Friday 30 April 2010

Salinger demands apology from Coleman and Rams


Former council leader Brian Salinger has demanded an apology from fellow councillors Brian Coleman and Robert Rams over claims that he had been asking officers for information about councillor expenses.

In an e-mail to Conservative councillors, Mr Salinger wrote:
I now have written confirmation from senior council officers that I have not asked for any information about 2006/7 or 2007/8 expense claims and that the only information provided to me on 2008/9 was the limited information provided after Nick Musgrove circulated the list of expenses in November last year. This is exactly what I told the group.

The claims and allegations made by Cllrs Coleman and Rams are completely without substance and I look forward to receiving full apologies from them to add to the other apologies that I have collected from others leading members for false statements and errors of judgement made over the last years.
As regular readers know, Brian Coleman does not like plebs voters questioning his allowances and Conservative councillors agreed at a recent Group meeting that in future none of them would ask council officers any questions about expenses paid to them. Cllr Coleman then sent a defamatory e-mail to Tory councillors suggesting that Cllr Salinger had breached that agreement - even though an officer had written to him clearly stating that the request for information had come from a member of the public.

Many readers will be surprised that the very same Tory councillors who claim to be responsible with public finances have decided to simply close their eyes when it comes to scrutiny of their own expenses. This does not, of course, prevent the public from asking questions and Not The Barnet Times will continue to fight for full disclose of all public money paid to councillors and senior officials in accordance with Conservative Party policy.

3 comments:

Rog T said...

David,

Sorry to ask this, but I thought David Cameron stood for transparency and honesty in local government and there were pledges to support this in the Tory manifesto.

Surely such an agreement by local councillors is a breach of party policy and as such these councillors should be denied the Tory whip and stand as independents.

If Cameron takes no action against such agreements, then he is clearly unfit to be prime minister

Don't Call Me Dave said...

Rog

You can lead a horse to water, but you can’t make it drink. David Cameron can’t be held responsible if councillors simply refuse to look at the data. He has promised that all public expenditure at national level will be scrutinised under a Conservative government. What he must also do is ensure that at local level, councillors are forced to go through the spending line by line to see where efficiencies can be made.

In the mean time, there is nothing to prevent opposition councillors from asking the questions but they don’t appear to be in a mad rush in to examine their expenses either.

Rog T said...

I rather expect at least one might be come May 7th