06/06/2009 by Steve Tierney.

Cynical local newspapers, ‘Independent’ troublemakers and Massive upper Government scandals notwithstanding…

 We won!

The whole of Fenland remained entirely Conservative and I won my seat with a very humbling majority.

Thank you so much for your overwhelming confidence and support, people of Wisbech Peckover, Leverington, Gorefield, Newton and Tydd St. Giles.  I will not let you down.

I’ll blog more after the weekend.  Now… I need a celebration drink (or two.) 

Thank you again.- Cllr. Steve Tierney, Roman Bank & Peckover. Conservative.

Posted in Cambs. County Council, My Campaign, Election, Gorefield, Wisbech, Newton, Leverington, Tydd St. Giles | 1 Comment »

15/05/2009 by Steve Tierney.

Workload Break
I try to blog regularly but this month I have simply reached a workload level that means I am going to have to take a break until after June 4th.  As regular readers will know, I’m a candidate for the County Council and I am now well into campaign time.  Quite honestly, given the sheer size of my prospective division and the number of people I need to try and get to see I am being forced to ‘tune out’ some of my usual pastimes until it is all over.  So, I guess what I’m saying here is please excuse me for a couple of weeks or so.  I’ll be right back after June 4th (win or lose) to blog again for anybody who is vaguely interested in reading my rambling prose (and indeed, even if nobody is.)  Until then, if you would like to speak to me for any reason please do contact me and I will get back to you promptly.
Tel. 01945 583811
Mob. 08731 616127
Email: me@stevetierney.org

But before I go…

Oh How We Laughed
The Breakspeare column from the Cambs Times has put my name up in lights again this week.  That’s three weeks on the trot.  Given that Mr Elworthy has previously pointed out that he wasn’t particularly interested in me : “Ask me again in a year or so,” he chuckled wryly in his column - he seems to enjoy a regular visit to my blog.  I must admit to being sorely tempted to analyse his articles in fine detail, pick small pieces of the prose and then have a bit of fun ridiculing them for the ‘hilarity’ of my (admittedly small) audience.  But he’s much better at it than me and I’d surely come out the worst.  I do feel a little mortally hurt by his comment: “Oh How We Laughed..” referring to my blog and my attempts at mild humour.  I know that my comic timing and creative flair will never equal the Breakespeare column but I do my best with the limited talent I possess.  On the other hand he did call me ‘young’ and ‘earnest’which was refreshing.  I’m Forty, Mr Elworthy.  I’m no spring chicken, but I appreciate the compliments.  Don’t forget to vote on June 4th!  I trust the Conservatives can count on your support.

Talk to you all soon!

- Steve Tierney

The Small Print (legally required during election campaigns.)
Published by Mrs D N Clark on behalf of Steve Tierney both of 111 High Street, March, Cambs PE15 9LH.

Posted in Cambs Times, My Campaign, Cambs. County Council | No Comments »

12/05/2009 by Steve Tierney.

Everybody Is Talking About It
Another day, another round of horrific expenses headlines from the Telegraph, eagerly swarmed upon, leech-like, by the rest of the media.  Nothing makes a bigger story than some sleaze and corruption.  Out on the streets canvassing and leafletting, people often comment about these unfolding events and I’d like to share some of the responses I give to them in the hope that a little fresh air will be able to sneak in to the suffocating atmosphere that presently surrounds politics.

Before reading this post please see the notes* at the bottom.

“All politicans are stealing from the taxpayer.”
I would respectfully point out that the upcoming elections are for County Councillors (and MEPs, but I’ll let them defend themselves.)  County Councillors don’t have huge expense accounts, or huge wages, or second homes, or taxpayer-funded porn, or a moat.  I’m a county council candidate.  If I dug a moat, cars driving past my house would fall into it.  If my bathplug breaks, I have to go down to the local hardware store with my wallet just like you.  If I choose to pretend another residence is my main home, people will just think I’ve gone a bit mad.  They certainly wont offer me any money.  If I employ a gardener, or a cleaner, or any other sort of home-help, I’d have to do so out of my own pocket (and my pockets are not that deep.  My wife and I do our own housework thank you very much.)  If I wanted a grand piano tuned I would first need to own a grand piano.  Then I’d have to save up.  I guess what I’m saying is - please remember local politicans are not MPs.  At this level of government politicans of all colours and stripes (not just my own party) are simply decent, honest, hard-working folk who want to give something back to the community.  No more, no less.  It would be unfair to tar us with the same dirty brush presently aimed at the grandees on all sides.  It would be counterproductive too.  Councillors do great work.  The MPs will be held to account, I have faith in that.  Let’s not shoot ourselves in the foot and vote for some fringe looney out of spite, even is raving Lord Sutch Tebbit seems to suggest that would be a good idea.  It’s like throwing the baby out with the bathwater.

