Thomas who is the deputy leader of the council. Thomas sees Thompstone as a useful foil for unpopular policies. Given his personality, he acts as a lighetning rod for protests, deflecting flak from the puppet master pulling the strings. Anyone who has ever watched Thompstoen closely will have seen how he watches Thomas like a hawk for signals as to what to do. It is clar to anyone who has attended any Council meeting to discuss libraries that Thompstone,w ho clearly wasn't born or raised in the Borough, has no understanding of the role libraries play in the lives of local families. It is not unreasonable to expect a chair of the committee who has at least got some sort of understanding of what the service provides.

Another wholly inappropriate choice of chairman is councillor Tom Davey as chair of the housing committee. You will see from his declaration of interests that Cllr Davey is a financial analyst for British American Tobacco. Davey has made many pronouncemens about social housing tenants. Like many well to do young men who have had a priveliged start in life, Mr Davey has no real experience of the lives of people his decisions affect so greviously. Mr Davey is apparently a landlord. One has to assume that the salary of a financial analyst for a tobacco firm is either massively well paid or mummy and daddy have helped out with his property purchases. Given his age and his listed property is in one of the most well sought after cul-de-sacs in Mill Hill, it is fair to assume that the plight of young people seeking social housing in Barnet are a million miles away from his personal experience. I suppose it is ironic that many of his fellow Tory members find the fact that many social housing tenants and benefit recipients spend cash on the addictive products that Mr Davey's firm produce distasteful. Mr Davey clearly sees no problem with the sale of addictive and dangerous products and one assumes that his analysis produces information which is used to justify a product which has killed and caused debiliating illness to millions of UK citizens. We have to ask, what experience he has he got to justify this important role? As a private landlord, his income is presumably affected by the provision of social housing, as all commercial rents are dictated by the laws of supply and demand. Am I alone in seeing a clash.

Finally we look at the Planning Committee. The chair of this is Melvin Cohen. He is Dean Cohens dad. Councillor Cohen is a lawyer by trade (according to his declaration). Given the huge amount of building going on in the Borough, this is a massively important committee. By all accounts Councillor Cohen is reasonably effective as chair when dealing with small scale planning applications in nice leafly suburban areas such as Edgware, Golders Green and Mill Hill. The problem is that the vast majority of planning applications that are phase shifting the nature of the Borough are mega developments in places like Brent Cross, West Hendon and the Inglis Barracks in Mill Hill. Cohen has shown himself to be completely out of his depth. In fact I get the impression that the whole Tory team on the planning committee are genuinely clueless when it comes to what is happening in our Borough. I have no idea if any of the Tories actually have any interest at all in ensuring a mixed neighbourhood, social housing or green spaces are preserved in planning applications, but there has been scant indications of this.

For Barnet to remain a great place to live, all of the committees I've mentioned need strong chairmen. If they don't do their job, then our Borough and our lifestyle will be trashed. We are aready seeing huge pressure on roads, schools, hospitals and police. When I a teenager, we had two A&E hospitals in the Borough. In that period the population of the Borough has increased by 50% yet we've lost one of these. Try applying for a school place. My eldest daughter was declined a place at the nearest secondary school to us on "catchment", despite living less than 1 mile from the establishment. She ended up having to take a bus to Finchley every day.  This is the monster they are creating.

A final word for the Labour group. It is simply not good enough to go along with these lacklustre Tory placemen. They need to use every meeting to ram home the message that the Tories are getting  a massive payout and they are not cutting the mustard. They are singularly failing to do this. They need to get on top of their briefs and start holding these rather ineffectual placemen to account.

When I was chatting with my friendly Tory councillor I told him the joke about the manager at the lap dancing club. He roared with laughter. He wryly commented "We can't choose people like that in the council". Of course he's right, but what he didn't say was how they did choose them. I guess the reason is because it is even more embarrassing.

