Tag Archives: May Gurney

BLACKLIST BLUES: ANOTHER RUBBISH DAY FOR KIER

More details continue to emerge about the BLACKLISTING activities of Kier Group, the construction giant which bought up May Gurney and now runs Bristol’s rubbish and recycling collection routes.

It seems that Kier paid a WHOPPING £30,620 to the industry-backed spy company The Consulting Association – giving them access to files on 229 workers!

After the recent council vote to ban blacklisters from BCC contracts (see The BRISTOLIAN #4.6), there’s not much else that can go wrong for Kier.

Except be named as the construction company under investigation by the Information Commissioner’s Office for direct involvement in illegal snooping practices like ‘blagging’, perhaps?

EXTRA:

Next issue (The BRISTOLIAN #4.8) we will cover the recent on-the-retreat move by blacklisters including Kier to set up a fund to pay out to the thousands of workers they shamefully kept out of work…

MASSIVE PAYOUTS! MASSIVE CUTS! MASSIVE BELLENDS! …PLUS SOME GOOD NEWS TOO IN THE LATEST EDITION OF ‘THE BRISTOLIAN’!

The BRISTOLIAN #4.7 - coverOctober’s edition of The BRISTOLIAN is another PACKED ISSUE, featuring…

» NEARLY £900k IN PAYOFFS TO CRAP COUNCIL BOSSES!
Ex-Chief Executive and six Directors squeeze almost a million quid out of us

» FAT CAT GAGA’S DOSH SENSATION!
Second choice ‘City Director’ Nicola Yates’s well-funded departure from Hull

» GARGAN GETS FEAR OVER INTERNET PROFILE PIC!
Avon & Somerset Police’s Arch-Druid Nick Gargan confuses fictional copper for real thing

» INDYREDPANTS MAN AND THE AFFAIR OF THE ACCIDENTAL WORKFARE
PR guru Oliver Mochizuki fails to silence concerns over festival’s forced labour ‘volunteers’

» LABOUR’S NON-MAYOR: REES-KING RIDICULE?
Failed Shitty Hall candidate Marvin Rees shamelessly puts himself in same category as MLK

» HAVE A KITCAT? BREAK A STRIKE
Councillor Telford and Mayor Ferguson get chummy with Brighton’s binman-hating council boss

PLUS: NEWS IN BRIEF!!!

» BRISTOLIAN BITES
Tantalising titbits including…

  • MERCHANT VENTURER LANDGRABhow Fergo’s pals want your libraries and parks!
  • CHICKENS COME HOME TO ROOST who does John Hirst remind us of?
  • CABINET KNOWS BESThow Council leaders think they have nothing to learn

» VICTORY NEWS
Positive stories from across the city!

  • V FOR VALERIANpressure from The BRISTOLIAN helps trapped residents
  • ALLOTMENTS SAVED – Lynmouth Road gardeners don’t lose the plot
  • BLACKLISTERS IN RETREATsafety-hating construction companies on back foot

PLUS: COMMENT!!!

» BRISTOL’S BROKEN DEMOCRACY?
Outgoing Finance boss Peter Robinson leaves a ‘Zero Budget’ shit-in-a-box for Mayor Fergo

» TOWN GREENS: LATEST
Why you can’t trust councillors to do the right thing

PLUS: NEW D.I.Y GUIDES!!!

» TOP TIPS TO BEAT THE BEDROOM TAX!
Practical lawyer’s advice on how to survive the ‘Spare Room Subsidy’

Blimey! And all that for FREE!

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Then you can DOWNLOAD a PDF version here:

» The BRISTOLIAN #4.7 – October 2013

GEORGE’S RUBBISH JOBS: CITIZEN ZERO HAS ZERO CLUE ON ZERO HOURS

Our blue skies imagineering property magnate, hipster entrepreneur, millionaire mayor George Ferguson is at it again.

In a recent reply to questions on Bristol City Council’s use of ZERO-HOURS CONTRACTS – where employers offer you a job but don’t actually guarantee any work – he half-heartedly explained:

In respect of contractors, I cannot give you a definitive assurance that zero hours contracts are never used.

