There are some council meetings in the London Borough of Broken Barnet which, in themselves, are routine, trivial, meaningless, pointless - and need no reporting. Mrs Angry enjoys these events almost more than anything, to be frank.
It is, you see, in the very banality of the occasion, the sheer nonsense and self indulgence, that you find the answer to a very interesting question: why do the Tory councillors in Barnet behave in the way they do? What motivates them?
Yes, we are talking about the council's annual general meeting, where the ceremony of mayor-making is held, and appointments to all the committees and Cabinet are made.
The usual full council meetings are awash with archaic municipal ritual, of course: the fondling of the mace, the footmen, the pantaloons, the tricorn hats, the bowing and scraping: and that's before Brian Coleman even leaves home for the Town Hall.
But the annual do: dear God - you can have no idea, dear reader, of the feverish excitement amongst our elected representatives, at least on the Conservative side of the chamber.
On Tuesday night the councillors packed out the room and the public gallery with their wives, mistresses, mothers, lovers, and an assortment of members of the armed forces, one in camouflage, clearly hoping he would blend into the background and disappear from view. So many men in uniform, in fact, that Mrs Angry wondered if certain Tory councillors were planning a military coup, and to replace the ruling junta of benevolent dictator Richard Cornelius with a regime of robust discipline, to kick the council back in line with the right sort of swivel eyed loon values that linger in the heart of Barnet Conservatism.
But there were no tanks on the lawn outside the Town Hall, just a demonstration against the blacklisting of building workers, and consequently a lot of impertinent noises at the most hushed and reverential moments of the evening, which caused Mrs Angry no little amusement.
The Tories love the excuse this annual event affords them, to dress up in academic style gowns, and prance about feeling intellectually validated. Mrs Angry was reminded of some of the teachers at her old school, who insisted on wearing this sort of get up. The ones that did were barking mad.
Disgraced councillor Coleman, fresh from his conviction for criminal assault, was all the more determined to turn up to this pantomime, and wear his gown and that medal on a ribbon he is so proud of - Mrs Angry informed the public gallery that he won it for swimming a width at Squires Lane pool, circa 1969, a revelation which bemused some of the Tory wives in the reserved seats.
The Tory Mayors of Broken Barnet hate having to give up their role, at the end of their reign, and pass all the bling and moth eaten, fur trimmed velvet robes to their successors. When Coleman had the Mayorship wrested from him, he actually cried.
Last year, when Toyah Wilcox lookalike Cllr Lisa Rutter stepped down, her speech, uttered in the curiously royal tone she had adopted for the role, was almost longer than her year in office, and threatened to leave new boy Brian Schama fretting impotently at the side forever, like Prince Charles waiting tetchily for the throne, with nothing to do but sell Duchy biscuits and argue with Camilla.
Retiring deputy Mayor Kate Salinger now led the chamber in prayer.
She beseeched the Almighty, on behalf of her shameless colleagues:
Give us wisdom, insight, patience, dedication, integrity, open mindedness, and above all: humility ...
Yes, thought Mrs Angry, chortling in her seat, these qualities are certainly in short supply in the ranks of the Tory councillors of Broken Barnet ...
And above all: humility ... Councillor Coleman, at this point, had his head bowed, and his eyes closed in prayer.
What was he asking, wondered Mrs Angry, full of grudging admiration for the old rogue's total lack of shame?
Dear Lord,
Please make me a Good Boy.
I promise to stop assaulting Women in the street,
and parking in Loading Bays,
if only You will give me back my Glorious career,
and teach the Old Hags of Broken Barnet to Shut Up
and know their place,
at the *rse end of everything,
in Your Plan for the World,
Amen.
Amen, prayed Mrs Angry, silently, as she looked on, deeply moved.
Councillor Hugh Rayner had proposed Melvin Cohen to be Mayor, and wanted us to know why.Mrs Angry wanted to know why too, as he has already had a go at it, and the other contender Brian Salinger, has not. As 'La Bloggeuse' tweeted to Barnet Council last night:
To swear in Melvin Cohen as Mayor of Barnet once may be regarded as a misfortune. To do so twice looks like carelessness.