“All MPs are corrupt.”
There are six hundred and forty-six MPs in the House Of Commons.  We’ve seen thirty or so names indicated in this expenses scandal.  By what measure does a couple of dozen or so from a total lot of six hundred and forty-six represent ALL MPs.  It doesn’t.  Do you think that maybe the Telegraph has withheld the other 6oo (ish) out of generosity?  It being such a good-hearted newspaper and all that?  Of course not.  It’s because all MPs are not the same.  Not even close to it.  Let’s get on and fix the problem, change the rules, sling out the real bad guys and get on with our lives. 

“What About Our Local MP?”
I’m glad you asked.  We’re a lucky constituency.  Now I’m not privy to all Mr. Moss’s details but from what I can see on his website it would appear that Malcolm Moss MP is one of those very good guys.  Malcolm has been publishing his expenses in some detail from his website for ages, which is more than many MPs have done.  He appears to keep no secrets, nor to do anything untoward.  In short, it would seem he’s precisely the sort of old-fashioned decent MP that everybody says they want (and we’ve got!).  Our prospective Parliamentary Candidate, Stephen Barclay PPC, I have come to know rather well from encounters during my campaign to be a County Councillor and he certainly seems to me to be a straightforward hard-working honest candidate, which is why I hope very much that he will end up as our MP.  I would even venture that that’s the nature of politics in North-East Cambridgeshire.  We aren’t perfect, I suppose, but nor are we currently part of this unsavory mess that’s going on and we should applaud that and hope it remains thus.
(Post updated after constructive criticism from other parties.)

**I’d like to stress that my blog contains entirely my own personal opinion.  It does not represent the opinion of the Conservative Party, nor of any other member other than myself.  I’m not infallible so I’m sure I won’t always be ‘right’.  But I do my best to speak my mind and the truth as I know it. Which is, I think, all any of us can do.

The Small Print (legally required during election campaigns.)
Published by Mrs D N Clark on behalf of Steve Tierney both of 111 High Street, March, Cambs PE15 9LH.

Posted in Expenses Scandal, Election, My Campaign, Cambs. County Council, Conservatives | No Comments »

10/05/2009 by Steve Tierney.

The Expenses Witchhunt
Doesn’t watching the news just get you down, lately? Every day a new sleaze allegation, a new misuse of office, a new expenses scandal. MP after MP, night after night, is being brought low by the terrible might of the Daily Telegraph (and whatever mole made a fortune leaking the list to them.) I know it’s not going to be popular, but I’d like to make a plea for calm. Before I do, I suppose a few clarifications need be made to prevent being hauled into the stocks and having fruit hurled at me.

Clarifications: I’m as outraged by the misuse of MP expenses as the rest of you. It’s wrong, they shouldn’t have done it, and the rules need to be changed right away.

Okay, with that out of the way, I’d like to make the case for some old-fashioned reason instead of all the frothing and shouting that the press are urging so fervently.

This is what has happened (in a nutshell). MP’s represent huge bodies of people and in public life somebody with that level of responsibility and duty would be paid very highly indeed. MPs earn a perfectly healthy wage (most of us would love to earn that much), but compared to the private sector wages for a similar job they earn very little.  On top of that, those who live a fair way from London and have to work there several days a week must have somewhere to stay while doing their job.  It’s no good telling them they ‘earn enough’ to pay for it themselves.  They mostly don’t (unless we only want millionaires in parliament…)  Hotels in London are expensive and staying in one several nights a week would be just as expensive as a second home.

Over many years MPs have shied away from giving themselves any significant pay rise, but the costs of living and staying in London keep getting higher.  Let’s face it, the reason they didn’t give themselves a pay rise is because there’s no nice way that story will ever play in a newspaper. 

So a culture has built up between MPs that instead of taking a pay rise, they will use their second homes allowance instead.  Please note: I’m not saying this was right.  It certainly wasn’t clever.  But nor is it ‘evil’.  If anything it was cowardly, or just a bit dumb. 

Instead of shrinking back in horror as it becomes clearer by the day that: “they are all at it” we could choose to take some solace in that.  Surely only the most paranoid anarchist actually believes that ‘every MP’ is crooked?  It’s so obviously not true.  What they are is human.  They used a scheme rather than take a payrise (stupidly) and presumed it would never get looked at too closely (also stupidly) and because they were all doing it they talked themselves into believing it was right and proper (most stupidly of all.) 

We know it was wrong.  They know it was wrong.  Yet still the public bay like a pack of starving wolves, circling the increasingly wide-eyed and frightened members of parliament with the scent of blood in their nostrils.  The media are stoking the fire with furious glee.  After all, every new secret brought to light is a new headline, a new expose, and a hundred thousand papers sold. 

The damage being done here is immense.  The public are losing all faith in their politicians.  Our whole system of democracy is being undermined.  The story is now feeding itself and getting hungrier.  Some sanity needs to be restored.

