After years of members of the public working hard at grassroots organisations like COUNTER COLSTON and the BRISTOL RADICAL HISTORY GROUP, the thieving old white men who run the University of Bristol have finally woke(n) up and appointed a PROFESSOR OF THE HISTORY OF SLAVERY. They will “examine Bristol’s connection to the transatlantic slave trade”. Work that has already, largely, BEEN DONE by our city’s grassroots historians anyway.
The university old boys have hired Sorbonne-educated hack, Olivette
Otele, with a press fanfare that has somehow eluded less prestigious local
historians tackling the same subject without THE ELITE EDUCATION, the ‘DIVERSE’
BACKGROUND and a PROFESSIONAL PR
DEPARTMENT talking them up.
Anyway, won’t it be interesting to see whether Olivette, who lists
“memorialisation of the past” as an interest, publicly demands the IMMEDIATE REMOVAL of Colston’s statue
from the Centre? Or will she piss arse
about ‘NUANCING‘ in the elite-style,
making CRAP EXCUSES and rambling on
about ‘corrective plaques’ and the like?
In a bizarre outburst of WHITE
LIBERAL GUILT, Nazi Post editor and reformed
tinpot Tory, Mike “News Bunny” Norton, has apologised to his readers
for publishing a large front page photo of the Reverend Rees that didn’t depict
the glorious leader in a pose that his supporters felt made him LOOK IMPORTANT
ENOUGH!
A highly enthusiastic front page splash with the headline “I’LL PAVE THE WAY FOR THE FUTURE”
appeared the day after the Reverend’s UNDERPOWERED
‘State of the City’ speech last month. A speech widely received in the city –
outside the pages of News Bunny’s DELUDED
PUBLICATION – as yet another wholesale departure from lived reality by the
Reverend and his team of clueless acolytes.
However, News Bunny’s cheerleading splash didn’t reflect THE VANITY OF THE REVEREND or his
efforts to create a cult of personality in the way the city’s woke race
relations industry now demand. One of them, Tracie Joliffe, an obscure NHS
middle manager, BLASTED News Bunny
on Twitter, “Was it a deliberate strategy to portray an image of the Mayor
@MarvinJRees like a criminal mug shot?”
The nutty complaint was then taken up by Sandra Gordon from the
Reverend’s official Commission for Racial Equality talking shop. She THUNDERED, “the picture of Marvin
published does not portray our city leader in a pose that reflects this article
– he was delivering a critically important speech to a packed audience in the
imposing Wills Memorial Building.”
News Bunny immediately switched to PANIC
MODE over this harmless front page close-up pic of the Reverend –
which looked nothing like a “criminal mugshot” – even comparing
it to the notorious ‘FACES OF EVIL’Nazi Post front page of 1997, and
published a FAWNING APOLOGY to
bemused readers.
“It was not appropriate,” wailed the city’s latest ESTABLISHMENT SNOWFLAKE, “It
didn’t give Bristol Post’s readership the right message about Marvin’s position
in the city and about the importance of his role or of this address.”
Indeed not. The right message would require a photo of Rees with his head up his arse.
by CITIZENS ROBESPIERRE &
MURAT ably assisted by Dr J.I Guillotin
November’s Full Council meeting
saw an outbreak of ‘MARIE ANTOINETTE SYNDROME’ among entitled councillors in
official foppery pitted against a SEETHING MASS of unwashed sans-culottes in
the public gallery. Controversy began when Lord Mayor Jos Clark decided
(without historical precedence in Bristol or nationally) to SUSPEND PUBLIC
QUESTIONS to the Mayor due to “lack of time, because of the national
election”.
The Lord Mayor had informed public questioners by email that they could
NOT ASK QUESTIONS in the Council
Chamber and that the Mayor would not offer any verbal answers. Instead,
questioners would receive a written response within 10 working days. The
BRISTOLIAN, analysed these questions and – lo and behold – many were POTENTIALLY EMBARRASSING to the
Reverend Rees. Raising issues such as the gentrification of Cumberland Basin,
jobs for Marvin’s evangelical pals and the contra-BCC policy of hiring trade
unionist BLACKLISTING CONSTRUCTION FIRMS.
