Tag Archives: Barra Mac Ruairi

ARENA CONFLICT: HEAD BOY TAKES OVER

With Barra Mac Nugget safely employed at YTL, a new face appeared on the scene at Bristol City Council. Please step forward Colin “HEAD BOY” Molton, a former director at the HCA, the quango that sold Arena Island to Bristol City Council in the first place.

Initially employed as a temp to cover Mac Nugget’s post until a permanent replacement was found, Head Boy Molton was eventually handed the job to sort out Bristol’s arena on a SHORT-TERM CONTRACT basis, apparently without the hassle of having to go through any FORMAL RECRUITMENT PROCESS. Instead, Head Boy cut a deal with Bristol City Council to continue in his £1.5k a day post until May 2020 Conveniently enough, when the Reverend will likely be voted out of office.

Such a deal is, of course, outside all KNOWN PRINCIPLES of good employment practice and contrary to Bristol City Council’s constitution and equalities policies. How can an old white man with a chartered surveying qualification and a useful contacts book simply be handed a highly paid senior job at Bristol City Council without going through a COMPETITIVE RECRUITMENT PROCESS?

Since taking up his post, Molton has been glued to the Reverend’s side. Even attending the annual property development piss-up (surely networking event? Ed.), MIPIM in Cannes with the Reverend where the pair MET WITH YTL on at least TWO OCCASIONS.

However, perhaps Head Boy’s most interesting piece of handiwork – so far – was to employ yet another EXPENSIVE CONSULTANT as his ‘Arena Director’.

Please step forward, Nigel “Independent” Greenhalgh …

ARENA CONFLICTS: MAC NUGGET’S REVOLVING DOOR

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It’s a matter of PUBLIC RECORD, published in the The Nazi Post, that Barra Mac “Nugget” left his £136k a year job at Bristol City Council to work for YTL Developments as Chief Operating Officer on 5 May 2017.

However, emails published under FoI, courtesy of Frank Church, show Mac Nugget, still a senior city council boss with responsibility for the arena, arranging a SECRET MEETING in an UPMARKET BRISTOL HOTEL BAR with a representative of YTL for the 18 April. This meeting was “about the potential for using one of the HANGARS AT FILTON” as an arena and “HOTEL AND CONFERENCING AT TEMPLE MEADS“. Mac Nugget even asks the unknown YTL rep “can we keep this [meeting] as a one to one please”?

So, while serving out his NOTICE with Bristol City Council, Mac Nugget met his future employer to directly discuss SENSITIVE LAND AND FINANCIAL ISSUES with them on behalf of Bristol City Council, while going to great lengths to ensure that there were no witnesses to this meeting and no minutes.

In many countries Mac Nugget would now be spending a considerable amount of time with law enforcement agencies discussing CORRUPTION, conflicts of interest and the exchange of inside information. Unfortunately the UK is not one of those countries.

Instead, Mac Nugget moved on this spring from YTL to Bristol University on another FAT SALARY to manage the university’s Estates Department. In this post he’ll be responsible for delivering a new campus directly opposite, er, Arena Island.

The purpose of Mac Nugget’s year long stint with YTL remains shrouded in mystery as does any generous remuneration arrangements he may have had with them.

ARENA CONFLICTS: A TANGLED WEB

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Thanks to the hard work of a MEMBER OF THE PUBLIC, Frank Church, a number of emails between Bristol City Council and Malaysian multinational, YTL, potential developers of an arena at Filton were finally released under FoI in August. This saw, even, the Nazi Post bothering to read some emails in brief flurry of investigative activity courtesy of their local government correspondent, the fragrant Esme “DAN” Ashcroft.

“During the second of three extraordinary scrutiny meetings on June 20,” explained Ms Ashcroft, “Liberal Democrat councillor for Knowle Gary Hopkins asked when council officers were told to start drawing up plans for a MIXED-USE DEVELOPMENT on Temple Island.”

Colin “Head Boy” Molton, the reverend’s PERSONALLY APPOINTED £1.5k a day regeneration chief replied to Hopkins: “It was around LATE AUTUMN last year when the YTL proposition came to the fore.”

However, observes Ms Ashcroft, “Freedom of Information (FoI) documents seen by Bristol Live reveal a SENIOR COUNCIL OFFICER was exchanging emails with Malaysian investment firm YTL LAST APRIL about the prospect of an arena in the Brabazon hangar at Filton Airfield.”

