Tuesday 7 July 2009

Freer resigns….


…himself to staying on as leader of the council!

Not The Barnet Times has learned that Mike Freer plans to ignore colleagues calling for him to stand down as leader of the council in September in order to give his successor time to form a cabinet and devise policies to lead the party into the local elections in May 2010. Instead Freer wishes to go “on and on”.

As a serial trougher, Mike Freer would not only lose his Leaders Special Responsibility Allowance of £34,909 a year if he stood down, he would also have to resign from two quangos which rake in another £24,248 p.a.

But Freer’s decision is not just about money. Displaying the classic signs of hubris - or Leaderitis as Brian Coleman once called it behind Mike’s back - Freer simply does not believe that there is anyone in the cabinet capable of doing the job as well as him. Mind you, with Peer of the Realm Cabinet Member Richard Cornelius admitting that after three years he still doesn’t understand what is going on, perhaps he has a point?

Freer wants to leave his legacy and is worried that a new leader will reverse the wardens decision and scrap Future Shape in order to help secure a Conservative victory (just as John Major had to scrap Maggie’s Poll Tax). The problem with this strategy is that with Freer standing in the General Election, it will leave the Conservatives fighting the council elections leaderless, which is totally unacceptable.

In 2006, the public voted Conservative on a manifesto produced under the leadership of Brian Salinger. Shamefully, Brian Coleman secretly proposed a motion of no confidence in Mr Salinger during the midst of the election campaign, when councillors should have been looking outward rather than trying to secure themselves a big fat juicy allowance.

The public will not forgive the Conservatives if they try to deprive voters of their democratic rights for a second time.

2 comments:

Anonymous said...

Oh how out of date you are, it really amuses me to read this balderdash it really does!

Rog T said...

Anon,

Yup, it's hilarious. Nearly as funny as what a member of the Tory cabinet said to me in the car park last night after the council cabinet meeting.

Betcha can't guess which one? Betcha probably can guess what they said though, if you really try hard