Perhaps Mayor Fergo – or rather the lackey that writes his answers for him to read out – should be a little more inquisitive about the conduct of his council’s contractors.

Because The BRISTOLIAN is happy to give our readers a ‘definitive assurance’ that, in fact, THEY DO USE ZERO HOURS CONTRACTS.

In fact at the exact time George published his pathetically weak answer, notorious employment agency BLUE ARROW was advertising on the government’s Universal Jobmatch website for Recycling Operatives in the “Bristol area” for:

one of our large recycling clients whohave mutilipul depots all accross the South West [sic]

Blue Arrow - pimping out zero hours council jobs for May Gurney

Blue Arrow – pimping out zero hours council jobs for May Gurney

A brief phone call to Blue Arrow reveals that this particular ‘large recycling client’ is none other than MAY GURNEY – operator of waste services for the city council already mired in a blacklisting’ scandal – and confirms that it’s a zero hour contract on offer. Blue Arrow even helpfully add: “own transport is an advantage as it means that if work goes quiet at one site employer can try and get applicants into another.”

How nice. An employer running public services that might find you some work – somewhere – if you can get there – if not, you don’t get paid! Great for MISERLY BOSSES, but not such a great offer for someone trying to sign off, though…

Yet another feather in the cap for Fergo’s supposed international city of cool, don’t you think?

BLACKLIST BAN!

Council finally calls time on sickening anti-safety bosses – but will Mayor Fergo take notice?

Bristol Hazards Group - fighting the blacklisting bastardsAfter a long fight led by determined construction workers, Bristol City Council in early September voted to END THE GRAVY TRAIN of juicy local authority contracts for firms that profit out of ‘blacklists’.

With blacklisting, construction giants like McAlpine secretly trade ILLEGAL FILES on ‘troublesome workers’ – the ones that kick up a fuss over inadequate safety – and keep them out of a job.

Whilst the new council policy won’t affect private sector projects – such as the building of Cabot Circus, where building boss CULLUM MCALPINE admits his company blacklisted brickies and sparks from the site due to whistleblowing on safety issues – it could help workers running council services.

As we revealed in The BRISTOLIAN #4.4 back in June, KIER GROUP – now responsible for Bristol’s household waste collections after it bought up May Gurney – has a proven record as a key contributor to the blacklisting database.

Thanks to the LONG-RUNNING PICKET of May Gurney’s depots by blacklisted workers, union activists and local campaign Bristol Hazards Group that put the blacklist issue onto the table, Kier may yet lose that lucrative council rubbish collection contract…

Focus now shifts to McAlpine’s fellow Merchant Venturer, millionaire mayor George Ferguson and his own CAVALIER APPROACH TO HEALTH AND SAFETY.

It was Mayor Fergo’s outspoken disregard for safety that helped cost cyclist Sean Phillips his life in March (see The BRISTOLIAN #4.3), and in 2009 his deathtrap ‘Millennium Mast’ in the Centre had to be dismantled over fears pieces could fall off and cause fatalities.

And did we mention his fast-becoming-legendary CONTEMPT for ordinary bar workers at his image-over-substance hipster venues like The Tobacco Factory, #1 Harbourside and Canteen?

So whether Gorgeous George actually honours the blacklist ban, or throws his weight behind his corner-cutting rich building boss pals, is still not entirely clear…

BRISTOLIAN 6 HITS THE STREETS!

Front page
Featured in this edition:

» BLACKLIST BAN!
Council finally calls time on sickening anti-safety bosses

» HORSEWORLD – ROUND 2!
Horse flesh scandal!

» BEDROOM TAX BALL-UP!
Hoyty-Toyty and Co. in brewery/piss-up non-shocker

» COMMUNITY CENTRE COUP!
Plans are afoot in Easton …

» COUNCIL BOSSES SECRETLY PLOT TO BACK TORIES!
Sicko Shitty Hall Tory election plot

» ZERO CLUE ON ZERO HOURS!
May Gurney taking the piss out of Shitty Hall bosses (again)

» THE BIG B.I.D. CON!
Tory rat’s personal fiefdom paid for by you!

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UPDATE: Digital PDF of The BRISTOLIAN #4.6 now available to download!