Chaos reigned in the public gallery as, first, questioners were told
that THEY COULDN’T SPEAK OR GET ANSWERS.
Then they were told that, maybe, they COULD
ASK QUESTIONS BUT NOT RECEIVE ANSWERS and then, finally, they were told
that the original ruling would stand. Breathless council flunkies dashed around
the chamber with leaflets and ‘clarifications’ as each modification was made up
on the spur in council back offices. Adding to the confusion, it also turned
out that some questioners were unaware of this ARBITRARY DECISION until they arrived.
Next, onlookers in the public gallery were confronted by BRISTOL’S COUNCILLORS SWANNING IN to
pose in Hawaiian shirts for a photographer. Why was this? It was supposed to be
a tribute to Hawaiian shirt fan Cllr Mike Langley, who had recently died.
Shirt-clad councillors posed with arms around each other before going off to
their benches and delivering 40 MINUTES
OF SPEECHES in memoriam to their deceased colleague.
Those who knew Mike – A GENUINE
SOCIALIST – were confronted with the unedifying spectacle of Tory, Blairite
Labour, Lib Dem and the rest competing to see who could deliver the most NAUSEOUS HYPOCRISY while shedding CROCODILE TEARS as most of them had
hated Mike. One councillor even announced … ‘In the words of Mike Langley,
Vive la Revolution!’ The whole SORRY
SPECTACLE resembled one of French Queen Marie Antoinette’s ‘soirees’ where
she and her courtiers would dress up to play peasant shepherds and
shepherdesses while real peasants starved outside the gates.
After their PRIVATE FANCY DRESS
PARTY, the public presence in the gallery was finally acknowledged by the Versailles
Court and farce descended into ABSURDITY.
When ‘no-question’ time was announced, ONE
PLUCKY PROLE stood up and asked why procedure had changed from what was in
the council constitution?
Lord Mayor Clark tried to shut down this unseemly interruption to her
travesty in motion while security goons twitched in anticipation on the gallery
stairwell. Their services were unnecessary, however, as the prole sat down
after shouting – to thunderous applause from angry sans-culottes in the gallery
– ‘YOU’RE A DISGRACE – YOU SHOULD
RESIGN!’
Rumours of scythes and pitchforks
being sharpened in Bristol’s outlying suburbs cannot be confirmed.
A well-placed source tells us that it’s
slowly dawning on the boss class at the Counts Louse that the Reverend Rees has
NO HOPE OF WINNING THE MAYORAL ELECTION next May and will not be serving
another term as they had anticipated. This, we learn, has resulted in some especially
long queues at Counts Louse shredding facilities as “NO ONE WANTS TO END
UP IN COURT”.
What have the Reverend, his PR bag man
“Slo” Kev Slocombe and their dubious corporate property man
“Head Boy” Molton been up to for the last few years then? Are the
Reverend’s chickens en route to their roost? Will it require ANOTHER REPORT
from STEVE BUNDRED to get to the bottom of all this?
Maybe someone at the Counts Louse should give Steve a call now?
PRIME IDIOT
“I WANT TO BE PRIME
MINISTER,” announced the Reverend Rees to some unfortunate young people
who somehow got trapped in a room and forced to listen to our Mayor’s
meaningless jargon-riddled drivel at the LABOUR PARTY CONFERENCE last month.
What a great idea from the Reverend.
Apart from the limited intellect, the thin skin, the lack of character, an
Inability to lead, the hopelessly poor judgement, the crap Thatcherite
politics, the corporate free market obsession and the dodgy gang of right wing
evangelical mates he’s promoted, WHAT’S TO STOP THE REVEREND GETTING ELECTED
TO RUN THE COUNTRY?
The ‘Smart City’ prophets love games
and play and promote them hard because what you need to understand is that the
‘Smart City’ is a whole lot of fun. Harmless fun entirely for your benefit. It
brings jobs, growth and innovation to make you wealthy and delivers
entertainment, play and games to keep you happy.