Barnet Libraries - Commentary on Reuben Thompstone dialog with the Barnet Eye

Regular blog readers will know that on Friday, I emailed Councillor Reuben Thompstone with some suggestions as to how he could make his suggestions that the role of volunteers could be used to enhance the offering of the Barnet Library Service (  http://barneteye.blogspot.co.uk/2015/10/open-letter-to-councillor-reuben.html ). I will not pretend that myself and Councillor Thompstone have radically different views on what the Library service should look like and how volunteers should be used.

Let me give you some insight into how I think you deliver real savings and real change for the better in organisations. I am not talking out of my hat, I have run a successful business for 36 years. One of the principles I use is that "difficult individuals are an assett". This may sound like a ridiculous statement to many, but I want my staff to challenge my decisions. I want people who care passionately about the business and are prepared to stand their ground and argue their case. Between 1994 and 2000, we totally transformed Mill Hill Music Complex studios from an operation with two underutilised rooms to one with ten studios, a shop and a hire business. I went from employing one persone in 1994, to employing seven people in 2000. Why? I employed the most difficult individual imaginable as my studio manager. Ernie Ferebee, who served this role was 6'6 and a former bouncer, security guard, overland coach driver, London Ambulance service driver, bus driver and band tour manager.  Every decision I made, Ernie would challenge. He'd always take a different view. We would argue for hours. At the end, we'd come up with a solution which we both agreed. Often it was radically different to what either of us had initially suggested. We had a rule. Every penny we spent on the business, we'd apply a simple test. We'd apply three questions.

1) Of all the things we can spend this money on currently, is this the one which will bring the best return on investment.
2) Have we really looked at every alternative for ways of doing the same thing better.
3) Will the change deliver the biggest improvement for our customers.

Applying these simple tests and arguing vigorously about them delivered huge benefits and savings. One example. In one studio I suggested buying energy saving bulbs, because our bills were high. Ernie said "It would be more cost effective to buy door closers, then the heat would stay in". Guess what we did in the end? We agreed that heating was the biggest cost after some discussion. We then identified that most heat was lost because the studio had a corrugated iron roof with no insulation. Although fixing this was a far more expensive option than door closers, it would bring far bigger savings. In the end we got insulation, door closers and low energy bulbs. Our customers were warmer, bills went down and the business improved. One of the things we'd do as a business, is discuss changes with customers before we did them. If we felt they may have some useful knowledge or feedback, we'd  get even more benefit. As a result got the work done by a local builder who wanted some studio time. He did the work in exchange for some free studio time at a time of day when we didn't lose other business. By working with our customers, we delivered even more savings.
If I was a dictator who employed yes men, I'd simply have saved the money from the energy saving bulbs and thought I was marvellous.

What has all of this got to do with the responses from Councillor Reuben Thompstone yesterday? As I mentioned, Councillor Thompstone and myself have different views as to how the library service should be run and how savings can be derived. But there are areas where we both agree. We both believe that volunteers have a role to play. We disagree on what that role is. Now as an intelligent person, I would be quite prepared to sit down with Councillor Thompstone and discuss this. If I was doing Councillor Thompstones job, I'd set up forums at the local libraries, invite users, local business and other interested individuals along. I'd say "We have issues with the budget, how can we fix these?". Barnet is full of entrepreneurs, who know what they could come up with to make the library service better, cheaper, more relevant. Councillor Thompstones solution is to sack the staff and get people to open the doors as volunteers. He admits they are not librarians. Is this really the best way to use  valuable community resource. He also wants to cut the size of libraries down, which means less books. Is this better for the users? You can read Councillor Thompstones dialog with me here http://barneteye.blogspot.co.uk/2015/10/councillor-reuben-thompstone-responds.html. 