All MPs, or even most MPs, are not crooked.  You may not like the rules (I certainly don’t) but they were within them.  It was a ridiculous, flawed system.  But it has now been uncovered.  The thing to do here, the sensible, calm, rationale thing is to change the rules.  Do away with the loopholes and all non-business expenses.   Demand all receipts.  Publish the full list every year.  And that, my friends, will be the end of that.  As for second homes, I personally think they are fine, but that they should belong to the taxpayer.  When an MP finishes their time in parliament the house they bought is sold and the money (and profit) is put back into the taxation pot.   Voila! (Excuse my French)   No more expenses problems ever again.

As for getting the police involved.  Sure - if they have actually broken the law.  A very few may have done so.  Let’s just try not to tar them all with the same brush.  It’s certainly a good story to see that an MP bought nappies on his parliamentary expenses, or a plug, or a couple of toilet seats, but it’s not the same as, say, cash for honours.  If the police think there’s a case, let them make an arrest.  That is, after all, their job. 

Visiting Sutton
I’ve been canvassing in Sutton (Ely) today on behalf of Cllr. Philip Read.  Why am I campaigning for somebody else and not my own seat?  That’s easy - because I’m part of a team.  Cambridgeshire Conservatives don’t operate in little isolated pockets, we work together and help one another.  An impressive team it was too, since it included (but was not limited to) our organising secretary Debbie Clark, the leader of the county council Cllr. Jill Tuck and the Prospective Parliamentary Candidate Steve Barclay. 

Highlights of the day included a very interesting debate about Europe with a gentleman who wanted to know what the Conservative position on it was.  The fantastic views of rolling countryside and fertile fields that can be seen from most of Sutton and is particularly easy to appreciate on such a clear and sunny day.  And being chased by a dog (who caught me and proceeded to drool all over me.)  Please note: nobody set the dog on me.  I wasn’t canvassing for Labour. 

Councillor Read is an experienced, dedicated local politician, councillor and gentleman.  The people of Sutton clearly know that already, since many of them knew him personally when I knocked on their doors and had nothing but good things to say about him and his work.  He also has a donkey, which is kinda neat in my humble opinion.  How many people have a donkey in their backyard?

So, if you live in Sutton, maybe we met today!  If so, maybe you were one of the many people who told me on the doorstep how tired you were of Labour and how unenthused you were by the Lib Dem’s unlikely affectations and grandiose promises.  I couldn’t agree with you more.

Out n’ About
My own Campaign begins officially tomorrow.  Obviously I’ve been doing preparation and all sorts for quite some time.  But tomorrow is my first day of actual canvassing and leafletting.  The Conservative Office have done a great job of my literature and I’m really pleased with it.  Over the next month I’ll be in Wisbech Peckover, Leverington, Gorefield, Tydd St. Giles and Newton.  It is my intention to get around as much of the division as is humanly possible.  If I can do every house, I’ll consider that perfect.  That’s the target I’m aiming for.  If you live there and you see me, please say: “Hi!”.  And please remember to vote Conservative on June 4th.  Every vote counts. 

If you have any questions for me please don’t hesitate to;
phone (07831 616127)
Email me@stevetierney.org
or write : Steve Tierney, 6 Alexandra Road, Wisbech. PE13 1HQ.
 
The Small Print (legally required during election campaigns.)
Published by Mrs D N Clark on behalf of Steve Tierney both of 111 High Street, March, Cambs PE15 9LH.
  

Posted in Gorefield, Cambs. County Council, My Campaign, Wisbech, Leverington, Tydd St. Giles, Newton, Conservatives | No Comments »

27/04/2009 by Steve Tierney.

Vote Blue On June 4th
If you live in the Roman Bank & Peckover County Division I will be asking for your vote on behalf of the Conservatives on June 4th.  I am sure you will hear my political opponents promise you the world on a silver platter.  I have already had a taste of some of the grand claims they make and grander criticisms of the present Conservative administration.  It doesn’t seem to matter how skewed their presentation or how invalid their comment.  They seem to think that if they promise you the Sun and the Moon and Six Miracles Before Breakfast that’ll somehow win them a seat.  In the end, I’m sure readers of this blog are well aware of the political merry-go-round.  You’ve heard enough nonsense like this over the last decade to be immune to it.  Nevertheless, this month you may be presented with dizzying spin from as varied quarters as UKIP and Labour and the Lib Dems.  I don’t want to get into that big-talking point-scoring political nonsense.  As a local candidate I just want to make a few simple, honest promises.  You’ll be able to reach me (locally) when you need help.  I’ll listen to what you say, I’ll push the things you want and I will work like a dog on your behalf each and every day.  There’s nothing grand or colourful about those promises, I know.  But you can take them to the bank.  Try me.  I won’t let you down. 