The senior council officer exchanging these emails was former Bristol City Council Strategic Director Place, Barra Mac “NUGGET” Ruairi, the man personally running Bristol’s arena project until he went to work for YTL, the opposition. But why was the Reverend’s personal property expert (troughing around £200k a year off the rates) Colin “HEAD BOY” Molton telling porkies about these emails?

Perhaps Ms Ashcroft should have paid a little more attention to Mac Nugget’s emails and the dates they contain? (To be continued …)

REES’S ARENA BELLYFLOP LATEST

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The recent announcement by the Reverend that he was launching a review by bent accountants KPMG of his review of the Arena and standing down the current developers is the final NAIL IN THE COFFIN of an arena at Temple Meads.

However, a new site for the venture seems to have suddenly found favour: the Brabazon Hangar in Filton. A development site owned by Malaysian firm YTL Developments that’s run by Merchant Venturer Colin “TORY BOY” Skellett, Wessex Water boss and former chair of TORY business quango, the Local Enterprise Partnership.

Coincidentally, working with Tory Boy on his new development project at Filton are a couple of familiar faces – former Bristol City Council Strategic Director Place, Barra Mac “NUGGET” Ruairi and former city council property boss Robert “SPUNKFACE” Orrett.

What a remarkably small world it is.

Even more coincidentally, the Reverend stopped off in Malaysia to meet YTL bosses on the way to his pointless China junket before Christmas. So how long before we’re handing over £120million quid plus any overspend and extras of public money to this gang of INSIDERS and CHANCERS at Filton to build our arena on their site and on their terms?

The Filton site is already no stranger to controversy and strange public-private shenanigans. YTL, run by Tory Boy Skellett, purchased the former airport after an extensive marketing exercise on behalf of owners BAE paid out of PUBLIC MONEY and carried out by er, Tory Boy Skellett’s Local Enterprise Partnership.

Another remarkable example of a remarkably small world up there in Filton where conflicts of interest appear to cease to exist.

PROPERTY IS DEBT

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Ding, dong the Spunkface is dead!

Council property boss Robert “Spunkface” Orrett, brought in to the council in 2012 for his “PRIVATE SECTOR EXPERTISE” has ceased to run the world’s most useless council department that specialised in draining us of public money.

Last year, Spunkface’s department – responsible for all the council’s buildings and its lucrative land and property portfolio – posted an inexplicably HUGE LOSS of £7.7million due to his failure “to achieve savings”. This ABJECT FAILURE went on to comprehensively fuck up the whole of the council’s accounts. This year, Spunkface, already facing losses of – at least – £2.6million in more unachieved savings, has finally quit.

Perhaps the Reverend Rees was no longer prepared to tolerate Spunkface, who – when not losing enormous amounts of public money – is best known for his crude COVER-UPS of “mismanaged” cash in his Facilities Management Department’s markets and security operations?

We understand that Spunkface has now taken up a role locally at YTL PROPERTY alongside his former boss at the council, Barra Mac Ruari, the posh urbanist twit mate of Mayor No More Ferguson. YTL is Merchant Venturer, Colin Skellett’s development firm that bought the huge Filton Airfield site for development after an extensive marketing exercise by, er, Colin Skellet’s Local Enterprise Partnership!

Housing Tsar, Paul “Wolfie Smith” was handed responsibility for the council’s Property Services over the summer, mainly to act as nursemaid to the latest multi-million pound Broadmead corporate makeover.

But did Wolfie finally pull the trigger on Spunkface and put our city out of the misery he imposed?

WHINY TWAT SEEKS PRIVATE SECTOR MOVE?

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Whiny twat: working seven days a week to fuck up our city

Whiny council twat, Barra Mac “NUGGET” Ruairi, jerking himself off under the title ‘Strategic Director of Place’ and struggling by on about £130k a year for hacking our public services apart was forced by the Rev Rees in November to attend a public meeting in Henbury about the cuts.

Many who attended openly EXPRESSED THEIR FRUSTRATION at clowns like Mac Nugget filling their boots at our expense while cocking up everything in sight.

Mac Nugget replied, “I’m an exec leader with SIGNIFICANT SALARY who moved from Sheffield to serve the city – seven days per week – genuinely doing my best. I work with £100million contracts, miles of roads, planning, 38 refurbished schools. It’s a significant job with over 1,000 staff. We need qualified people to deliver this kind of work.

“I chose to work in public but could work in the PRIVATE SECTOR. We have trouble recruiting as the private sector take our staff. We don’t just work 37 hours per week but put in as much time for the city as we can.”

