onionbagblog

It’s crunch time this evening for the Stop Kev (unsettle Hoey) campaign that is being carried out by the right wing of the @LambethLabour party. Thursday sees the AGM of the Vauxhall Constituency Labour Party, and the vote to see if @kevindcraig remains as the Secretary.

You may remember how a squeaky clean (and recently newly elected) Lambeth councillor was given the task to unsettle the left of the party, remove @kevindcraig, replace him with a Nu Labour puppet and then allow the Poster Boy to take on the power of the fragrant Mss Hoey.

Blimey.

But even with the local branches seemingly turning their backs on the Nu Labour project and endorsing @kevindcraig, the Coup d’Vauxhall is still in the balance. No surprises that the Oval branch backed the Poster Boy 11-3, but a bit of an eyebrow raising moment when Bishop’s ward went the way of the left.

The AGM, being held at the Wheatsheaf Community Centre this evening, will see the branch delegates voting on the decision. This should be a formality, but a last ditch attempt by the squeaky clean (and recently newly elected) Lambeth councillor has now come into play.

Shame on the Stockwell branch, who having voted to back @kevindcraig, is now sending the right wing of the party to try and tip the vote. @RichardAngell and Councillor Bigham will be doing the best for their Poster Boy later this evening at the Wheatsheaf.

The outcome is still far too tight to call. The only certainty is that if the right wing puppet Paul Gadsby is put in place as Secretary, Hoey will start to look wobbly, leaving the path open for the Poster Boy come 2015.

When is a free swim not a free swim? When the coalition government is used as an excuse by @LambethLabour not to continue with the local election pledge it made less than two months ago.

Ah yes - it’s a return to an old family favourite around these parts - that @LambethLabour election pledge of “free swimming for every resident.”

*sigh*

Almost two months after @LambethLabour was returned to power, has anyone actually managed a free swim at any of the borough swimming pools Brixton Rec yet?

Nope, me neither.

I appreciate that for pledges to become policy takes some time. What is not acceptable however is to make political capital out of a pledge, just because you don’t like what the ConDem coalition is doing up the road in Westminster.

We’ve seen this already in the Rotten Borough, with the mixed message being sent out regarding the school Academies debate (bad locally, but we’re still going to build one…) It now seems that swimming has become caught up in the political point scoring as well.

The axing of free swimming for under-16s and over-60s in the ConDem budget was a typical free market move. Pay to play etc, and sod the healthy benefits that are often needed by this demographic.

But the national ConDem swinging of the leisure axe has absolutely nothing to do with the local election pledge made by @LambethLabour less than two months ago.

Free swimming for every resident is free swimming for every resident. Simple. No ConDem opt-outs were made in the manifesto. The choice was clear for Lambeth residents - vote for @LambethLabour and free swimming will be rolled out.

Not so now it seems.

Already @LambethLabour councillors are starting to show signs of using the ConDem budget as the get out clause, rather than be held to account.

If manifesto pledges are dependent upon a higher power, then what’s the point in making them in the first place? You may as well live in fantasy Lambeth La La Land, promise the most ridiculous piece of local legislation, and then retract it whenever the electorate decides not to vote in your Westminster pals on a national level.

Keeping it local, and I’m still paying twice for my daily swim - once with Fusion for @BrockwellLido, and once again with Greenwich Leisure Limited for my Brixton Rec membership. Both pools are owned by @lambeth_council, but the pimping out model of public services means that residents get fleeced twice.

And so yeah, Councillor Bigham - free swimming for every resident? This blame game is starting to sound a little lame.