Closing a door...

I have decided to retire MorleyGate, my Poliblog. It was started to decant my anger and vitriol away from Shades of Grey after a particularly frustrating Town Council Meeting where a politically correct and contradictory policy decision was rushed through without proper debate.

My final posting can be found here, featuring a sublimely cak video of a bus journey to Morley Town Hall that I stumbled across on YouTube.

Petulant? Moi?

a local politician who should know better is having a go in the local rag. The irony is that she is contradicted by someone else in the previous letter...

for the joys of small town politics amble over to Morleygate.

Enough of this PC stuff- we want to hear about Lionel Blair stroking your leg!

I'm very conscious that Blogpowerers are probably thinking that I have turned into a political obsessive one-dimensional rabid fruitloop with all of this Morleygate business.

I'm pleased to report that I am moving all further local politics shenanigans into a companion blog as I am well aware that we don't want dirty tricks spilling over into our jolly comment fields in amongst the banter, thoughtful contribution and willie jokes.

So, to finish off, here are the final three Dan Browne PC purging points.

8. Don't do guilt by association. Judge people by what they are in themselves, not by their tenuous links to others.

9. Don't do zero tolerance. Humanity is not black and white, but many shades of grey. Thinking in absolutes is not thinking at all.

10. Don't indulge in self-loathing. If you thinks you should be proud of yourself, and your culture, then be so. Coming from a dominant culture doesn't make you bad.

Morleygate can be found in the other place.

Normal service has now been resumed. Now... where is that photo of me with a toilet on my head?

I have in my wallet a piece of paper...

...which I took to the Mayor's Ball last night but had no reason to unfold.

It is page eight of the Morley Town Council current Standing Orders, Standing Order number 31.
=====================================================================================
CLOSURE

At the end of any speech a member may, without comment, move “that the question now be put”, “that the debate now be adjourned” or “that the Council now do adjourn”. If such motion is seconded the Town Mayor shall put the motion but, in the case of a motion “to put the question”, only if he is of the opinion that the question before the Council has been sufficiently debated. If the motion “that the question now be put” is carried, he shall call upon the mover to exercise or waive his right of reply and shall put the question immediately after that right has been exercised or waived. The adjournment of a debate or of the Council shall not prejudice the mover’s right of reply at the resumption.

(Note: Where a meeting is adjourned the subsequent proceedings are part of the original meeting and no new notices or agendas need to be issued except a notification to members not present of the date of the continuation of the meeting.)
=====================================================================================

The language is rather arcane but note the bit I have emphasised. If the Chairman of the meeting has colluded in the move towards stifling debate at meetings behind closed doors rather than genuinely believing that the motion has been sufficiently debated, then he is not chairing the meeting impartially and is probably guilty of misconduct.

If, on the other hand, he thinks the motion has been sufficiently debated after 71 seconds of comments and with a Councillor still wishing to make a speech, he is probably guilty of a serious error of judgement.

On the other, other hand, he may have simply forgotten that he had this authority in which case he is guilty of being rather unlucky...

If you haven't got a clue what this post is about, type "Morleygate" into the search box at the top left.

PC Cold turkey

More steps on how to eradicate the PC devils from within:

2.Be open to self-criticism, and criticism from others.

3. Don't psychologise those you disagree with: judge what they say at face value, rather than believing there are hidden, dark motives that entitle you to dismiss what they say without thinking about it.

Oops- can I have a dispensation for politicians with step four ;->

Hat tip: Civitas

Purging without laxatives

A guide to purging the political correctness within is the epilogue to The retreat of Reason, some chapters of which are available online.

The author makes ten points which he sources as being originally from the essay of an American philosepher, Sidney Hook. Hook also said:

The cardinal sin, when we are looking for truth of fact or wisdom of policy, is refusal to discuss, or action which blocks discussion.

Does that remind you of some recent posts?Repent, Morley Town Council, repent!

Here is Anthony Browne's first suggestion for the purge.

1. When you say something in public, ask yourself are you saying it because it is politically correct, or because you know it to be factually correct? Are you choosing intellectual laziness over emotional discomfort?