Here in Bristol we have a publicly
funded organisation dedicated to promoting what a load of harmless fun a ‘Smart
City’ is – the Pervasive Media Studio at the Watershed. “It’s a world of
amazingness and wonder. If Willy Wonka existed, he’d be jealous of it :)”
Kieron Kirkland, their former Magician-in-residence uncritically assures us.
Magically unaware that the manufacturing of confectionary doesn’t conjure huge
amounts of behavioural data for tech firms to appropriate and monetise.
The Pervasive Media Studio’s big idea
is the ‘Playable City’. “There were a lot of older people,” these ageists
tell us, “who were totally terrified at the notion of a smart city and how cold
and alienating it was. So we decided to reappropriate smart cities’ technology
for play.”
But who’s playing what game and
what is really being reappropriated in a ‘Smart/Playable City’? Are “older
people” right to be alienated? On the face of it, Pervasive Media, once
you get past its creepy name, is pretty harmless. ‘Playable City’ is little
more than an annual international conference and accompanying prize for daft
ideas such as creating smart phone enabled talking street furniture or randomly
triggering projections of animals at unsuspecting pedestrians at night.
So far, so much municipally imposed fun
courtesy of hipsters. However, the corporate Godfather of the outdoor digital
play market, Pokémon GO, is taking digital play somewhere else entirely.
Initially this ‘augmented reality mobile game’ involved finding and capturing,
on your phone, virtual cartoon characters in your neighbourhood. Then Pokémon
GO struck deals with the likes of McDonalds, Starbucks and other corporates who
handed over hard cash in exchange for the behavioural and location data held by
Pokémon GO.
These transactions transformed Pokémon
GO. A cheap, harmless hour in the park with the kids hunting virtual
characters became the completely different game of nudging you through the door
of a corporate outlet to spend money.
Pokémon GO
is a step forward in the use of your behavioural data by tech firms. They’re
moving beyond storing and analysing data to predict your behaviour (say
through promoting certain ads on the internet at you) to trying to directly
manage and control your behaviour through your digital device. Behavioural
control and management is the new frontier for big data firms in the ‘Smart
City’ test bed and play and games are among the tools in their box.
When you pick up your phone to play, regardless of how old you are, be sure to know what game you’re playing.
The enthusiasm with which our serially
useless senior council bosses are suddenly embracing advertising their
INCOMPETENCE is a new and novel innovation for our Counts Louse’s Third Floor
DEPARTMENT OF DUNCES.
Their public confessional follows a
report from Green Councillor and Audit Committee vice chair Clive
“Shakin'” Stevens into how former chief exec Anna “Big
Wedge” Klonowski walked away from Bristol in 2017 after just SIX
MONTHS’ OF INDIFFERENT WORK with £98k in her pocket. Shaky, was given
access to carefully selected top secret documents by dodgy council bosses and
has devised a personal “MOST LIKELY SCENARIO” regarding the
payout.
Shaky claims it was all down to SERIAL
INCOMPETENCE and council bosses are queuing up to cheerfully admit it. Not least
because their only other option would be to admit to UNLAWFUL ACTIVITY.
What Shaky alleges transpired is that Big Wedge’s colleague and associate,
Jackie “You’re Fired!” McGeachie – the former Tesco exec turned
jobbing senior local authority HR interim – “ACCIDENTALLY”
sent the wrong Chief Exec contract to lawyers in 2017, which allegedly entitled
Big Wedge to a big wedge and, er, nobody noticed it was the wrong contract
until it was too late.
However, Shaky’s “most likely scenario”, which we’re invited to believe over “the conspiracy theories”, raises as many questions as it answers. For instance, if the payment to Klonowski was an error, WHY AREN’T WE ASKING FOR IT BACK? And what type of contract was sent by Big Wedge’s personally appointed HR boss that allows someone to resign and scarper with immediate effect but contractually obliges the employer to fork out six months’ pay in lieu of notice? AN UNPRECEDENTED ARRANGEMENT Shaky fails to explain.