NOTHING VENTURED, NOTHING GAINED… HOW BRISTOL’S COSY CLUB FOR RICH BUSINESSMEN KEEPS THE MONEY GOING ROUND

A couple of examples emerge of just how charitable our old friends at the SOCIETY OF MERCHANT VENTURERS really are.

First, please step forward TIM ROSS who seems well-versed in that old Venturer trick of turning public money into private wealth.

Ross was, until June last year, Chairman of financial basketcase waste company MAY GURNEY (see The BRISTOLIAN #4.3 & 4.4), currently being rescued from financial collapse via a multi-million pound takeover by anti-union construction outfit, KIER GROUP. Indeed such are the financial problems at May Gurney that Bristol City Council has been discouraged from enforcing the penalty clauses in its waste collection contract with the company as it was thought it would bankrupt them and our rubbish could go uncollected.

However, bankruptcy is not something that’s likely to happen to Ross: once the ink was dry on May Gurney’s contract with the city council, he cashed in 100,000 of his shares in December 2011 to pocket A COOL £235,000 – conveniently before the share price of the company went south! He scarpered as Chairman of May Gurney six months later, just a few months before the share price tumbled below a pound.

Our second all-heart, all-charidee Venturer is CULLUM MCALPINE, scion of the civil engineering giant SIR ALFRED MCALPINE LTD, a firm that is never far from a tasty government contract or two. Cullum is a director of the company and has been personally named in papers lodged with the high court as being “intimately” involved in the operation of a “clandestine” organisation – The Consulting Association – holding a list of people barred from the construction industry. Or trade union blacklisting as it’s generally known.

The court papers claim, “McAlpine was the founding chairman at the [Consulting Association’s] inception in 1993. He was intimately involved in the foundation and operation of TCA. He formally offered Mr Kerr the position of director in August 1993. He finalised the written particulars of Mr Kerr’s employment, sending them to members for approval and obtaining legal advice in relation to them. He oversaw the arrangement of life and health insurance for Mr Kerr as part of his remuneration.”

IAN KERR was the director of The Consulting Association, the organisation which operated the ILLEGAL BLACKLIST OF WORKERS on behalf of big construction firms until he was exposed and prosecuted in 2009.

Perhaps Mr McAlpine should keep better company – as should the Society of Merchant Venturers.

AND ANOTHER THING …

Venturer DAVID ORD, co-owner of the Bristol Port Company at Avonmouth, has donated more than £330,000 to the Tory Party since 2005.

He was also one of forty donors to attend dinners with senior ministers, including the Prime Minister, in the last quarter of 2012.

So, did Ord use his access to ‘Dodgy’ David Cameron to lobby for the scrapping of plans for an electricity-generating Severn estuary barrage?

PHWOARR WOT A SCORCHER! NEW ‘BRISTOLIAN’ HITS THE STREETS

Bristolian #4.5After a few technical problems (it being boiling hot for a start) the latest issue of your favourite muckraking scandal sheet The Bristolian is now hitting the streets!

Packed full of stories, this edition features:

CUFF LOVE
Bristol City Council arms security guards with cop-style handcuffs to use on people visiting Phoenix Court ‘Customer Service Point’!

FERGUSON FAMILY FIND FUNDING – NOTHING FOR KNOWLE WEST
Mayor Fergo and his daughter find plenty of money for their linked pet schemes – but Knowle West community service has funding removed…

INHUMAN RESOURCES?
Budget slashers at Shitty Hall threaten overtime ban for workers

NOTHING VENTURED, NOTHING GAINED
The dirty blacklisting secrets of the rich bastards rinsing our city

COUNCIL FRAUDWATCH
A look at the leaky sieve that is the BCC accounts

£103 IS THE MAGIC NUMBER
We know what £103 means, you know what £103 means – but does it add up?

REDTROUSER RADAR
We continue to track the globetrotting antics of our lothario millionaire mayor – racking up the Air Miles on your money!