Mac Nugget was noticeably light on detail about any of his ACHIEVEMENTS. So here’s some of the things he’s been working seven days a week to achieve:

An arena over two years behind schedule, 20 per cent plus over budget that doesn’t have anyone to build it; a Metrobus bus scheme that nobody wants with no one to run it that’s also over budget; unnecessary concreting over of bluefinger land and allotments at Stapleton for the Metrobus; destruction of hundreds of trees for the Metrobus scheme; endless traffic congestion that continues to get worse; collapsing city docks infrastructure that has culminated in the ongoing closure of Princes Street Bridge; cancellation without notice of vital bus services like the number 51 last year; occupation of council properties by guardian companies that don’t comply with his own council’s licencing and health and safety rules or the law; the proposal to build a five metre wide road through Victoria Park; an inexplicable £9m deficit in his Property Services Department run up between March and June last year; an ongoing failure to deliver smart ticketing on public transport.

Then there’s the risk of failure to the major infrastructure projects he’s managing. Such a failure is currently listed as ‘LIKELY‘ by Bristol City Council

Please private sector take this useless twat. He’s all yours

CITY COUNCIL SALARY WATCH

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Greedy pig: Nicola ‘Lady Gaga’ Yates

Anyone got any idea how much city council Chief Exec Nicola “LADY GAGA” Yates really earns?

The council’s annual report, which contains audited accounting information, insists she earned £180,617 in 2014 -15. However, the ‘Table of Salaries for City Director and Chief Officer Posts as at 1 April 2015’ published with great fanfare and openness on the council website insists she trousers a mere £160k.

Why the difference? And are either of these figures accurate? Because Nicola actually has FOUR jobs courtesy of Bristol City Council. As well as Chief Exec, she’s the ELECTORAL RETURNING OFFICER for the city; Chief Exec of the disastrous GREEN CAPITAL private limited company and she’s now nabbed a directorship of the brand new ‘BRISTOL WASTE‘ private limited company!

In the case of the last two, Gaga has openly used her influence to ensure the accounts of these publicly owned companies are TOP SECRET and not even subject to the attention of the council’s auditors. This means we have absolutely NO MEANS OF KNOWING if Gaga’s trousering any more of our cash on the sly through these companies.

Ain’t secrecy grand?

Elsewhere, the ‘Table of Salaries for City Director and Chief Officer Posts as at 1 April 2015’ for public consumption lists the salaries of Lady Gaga’s four STRATEGIC DIRECTORS as between £130 – 135k pa each.

Which is odd because the audited annual report says Business Change director MAX WIDE “BOY” earned over £141k in 2014 – 2015. Meanwhile Mayor Pillock’s thicko urbanist mate BARRA MAC “NUGGET” RUAIRI reels in a cool £139,350 pa for wandering aimlessly around ABU GHRAIB – Lady Gaga’s ‘agile’ Temple Street office complex – in brown cords.

Can these two senior bosses not add up? Or have they been treated to a secret pay rise?

ARE COUNCIL BOSSES BARRA MAC RUAIRI AND ANGELO CALABRESI BENT? (SLIGHT RETURN)

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NOW ‘ADVICE’ TO A CHAIR OF A PLANNING COMMITTEE HAS BEEN ‘DISAPPEARED’!

Until around the 20 October, Bristol City Council planning officer ANGELO “KING PRAWN” CALABRESE was set to make an unconstitutional delegated decision to give planning permission to the Nexterra/Balfour Beatty AVONMOUTH BIOMASS PLANT.

However, a major u-turn ensued after an outcry from an unholy coalition of The BRISTOLIAN, members of the public, MPs, prospective parliamentary candidates and councillors of all parties demanding that this decision went to a planning committee as the King Prawn’s OWN GUIDELINES demanded.

The BRISTOLIAN has already remarked that KING PRAWN‘s conduct and – by association – his boss BARRA MAC“ NUGGET” RUAIRI‘s conduct of this process looks extremely dubious.

So to further explore what had been going on, a Freedom of Information request was put in:

Dear Bristol City Council,

The above planning application is to be decided by officers under
delegated powers.

1. Please can you provide me with any information held in any form
by Bristol City Council as to why this application can be
considered under delegated powers.

2. Please can you provide me with any information held in any form
by Bristol City Council and provided to the chair of the relevant
planning committee, Cllr Alex Woodman, by city council officers as
to why this application can be considered under delegated powers.

