Thursday 20 November 2008

Have Labour abandoned Newton Ward?

And have the Liberals been reading my blog. We received our Liberal Focus on Newton yesterday which was much as I had predicted in my earlier post “Another first for Bob’s Blog? Leading story was the saviour of Sons of Rest followed by a nice little piece on the lack of GP services in our area and their concerns that poorly maintained facilities will cause the existing doctor to leave. I would take issue with them on their story claiming there are plenty of clean public toilets in USA and the working for you year round bit. Public toilets are almost always provided by businesses over there. Regular readers will know that I tried to tease our MP to lobby for the provision of toilets in stores above a certain size in this country (blog action week). Of course this went nowhere but it might be worth raising again. Regular readers will also remember I suggested to our labour councillor who I feel is doing a splendid job that it was no use him working hard if he is not telling constituents what he was doing. The Liberals most certainly are and their policy of regular leaflets is what as kept them in power here for the last thirty years. It’s not rocket science David. Labour have not put out a leaflet since the last local election, Liberals I think it’s three.
So what conclusions might we be able to draw from this situation?
1, local labour party don’t care about the ward?
2, funding is tight and they do not have enough local support to deliver a leaflet?
3, they do not have the ability to write regular leaflets?
4, David has come to the conclusion he is a one term councillor, is trying to make an impression and get as much done as he can in the time left?
5, he is sidelined by the labour group who are not used to having a Labour councillor in Newton and perhaps he is thinking that running as an independent would be a better choice next time. Now that would be an interesting scenario. Newton as always has been a white elephant to Labour, partly because of the talents of the late Martyn Smith who was a massive champion for Newton and well deserved his longevity on the council. Things are different now which can clearly be seen by the poor quality of Liberal leaflets.
We never see our Labour MP in our ward and perhaps this is a reflection on the parties approach to us. The MP is a career politician great friend of Gordon and a junior minister so perhaps that is not so surprising. With what is happening nationally and Gordon offering a big tax bribe this Christmas could we perhaps be seeing a general election next year? How would the voters of Newton see Labour and our MP then I wonder? My guess is a big thumb’s down. But in the meantime come on David talk to us.

3 comments:

Anonymous said...

What about t'internet Bob? You use it.- and dont say the majority of people havent got a computer-theres more in the library than books!Councillor info is what its called-mostly written by councillors themselves.

Bob the Black Country Brummie said...

Good comment Margaret but I honestly don't think our councillors are keen to follow that route. How about a Newton Enews. I might start to do that myself but suppose my blog does it to some extent.

Bob the Black Country Brummie said...

Good comment Margaret but I honestly don't think our councillors are keen to follow that route. How about a Newton Enews. I might start to do that myself but suppose my blog does it to some extent.