Conservative Spring Forum
I have just returned from the Conservative Spring Forum, which I visited with a number of friends and colleagues this weekend.  It was an enjoyable trip which I found useful and interesting.  The agenda could have done with a bit more meat on its bones, to be honest.  Nevertheless, the speeches and presentations I attended were solid and intelligent.  In particular, I was lucky enough to be at the Freedom Association fringe event with the folk from FensCF when MEP Dan Hannan addressed the small but attentive audience with an impromptu ten-minute speech.  As usual when Dan Hannan makes a speech I was blown away.  Nor was I alone in this as the audience were clearly just as taken with his smart, confident and intelligent arguments.  The following day he had another speech for conference, presented here.  I have been a fan of Mr. Hannan’s work for some time (I very highly recommend his book, The Plan, to anybody interested in politics and democracy in the U.K.) and so it was a privelige to hear him speak and a stroke of great fortune to be able to do so from a few feet away!  Quite honestly, It made the weekend for me!

European Elections
We must not forget that on the same day that our County Council elections are taking place we will also vote on our European candidates.  I’ve heard a few ‘normally Tory’ voters suggest they may flirt with another party as a ‘protest’ over the whole Europe and refendum thing and I’d just like to say: Please Don’t.  Let me explain why.  Most Conservatives are sceptical about further integration with Europe and even those that aren’t want to support proper democratic procedure.  The only way to make Labour rethink its blind course of destruction right now is to deliver them a sound thrashing at the elections on June 4th.  If you vote for the ‘fringe’ parties you may think this works as a protest.  And of course you have a free vote and should obviously cast it wherever you choose.  But Labour will not be shaken by a few votes moving to parties with no power or influence.  That protest will do nothing to turn their arrogant grins upside down.  What will scare them and move them to rethink their position is a Conservative Landslide.  Add to this the fact that we really do have decent, honourable, hard-working candidates who we desperately need to get elected so they can bring some sanity back to Europe and you can see why I’d quite literally beg you to remember how important this European Election is.  The European Union is the Monster in the Closet, it wants to creep out at midnight when you least expect it and literally take control of your lives.  Give your vote to the Conservatives and we’ll have a real platform to tame the beast and put it back in its cage.

Irritating? Me?
In last week’s Cambs Times, Columnist Samuel Brakespeare called me irritating.  He did it in a subtle and ironic way, but still.  Irritating?  Me?  Surely not.  My first actual outing in the local press and I get called names!  Yikes.  I suppose it’s lucky I’ve got thick skin if this is what I have to look forward to!  I’m joking, of course.  I rather like the Fen Diary regular slot, which is witty, punchy and informed.  I don’t mind that I have been labelled as a potential source of ‘good sport’ there.  At least he took the time to read my blog and comment.  I just hope that as time passes I’ll be able to get the inimical Brakespeare to think of me as useful instead.  I’m a newbie in local political terms.  Maybe I’m naive too.  But I really do think we can move beyond cynicism and actually contribute something to our communities.  That’s why I got involved in local politics and that’s exactly what I want to try and help achieve.  If I can demonstrate this then I hope even the most professional cynics will agree I’m useful rather than irritating. 

The Small Print (legally required during election campaigns.)
Published by Mrs D N Clark on behalf of Steve Tierney both of 111 High Street, March, Cambs PE15 9LH.

Posted in My Campaign, Election, Europe, Conservative Future, Cambs. County Council, Conservatives | No Comments »

23/04/2009 by Steve Tierney.

St. George
Every time the question about a national day for the English comes around it seems to get bound up in rhetoric of whether we should, or should not, be proud to be English.  Whether we (as a people) are given to this sort of celebration or not.  Whether we even have anything to be proud of.  Well, I am certainly proud to be English.  I am indeed given to this sort of celebration.  And I do believe that England has a great deal to be proud of.  Times are hard for many and they’re going to get harder.  One of the things that will help get us through is to remember our long, colourful history.  Another is looking at our communities and the decent, proud, generous people who live in them.  We sell ourselves short sometimes, getting bogged down in arguments about benefits cheats, teenage parents, corrupt bankers and knife crime.  Let’s try to remember our good points too.  A national day to keep that in mind is a good thing. 
Happy St. George’s Day!

Stand And Deliver
Yesterday the Prime Minister put on his mask, strapped guns to his hips and laid in wait on the side of the highway.  The first carriage to come along was carrying the Middle Class.  Gordon leapt out into the road and shouted : “Stand and deliver!  Your Money Or Your Life!”  People might be forgiven for thinking Robin Hood had arrived, stealing from the rich (well, prosperous, anyway) and giving to the poor. 

Until the next wagon to happen by.  “Stick ‘Em Up!  I’ll be taking all your jobs, please.” Gordon ranted, aiming his six guns at a bunch of weary working class travellers.  “I know the prosperous employ everybody else, I just don’t care.  The public sector isn’t big enough yet anyway!”  Leering evilly, Gordon smirked: “Don’t worry, you’ll be looked after.  As long as you meet the criteria.  You need to be a teenager, out of work for six months or more, driving an eleven-year-old car, the seventh daughter of a seventh daughter, born on the Sabbath under a blood red moon.”  Or something like that. 