Yours faithfully,

And back, in a matter of days, came a reply from someone called Steve Knight, masquerading under the minimalist job title, ‘Place’:

This application is being determined at committee level on 5^th November
2014 rather than under delegated powers. As the information is not held,
we are therefore unable to have that information communicated to you.
The application details are available via the council’s Planning online
facility
[1]http://planningonline.bristol.gov.uk/onl…
. The details of the committee meeting will be available a week before the
committee meeting via
[2]https://www.bristol.gov.uk/CommitteeMeet…

“The information is not held”. How strange. Because on 18 October, the chair of the planning committee, Alex Woodman, announced on Twitter:

How, one wonders, did councillor Woodman offer his opinion about something for which no information exists?

Of course this information exists. How could King Prawn have possibly formed any opinion, communicated it to a variety of third parties and got to within two days of making a decision otherwise?

So what’s happened to this information? Has it been lost? Mislaid? Shredded? Rest assured The BRISTOLIAN will be chasing this.

And we’ve said it once – and we’ll say it again – this whole planning process needs to be HALTED and Bristol City Council needs to start an immediate investigation into King Prawn and McNugget for potential breaches of THE BRIBERY AND CORRUPTION ACT.

Something doesn’t add up. There’s something rotten in Denmark.

AVONMOUTH BIO-MESS: IT’S A KNOCKOUT!

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It isn’t, actually. But it’s a solid win on points!

News comes in that the Balfour Beatty/Nexterra BIOMASS POISON PLANT planning application for Avonmouth will now be going to a planning committee after all, rather than being decided behind closed doors by unaccountable planning bosses. This proves – yet again- that corporate-friendly city council management wankers like ANGELO “KING PRAWN” CALABRESI and BARRA MAC“ NUGGET” RUAIRI don’t like it up ‘em.

Avonmouth Tory Councillor, WAYNE “DUM” HARVEY today stepped into the planning row and agreed to “call-in” the controversial application so that it will be decided by a committee of councillors as the council’s constitution clearly requires rather than by the dodgy duo.

This is a very messily executed 180 degree U-TURN by Harvey. He originally accepted King Prawn Calabresi and MacNugget’s bullshit corporate-friendly “advice” and did not demand the application be heard by a planning committee when he had the opportunity to request this during the official ‘call-in’ period. Now the councillor has been forced to act very late – on the actual day his planning bosses’ decision was due in fact!

But why the last minute change of plan? Was it that overwhelming STENCH OF CORRUPTION emanating out of every pore of King Prawn and MacNugget’s inexplicable corporate-friendly decision? Or was it the PRICEY JUDICIAL REVIEW that would inevitably follow any secret management decision to approve planning permission for the poison plant, which would then have delayed their CORPORATE FRIENDS’ development for about a year and cost us council tax payers a packet?

Who knows? But we’ll chalk it down as a small victory. And watch out KING PRAWN and MACNUGGET … We’ve got your cards well and truly marked now you little pair of shits. And yes, it’s personal. If you wanna trash our communities then we’re gonna trash you.

Seconds out, round two …

ARE COUNCIL BOSSES BARRA MAC RUAIRI AND ANGELO CALABRESI BENT?

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Senior Bristol City Council planning officer ANGELO “KING PRAWN” CALABRESI along with his boss, head of planning and place, BARRA MAC “NUGGET” RUAIRI have decided that planning permission for a 10MW BIOMASS INCINERATOR in Avonmouth can be decided by themselves, behind closed doors, on Tuesday.

How have they reached this bizarre anti-democratic decision not to put this application in front of a planning committee? Their written guidance clearly states:

(a) Delegated officers must refer matters to the relevant committee as
they consider appropriate having regard to the following factors:-

i) whether the matter would have such an effect on communities, businesses or individuals such as the matter ought to be considered/determined by councillors;

How can anyone seriously believe burning 60,000 tonnes of waste wood a year near a residential area will not have an effect on “communities, businesses or individuals”?

Their decision is perverse. Moreover, why have they not attempted to publicise this application to the community? And why haven’t they displayed notices at or near the proposed site as required by law?

There’s two reasonable explanations for the pair’s conduct:

1. They’re thick and incompetent and simply do not have the basic reading and comprehension skills required to do the jobs they’re handsomely paid to do.

2. They’re bent and in the pockets of biomass corporations.

While there’s considerable circumstantial evidence – judging by his lack of performance in post over his nine months in Bristol – that BARRA MAC “NUGGET” RUAIRI is a posh, thick incompetent who ain’t up to the job, we also think other avenues need to be explored.

We therefore believe that Bristol City Council needs to start an immediate investigation into this pair for potential breaches of THE BRIBERY AND CORRUPTION ACT.

We also think the city council should inform the police with a view to having the pair’s bank accounts searched for any unusual payments.

Can’t do any harm can it?