Morleygate update

The Morley Observer & Advertiser have been on the phone, asking if I would mind if they turned my letter into an article as it was a bit too long for the letters page. (They normally attend Full Council but Erica the reporter couldn't make it this time.)

I'd be delighted, I said. I look forward to Wednesday's paper with interest...

We have the Mayor's Ball tomorrow night, it will be interesting to see if news has spread about the cat loose amongst the pidgeons.

I make a great friend but a terrible enemy!

Morleygate

The reason I was so grumpy last night was that I was denied an opportunity to speak on a resolution by what I regarded as a rather untimely move to the vote after minimal discussion. I made it perfectly clear that I wished to speak but the majority of councillors voted in order to prevent me doing so.

The motion was carried with I believe two against- I voted against it because I regarded the motion as seriously flawed, contradictory, inadequately documented, inadequately proposed and hastily disposed of. It also would have been my valedictory speech and I had prepared a real humdinger.

On reflection after a night's sleep, I don't think the rebuttal was aimed at me personally. I imagine the decision to rush to the vote had been made behind closed doors and some of the participants were too foolish to realise that their actions backfired rather spectacularly to the public as it would have looked as though they were trying to freeze me out.

I was ready to resign in disgust last night but Mayor Bob persuaded me to sleep on it. Normally, in the cold light of dawn, the fancy plans of retribution made mentally in the early hours look somewhat over the top but I woke up this morning still angry.

There is an obligation on all Councillors to report any breaches of the Code of Conduct so I carefully read the documentation to see if this had been the case.

Had I been treated with respect? Not in my opinion, no.
Had the council brought itself into disrepute? Probably, in the eyes of the general public present.

As I waded through the turgid website, I realised what a particularly unpleasant quango the Standards Board is, how long-winded their procedures were and how much I don't actually like what they stand for. (It has become a party political pillowcase to include in the armoury of childish point scoring).

Eventually, I found an escape clause- they cannot investigate complaints about the way in which the authority conducts and records its meetings.

At this point, I felt relieved, I didn't have to report anyone at all. I still feel like a bear with a sore head though!

Eight weeks before I'm no longer a Councillor. I can then speak a lot more openly...

Only a brief post tonight

I've not long been back from a rather disappointing Town Council Meeting.

I'll blog further after sleeping on it, as they say.

Togetherness in Morley

The Morley Observer & Advertiser comes out on Wednesdays. This week, a few things caught my eye.

On page Five, there is mention that the Town Council precept will remain the same and I would have voted against putting it up anyway (I'd like to see it come down). This is good news for Morleians but it does rely on us drawing from reserves again this year, some £55k. The Reserves are higher than normal for various reasons but the current spending level is not sustainable in the longer term and we will have to cut our coat according to our cloth which means less spending or more local tax. I go for the former, unsurprisingly...

In the letters pages, there is a kerfuffle about some comments made in a letter from a BNP supporter last week, related to the Literature Festival. I have to say that the words went straight over my head as I could not recollect taking offense at them (and can't be arsed to to rooting around in the recycle bin).

I read Letters to the Editor with my Cynic filter engaged, namely- what are they saying, why are they saying it and is there more to this than meets the eye?

Some of my fellow politicians, however, probably more concerned about the forthcoming election battle in May than I am, have their PPS filters engaged (Political point Scoring). The letter headlines are "Shameful attempt at brainwashing", "Approved reading?", "Desperation setting in" (from a different BNP supporter) and "Come to the Forum" about our Leisure Centre. Letters three and four will probably result in further banter next week.

Over on page 12, the news is about "Stewie Mac" (his radio name, or at least that is what I call him). He has announced that he is standing again as a Leeds City Councillor in May, although last Wednesday he told me he was still undecided. He will be cringing at such a lengthly article and a picture of him from his days as a Marxist Bingo caller back in the swinging sixties. (Have you played Marxist Bingo? It is a bit like ordinary Bingo, except that when you win, instead of HOUSE! you shout PROPERTY IS THEFT!) There are some revealing comments on why he is an independent rather than a Morley Borough Independent. I like SMc, he is perceived by some as a loose cannon, exactly what the same people think of me!

