How Embarrassing!

Green Councillors Keeling and Higgins, have come up with an interesting wheeze.

Readers will recall that at the last Labour Group meeting, Labour councillors discussed the mayor’s decision to renege on the promises that she had made in her manifesto, only 12 months before. In a motion that was critical of the mayor, Councillors Das Gupta and Beckles urged the Labour Group to support a return to the policy upon which they had been elected.

It was a move that was popular with the members of the Labour Group and they duly voted in favour of the motion by a margin of 2:1.

It was then, in what seemed to be a stroke of Machiavellian genius, that Cllr Asser intervened to suggest that the motion was in order to help the Group define its policy. It was not for discussion at full council. As the mover of the motion, Cllr Das Gupta accepted this.

It seemed that an embarrassing public debate had been avoided.

And so it was until Cllrs Keeling and Higgins proposed their own motion on 50% of new housing for social rent. The motion is included below alongside the original motion from Das Gupta and Beckles. You will note a remarkable similarity between the two.

The Green councillors have proposed a policy on housing development that mirrors that of the Labour Group, and is eerily similar to the policy on which they fought the last election, but which is now opposed by the mayor. We look forward to seeing how this plays out.

Our suspicion is that the business managers will ensure that it is never discussed. It is motion number 10 and we anticipate a bit of filibustering on the part of the mayor’s allies that will ensure that time runs out before this motion is ever discussed.

Nonetheless, well-done to Cllrs Higgins and Keeling. You have raised an important point, or rather two (social housing and the mayor’s tenuous commitment to her manifesto) and you have done this with some wit.

How many of the Labour Group will vote to support their own policy, we wonder?

Here is the piece from the manifesto, just in case you have mislaid your copy.