EXCLUSIVE: London Mayor rants at Council Leader?
Regular readers may have noticed a slight slow down in postings over the past few days. Sadly, unlike many of our elected councillors, we have to actually work for a living rather than having the Council Taxpayer help us out, hence we've been busy.
That said we do have some exclusive news just in. According to our source in the Town Hall, the leader of the Council, Chris Roberts, attended some sort of dinner this past week at which there were Council leaders from across London, as well as the Mayor of London, Ken Livingstone.
At this event we've been told that Ken Livingstone let off a volley of abuse and derision at Chris Roberts on a number of key issues. From what we've been told words along the lines of incompetent and rubbish were levelled at Roberts. From what we've been told Roberts simply took it all and didn't even try to defend himself.
We're not sure which is worse. Being so weak that you can't come back at Livingstone, or having the pot call the kettle black.
That said we do have some exclusive news just in. According to our source in the Town Hall, the leader of the Council, Chris Roberts, attended some sort of dinner this past week at which there were Council leaders from across London, as well as the Mayor of London, Ken Livingstone.
At this event we've been told that Ken Livingstone let off a volley of abuse and derision at Chris Roberts on a number of key issues. From what we've been told words along the lines of incompetent and rubbish were levelled at Roberts. From what we've been told Roberts simply took it all and didn't even try to defend himself.
We're not sure which is worse. Being so weak that you can't come back at Livingstone, or having the pot call the kettle black.
Labels: Chris Roberts, gossip, Livingstone
posted by greenwich.watch at 12:44 pm
5 Comments:
Mind you, is there a council leader in London that our Ken DOES like? Remember, he did have the idea of reducing London boroughs from 32 to five before he rejoined the Labour party and buttoned his lip about it.
Good yarn, though :-)
OT almost but Roberts did support Nicky Gavron in the 2003 selection for Labour mayoral candidate (ie. Livingstone by proxy).
But Livingstone and Roberts have had numerous beefs over the years, not least over social housing (or lack thereof) on the Greenwich peninsula (ie. Livingstone wanted more and Roberts took what developers offered). While Roberts would no doubt lose his rag in a second if this took place in the right company, this sounds as if it didn't.
That's interesting to hear about Livingstone and the Greenwich peninsula - the way the Millennium Village has become a buy-to-letters' paradise is criminal.
Agreed, Inspector, although it's unclear to me how making the Peninsula into a ghetto for benefit claimants and public sector workers would be any better.
The beef between Livingstone and Roberts regarding the peninsula was over the London Plan, which states that 40% of housing there should be set aside for social housing and key workers. Roberts took the side of the developers. Well, the council treat Woolwich tenants with naked contempt so why should anywhere else be different? Other examples of Roberts making friends and influencing people included the Ferrier, where he managed to antagonise one Shahid Malik MP in the pages of the Guardian over the council's refusal to allow tenants the right of return once the place had been renovated. Obviously this is the 'political leadership' the govt. bangs on about so much (I wonder what the government think of Roberts?).
Might this be the occasion of the Livingstone slap-down of the charmless one?:
http://www.alg.gov.uk/doc.asp?doc=18237&cat=937
"Cllr Chris Roberts (Lab) – Culture, Tourism and the Olympics"
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