Finally, on page 19, there is the "Morley Together" campaign launch, where "...organisations and businesses in Morley are being challenged to sign up to a campaign to tackle racism and xenophobia." Of course the principles of it are exemplary, even if the grammar isn't (there is a comma before an "and", I'm picky about that sort of thing) but it is from Colin Challen our MP and I do wonder if it is a localised Morley thing or a national Labour thing wherever they are losing ground to BNP. I read this with an increasing sense of unease as the tone implies that if you are not with us, you are against us.

I consider the term Racism to now be devalued to the point where Racist is a knee-jerk response to any opinions someone else doesn't agree with, or where the reactor feels that something should not be said out loud based on received wisdom, even though the statement may be patently true. Is it racist to say that in black street culture school isn't cool? Of course not. Is it racist to say Paki shop? it depends on the context, but generally, I would say no, even putting to one side that being Pakistani is not a race but a cultural grouping. Up until relatively recently, it simply referred to a local general store trader open for extended hours ran by a family business originally from the Indian Sub-Continent. It still does of course, but now there is the worry that someone (undefined) might take offense.

(As an aside here, I was in my local Premier Store recently which is ran by a Sikh family. A girl in the queue in front of me was talking on her mobile and as she was about to get served she said "I'll be about five minutes, I'm just buying some Fags in the Paki Shop." She then realised what she had said and looked sheepish. The owner and myself exchanged knowing smiles! I was tempted to tell her that she should have called it a "Sikh Shop" but wouldn't have wanted the owner thinking that I was taking the piss.I also suspect that she wouldn't have known or cared about the cultural differnce between the various Asian groupings...

I'd probably take offence to someone referring to "Pakis" in an offensive or ignorant manner but I much prefer Bigotry as the more accurate term rather than Racism. The other nuisance is that "Paki" is a shortening of "Pakistani" which is a bit of a mouthful with four syllables. (I never got concerned being called a Brit in Saudi, but did get uncomfortable over there on one occasion with a number of Scots (& their Wives) that I had a working relationship with but I didn't know too well, when it became apparent that they rather resented the English and their good natured taunts weren't that good natured).

Back to the campaign. It has wisely stayed clear of a number of Cliches that sound increasingly ridiculous in the political correctness backlash. It doesn't mention issues, it uses tolerance instead of respect and it doesn't emplore us to celebrate diversity.

Personally, my own value system tells me to follow the path of polite indifference. It sounds a bit harsh when said cold but so does "So what?" to cold calling salesmen!
Polite is the tolerance bit. I see no reason to be rude to people because of their own beliefs but it doesn't mean that I have to respect the beliefs they hold. Indifference simply means I'm not really interested in the detail of all of the mumbo jumbo in the baggage people and cultures carry around with them. Indifference does not make someone a racist in the same way that I choose to be indifferent to Opera, Modern Jazz, Football and Dogging. This doesn't mean that I am a cruel heartless bastard, just that I get interested in things, people and culture for some particular trigger reason of my own choice, rather than being told to.

We are seriously screwed up in this country over the whole business of being nice to victim groups, the various minorities having now being calculated to actually add up together as the majority of the population!(see We're (nearly) all victims now). It must make the do-gooders wring their hands in dismay when they realise that many of the victims often hold even more intolerant views than white van man.

I rather like the No prejudice, no preference strapline which I stumbled across recently at UKIPHome. An interesting blog but how mainstream UKIP it actually is I'm not certain. It is parodied here.

So, should any organisation I'm involved in sign up to Morley Together if the letter pops through the Chairman's letterbox? Colin has even said that we can approach him to take the pledge. Sorry Mate, I'm uncertain at this stage and somewhat cynical. I'd like to see the invite and maybe even chat with CC to try and work out his motives, because driving the BNP out of Morley has a big benefit for the Labour vote. For now, I go with polite indifference vergalised as No thanks, I'm not interested. Treat it like a pushy car salesman trying to close an unwanted deal, or a Jehova's Witness wanting to know if you believe that God is your Saviour. Dust down your assertivenes techniques, starting with broken record.

No thanks, I'm not interested...no thanks, I'm not interested...no thanks, I'm not interested...