From Clive Hart - Thanet Labour Leader.
A month ago we launched our Thanet Labour Manifesto. We also launched our ThanetLab 'blog site' and our goal for both projects was to set out our aims and objectives, clearly and concisely for all the people of Thanet. We've used the blog to expand on a number of pertinent topics and we hope that has been helpful.
For example, the Labour government brought high speed trains to Thanet and we've outlined our continued support for shortening travel times to London. However, Thanet Labour is always mindful of our local environment so a Parkway station with (to quote the Tory Leader at the last full council meeting) a huge car park, just doesn't make economic sense and we will certainly fight to keep Ramsgate main station.
We explained that Thanet Labour will support the development of Manston Airport but will always be mindful of the impact on residents and the environment. To this end we will implement a policy of no flights during the hours of 23:00 to 07:00, except emergency landings and humanitarian flights. We have simply not been convinced that the economic argument has been made for night flights, particularly when the airport is so underused during the day.
We have highlighted the sad plight of our local harbours under eight years of Tory neglect. Margate silted up and smelling of rotten seaweed and Ramsgate Royal Harbour and marina left in such a shoddy condition.
It was important to expose poor Conservative decision making. During discussions on a matter with serious financial implications and at a full council meeting last year, a leading Tory clearly said "lets make the decision now and look at the detail later". For this election, the Conservative's have also boasted openly on their leaflets that they help local traders by encouraging residents to shop locally, whilst having the very same leaflets printed in Canterbury.
Furthermore, the Tory fiasco regarding development in Pierremont Park in Broadstairs once again explained the Conservative's total lack of meaningful consultation and has all the hallmarks of their marathon fight with our own Thanet residents at the Montefiore Games Centre. That particular nonsense cost tens of thousands of pounds of ratepayers money and hundreds of hours of council time.
We set out our aim to have a Criminal Records Bureau check for every Thanet councillor and just to validate our claim that we need to improve standards at TDC, a Conservative candidate for Salmestone ward had to resign from the Conservative party only last week, due to appalling views he expressed openly on the internet.
For the past four weeks we have also been very busy delivering as many paper summaries of our manifesto as possible through residents letter boxes across Thanet (printed on the inside of Labour election addresses). It's been a fantastic month with wonderful weather and we've been joined by a number of leading Labour MP's including Harriet Harman and Yvette Cooper.
We gave our manifesto a great deal of time and thought and we sincerely hope we've informed you of our aims and objectives in one way or another. We know that everyone has busy lives these days, but this election will be a very close run event and every vote will count. We hope we have convinced you of our commitment to bringing back the pride in Thanet and that you will take the time to vote Labour on Thursday.
Thank you sincerely for your time.
Clive
Clive Hart - Thanet Labour Leader
Just exactly what does Clive Hart hope to achieve by introducing Criminal Records Bureau checks for councillors. It is within the remit of the Electoral Officer to decided if a candidate is disqualified from standing, not the council itself or its leader. Fortunately, despite Labour trying hard for thirteen years, we do not have a totalitarian style of governance in this country but a democracy.
ReplyDeleteTo also mention Mr. Payem Tamiz in the same paragraph as the CRB checks idea is bordering on the libellous. Mr. Tamiz did not do anything criminal, but made an unwise statement on Facebook long before he became a candidate. It is this kind of smearing of opponents that makes Labour so unacceptable in my view.
As to the alleged Tory fiasco over the development in Pierremont Park, as Labour know quite well, this is a project a long time in the planning, has previously gone through consultation processes and it now has planning consent. There is nothing Mr. Hart can do about it even if he is elected.
Perhaps Mr. Hart could tell us what he proposes to do to replace the hundreds of jobs at Thanet Earth and Tesco he and his associates at Unite seem intent on destroying. Just take a look at the video they concocted outside Tesco on a link through Promote Thanet blog.
Labour do not have a proper costed manifesto, but a statement of ideas most of which are outside the authority of the council. Some lessons on local governance rules would not go amiss yet they think they could run thev place.
SURELY THANET HAS SUFFERED ENOUGH AND DESERVES BETTER THAN A PARTY THAT DESELECTED ITS HARDEST WORKING COUNCILLOR!
8.20, yes sorry about the clock on this blog, one notable omission today, which is no press release from the district Conservative leadership, as you are obviously supportive of them have you any idea why?
ReplyDeleteI am not trying to be funny or partisan here, just wondering if its gone astray
Michael, there is a press release and extensive email shot from Laura Sandys, on behalf of the South Thanet Conservatives, which you now have a copy of on this site. Over in North Thanet, Dr. Simon Moores has published a call to the faithful to vote.
ReplyDeleteThe Conservative party manifesto you had a copy of some time back so things are pretty well covered. One can issue too much to the point of annoying folk.
The one thing about the local Conservative group is that they are team players and utilise the best talents in the team. Hence Dr. M's regular bulletins on one side of the isle with Laura Sandys, MP picking up the mantle on the south side.
Elsewhere others play varying rolls in the campaign whilst the leader guides and directs. Not a one party spokesman type organisation like some others, but then, we mustn't over shadow the leader must we. After all, we all know what happened to Mark who did.
10.49 sorry about the clock, I hadn’t intended to get involved in a dialogue here and I can’t keep calling you a number so I will call you Freeman, I hope you don’t mind the honorific, change it if you like.
ReplyDeleteFreeman I wasn’t really thinking about some sort of rant, but the normal, go out and vote, is sort of traditional and I wondered if it had got lost in wondrous world of the internet.
Couple of points, where you are in error, Payem Tamiz didn’t make an unwise statement on Facebook, but was joint administrator, as I am administrator on this blog of a Facebook site called “Girls in THANET...you are all slags , hoes , brasses , and bheads.” He definitely posted there on 13th April 2011, well after he was chosen as a candidate.
If you don’t believe me then bung his name into Google with the above description of our lasses and click on the cache, which will show you the record of the page at that time.
Frankly as this is site where young people of both sexes discuss the premise which is the title of the site, without any apparent sense of this being an inappropriate thing to do, it may well be that Payem Tamiz’s main crime is being young.
What everyone will do if he gets elected, and there are a surprisingly large amount of young voters out there, god alone knows. Perhaps if the result is hung he could wind up holding the balance of power, there’s a thought, the left the right and the young.
If you are in the harbour at some time look at the notice on the historic vessels pontoon and ponder how this sort of thing to relate to a team, possibly allies would be a better word.
My point was that Mr.Tamiz is hardly the major issue or the subject of your earlier query. He acted stupidily and has paid the price, but it is not something that a CRB check would reveal.
ReplyDeleteAnyway, time pressing on, tomorrow will soon be with us and the die will then be cast.
Freeman I do wonder about the way local Conservatives handled the Payem Tamiz issue and if perhaps this is a case of us the older generation missing the main point, which is, if there is a problem with girls or for that matter boys of Thanet being, slags , hoes , brasses , and bheads, shouldn’t it be us discussing the matter and trying to resolve the problem?
ReplyDeletePerhaps I am reading this wrongly, but isn’t there a sense of shooting the messenger here?
Most definitely, Michael, but just before an election the Conservatives had little choice but to condemn this behaviour. Especially so as Labour, who first exposed it, were milking it for all it was worth. In any event, Mr Tamiz resigned before he was pushed.
ReplyDeleteAs to the deeper problem of lack of moral guidance, decline of marriage as an institution, lack of father role models, teenage pregnancies and, dare one say it, a lack of a sound religious faith in too many cases, it is a bigger issue than Thanet and the TDC.