PLUS:

  • Sir Gus Hoyty-Toyty’s Cabinet Diary – the latest journal entries from Bristol’s village idiot
  • Plot 6 Thickens – the industrial wasteland they can’t give away
  • Mallett’s Mayor – we reveal Fergo’s showbiz chums
  • Hibaq To Basics – Lawrence Hill councillor’s very own sex scandal brews on
  • A Sick Racket – profiting from misery in Kingsdown RPZ

See the Distribution page for your local stockist – and if there isn’t one near you, let us know!

» DOWNLOAD: The BRISTOLIAN #4.5 – July 2013 (PDF)

WELL I NEVER! NO.1 – COUNCILLOR GARY HOPKINS

Whether it’s refuse collection contracts that aren’t worth the paper they’re written on, or a white elephant kiosk shambles, Cllr ‘HEFTY’ HOPKINS is all about the quality…

March 2011

“Did someone mention free Danish pastries?” Castle Park kiosk opens, 2011

“Did someone mention free Danish pastries?” Castle Park kiosk opens

Having outsourced the running of cafes in Bristol parks to Diamond Catering and bought a load of pricey sheds from Italy on the say-so of a bloke with a financial interest and rumoured family connections to the vendor:

The installation of these kiosks will not only provide a range of high quality drinks and snacks but they will also bring people of all ages together to meet informally and socialise. The kiosks will also provide an important income for re-investment in parks.

May 2012

“Did someone mention free lattes?” Cafés brought in-house by council

“Did someone mention free lattes?” Cafés brought in-house by council

Having brought the parks cafés under direct council control following the collapse of Diamond Catering seven months previously:

By bringing the café and kiosk service in-house we know we can offer local people a consistently high quality service at a fair price. The catering service will not only offer a great service for visitors, it will also bring in additional revenue, which will of course be re-invested into the council’s park services.

BONUS:

July 2011

“You know some people throw away perfectly good cream cakes just because they're a bit over the Best Before date!” Yet more dedication to publicity photos from Gary Hopkins

“You know some people throw away perfectly good cream cakes just because they’re a bit past the Best Before date!”

On the announcement of the £96 million waste collection contract awarded to May Gurney:

[It] will bring a quality service.

WELL I NEVER!

‘I’M ALRIGHT, JACK’ SAYS MP’S BROTHER WHO CLEANED UP IN MOVE FROM COUNCIL TO MAY GURNEY

Giovanni Lopresti (centre) - former council waste manager 'recycles' himself into lucrative private sector job?

Giovanni Lopresti (centre) – former council waste manager ‘recycles’ himself into lucrative private sector job?

At least one person in Bristol is pleased with how the city council’s waste contract with SERIAL BLUNDERERS May Gurney has turned out.

While household recycling might go uncollected, streets remain uncleaned and fly tipping is overlooked, the Shitty Hall’s former Waste Services Contracts Manager who personally negotiated and oversaw the flawed and expensive contract with the rubbish waste collectors, one GIOVANNI LOPRESTI, is unlikely to give a toss.

For Giovanni, younger brother of Filton’s low-profile Tory MP Giacomo ‘Jack’ Lopresti, was made an offer he couldn’t refuse and now has a well-paid job as Contract Manager with, er… May Gurney!

THE STINK OF FRAUD?

Senior figures at ailing waste management company May Gurney, which is soon to be absorbed into construction-and-services giant Kier Group, might not have time to enjoy any windfall payments from the merger deal – if how they ran the Bristol rubbish collection contract reaches the attention of the police.

It seems that soon after winning the seven-year ‘flagship’ contract in 2011, MG management realised that they couldn’t keep up with the pace of collecting rubbish and recycling throughout the whole of Bristol. So, instead of hiring more staff to spread the workload, the company’s bosses decided instead to MASSAGE THE FIGURES.

Whilst Bristol City Council set the time limits on how long ‘jobs’ should take on collection routes, it relied wholly on May Gurney to tell it whether everything that should be done had been done… Except MG routinely ‘closed’ active jobs, even if they had not actually been completed.

“Doing this saved MG hundreds of thousands of pounds in fines,” a well-placed source told The BRISTOLIAN, claiming also that “over 500 jobs” were dealt with in this way.

And the result? Rubbish piling up uncollected in hundreds of streets from Easton to Clifton and Filwood to Horfield.