Still, Hugh likes the cut of his jib, and recommended him for the following reasons:
1. Because he thinks before he speaks
2. Because he doesn't feel obliged to speak, just for the sake of it.
3. Because he doesn't interrupt.
Hmm. But most of our Tory councillors are similarly silent, and probably not so much because they are thinking but because they are not thinking, or thinking about something else entirely, like their dinner, or how much longer the meeting will last, or why Mrs Angry is looking at them and laughing, and scribbling down notes.
Hugh told us that Melvin Cohen had lived through the leadership of five prime ministers, and listed them dutifully, reserving a tone of deep forebearance for Tony Blair and Gordon Brown, and a certain amount of equivocation for -oh dear, David Cameron. Hugh Rayner is not, of course, a swivel eyed loon, but some of his best friends in Hendon Conservative Association most certainly are.
Cohen, he told us, had also outlasted six Chief Executives. Apparently this is some sort of rare victory. We were also informed that Melvin was an expert on the constitution. Expert? Certainly he presided over the emasculation of the constitution with great zeal, overseeing the silencing of Residents Forums, for example.
Are there any other nominations? No? The chamber was silent.
Now that's what I call an election, declared Mr Shepherd, the perenniel one man chorus of disapproval in the public gallery, from behind his copy of Jewish Socialist magazine.
After much traipsing about between the chamber and a side room, where Cllr Cohen received the secret initiation into his new role, comprised of solemn oaths, trouser rolling, threats of violence and manly handshakes, he was seated on his throne of office, with Mr Jeff Lustig, the Director of Corporate Governance, at his right hand side, like an awful foretelling of Judgement Day.
Goodbye to the former Mayor, Brian Schama - a very long goodbye - and farewell to his wife, who for some reason had to put on a pair of white gloves in order to be presented with a badge, for her 'very splendid service', presumably in putting up with Cllr Schama, who is still in Mrs Angry's bad books for not telling Brian Coleman off properly when he insulted the women in the public gallery with his 'old hags' slur.
Another farewell too to Mr Lustig, who is retiring after working for Barnet Council for more than thirty years. Mr Lustig must have done something very, very bad in a previous life, and has been well and truly punished for it in this one. His sentence is coming to an end, and escape is in sight. Mrs Angry will miss him, as he was a worthy opponent in the game of corporate scheming, here in Broken Barnet, and was a master of his art. Once he leaves, the council will self destruct, as only he has any real knowledge of the way to run the bloody thing, and with him go many secrets, one suspects.
Tributes were paid by all parties, including one from the Independent party of one, represented by Brian Coleman. Coleman had spent the evening sat next to the long suffering Libdem councillor Suzette Palmer, who was too gracious and well mannered to tell him to shut up when he kept whispering comments in her ear, the free use of Tory ears being in rather shorter supply than in the past.
Lady Palmer is a keen knitter - a worthy occupation for the women of Broken Barnet - and often sits with her needles clacking throughout meetings. Coleman was lucky that she had left them at home on this occasion, or Mrs Angry imagines that he may have found himself skewered on the end of one, as the evening continued.
Mr Lustig, declared Brian, with all the patronising approval and demi-god like authority of someone who imagines that he is still directing the course of events on earth, and has forgotten he has been returned to the real world, to dwell among mortals once more .... Mr Lustig is one of a dying breed of local government officers ...
This made Mrs Angry laugh, as of course he was no doubt also obliquely referring to her brother, who worked in Corporate Governance with Lustig, for about the same length of time. (Brian bumped into Mrs Angry's brother at a funeral, recently, and informed him that everything had gone to pot, since he had left: see, Brian - can't cope without us, can you?)
A sad moment next, for Mrs Angry, as we heard from Councillor Andrew Harper, who is stepping down from his Cabinet post with responsibility for education. He has handled his portfolio with great enthusiasm throughout the last three years, and clearly finds it difficult to stand down now, but the demands of such a position are apparently too hard to sustain, for the full length of the current administration.
Shame.
Ah: next on the agenda - the question of committee membership.
Mrs Angry had been particularly looking forward to this.
Can you guess, readers, which councillor was not at all happy about being excluded from the membership of any committee?
Yes, Independent councillor Brian Coleman, having recently pleaded guilty to the offence of assault by beating of a female resident in the street, seemed to think that his criminal conviction should be no bar to appointment to a place on one of the council's committees.