Having now put the lie both to the Big Idea that the middle classes have nothing to fear from New Labour and to their Manifesto commitment against huge tax increases, Gordon Brown finally openly reverts to type.  It’s back to the Seventies with a hit parade of class warfare, economic ruin and social jealousy.  Since today is also William Shakespeare’s Birthday I think a quote is in order. 

O, beware, my lord, of jealousy;
It is the green-ey’d monster, which doth mock
The meat it feeds on.
- Shakespeare’s Othello

I’m aware that my metaphors are something of a mish-mash.  Much like that disastrous nonsense of a fabricated budget.  Give me strength.

The Small Print
At the end of April ‘09 we move officially into Campaign Season.  The run-up to the County Council and Euro-Elections mean that some rules come into force which I am advised I must adhere to since I am a candidate for the Roman Bank & Peckover county division.   As a consequence of this I will be obliged to include an amount of ‘Small Print’ at the end of every blog post detailing my Conservative affiliation and some other campaign-related details.  My posts will also be slightly delayed as they will need to be ‘approved’ by my local organising secretary.  She’s a good sport and I’m not particularly controversial, so I don’t anticipate any problems.  I’m only making this advance notification in case anybody wonders why small print suddenly starts appearing at the end of my posts.  It doesn’t mean I’ve sold out, or am under the dictatorial thumb of Big Brother.  It just means (like any good Conservative) that I want to stay within the law and do the right thing as a county candidate.  Somehow, I doubt that telling readers I’m a Conservative at the end of each post is going to be a big surprise to anybody.  But if it is I’d have to ask… what Blog have you been reading all this time? 

Three Thousand Readers
My latest ‘hits count’ for the blog website is three-thousand individual readers a week.  TWELVE THOUSAND a month?  Bloody hell!  (Excuse my French.)  Who are you all?  Thank you for reading but please… leave a comment once in a while!  It’s exciting to know my occasional rant encourages some inspection.  It’d just be nice to get some feedback!  Speak now, or forever hold your pieces.  <Ahem>
  

Posted in England, St. Georges Day, Budget, Labour Party, Cambs. County Council, My Campaign, Conservatives | No Comments »

19/04/2009 by Steve Tierney.

In my last post I had a bit of a dig at local rivals the Lib Dems and their proposal to slash council tax rates.  My point was that it’s easy to say this stuff in opposition, but that I did not believe that from a position of power (which I truly hope, with all due respect to Lib Dem rivals, never comes to pass in Cambridgeshire) they would follow though.  In the spirit of fairness I did also say that I understood they were playing the “opposition game” and that I expected the Conservatives might not behave so differently in their shoes.

Well, lo and behold, while browsing randomly on the web today I stumbled upon this. 

Conservatives condemn Labour and Lib Dem
pact to hike council tax

Sure enough, down in Reading where the Conservatives are in opposition to Labour in the Borough Council, Lib Dems have voted with Labour to push through a rise, while Conservatives call for a freeze.  Now if that doesn’t prove the point I was trying to make, I don’t know what does.  In opposition, local government parties (including, sadly, my own on occasion) can promise the world.  In power, given the task of delivering, reality sets in.  The best laid plans of mice and men are found wanting.

I don’t think this is the fault of the parties in local government, actually.  The fact is, all parties want to try and offer great services for fair and reasonable costs.  The thrust and parry of politics on both sides can be inelegant, we disagree on some points of fair governance, but all want to achieve the best outcome for the electorate.  Even Labour, possibly with the exception of Gordon Brown’s cabal, who just want to cling to power forever like leeches on the skin of the country.

The problem with our services is that there is never enough money to do everything, or even most things.  Why?  Because we waste too much of it on nonsense and because we have made it impossible, or at least very difficult, for people to do anything for themselves.  The government is constantly trying to give councils less money, while giving them ever more top-down ‘targets’.    We are burdened by a ridiculously expensive public sector which employs far too many, pays some of them far too much and encourages ever more waste.  On top of all this we insist on bailing out every failing institution which comes to the government with a cap in its hand and a sad face.  There is only so much money to go around (the ability of the Bank of England to print it with a Mickey Mouse logo notwithstanding).

I’d like to see Council Tax rates going in reverse.  Each year, your bill would tell you how much of a percentage LESS than the previous year it would be.  With the Labour government’s waste, over-regulation and poor practice, this is presently impossible.  A rise is necessary almost everywhere because we have to take care of people and that means more money.  When an election is finally called we can only hope that a Conservative government sweeps in with a massive majority and can then set about restructuring and stripping away the fat.  A lean, powerful, dynamic public sector will make lower council taxes possible.  I know it seems such a thing can never happen, but I remain hopeful that it can.  Falling Council Taxes.  Can you imagine?  You’d almost look forward to the bill.  (Okay… maybe that’s taking it a bit too far!)