He accuses me of making Ad Hominem statements. For those of you who haven't studied Latin (as a victim of the Catholic Education system, I did for three years, at times like this it comes in useful) it means attacking the person not the issue they are proposing. If you read the original email, this claim is totally unsustainable. Maybe Cllr Thompstone lacks the sort of excellent education which Barnet provides and didn't really understand the phrase. Maybe he thought it meant "marvellous ideas", who can possibly know as he gives no justification at all for his statement (though he repeats it on numerous occasions). What I do no is that he completely failed to respond to the email

Firstly, I had made an offer to assist him to find volunteers. He responded by saying that if I organised events to promote volunteering at Libraries, he'd turn up on condition I was nowhere to be seen. In my opinion this is rather rude. He stated that based on the fact that he didn't like what I had to say at the Council meeting to discuss the future of the libraries, I had nothing worthwhile to say on the matter. I read this as saying that he is not prepared to have a sensible adult discussion with someone who has a long track record of involvement in trying to maintain a decent library service. It is a matter of public record that following the campaign I ran in 2010, the Barnet Conservatives did a complete U-turn on their strategy and actually ended up agreeing with me. Even Friern Barnet Library, which they shut and wanted to sell, has been reopened. They could have saved us all a lot of pain, if they'd had the conversation over a nice cup of tea in 2010 and we'd worked out a strategy without the huge campaign.

Sadly Mr Thompstone looks set to make the same mistakes. Mr Thompstone clearly objects to my suggestion that he give up his £15,000 special allowance for chairing a committee that meets a dozen or so times a year for a couple of hours. I suggested that doing so would be a fine way to show his commitment to volunteering. I believe leadership is primarily about setting an example. This huge allowance was brought in by Barnet Council as recognition of the responsibility of being part of the Councils decision making cabinet. Whilst I disagreed with this concept, at least there was a justification as a cabinet member takes responsibility. The Tories abolished the cabinet system last year, but kept the bung for the committee chairmen. I don't think that giving a £15,000 bung in these difficult times to someone for a couple of hours work a month is justified. Other committee members get nothing. I would assume that if they do their jobs properly, they do just as much work. That is how committees are meant to operate. I also note that Mr Thompstone doesn't list any volunteering or association with such organisations where he may volunteer in his declaration of interests - Register of interests PDF 386 KB - which would seem to me to indicate that he talks a good game on volunteering, but foesn't walk the walk.

Mr Thompstone also refused to discuss whether you can actually call a room full of books a public library, if there is no qualified librarian. This is central to the issue. I want Barnet libraries to be a successful service and one of the reasons why people want to live in Barnet. I believe volunteers have an important role in realising that goal. I believe that if Councillor Thompstone was prepared to engage with the whole community and seek ideas for ways to improve the finances of the libaries, such as commercial sponsorship, active friends committees, technolgy such as Solar panels etc, he could avoid the need to sack people. I am not a Luddite. It may be that some Librarians need to be a bit more agile in their working practises. If that is the case and that by working with volunteers, the same service could be delivered, then that proposal would merit serious discussion. But Mr Thompstone isn't prepared to have that discussion. He thinks he knows best.

I do wonder about how the UK runs its public services. Just for a second consider this. Consider a library such as Mill Hill. It was built in a different day and age. It has large windows. It has a large roof space. Double glazing and solar panels would deliver huge savings in energy costs. Both would pay for themselves over five years. If Councillor Thompstone was committed to keeping the service, then there is an excellent case to spend the money on them. Clearly there would be no issue getting a loan facility, as the council is a good payer and a stable organisation. So if the money was borrowed over ten years, then the council would see an annual cost reduction. If this was repeated across all of the Boroughs libaries, presumably that would save enough to fund a couple of librarians. Just suppose they say to the installer "We'll let you run a sales stall in the Libaray foyer for six months if you give us a discount on the job". Presumably this would also save money. Local people would clearly be inclined to use such a trusted installer. We could say the same to the solar panel installers. The council could promote such ethical companies on their website etc as part of the deal.

Mr Thompstone clearly gets upset by what he describes as "Ad Hominem" attacks. He feels that what has been said is personal in nature. As I explained this was not the intention and the claim cannot be substanciated with regards to the initial correspondence. I have to say that having seen his repliesand witnessed his behaviour, I do not think it is unfair to call Mr Thompstones behaviours and ethics into question. He receives a £15,000 allowance from the taxpayer to do a job.  Does he believe he is above criticism? I don't care what Mr Thompstone does in his spare time. Any comments are directly related to how he does his job. If he chairs his committee (at my expense) in a pompous and arrogant manner and is rude to me in correspondence, does he really believe I am not entitled to hold him to account. Most Conservative committee chairmen have a degree of urbane wit. Most understand that sometimes decisions arouse strong feelings and have the compassion to react accordingly. Most have the intellectual capability to engage positively with people they disagree with, for the betterment of Barnet. Most have the good manners to reply cordially, or not at all if they can't. Mr Thompstone chairs one of the most important committees. One where wise leadership can make a huge difference. Wise leadership involves bringing people into the tent, building a team and taking the various stakeholders with you.

I end by asking any fair minded reader one question. Councillor Thompsone is the chairman of the Children, Education, Libraries & Safeguarding Committee Does he have the good manners,  wit, compassion, morality, intellectual capabilities and leadership skills to hold such an important portfolio in Barnet Council? I'll let you form your own opinion. I've made my mind up though.

If you feel he's done a marvellous job and I've got it all wrong, plese email him with your support. I'm sure he'd be thrilled to hear from you. You can email him at cllr.r.thompstone@barnet.gov.uk 

*** Updated **** Councillor Reuben Thompstone responds to the Barnet Eye open letter regarding volunteering at Libraries

On Friday, I emailed Councillor Reuben Thompstone regarding volunteering at Barnet Libraries. I suggest you read this blog (if you haven't already) to see exactly what I suggested. Here is Councillor Thompstones reply.  http://barneteye.blogspot.co.uk/2015/10/open-letter-to-councillor-reuben.html

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From: Thompstone, Cllr Reuben [mailto:Cllr.R.Thompstone@Barnet.gov.uk]
Sent: 18 October 2015 08:53
To: 'Roger.Tichborne@btinternet.com' <Roger.Tichborne@btinternet.com>
Cc: Cornelius, Cllr Richard <Cllr.R.Cornelius@barnet.gov.uk>; Mrs Angry; Thomas, Cllr Daniel <Cllr.D.Thomas@barnet.gov.uk>;Mr Reasonable ; Mr Mustard; Barbara Jacobson; 'aslater@london.newsquest.co.uk' <aslater@london.newsquest.co.uk>; 'james.caven@london.newsquest.co.uk' <james.caven@london.newsquest.co.uk>
Subject: Re: Open Letter to Councillor Reuben Thompstone regarding volunteering at Barnet Libraries

Dear Mr Tichbourne,

Thank you for your email, I note your initiative. I welcome your offer to support as a volunteer and would like to clarify, the constitution allows members to question those making a public comment, however prohibits this for those asking public questions, hence no intentional differential treatment. With respect to your offer of working in partnership, your comments during the meeting on Monday, whilst officers were attempting to respond to elected members' questions, in conjunction with your ad hominem statements below, lead me to conclude that this would be unlikely to be a productive arrangement; instead I would be happy to endorse you to use those relationships to which you refer to encourage those who may be interested in volunteering to do so, and am happy to attend such meetings as my diary would allow, where this might prove productive and where you were unable to attend for any reason. I am not in the habit of responding to ad hominem statements and thus respect your right to your own approach to public conduct as you see fit without commenting further.

Regards,

Reuben Thompstone
Councillor for Golders Green
Lead Member for Children
London Borough of Barnet
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I am not surprised by Councillor Thompstones response. I have responded to Mr Thompstone. Here is my reply

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Dear Councillor Thompstone,

Many thanks for your reply. I much appreciate the time you have spent composing your response and the efforts you have made responding to the points I raised. As you may be aware, I write a blog called the Barnet Eye, which is read by several tens of thousands of people in the London Borough of Barnet. Clearly, I am keen to keep the people of Barnet as up to date as possible with important developments in our community and also how Barnet Council spend the council tax raised from the wallets of hard working families. Whilst I appreciate the magnificent effort your response, it seems that you have omitted to address a couple of points which are fairly fundamental. I am sure this is merely an oversight due to the excitement generated by the Rugby world cup and the great success of the team from your native homeland. Many congratulations on them and their performance, a stark contrast to England.

Anyway, if you could be so kind as to address the key points, I am sure myself and the people of Barnet would be most reassured. To ensure that there is no misunderstanding, please can you respond to the following questions.

1)      I asked if you would be prepared to forego the £15,000 allowance which you receive for chairing the committee responsible for deciding the future of Library policy. I suggested that this would set a good example and would help encourage other people in the Borough to volunteer. I suggested that there are other ways that this money could be spent that would provide more benefit to the people of Barnet than simply going into your wallet. Please can you confirm that you have checked the budget of your department and you are 100% sure that paying you an allowance of £15,000 for chairing a committee which meets a dozen or so times a year for a couple of hours, is the best way of spending taxpayers cash? I note other committee members do not get such an allowance. Since the Cabinet system in Barnet was abolished, surely the related cabinet responsibility allowance is no long justified (that was the pretext for the huge allowance hike in 2010)? If you are having trouble managing your finances without this bung from the Barnet Taxpayer, can I suggest that you speak to this organisation http://www.stepchange.org/Howwecanhelpyou.aspx

2)      You state that you would only appear at events to promote volunteering in Barnet under the condition that I did not attend. I would like to point out that I have worked with many of your Conservative colleagues, promoting all manner of good causes. I have helped raised large sums of cash for mayoral appeals from colleagues including Tony Finn, Lisa Rutter, Brian Schama and Hugh Rayner. I have promoted football schemes at the request of Hugh Rayner. Lisa Rutter launched a charity project based at my business in her capacity as Mayor of Barnet. None has ever had an issue appearing with me when this is part of the process of doing good things in Barnet. I have even helped your colleague John Hart promote his book. I am surprised that you completely dismissed my offer out of hand, without bothering to discuss ways that any initiative could be made to work. The Conservative Party promotes the concept of a big society. Do you think that your public rejection of an offer to assist you, in such a bad mannered way, will really help encourage volunteering in Barnet?

3)      I asked if you were aware that being a Librarian is a profession and that it requires a qualification. Furthermore, I asked whether you recognised that for a library to serve its primary purpose, you needed a librarian. You declined to answer this question. Would you care to now?

4)      There is a suspicion that your administration has no interest at all in actually seeing volunteering in well run Libraries. There is a suspicion that the whole scheme is designed to fail, so the council can shut down libraries completely and sell them off for a capital receipt. It is 100% clear to anyone who reads my original open letter and your response that you have zero interest in exploring in any way, shape or form my offer. You have no interest in engaging in dialog to try and develop a strategy with active members of the community. It is also clear that you are not the slightest bit interested in engaging with anyone who is prepared to give up their time to help in local libraries, unless it is on the terms you dictate to them, with no discussion at all. Do you believe that behaving in such a manner is the way to engage with members of the community who have contributed so much to yoyur household budget?

I have lived in the London Borough of Barnet all of my life. One of my first memories is going to Mill Hill Library with my mother to get “Thomas The Tank Engine” books, which she would read to me at bed time. My favourite was the story of Henry the Green Engine. I would strongly recommend this book to you. I see parallels with yourself and there is a strong message embedded, as you may expect from a vicar who was also an author. When I was a teenager, studying O levels and A levels, I spent many hours studying and revising in Mill Hill Library. I found that this was an environment free from distraction. I ascribe what academic success I had at school to this time. When my mother was in her final years, with failing eyesight and housebound, I would take her once a week to Mill Hill Library. She would return three large print books collect three more. She would ask the librarian for recommendations. The Librarians knew her well and would invariably pick out good choices.

