Harringay online

Harringay, Haringey - So Good they Spelt it Twice!

Our Prime Minister was hubristic enough to call an election, lose it and have to give a bung to a right wing religious group for support.

Our council leader is way better than that. She had a selection timeline forced upon her and tried many times to change it but came home in the end anyway with a fantastic, momentum busting, 64-19 win in Seven Sisters after her colleague Joe Goldberg stepped aside at the last minute.

Weirdly the local Labour party took in £700 on the door in lapsed membership fees from the local Orthodox community, 40 of whom had registered as families back in October 2016 paying the minimum amount and one year in advance. It was gushingly reported on Twitter by local Jonathan Pie wannabe Martin Ball that bleary eyed teenage girls had turned up with their fathers in a pious demonstration of democracy at its finest. There were apparently some grumbles about having to pay for another year but being a member is the important thing!

Well done Claire Kober! It must be amazing to come through all of this after the possible sword of deselection was waved over your head by Dave Hill Momentum.

A local wit asked me what you had done that was wrong and I said that "oh no, it was all within the rules, just not very classy". They said that would be a fitting epitaph for you.

Tags for Forum Posts: labour, selection, sevensisters, stanns

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I am very happy that there is going to be an investigation. Perhaps finally the Labour Party is cleaning itself out.

What do you expect from "these people".

It has been clear for a while that that is the nature of their aspirations for the area...sycophancy of the utmost degree.

I hope you get through but am not holding my breath!

No, there have been no Tory councillors in Haringey for yonks. I think your daughter may have been living slightly across the border in Hackney where the local Orthodox community are in the Conservative Party and are elected.

Thanks John, that was almost certainly the case, it was borderline. (Original post deleted).

Kober's latest one

The Local Government Association, which represents councils, said people facing difficulties should contact their local authority to discuss options such as repayment plans.

Claire Kober, who chairs the LGA's resources board, said: "No council wants to ask people on the lowest incomes to pay more, but councils have a duty to their residents to collect taxes - these fund crucial services, such as caring for the elderly, protecting vulnerable children, keeping roads maintained and collecting bins.

"With councils facing a £5.8bn funding shortfall by 2020, it is essential that these funds are collected so these vital services can be protected."

She said that councils took steps, where possible, to ensure people in financial difficulty were supported.

http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/business-41974406

And for balance

https://www.theguardian.com/money/2016/aug/04/retired-vicar-paul-ni...

There has always been money for Kober, Strickland, and Goldberg's pet projects. There was always money for lawyers to fight Rev Paul Nicolson in the High Court. Always money to pay for trips to Cannes and dinners with developers, free flights, free hotels a new Mayor's Parlour, starchitect's studio, chicken shop subsidies, and all the other wasteful flim-flummery.

My wife Zena Brabazon and I know Rev Paul Nicolson personally. Not well. But well  enough to like, admire and agree with what he says and does.

In my view, Paul doesn't have all the answers. But he has contact with a huge number of experts who know about poverty and inequality. Instead of always ignoring Paul and then trying to bankrupt him for speaking Truth to Power and acting on his Christian beliefs, why didn't Claire Kober and her pals put aside their enormous hubris and deep ignorance?
Instead try to have a completely open dialogue with Paul and his experts. Maybe Haringey could be a genuine anti-poverty borough?
Maybe they will now. The May elections are approaching and they are desperate to cling onto power and their Special Responsibility Allowances and to pretend they care before it's too late.

I think of all the things you have ever said about Councillors Kober and Goldberg that fall into off-putting and bitter adjectives "always ignoring Paul and then trying to bankrupt him" is all you ever need to say.

John, I'm not in the slightest bitter about Kober & her pals.
For sixteen years I had the amazing privilege of representing local people as their councillor. I hope some of them feel that I didn't do too bad a job. I also came off the council exactly when I chose to. And I now have the privilege of saying and writing anything I like without some party apparatchik breathing down my neck. (Not that I ever took much notice anyway.)

I am though, very very angry with right-wing members of Haringey Labour Party who are now trying to sell-out the residents, Including thousands who loyally voted for us.

If other people find this rage off-putting that's up to them. I'm not seeking anyone's votes or approval. As the title of Michael Rosen's new book says: "So they call you pisher".

Of course I'm pleased when people who support the HDV and Kober's Tory policies are not selected as Labour candidates. Why wouldn't I be pleased?
Am I pleased that Cllr Joe Goldberg is not standing again? Yes.
Would I be delighted if Cllr Alan (fine dining) Strickland was not selected? Yes. He is one of the main proponents of the HDV.

Though I'm also sad about many former colleagues I used to like and respect who have gone along with the HDV scheme and other right-wing policies. And refuse to consider or seriously discuss the very real harm this does.

As a former Tory candidate in Haringey, do please announce your personal endorsement for Claire Kober.

● Yes she runs a wasteful council.
Bad at any time; worse when there are deep painful cuts.
● Authoritarian leaders suppress dissent.
Listening to and actually encouraging dissent is part of good leadership and a sign of a healthy organisation.
● Claire Kober has made two good decisions. One when she was the Chief Whip.
● The jaunts to Cannes were wasteful & unnecessary. An FOI question disclosed that Haringey made no contacts there that it couldn't (and did) make in London.
● Decisions taken or formulated at secret meetings in Cannes are undemocratic and neither open nor transparent. Such practices corrode confidence in democracy. Please read the Nolan Report
● Of course Leadlease, Spurs, Argent and the others give Kober & her pals the run-round.
They recognise and welcome gullible patsies who walk into their high stakes poker game bringing large piles of cash and valuable land.
● Yes Kober has prepared the Council for "a more commercial era".
It's called selling-out the borough to corporate capital. You approve; I don't.
● Who would give a toss if you added your name to other Tories who have publicly endorsed her? You really can't guess?

As a Conservative who backs Theresa May into getting us a good hard Brexit and getting us another win at the next general election in five years because the economy has boomed, I'm glad to see Clare Kober seeing off the loony Left. Kober has made Haringey into a better run and much less criticised borough. Long may the two women rule!

Thanks for that clear and honest comment, Neil. Plainly we don't live in the same Haringey. Or to put things in a less belligerent way, what we see, hear, read and experience about the Kober regime leads us to draw different conclusions. And probably to make our assessments using different frameworks.

It's at least a reasonable and legitimate viewpoint to observe and suggest that the borough isn't actually better run under Kober. For example, even if the street where she lives is always clean - I don't know - that's not the case in my neighbourhood.

Please consider also the possibility that Claire Kober isn't "seeing off the loony Left".  One factual reason is that the coalition of people opposing her Haringey Development Vehicle is not made up of some  cartoon versions of "lefties" the right-wing media loves to use.

By the way, while I don't know which variety of Conservative you are, I don't consider holding right wing views as evidence of being "loony". For instance, the theory that the world is a market and there is no alternative is a highly persuasive "story". It has persuaded millions of people for the last forty years. But not everybody.
'I'm sane; they are loony' isn't a helpful way to debate serious issues.

Nobody confidently knows the outcome of the Labour Party's current candidate selection process. Nor can anyone assume how Haringey electors will vote. Not least because people move - both in their views and in their locations.

Finally, you might want to consider the possibly negative impact of a fulsome Tory endorsement for Claire Kober. Maybe that was your intention?

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