It might not be as glossy as Sandra Hart's leaflet, which was,I must say,very impressive, but I was delighted to see that Wendy Allan and her team managed to drop a leaflet through my door today..
She is very much a local candidate and has been involved in Dane Valley Ward for some time. I like her plug for the Independent approach and would certainly vote for her in 2011 when she has this to say:
"If elected I will be voting for good policies and commonsense politics, but definitely not for party politics."
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The only problem is that if she were elected it would give us only 3 truly Ind Cllrs; I still feel at the moment that Sandra Hart (Labour) is the best bet to oppose Thanet's 'Ezekiel' Party until 2011.
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On the subject of The 'Ezekiel Party', still no leaflet or contact from The 'Ezekiel' Party candidate, ex Cllr Ingrid Spencer, who Tom King ousted out in Westgate in 2007. Is this because there will be a last minute effort closer to 3rd December or an assumption that 'tribalism' will come into play and ' the i've always voted Conservative brigade' will come to the rescue?
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A proper and respectable local Conservative Party in Thanet would be something to celebrate and support, but until then, Bertie still thinks Sandra Hart has his vote as the most effective addition to TDC's opposition. However, I wish Wendy good luck and admire her civic committment.
12 comments:
Ah Bertie,
Have you otnoticed something odd about the Hart leaflet? Stand back for a second. The District Council Labour leaders wife is unanimously elected as candidate. Was there no other candidate? Are the local Labour party now so short of people they can only look inside their immediate little circle for support?
Their hugely expensive, glossy leaflet contains endorsement, not from real voters, but from the labour tribe core members - who presumably thought not adding their endorsement was not a good career move....
Is this not evidence that the labour party, both locally and nationally are reduced to a rump of dedicated mutual self supporters to promote their cause, and are completely cut off from real voters?
Tis intersting, cos the result, as the labour party nationally is currently prone to say, is in voters hands, not those of newspapers, blog sites or glossy leaflet writers.
Only time will tell, as they say on the movies. I trust Lady Sandra is ready for the fray, with the support of Max and a dog...or was that a tacky 70's TV show where a married couple made outrageous claims to be able to save the world by their brilliant intervention against every opponent? Difficult to tell the difference sometimes between tacky gloss and tacky spin where the Harts are concerned!
I had thought rather more of you Chris than this rather tacky and desperate comment!
Obviously the almighty Ezekiel party is rattled!
Chris, you are just as bad as the Lib Dems and there was me thinking you were one of the bright ones on TDC.
I must have got it wrong.
"You take as you find" Chris and as a fellow traditional Tory the same as Bertie there are those of us who feel much more inclined to support honest hard working labour councillors, unlike the shallow devious members of the "Ezekiel party" i appreciate you and as Bertie points out others - are not in the crew but you are loners i'm afraid - in a very much "tarnished unattractive conservative motley crew"
local tory councillors in the main are nothing like the "cameronistas" nationally. Councillors in Cliftonville east are only ever seen at election time - Sandy Ezekiel professes to "be passionate about his ward" but is at the same time invisible and mainly unsupportive to those in his ward who approach him with problems!
Lets be a little more straightforward then. The labour leaflet is all about personality and contains almost nothing on policy. The conservative leaflet is criticised for having policy on it, and the achievememts mainly down to Mike Jarvis are ignored. Bertie appears very one sided in his criticisms.
I do know how many candidates were looked at and considered. The conservative leafletr is more professionally focussed on politics rather than the cult of personality favoured by new labour.
Sure Start has been successful in the main. The original Sure Start programme has been superceded by the Childrens \Centre programme - but with much smaller government budgets to deliver the same interventions. The early successes are noted and agreed. We will not know for twenty years if they have fully done their job, and if they are significantly better at it than the lesser funded successors.
Bertie
If you and so many others want change in Thanet then getting more Independents to council is the only real option.Eight tory seats won by Independents would be more than enough to hold this present council to account - something the weak labour group has been unable to do for years,its time for armchair warriors to put up or shut up if you want change you'll have to make it happen.