Of course, this mysterious ‘top secret ROGUE CONTRACT remains safely locked away from the public, despite, by Shaky’s definition, being an out-of-date generic document and not personal information relating to a named individual. Shaky also says he discovered evidence of “GROSS OBFUSCATION” or “A COVER-UP” from bosses over the payment. Only to meekly announce “they should be ashamed”. But why isn’t Shaky recommending IMMEDIATE DISCIPLINARY ACTION against them? Why would anyone want bent and dishonest bosses to remain in post running our council?
Is it because these bosses might start revealing what really happened and who authorised paying Klonowski £98k of hush money that we weren’t obliged to pay?
UKS Group are at it again. The company built a block of flats in Bishopsworth in 2017 – Litfield Court – that was LARGER than they had planning permission for (see ‘PLANNNING NEWS’, BRISTOLIAN 36), pissing off many locals in the process. After the REFUSAL of a retrospective planning application by the council, the company finally got permission for the enlarged block on appeal.
Now one of UKS’s directors Sam Litt, is trying to REPEAT THE TRICK at 32 – 38 St John’s Lane, Bedminster, where a blatant OVERDEVELOPMENT of ugly housing has sprung up with a glaring problem. Some of the properties are listed on the planning application as 3-BEDROOM, with a much smaller floor space than actually constructed. In reality they are 4-BEDROOM PROPERTIES.
Now Mr Litt, to overcome this little problem, is applying to the city council’s planning department for a ‘variation of conditions’ to make “MINOR AMENDMENTS” to his original planning application. And the planning officer dealing with this? Step forward our dear old friend ANGELO “KING PRAWN” CALABRESE, who had to be hastily shifted out of Avonmouth after a series of UNLAWFUL officer-delegated planning decisions favourable to the Port of Bristol Company and various corporate waste firms came to light.
Has King Prawn learned any lessons? Or is he overseeing dodgy planning decisions in South Bristol instead?
The Reverend Rees’s deranged efforts to
build his way out of his carefully branded “HOUSING CRISIS” is
hitting south Bristol and its open spaces very hard. Following last month’s
unveiling of the Reverend’s IKEA/BOKLOKS housing solution, giving his loopey
evangelical mate Jez “I’m no housing expert” Sweetland free rein to
build 200 IKEA chipboard homes for the DESPERATE and the VULNERABLE on the
narrow verge of a trunk road in Hengrove, comes news of another attempt to grab
open space in south Bristol.
Filwood residents expressed their
displeasure at Rees’s madcap “CHIPBOARD AND PRAYER” plans for
the Airport Road at a cabinet meeting last month and community GROUP KNOWLE
WEST FUTURE asked that the council, at least, reduce the number of homes
planned for the small and narrow tree-filled site to 100. The group said, “A
possible 400 people emanating from this site would be a significant addition to
that area and if that is to happen other parts of community retail and
infrastructure need to be improved.”
Meanwhile, less than a mile away at
Broadbury Road in the heart of Knowle West, Curo Housing Association have
unveiled plans for 47 homes on a small piece of COUNCIL-OWNED OPEN SPACE
WITH A PLAYGROUND behind Broad Plain House. And the community are not
impressed that their wildlife and rights of way are to be traded away by the
council for concrete, traffic and overshadowing by large buildings.
Residents have also pointed out that
the site is part of GARDEN CITY PLANNING PRINCIPLES and that the area
was built to have green spaces. However, principles, planning or otherwise, are
in short supply at Rees’s DUMBED DOWN FREE MARKET COUNCIL or at even
dumber Curo. Instead Curo Communications Manager Valentina Warren gives the
game away by gormlessly explaining the complex planning vision underpinning the
Reverend’s “housing crisis”. “You can’t build new homes and have
green space at the same time,” she’s announced.
So that’s south Bristol’s NEW
ENVIRONMENTAL AND PLANNING STRATEGY sorted by Rees and his ragbag of
religious looney mates, voluntary sector morons and second rate Counts Louse
planning officials, then:
