
Must be where he got the idea for all the rabbit hutch flats.
Read the full story here
(actually the Church Farmhouse museum in Hendon is great, so check out their exhibition of toys)
Music, football, Dyslexia, Cancer and all things London Borough of Barnet. Please note we have a two comments per person per blog rule.
FULL EXPENSES, 2007-2008
Andrew Dismore, MP for Hendon (Lab):
TOTAL: £137,366
Theresa Villers, MP for Chipping Barnet (Con):
TOTAL: £142,696
Rudi Vis, MP for Finchley and Golders Green (Lab):
TOTAL: £133,200
Speaking on GMTV, the Conservative leader said he believed Ms Smith had "questions to answer" about her reported claim of at least £116,000 in second home allowances on her Redditch family home while listing a London flat she shares with her sister as her main home.
But asked if she should resign following the revelations at the weekend, he said: "I do not think this individual thing is the issue."
Such arrogance. Mr Wakeley clearly thinks that investing cash is too complicated for mere councillors. Personally I would be concerned if day to day activities weren't a concern of members. I think that the trouble in Barnet is that the officers clearly hold councillors in disdain.Mr Walkley, giving his first interview as council chief executive, a job he started on Monday, defended the leader.
He said: “I’m obviously really concerned where any public official is being named and vilified in this way, as that is not what public servant gets into things for, but quite clearly there is officer accountability here and officers are accountable for the failures that appear to have happened.
"The treasury department is a highly technical and specialist area and I would be concerned if the day-to-day activites of that team were the subject of member intervention. There is an appropriate division of responsibilities.
"If there are issues beyond the individuals identified, then the council’s procedures will need to deal with those."
Firstly we need far tougher border controls to control the flow of people into our country. Secondly we need a frank debate about what to do with the half a million in the capital who are not able to join the economy legally.
Since the British National Party cannot really have any direct impact on Government policy at present, although indirectly we certainly do, I'll have to provide you with an image of what would have happened if this act had taken place on our watch. After viewing the BBC video, which you can find by clicking on the graphic below (sorry no link - too lazy - Rog), imagine a supplementary thirty or so seconds of video tagged on the end. That material would have been shot at nearby Luton airport where every single one of those "demonstrators" would have been filmed boarding a military aircraft, placards still in hand. That plane would then be filmed taxiing on the runway before its four giant turboprops propelled it off the ground on its journey towards some fly-infested desert in Afghanistan.
Council Leader Freer is also the chairman of the Resource management committee. He gets a responsibility allowance for this. Now I ask this question - where was the leadership and where is the responsibility. Leadership is all about ensuring that those who work for you know what they are meant to be doing. They should know that when things go wrong, you as leader will immediately get to the bottom of things. I was at an Emergency Council meeting last year, where Mike Freer resisted calls for the Icelandic investments to be investigated externally. Five months have since been lost. Five months where incompetence has flourished. Did Mike Freer never think to ask his officers "Prove it, show me the evidence"?
Despite previous assurances from Barnet Council Officers that correct treasury management controls were applied to Icelandic deposits, it has now come to light that in fact this was not the case. On Monday 9th March I was presented with a scrutiny working group report which makes clear that officers did not in fact follow the correct procedures despite having repeatedly told me both verbally and in writing that they had done so.
The lead officer responsible for this failure resigned his post prior to the scrutiny meeting on Monday 9th March and I have now written formally to the Chief Executive asking for a full investigation into how I as Leader of the Council was misled by officers in this matter.
An external investigation will be carried out to identify why our external auditors did not pick up these issues in their previous audit work. I would like however to reassure residents that at this point the Icelandic deposits remain frozen by the administrators of the two banks involved and discussions around the return of this money remain positive and ongoing.
Doesn't it ever occur to you that maybe when friends get together and want to all leave posts, they may use the same computer? Oh, I don't suppose you have any friends so you wouldn't know