He tried desperately to wedge himself into a position, forcing a vote on the issue. The chamber looked on as the motion was put. Only two councillors put up their hands (although Mrs Angry could not see the Mayor to note whether or not he supported his old ally).
The two councillors who approved Coleman's bid were Councillor Brian Gordon, the right winger who once 'blacked up' in order to impersonate Nelson Mandela, to 'amuse' the poor residents of a care home, and thinks gay partners should not be allowed to foster or adopt children, and handle bar moutachioed, silver fox and expert linguist Councillor John Hart, who has also been the subject of a complaint in regard to an alleged racist remark to a resident at a forum, and is the only councillor Mrs Angry can recall daring to use the f word in the council chamber. No, not Finchley, or fishwives: fucking. Tssk.
Councillor John Hart votes for Brian, as Mrs Coleman looks on
Mrs Angry has written to Councillors Gordon and Hart to ask why they think Councillor Coleman should be given such a position of trust, after his recent conviction. She has received no reply yet, but looks forward eagerly to their response.
Just to make sure, a count was taken of the number of Tory councillors who did not want their erstwhile colleague to be given a committee place. Twenty eight, intoned Mr Lustig, with, Mrs Angry may just have imagined, the very slightest trace of lingering satisfaction.
For one ugly moment, Coleman's face darkened with fury. He then pulled himself together and set about trying to cause havoc by objecting loudly several times - Not Agreed! -to the remuneration status of the committees, an action which has consequences requiring a proportionality of selection, and was not welcomed. Pointless, as he achieved nothing other than revenge.
When it had been possible that a vote might have won him a seat, leader Richard Cornelius looked petrified, and started signally wildly at the Mayor. He then managed to interrupt and say that Coleman had been offered, at some point, a position, but had not liked what was on offer, and had demanded something else.
Quite why any place was offered at all, was not explained, other than that our Tory leader appears to be utterly incapable of standing up to the man. He managed to blurt out that he thought the question of his membership of any committee should be delayed until another meeting, by which time, of course, Coleman may be - may be - finally thrown out of his local association.
Mrs Angry is informed that there is to be a meeting on 5th June at which fifty members of the executive of Chipping Barnet Conservative Association will listen to their chum's tale of woe, and then take a vote, by secret ballot, as to whether his membership should be re-instated. Ms Michael's side of things will not be presented, naturally. It is entirely possible that Coleman's colleagues will continue to support him: in that case central office will have to step in, one hopes.
None of this scandalous state of affairs was allowed to impinge on the evening's performance, of course: nor any mention of the real issues facing the residents of this borough - in fact amongst all the self congratulatory proceedings there was no acknowledgement of those whose interests this prize collection of fools, charlatans and incompetents purport to represent: the residents, taxpayers, and voters.
Only the day after the empty headed Tory councillors were told by their senior officers to accept the bid from Crapita for the DRS contract, giving away another massive range of our council services for the profiteering of the private shareholders, at our expense, they had already forgotten, and were busying themselves with their gowns, and their speeches, and their backslapping, and gleefully accepting lucrative posts on committees where, for the next year, they will look on in total indifference, nodding through reports they have never read, while all around them the residents they represent struggle to pay their rent, or to find employment, or keep their families together, in good health, security, and a modicum of happiness.
So there it was, the council meeting where the new Mayor of Broken Barnet became, by default, the Mayor of Capitaville, and no one cared.
And as we write, the long fingers of Capita are probing the secret places of the corporate body, and familiarising themselves with all the temptations and promises of the pleasures, and the profit, to be found here.
There is of course one other thing that was not spoken about, in all the fun on Tuesday night: the small matter of the Judicial Review, and the appeal which is due to take place. At any moment we expect to be told the date of the court hearing, and the next performance will be: Capitaville goes to the High Court.
Mrs Angry has her seat booked.
2 comments:
Kate Salinger's prayer was a tour de force, calling on her colleagues to act with integrity, to scrutinise, and to put people before party, thereby raising indirectly a host of issues from One Barnet to the allowances scandal.
Hmm: not a tour de force, exactly, much as I like Kate: a rare example of something approaching a real sincerity and a sense of duty, perhaps.
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