Posted in Liberal Democrats, Labour Party, Election, Cambs. County Council, Conservatives | No Comments »

16/04/2009 by Steve Tierney.

Low Low Low Prices - Everything Must Go!
While browsing the web today I visited Nichola Harrison’s site. She’s a Lib Dem County Councillor and I often read her blog because she writes well, is clearly passionate and is often entertaining (perhaps unintentionally, I’m not sure.) Now I must stress that I seldom actually agree with her conclusions, but I do have a soft spot for people who can make a good argument and write from the heart. But her blog piece today, entitled: “If The Lib Dems Ran The County Council” just demanded a response. I apologise in advance for any readers who aren’t particularly interested in party versus party pieces, but I just can’t help myself.

The Lib Dems seem to be proudly trumpeting their claim that if only they were in charge the council tax rise would have been smaller. In opposition its easy to throw a figure and an ‘alternative budget’ (I use the term loosely) into the mix with grand claims. After all, you don’t have to implement it, do you? Then, should the time ever come that you do have to implement it you can introduce that hoary old chestnut “the circumstances are different now.” Of course they are. The circumstances are always different when a brash promise (or series of them) has to actually be realised. Now I don’t blame Nichola or her party for playing the opposition game. I suppose, if the Conservatives were in opposition, we’d probably do the same. But Nichola regularly bemoans the dangers of “party politics” interfering with actually doing the right thing (which, in principle, I agree with her about) while simultaneously playing the exact same game herself. (Which turns her argument to mush.)

Nichola then goes on to say:-

“The party believes that under the Conservatives the Council has become sloppy in the way it uses its resources, so that many millions are being wasted on unnecessary luxuries like the press office and glossy brochures, and on inefficient contractual arrangements for school transport and highway maintenance.”

I love that term: “The Party Believes.” Well, this blogger believes that: “under the Liberal Democrats the council would flush its resources away on pointless vanity projects and have nothing left to actually do the jobs the people who live in the county need.” Why is what Nichola “believes” any more valid than what I “believe”? Readers, you’ve seen the Lib Dems at work often enough around the country. You can make your own call. Would a Liberal Democrat council spend money wisely? I Doubt It.  

In principle, I would agree with Nichola that lower council tax is a good thing.  Who wouldn’t?  None of us want a big bill that we struggle to pay.  Or the sweaty brow of the District Council Enforcement Department leering over our shoulders.  But if slashing the bills means we cannot afford to pay for the services that the people of Cambridgeshire need, we can’t do it.  There are some very vulnerable people who rely on those services.  Who need more care, not less.  It’s the Labour Party who seem to think money can be conjured with the wave of a magic wand.  The Lib Dems are on board with that too, apparently.  I prefer the real world.  Fairy tales are all well and good, but when you have to pay for stuff you need actual money.  Not fictional money.  Slashing the budget in an “Everything Must Go” Closing Down-type sale is not (to my mind) smart management.  Even as an opposition ploy.  It helps nobody.

Finally, Nichola Spells Out Her Party’s Priorities:-

highway maintenance and better traffic management
more police to tackle anti-social behaviour
better local youth services and
more support for voluntary and community organisations
free vegetarian pizza every Friday (I made this last one up.  Sorry.)

Well… uh yeah. Of course. That’s what we all want, Nichola. (Not the vegetarian pizza, obviously.)  That’s what is on every prospective councillor’s election literature, both Lib Dem and Conservative, I would guess. A wish list is a lovely thing. I share your values. I just doubt your party’s  ability to deliver them. Whereas the Conservatives have been delivering fairly consistently for quite some time. I do not claim the Conservatives are perfect. I want to work to help improve the party. I do not claim we are immune to mistakes. That would be Gordon-Brown style arrogance. I just trust Conservatives with my taxes before I’d trust anybody with a yellow rosette. In my experience, Tories Do It Better.  Now that sounds like a slogan for a T-Shirt.  Somebody call the printers…

Posted in Liberal Democrats, Labour Party, Cambs. County Council, Conservatives | 1 Comment »

15/04/2009 by Steve Tierney.

Local Action To Improve The A1101
The A1101, combining Leverington Road and on into Sutton Road is an infamous blackspot in our area for a number of reasons.The A1101 has too many accidents, too many near-misses, too much speeding and too much dangerous driving along it.  Everybody knows it.  It’s no secret.  The road has grown steadily in traffic flow and usage by heavy goods vehicles over recent years.  It is an important and busy trunk road from Cambridgeshire and into Lincolnshire. 

