Monthly Archives: October 2015

REES FOG

marvin martin

Labour’s Marvin “LUTHER” Rees, now officially selected as their mayoral candidate, continues to inhabit his own personal alternative universe.

One of the first to congratulate Luther Rees on getting selected as Labour’s mayoral candidate was SIMON WOOLLEY at Operation Black Vote (OBV), a quango that’s dedicated to getting black people to run in elections.

Naturally Woolley is thrilled at Luther’s selection and bangs on about “a true story of tenacity, inner strength and determination to win against the odds” and claims that Luther is “ON THE THRESHOLD OF MAKING HISTORY”. As if Bristolians will elect some random equal opportunities manager as mayor just so that he can achieve his personal ambition and “make history”!

Even more bizarrely Woolley claims that Luther, after the last mayoral election in 2012, was “bitterly disappointed not least because of the attempted SMEARING OF HIS CHARACTER” and then claims Luther “NARROWLY LOST OUT to the sitting Independent Mayor George Ferguson”.

This is not making history. This is MAKING UP HISTORY. Luther, the favourite to win in 2012, was hammered out of sight after running an uninspired, safety first, lacklustre,pro-business campaign aimed firmly at appeasing the city’s business community and managed by a bunch of anonymous middle class arseholes at Labour’s regional office in Swindon.

A campaign that PISSED OFF and PISSED ON many of our city’s most influential social movements. Who are, on paper, his natural constituency. He was NEVER the victim of any smears either. He’s made this up and it may be self-defeating. Doesn’t the self-styled leadership expert not realise people want a strong character to run the city not some whining, poor-me victim?

Another emerging problem for Luther Rees, expensively trained in ‘leadership’ in the US, is that he’s basically a US DEMOCRAT and not an English social democrat let alone a democratic socialist. His last campaign was therefore built on a US-style big business and corporate agenda.

His wholesale and flat-footed support for the crap BRT TRANSPORT SYSTEM and Bristol City FC’s GREENBELT STADIUM PLAN with associated supermarkets and corporate retail sheds at the cost of established communities in South Bristol cost him dear. As did his REFUSAL to challenge austerity in any coherent form and unequivocally back our public services and public realm against cuts and privatisation.

The question now is whether Luther Rees will repeat all of these errors all over again? Already we’re seeing worrying signs. Like an INABILITY to view the city except through the prism of his own limited personal experience, much of it in the US; his SILENCE on grassroots campaigns such as saving the Bush respite centre; RUNNING AWAY from the press when they ask a tricky question; FEAR of any person or group who isn’t wealthy, a personal mate or a member of the Labour Party; an UNHEALTHY OBSESSION with ‘leadership’ and the REFUSAL to condemn right wing austerity economics outright.

What possible reason would people have to vote for Luther Rees over Ferguson when they share an agenda aimed at the comfortable middle classes and keeping business happy?

Both are so similar that we’re effectively being offered a sad little beauty contest run by crap Labour spin doctors.

TOP COP STITCHED-UP?

garagn

News that Avon & Somerset’s top cop Nick Gargan was found guilty of EIGHT minor charges of misconduct and was furnished with EIGHT final warning letters has got a bizarre coalition of Police Federation wankers, former chief constable wankers (yes, that’s you Colin port) and local politician wankers demanding his head on a plate.

A similar coalition led by fat twat Liberal Democrat, Gary Hopkins – notorious for his over-friendly relations with BROADBURY ROAD POLICE STATION – are  also behind attacks on Avon & Somerset’s Police and Crime Commissioner Sue Mountstevens. They are blaming her for wasting £0.5m suspending Gargan on full pay for over a year while investigating his conduct.

Gutbucket is now promising a full investigation by his committee of old farts at the POLICE AND CRIME PANEL. He says they’re going to “scrutinise the Police and Crime commissioner” due to “serious concerns” especially around Gargan’s “recruitment and what happened prior to his suspension”.

Which makes you wonder if the useless fat bastard and his gang of dodgy old coppers have bothered to actually read the Misconduct Panel report into Gargan’s misdemeanours?

This report does agree that forwarding confidential work emails to one of your many squeezes – local BBC journalist LAURA JONES – and assisting various other attractive women with their applications for senior posts with Avon & Somerset Police is probably the height of stupidity for a public servant on a six-figure salary employed for their absolute integrity. It also concludes GARGAN’s conduct is worthy of disciplinary action.

However, it seems, the wider story concerning this fiasco is being buried amid huge amounts of bluster from an establishment gang of old white men committed to scoring political points against a female PCC and who want to maintain an old school cop culture of RACIST POLICING and ENDEMIC CORRUPTION  at Avon & Somerset. A culture Gargan had been committed to removing.

Indeed, if you read the Misconduct Panel report into Gargan, they don’t seem much bothered by his minor misdemeanours and they don’t identify anything Mountstevens has done wrong at all.

In May 2014 Mountstevens received allegations regarding Gargan’s conduct around women from TWO WHISTLEBLOWERS. Mountstevens suspended Gargan and then passed the case to the IPCC to investigate, as she’s legally required to do.

The report makes clear that responsibility for most decisions regarding Gargan then passed to Avon & Somerset’s IPCC commissioner, JAN WILLIAMS. An inexperienced and incompetent health service manager who had already fucked up and delayed an IPCC investigation into the death of BIJAN EBRAHIMI.