Have to disagree Chris about Labour locally; nationally I suspect they are doomed but as local Councillors, taking up issues on behalf of their ward electorates, they exhibit more dedication and committment than many 'Ezekiel' Party Cllrs. What Dane Valley needs is a dedicated Cllr and I still think that Sandra Hart is probably the best choice at this moment in time.
15.03, the time for an Independent push at TDC will be 2011. One seat to join 2 independents ( I don't regard Cllr McCastree as Ind) for the next 18 months, is not really effective. There are many disillusioned 'conservatives' who have been in contact and are quite serious about standing in 2011 to either get elected or to split the 'tribal' Conservative vote and allow a Labour candidate in. The disillusionment locally with a disgraced 'Leadership' cannot be understated.
Perhaps Chris Wells could enlighten us to the policies the Tories at TDC support locally as, I for one, am vague on that aspect.
Apart from selling off everything in a fire-sale but things no-one wants to buy, errm, I can't think of anything else.
Incidentally, as he well knows, Cllr. Watkins is a local voter living in the ward but admitting that fact wouldn't help Chris Wells's case, would it?
And anon, if you are relying on one comment from the one member of the tribe who actually lives in the area, it smacks of your rather than my desperation!
Policies? There are plenty. The main manifesto commitment at the last election was about getting jobs into the area, which has led to many difficult decisions and debates with the public.
Fire sale? That is more about the squeeze and scream from central government to sweat assets ever more harshly. Did you listen to the Queen's speech debate? The promise to care for the long term critical elderly at home? Paid for by, and I quote the official labour machine, two thirds from NHS budgets , and a third from 'efficiency savings from local government'. The same efficiency savings the 3% Gershon demands have achieved year on year.
And then we get the truth, that it will be paid for by abolishing attendance allowance, the best non means tested benefit available to many of the elderly.
We in the final months of a fading government, whose members have no respect left among the population at large. Locally we are assured everythng and everyone is different. In truth of course there are good and bad on both sides of the political fence, but it is getting very tiresome to keep hearing repeated demands that Tories must denounce each other to achieve blog approval, but the labour party locally is immune.
Mark Nottingham's rage on racism has not a shred of integrity to it when his group, and their current leader, made excuses for, and refused to denounce their colleague Doug Clark's anti semitism. Am I allowed to say pot calling kettle black any more? Probably not. But I wonder how much labour members listen to many of the older voters on the streets who feel let down badly by their labour goernments failure to control immigration - indeed encouragement and continuing enthusiam for immigration.
I have spent considerable amounts of my members grant over 5 years trying to get differing groups of people, young and old, to understand each others culture and approaches to life. The pretence that there is not an issue out there, and that it is not confined to the BNP, and that we can silence people by threat and humiliation, rather than acknowledging the issues is pathetic and self serving, and leads us further down the road of a society imploding and choking on the lack of acknowledgement at other than a superficial level.
I wish all who want to put themselves forward for election and public service well. Whoever they are, they will have a tough task ahead of them the budgets to achieve things are vanishing before all of our eyes, and there is much to be done to restore public confidence in politics and politicians - because of Panama, duck houses, false personal claiming of things done many have been striving for, and the endless myopic assumption that your political tribe is superior and at no fault.
Having just read this back,I sound somewhat careworn and cynical. However, nothing is further from the truth. I am more dedicated than ever to ensuring I do the right things where I can, and admit to the wrong things where they apply to me.
I am sure there is lots to chew on there, Bertie, for any and all!
I think so Chris!
Hopefully I have got the facts right.I see that terence painter properties are marketing luxury appartements on the old pleasureama site How can this be If no plans to start have been agreed.See Rightmove at www. royal sands ramsgate .co.uk Appolagies if this is incorrect information but it appears sound on the web
18.47, my understanding is that marketing for this project began last year and at the time people were queuing up to make deposits! I hope prospective buyers are following Michael's blog on cliff face and the latest EA report on the site being regarded now as a Rapid Inundation Zone!
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