This week, a petition has been organised by one action group for one area of the road.   You have to admire them because they have fought long and hard to improve awareness of the dangers of the route.  So far, the response from the Powers That Be hasn’t been particularly inspired (in my humble opinion).  A few new signs saying things like: “XXX people have died in the last three years” and “Danger Of Death” or whatever are very dramatic and all, but are just a token response.  We need and deserve more.  It is vital that proper measures are taken before anybody else is killed.  It really is as urgent as that.

(Update: From the Fenland Citizen: Officials have pledged action including new warning signs, re-assessing the bends to see if double white lines can be installed and working in partnership with other agencies to place mobile speed cameras along the stretch.  Okay, that sounds a bit better than just the signs.  But I suspect more still will be needed!  Some traffic calming in built-up areas and some speed cameras would seem to be the least we could do!)

Also this week Leverington Road has made the front page of the local newspaper thanks to the inspired campaign of a local resident, Lisa Goddard.  Pitted with potholes and damage, vehicles thunder along the road causing unreasonable disturbance and discomfort for the residents unfortunate enough to live alongside.

I’ve made these points in writing to Fenland District Council and Cambridgshire County Council and I am now awaiting their response.  I hope the action they take will be speedy and positive.  It really isn’t much to ask that our main roads are kept in a good condition.  I want to be fair though.  Both our district and county councils are generally very good.  There is no reason why they cannot act promptly to address these issues now that the residents and I have raised them clearly and unequivocally.  I am confident this is what they’ll do.  It not… well, we’ll cross that bridge in a couple of months if we come to it.  If I need to put on my fighting gloves (metaphor) to get some action, I will.  I have been encouraged by the response from local councillors over this, though.  It looks like we’re all on the same page.

In the meantime, I’ve emailed Lisa Goddard offering my full support for any protest she wishes to stage (that is within the law, of course).  There is something wonderful about positive local activism.  People who are willing to stand up and be counted are a boon to any community and need our full support when they do so.  If any reader of the blog wants to offer Lisa their help, her number (shown on the front page of the newspaper) is 01945 587195.  I’m sure she’ll be glad of the additional support.

Posted in Fenland District Council, A1101, Cambs. County Council, Leverington, Newton, Tydd St. Giles | No Comments »

12/04/2009 by Steve Tierney.

Playground Antics
The schoolyard was a tough place, as I remember. Not ‘no food on the table’ tough, or even ‘five mile walk to the waterhole’ tough, but nonetheless kids can be mean. They say cruel things with little understanding of the hurt they cause to their peers. They can bully mercilessly, with little respite allowed to their victims. Usually, as people grow older and more confident the need to behave in this way is routed into other, more positive, outlets. Instead of being pointlessly mean, adults affirm themselves by the work they do, the life they lead, the part they play in society and family.  But apparently there are folk in the Labour Party who still lack that maturity.

We hear today that arch-blogger Guido Fawkes has uncovered a planned Labour Party attack on the Conservatives. Emails between Damian McBride and others (including lefty blogger and Labour-insider Derek Draper) show the depths they were prepared to sink to. Was the attack on policy? Of course not. How could it be? Their policies have consistently failed. Was their assault based on sound rhetoric and solid argument? Of course not. How could it be? They wouldn’t know honest debate if it grew horns and fangs and bit them in the (excuse my language) ass. No, Labour’s ‘big idea’ was to go for good old-fashioned character assassination. Lies, lies and more lies.

Among the various stories they planned to literally ‘invent’ out of thin air;- “David Cameron has an embarrassing disease.” “George Osborne used a prostitute.” “A Gay Tory MP was misusing his position to benefit a boyfriend’s business.” But the one that angers me the most is that they planned to make suggestions as to the state of George Osborne’s wife’s mental health. Now listen, I don’t approve of any of this rubbish and nor would any decent person from either side of the political spectrum. It’s playground bullying practised by adults and those responsible need to be dealt with promptly to demonstrate our lack of tolerance for this kind of infantile behaviour.  But Dave and George and the unnamed gay MP aren’t children, they are big enough and ugly enough to deal with this sort of mindless attack. They live in the political world, they know Labour make it dirty. Mrs. Osborne, on the other hand? What sort of slimy miserable scummy piece of filth picks on an innocent women, choosing her possible fragility as a source of ammunition? If one of Labour’s filthy spinners tried that on my wife I’d make John Prescott look gentle. Damian McBride has been sacked. Let’s hope it’s for good. Derek Draper needs to be next.

More Playground Antics
I’ve been involved in a debate over on ConHome about a new story “Police Swoop On Whitstable Graffiti Suspects”.  This was the story:-
A joint initiative between the police and Conservative-run Canterbury Council has resulted in a dawn raid on two teenagers who have been arrested on allegations of widespread graffiti. The police also removed plastic bags full of aerosol paint cans.

