We thought that we’d take a look at the progress Mayor Fiaz is making after three years in office. In her campaign she asserted that she was “Building Newham’s Future”. Let’s see how she is doing.

While some of you were doing interesting things, like watching paint dry, some of us were reflecting upon the activities of the Overview and Scrutiny Commission.

We’ve been having a bit of fun at the expense of the incompetents in the Town Hall and at their personal ambitions. What this disguises is, that real people in Newham have begun to suffer and notice the drop in quality of services across the council.

Having revealed that the Labour Party does not trust its members to choose their candidates for mayor and councillors, we thought that we’d have a look at some of the potential mayoral candidates.

We hear that the borough commander has recently decamped from Newham to set up his office in neighbouring Waltham Forest (his command is across the two boroughs). The reasons we have been given are that he found it impossible to work with the current Mayor.

We learn that Labour Party members in Newham have all received an email about the suspension of the parties in East and West Ham. They learned that the parties are still suspended!

A Labour MP brutally murdered by a right-wing extremist and her sister stands for her seat; it should have been a shoe in for Labour as they sought to capitalise on the sympathy vote. In 2019, at the general election Labour was returned with a healthy 3500 vote majority and some 42% of the vote.

You may have heard things along the lines of “it’s the government’s fault”, or “It’s Robin Wales’ fault, (he only left a balance of £54m and we’ve used it up!)”, or “we have great plans about how we spend your money”.

An Update on the Internecine Factionalism that is Rife in Newham Labour.

A recent meeting of the Labour Group were told that some eight members of the Group were currently under investigation by the Labour Party. This is unprecedented. Fully 12% of the Labour Group are being investigated by the Labour Party for breaches of their rules.

It’s got the right buzzword, “Peace”. Everyone is welcome. How can Open Newham be critical of such an event? Everyone in their right mind must hope, and if they have a deity in their lives, might even pray for peace in Gaza. You’d have to be cruel to wish otherwise.

So, is that what Newham Muslim Forum, the Mayor’s favoured Muslim organisation, is doing?

You would think that we had become used to the hypocrisy of the current regime. But then, something new happens and you realise that it can get worse.

On Thursday 6th May, Newham, and much of the country went to the polls. The results are in and now the arguments begin about what the results mean.

Readers who vote using postal ballots will have received their ballots and some of you will have filled these in and sent back your ballots for the Mayor of London; for the GLA member; and for the Referendum. All sorted.

But if you are fortunate enough to live in East Ham’s Central ward, you will have the chance to vote in the by-election for a councillor to replace Julianne Marriot.

Back in those halcyon days before the realities of office set in, Ms Fiaz was clear in her intentions to end the office of the Directly Elected Mayor, (DEM).

Gone were the days of concentrating so much power in the hands of a single individual.

So, the referendum is happening. Residents have begun to receive propaganda from both sides of the campaign. That is from those who want to keep the mayor and those who want a Leader and Committee model.

Newham will shortly be welcoming Karen Whelan to the senior staff team. Ms Whelan will come in to head the council’s Community Wealth Building initiative, one of Mayor Fiaz’s pet projects imported from Corbynite Preston.

For those of you who are wondering why the council has not been a little more energetic in informing the public about the referendum, we can assist.

We asked recently how long the Labour Party was going to be before it reported on the complaints of antisemitism against several of Newham’s Labour Group. No sooner had we published than this turned up.

The London Mayoral Election is coming up and Sadiq Khan is facing competition from a handful of candidates that no-one has ever heard of. If he fails to get an overwhelming mandate, that would be something of an embarrassment.