Another Late Night For CIIP Councillors

WHILE RESIDENTS ANXIOUSLY AWAIT details of how yesterday’s Comprehensive Spending Review will directly affect them and worry about the provision of local Meals on Wheels Services; Home Care Charges; Job Security; Benefit Reductions and huge increases in new Council Home Rents, the Canvey Island Independent Party’s blog – true to upholding its promise of keeping all islanders informed – has spent the last two months recording Neville Watson’s and other senior CIIP councillors’ appearances on the local celebrity circuit. But rumour has it that tonight will be an evening-in with a Chinese take-away and a six-pack as they anxiously follow the Tower Hamlets’ poll for an elected mayor on cable TV.

Unlike George Galloway’s Respect party, the local CIIP has been keen to distance itself from collecting resident signatures to have an elected Mayor - and an opportunity for Spink and Blackwell to launch a further attempt at controlling the borough. But, just as Galloway instituted the Tower Hamlets’ petition, there is little doubt that Spink’s fingerprints were all over Colin Letchford’s to provide an opportunity for the former to achieve another public office should he fail to be re-elected as our local MP.

Perhaps surprisingly, neither George Galloway or Respect is openly challenging the new Tower Hamlets’ office; but reports of Galloway’s flying back into the country to hold meetings with his various political advisers during candidate selection place him as potential King Maker behind the scenes. As Andrew Gilligan puts it in the Telegraph:-

‘A Mayor of Tower Hamlets has to live more or less full-time in the borough. He has to spend long days thinking about things like drains, and housing, and similar subjects of interest to us little people. He has to give up his lucrative radio show and can no longer lead glamorous Viva Palestina convoys to the Gaza Strip. Does any of that sound like George to you?’

Undoubtedly, Spink looked to Galloway for much of his political inspiration; but he was never able to be consistent or suggest any political solutions himself. Bandwagon Bob could only follow where others led – and claim others’ ideas as his own. Unlike Galloway, whose private income is considerable, Spink was never able to create a lucrative media following that could be turned into a successful career. All those doors were firmly shut against him when it became evident that he had used taxpayers’ money to fight his legal actions against anyone impugning his questionable integrity.

Tower Hamlets will be interesting because the borough is home to the far-left and a large immigrant community easily swayed by rumour and political propaganda. In addition, the expelled Labour candidate, Lutfur Rahman, is standing as an Independent – backed by many local businesses and the Islamic Forum of Europe (IFE), which wants a sharia state in Europe.

The Labour candidate is Helal Uddin Abbas, a Bengali like Lutfur, whom has been described as ‘a sickening manifestation of ruling-class racism.‘

Of course, Castle Point does not have a large immigrant community upon which the far-left can prey. But it does have Canvey Island and a regiment of far-left CIIP councillors installed in its bankrupt Town Council committed to misleading the electorate and treating local politics as some kind of board game to be played with residents’ lives. If Letchford’s petition should result in a referendum approving an Elected Mayor, then this borough may look forward to becoming another chaotic administration like Doncaster and fielding its own pair of failed front-runners, like Tower Hamlets, chasing those lucrative positions.

Early tomorrow morning, Tower Hamlets’ new Mayor will assume an expected salary of £75,000; a car; a driver; a press team and a policy team. In addition he will be able to directly appoint a political adviser earning up to £35,000 per annum; a Head of Leader’s Office (£45,000) and could, over time, appoint other cronies on similar salaries.

CIIP leaders will be examining Tower Hamlets’ results with interest tonight, hoping to see proof that their far-left strategies can still pay-off in the wake of a failed left-wing government and a population struggling to come to terms with Labour’s economic incompetence. It just remains to be seen if Watson creates another blog post about this night-in – and reports being ‘thoroughly entertained by the main show.’

The five candidates standing in the Tower Hamlets election are;-

Helal Uddin Abbas - Labour Party
Alan Duffell - Green Party
John David Macleod Griffiths - Liberal Democrats
Neil Anthony King - Conservative Party
Lutfur Rahman - Independent

... (22/10/2010, The Docklands) - New Tower Hamlets Mayor pleads for unity
... (22/10/2010, Dave Hill) - Labour well beaten in Tower Hamlets