LIEbour Turned Independent – AGM Reconvened

Hell has frozen over: Labour has chosen someone who is not a Labour councillor as the new STC leader and town mayor. What’s more – Labour has picked councillors who are no longer even in the Labour Party to lead the Leisure and Finance committees. From the outside, it looks as if the Council – where Labour holds a super-majority – is now ruled by Independent councillors. It’s sooooo weird!

Unfortunately, that’s just how it looks on the surface. The reality is much simpler: it’s just LIEbour playing dirty tricks again. They’ve completely lost the plot, and to keep things as they were, they went with a “safe” candidate from the old guard – once a staunch supporter of Kane and Fritchley, now turned Independent: Paul Harford. Labour backed him even though this is the man who flipped the table, took his toys, and walked away from the party.

STRANGE ELECTION
When the question was asked in the chamber – who is the candidate for Council Leader? – none of the Labour councillors nominated their own party colleague. This is a tragicomedy. The party with an absolute majority couldn’t find a single person willing to fix the mess left behind by Chris Kane.

Still, from my point of view, this was a carefully planned political move. Labour can now claim they no longer govern Shirebrook… The truth? 100% of councillors were elected from the Labour list, and they still support each other, scratch each other’s backs – but to the less informed voter, it’ll look like Independents are in charge, and poor, concerned-about-the-residents Labour is in opposition. LIE!

SPLIT VOTE
Interestingly, two Labour councillors—Cllr Dale Smith and Cllr Shaun Cheeseman—voted against the Independent candidate for Leader. Whatever you say about them, at least they voted in accordance with their own conscience. The rest of the Labour councillors betrayed their party and voted for the Independent. That’s super weird. Unless… Labour Party order was to vote on the Independent! That is beyond weird…

To wipe the tears, Labour installed Pauline Chapman as vice-leader, with the help of new Independents. It looks like a pattern or an agreement made before the meeting: where the Leader role went to ex-Labour, the Vice went to Labour. Where the Leader went to Labour, the Vice went to Independent ex-Labour. I feel like this was planned in advance. The only other explanation is that no one had control over anything, and it “just happened.” I’m not sure which of those is worse.

This split vote is even stranger because the rest of the Labour councillors voted for the Independent without a murmur, without discussion, without a moment’s hesitation. I don’t know what’s going on with Labour – it’s like they’ve got a personality crisis. Kane and Fritchley kept them under their thumbs for so long that now, without those two “overseers and stewards”, Labour doesn’t know what to do with itself. There’s no true leader, no one ready to take matters into their own hands, no one to point to a goal and rally the troops.

It’s like Labour at the national level. Everyone knows that Sir Starmer has betrayed everything Labour voters believe in. But the MPs? They’re sticking with him. Clinging to their posts with iron will. Until the next election. Maybe they’ll manage to fool the voters again…

LESSER OF TWO EVILS
I’ll admit – I’ve changed my mind about Paul Harford recently. Meetings have been much more friendly and open since Chris Kane vanished and Cllr Harford took over. He’s also much less confrontational than he used to be. Unfortunately, I still think Paul Harford is lying and pretending there’s no scandal around the pellets and solar panels. At some point, he’ll have to face the past, where he stubbornly claimed the 30,000 kg increase in pellet consumption was down to the “vaccination centre.” Paul – there was no pandemic in 2018! Riddle me this: where did those 30,000 kilograms go? Because they didn’t go into the furnace, right? Just look at the numbers!

Back to Paul Harford. I can say openly and honestly: I like how he runs meetings. He’s more assertive, friendly to everyone, and doesn’t act like a know-it-all bulldog ruling over a pack of dachshunds. When necessary, he stops the proceedings, explains what’s going on, and only moves on when everything is clear. However – today, almost nothing was clear to me. And I’m not only talking about the election of a non-Labour candidate to a position of power.

I’M CONFUSED…
Let me briefly summarise what I found strange about this meeting, beyond the leadership elections.

First, something’s up with the council asset register. I don’t even know how to describe it, but my first reaction was: WTF! See for yourself: https://www.shirebrooktowncouncil.gov.uk/uploads/stc-accounts-2022-23-asset-register.pdf Long story short: it’s outdated – and that’s just one of the problems. Maybe councillors received an updated version, but some of them looked as confused as I was. Cllr Cheeseman asked multiple questions about it, and it seems it wasn’t approved – but frankly, I’m not even sure.

Second, the land asset valuation is a joke – some entries shouldn’t even be there anymore, some are listed as NIL value, and the house owned by STC is valued at £66k while the house next door sold recently for well over £110k (I didn’t write down the exact figure).

Third, council insurance is based on these dodgy valuations – and no one even mentioned the pending court case which could seriously impact the cost of that insurance.

Fourth, there wasn’t a single word about devolution. The biggest change in local government in decades – and Labour is asleep at the wheel. We’ll wake up with our hand in our pants and Labour’s hand in our pockets…

Fifth, when I was an STC councillor and we discussed the composition of committees and the meeting calendar, everything was set in stone. Labour would raise their hands in affirmation, and we’d move on. Now? There was actual discussion. Councillors could suggest changes to committees – something that was supposedly “unacceptable” in my time. I once asked to move from Operations to Leisure to continue my investigation into the pellets – and was refused. Classic Labour. But now, with no real opposition in STC (because these “new” Independents are really just a repainted majority), suddenly committee swaps are allowed.

I’ve saved the best for last: the committee I’ve mocked the most – the “Finance and Growth Committee” – has dropped the word “Growth”. It’s now just the “Finance Committee.” Labour has literally abandoned growth. Isn’t that a perfect metaphor for their governance?

ELECTION IS COMING… AND LABOUR IS NOWHERE
Another sign of Labour’s decay is their absence in the by-election. Same goes for the other “main street” parties – the Conservatives and Lib Dems. Not one of them put forward a single candidate. On one hand, that’s good: the old parties, exhausted by reality, have stopped putting up paper candidates – empty suits just to say they still exist.

On the other hand – this is deeply worrying. I’ll skip over the Tories, who’ve chased every right-leaning person out of the party and betrayed all their core values. Let’s talk about Labour. Their two former “leaders”, Kane and Fritchley, spent years chasing anyone with a passion for Shirebrook away from Labour. They bullied people, intimidated them, shouted and insulted. And now their party is paying the price. If everyone over 70 retired tomorrow, Labour would be left with… three people.

One ex-Labour councillor summed it up best: “If there were an election today, not a single Labour councillor would be sitting in the Chamber.”
And that’s what I wish for myself – and for you…

Sylwester Zwierzynski info@shirebrook247.com
Lead photo: created with Midjourney