Ebrahimi was the Iranian asylum seeker BEATEN AND THEN BURNED TO DEATH in a horrific attack in 2013 in Broomhill under the noses of coppers from BROADBURY ROAD POLICE STATION. An episode that resulted in the suspension of TWELVE police staff and the prosecution of THREE under Gargan’s leadership.

The EBRAHIMI INVESTIGATION was crucial to Gargan and his efforts to modernise the Avon & Somerset Constabulary and sweep away what we can politely and lawfully refer to as his force’s “old fashioned practices”. In this context, the report by Gargan’s Misconduct Panel is extremely enlightening as it spends far more time discussing the conduct of the IPCC than Gargan’s minor transgressions.

It was Williams at the IPCC who, having discovered within two months that the allegations regarding sexual harassment against Gargan were baseless, embarked on a FISHING EXPEDITION of his iPhone. It was this investigation that formed the slim basis of the disciplinary action eventually taken against Gargan.

It was Williams at the IPCC who WITHHELD from Mountstevens’ office for months the fact she had obtained no admissible evidence from any female witnesses in support of the original hearsay harassment allegations against Gargan.

It was Williams at the IPCC that MISLED Mountstevens throughout the summer of 2014, in order to keep Gargan suspended, that there was a likelihood of a criminal prosecution being brought against him under the Data Protection Act.

It was Williams at the IPCC who consistently REFUSED to lift Gargan’s suspension and therefore used our council tax to pay him to sit at home.

It was Williams at the IPCC who continually FRUSTRATED disclosure of evidence to Gargan between 2 February and 27 May 2015 and therefore DELAYED Gargan’s Misconduct Panel hearing by months.

It was Williams at the IPCC who FAILED “to comply with its disclosure obligations all the way to the Misconduct Panel’s door”.

It was Williams at the IPCC who under cross-examination COULDN’T EXPLAIN what the term “evidence” means.

It was Williams at the IPCC, according to the Misconduct Panel, whose understanding of the concept of ‘relevance’ was, until 24 April 2015, ‘CONCERNING’.

It was Williams at the IPCC who was described as “ALMOST INCOHERENT” when giving evidence to the independent Misconduct Panel.

It was Williams at the IPCC whose submissions were described by the Misconduct Panel as “A LITTLE UNREAL”.

It was Williams at the IPCC who supplied a spreadsheet redacted “BEYOND COMPREHENSION” to the Misconduct Panel.

It was Williams at the IPCC who continually promised Mountstevens a ‘HARD HITTING’ report into Gargan despite knowing full well that her investigation had unearthed NO ADMISSIBLE EVIDENCE in relation to the original harassment allegations while the data protection breaches she uncovered did not merit criminal proceedings.

By the end of June 2014, when the investigation into the original harassment allegations had unearthed no admissible evidence, Mountstevens’ CEO Jonathan Smith had started action to prepare for Gargan’s return to work.

This was PERSONALLY STOPPED by Williams at the IPCC who had by then embarked on her iPhone fishing expedition against Gargan. The very same man who had complained about her conduct of another IPCC investigation into the death of – who else? – BIJAN EBRAHIMI!

And it was Williams who then had to have the simple concept of “CONFLICT OF INTEREST” explained to her by a lawyer when she gave evidence to the Misconduct panel.

Meanwhile, the Misconduct Panel’s report contains NO CRITICISM of Sue Mountstevens and treats the soppy list of minor allegations against Gargan as lightly as they deserve.

The whole investigation into Gargan has, therefore, more than a passing resemblance to a STITCH-UP by VESTED INTERESTS and OLD SCHOOL COPPERS desperate to get rid of a modernising influence on our police.

The IPCC’s got a lot of questions to answer here and JAN WILLIAMS’ position seems untenable. Does anyone believe this useless, dodgy bureaucrat is capable of independent oversight of our dubious police force after this?

And will Gary Hopkins’ and his political Police and Crime Panel be doing an investigation into the conduct of their IPCC Commissioner rather than pursuing a pointless and very public witch hunt for their own DIRTY POLITICAL REASONS against Mountstevens?

Don’t hold your breath.

SPIN WATCH WITH MATT BAKER #3: PAEDO SMEAR BOY WILL BE SUED NEXT WEEK!

mattbakerA semi-regular series on the ‘chequered history’ of the mayor’s new spin doctor, MATT “PAGE 3” BAKER, former bag-carrier and sleaze slinger for Labour’s hugely entertaining MP for Rochdale, Simon Danczuk.

Oh dear. It’s a full blown scandal!

It’s goes from bad to worse for Mayor Cock Up and his new spin doctor, Matt “Page 3” Baker.

It was revealed last night on the BBC’s North West Tonight news show that a Labour councillor in Rochdale who has been SMEARED AS A PAEDO by Baker will be starting legal action for lbel against him next week!

See this legal threat in all its glory. Just follow this link: BBC North West Tonight – Baker paedo smear story and the fun starts at about 8 minutes in.

We understand Baker has spent the last three days and a considerable part of his fee from Mayor Gullible trying to stop this being broadcast. Tragically he failed!

We also understand that while Baker told Rochdale Online last week he had “no recollection or record of sending this email [smearing a Labour colleague as a paedo]”, Baker has now claimed to a BBC reporter that his email account must have been “hacked”!

What will his tall story be next week?