I suspect that local Barnet libraries have not played such a key role in your life, hence your stilted view of their importance in the life and culture of Barnet. I note that you seem to have an issue with the fact that some Barnet residents have an emotional attachment to Barnets library service. You do not seem to have the emotional intelligence to recognise that for many of us, this is not just a matter of a few numbers on a Barnet Council accounts spreadsheet. Over the years, especially when the Conservatives were in opposition, I saw many examples of appalling behaviour both inside and outside the Council chamber, when things got heated. Life experience has taught me that this is a good thing. It shows people care. It seems to me from your comments, you really only want to engage with people who don’t care or are emotionally stunted. I trust you are not appalled by the behaviour of Tory MP’s at PMQ’s? Do you really want to live in a society run by Daleks?

Finally, can I give you some career advice. In my experience, the best committee chairmen recognise that the Public have every right to attend council meetings and when serious matters are being discussed will feel inclined to make their feelings known. Good committee chairmen deal with this with wit, humour and when necessary compassion. I sincerely hope that you start developing into such a chairman of your committee. Maybe you could have a chat with Tony Finn, who in my experience has no trouble getting the balance right.

I look forward to your response. Hopefully this time we will actually have some answers.

Regards

Roger Tichborne

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I await Councillor Thompstones reply. It must also be noted that Mrs Angry sent a response to the rather hapless Councillor Thompstone. I'm a dyslexic, so I personally would never make such comments, but clearly Mrs Angry is not exactly chuffed that someone who is clearly semi literate is in charge of education in Barnet.

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Dear Councillor Thompstone

Thank you for including me in your response.

Unfortunately, I could not understand it, as it is expressed in such impenetrable language, and seemingly without any reference to the rules of grammar.

I suggest that - in the course of your next session as a volunteer shelf-filler in a public library - you borrow a copy of 'Eats, Shoots and Leaves', or similar helpful guide to written English. 

If you cannot find anything on this subject, do ask a librarian to help you. You'll probably be able to track one down, in the queue at the local job centre.

With very best wishes,

Theresa Musgrove

pp Mrs Angry

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I wonder how long it will take the Leader of the Council and his deputy, who are both cc'd on all of this to twig that it appears that they don't really have someone who is up to the job.
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Updated 15:00

Councillor Thompstone responded to my email above as follows:-


Dear Mr Tichbourne,

Many thanks for your email, I note you appear to have presumed answers to your own questions and continue to engage in ad hominem statements. That is your prerogative however my response on the latter point remains the same and that for the former clearly requires no further response.

Regards,

Reuben Thompstone
Councillor for Golders Green
Lead Member for Children
London Borough of Barnet

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To which I simply replied
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Dear Councillor Thompstone,

Many thanks for your enlightening response. As far as I can tell, the only question you have answered is one which I didn’t actually ask. That question is “Does Councillor Reuben Thompstone have the good manners,  wit, compassion, morality, intellectual capabilities and leadership skills to hold such an important portfolio in Barnet Council”. This discourse offered you the perfect opportunity to demonstrate all of these key characteristics. Your responses speak volumes. The only positive thing to come out of our exchange is that the people of Barnet now have some insight into your personality.  

Regards

Roger Tichborne

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Updated 15:20
I will leave the last word to Mrs Angry. She clearly has his measure and sums it all up rather nicely!
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Dear Cllr Thompstone

In your responses to Roger Tichborne - (please note the correct spelling) - you seem strangely reluctant to answer the most important question: why do you think libraries should be run by volunteers, when you refuse to perform your roles as councillor and chair in a similarly voluntary capacity? 

In this age of austerity, when all of us are asked to tighten our belts, should you, as an elected representative and proud Conservative, not set a good example and forego the generous amount of money given to you from the public purse? 

My other question is this: you think that the role of a professional librarian can be replaced by unqualified volunteers. 

I believe that you are a teacher: if I offer to take your post, in your school, on a permanent, voluntary basis, will you agree to step aside? 

I'm not qualified, of course, but that hardly matters, does it? I can probably wing my way through a few lessons, armed with a copy of 'The Complete Idiot's Guide to Science', and a fire extinguisher. 

And yes, you will lose your livelihood as a result, and you and your family face a future of unemployment, uncertainty and hardship - but think of the budget savings that will ensue!

Yours sincerely,

Theresa Musgrove