Quite a few Conservatives were applauding the police for their action and I can appreciate why.  Graffiti is a problem in many places and as adults we find the practice of it (and other antisocial behaviour) by youths worrying and sometimes frightening.  But I just want to make a call for a little proportion. 

It’s easy to jump on the ‘hoody-bashing’ brigade and assume kids have gone feral. But have you noticed it’s always ‘everyone else’s kids’ rather than our own?  Anybody would think we’d never been teenagers! Or that the men amongst us were all teenage boys who did nothing wrong.  Well, I’ll come clean.  I was a little tearaway!  I had a couple of rebellious years when I was a royal pain in the derriere and then some.  Not violent, or anything like that, but certainly the sort of young man who can be, um, ‘challenging’.  Some proper guidance (and punishment, where required) helped me grow out of it.

Without wanting to get all Eighties “pop culture” on this blog, let’s just take a look at the presumption that the young men in Whitstable were so bad they really did require a ‘dawn raid’ involving joint-police action at great expense to the public.

I remember being a teenage boy quite clearly. I was a graffiti artist too, involved in the ‘breakdance’ craze for a number of years. In my ‘crew’ there were fifty or so young men.  We hung out on street corners, lay pieces of lino on the floor, spun on our backs and so forth.  We painted colourful murals on huge walls. Mostly where people wanted us to. Sometimes not.  We probably swore a lot. We certainly played loud music from our ‘beat boxes’.

I think I’d struggle to name a single ONE of the teenagers I knew who didn’t do *something* some commentators would consider ‘deliberate vandalism’, or ‘contempt for the norms of society’ (except me, of course.  I was an angel.  Ahem.)  The more troubled youths ‘tagged’ walls all over town. Got into fights. Stole people’s milk from their doorstep. Climbed on school and government building roofs. Ran along lengths of front garden jumping people’s hedges. I could go on, but you get the picture. They were acting stupidly while navigating the difficult path to adulthood and responsibility.

And these were the GOOD kids. The breakdance group weren’t the ‘bad boys’. There was an altogether darker element involved in gangs and drugs and the like who thought the breakdancers were ‘goody goodies’ (I’m cleaning up the language a bit here.)

I still talk to many of those people now, via the wonders of Facebook and its electonic friends. They are businessmen and bankers and lawyers and accountants and builders and electricians and doctors et al. They are married, with families. They vote. They are governors in schools. They do charitable work.

So, you see, my point is that sometimes this behaviour is just high jinks and its part and parcel of the norms of society. Even though its irritating, expensive, annoying and occasionally criminal.  Every time I’ve ever known a parent tell me: “My child wouldn’t do that, they were brought up RIGHT” has always been the parent of the most evil little oik of the lot.  It would be wonderful if we lived in a world where kids melded directly into adults without the confusion and hot-blooded ferocity that are the teenage years.  Or would it?  There always has to be a period of learning, or adjustment, or getting to know your value and place in society.  Guidance and discipline can be given without tick-box criminalisation.

I’m not saying: “let them off the hook.” No way. Now that i’m forty all that stuff annoys the hell out of me, just like it does you. But keep a sense of proportion. Punish, but don’t criminalise. You run the risk of turning what is basically a good young man doing a stupid thing into something worse. In the immortal words of a band from the Eighties, the Blow Monkeys: “It doesn’t have to be that way.”

Go Archer!
I wrote to the Fenland Citizen last week, turning my blog post “It’s Not Big and It’s Not Clever” into a letter the paper could publish.  The Leftie and Independent supporters in the area were quick to fly to the defence of the district councillor in question, Mr Archer.  But (predictably) their idea of defence didn’t include any sort of actual debate, didn’t address the issue I’d raised, and came across (to me anyway) as blind partisan solidarity.  Well, that’s okay.  Blind partisan solidarity has its place.  I value loyalty as much as the next guy.  But couldn’t we have some actual argument too?  The two things aren’t mutually-exclusive you know. 

One person asked “What right does Mr. Tierney have to speak on behalf of Manea?”.  Even though nothing in my letter suggested I felt I had any such privelige.  Mr. Archer was having a pop at the District Council.  I live in the District.  It doesn’t take a genius to work out that unless the laws on free speech and democracy have changed utterly, I have every right to take him to task. 

Somebody else pointed out that maybe the Conservatives were afraid that Mr. Archer might be looking to take a County Council seat as well?  Uh-huh.  Doesn’t that just confirm what I said?  Mr. Archer doesn’t care a hoot about the pay of a district officer.  He just knows a populist flag to fly while pursuing his own self-promotional agenda.  I don’t mind independents at all.  They are healthy for our democracy.  But only if they have something genuine to offer.  If some of the people of Manea are happy with Mr. Archer’s recent performance, good for them!  I know a fair few who have been put off by this latest piece of grandstanding.  If he stands for county he might be in for a surprise.  And a trouncing.

Posted in Fenland District Council, Cambs. County Council, Conservatives | No Comments »