Reform closes down flood committee in one of Britain’s most flood-prone areas

Lincolnshire is one of the UK counties that is most at risk of flooding, with over a third of residents being at “direct risk of flooding“. In some areas of the county that figure rises to 95% of properties.

So, naturally, after pretending to cut a bunch of initiatives that never existed in the first place, the first thing the new Reform local administration in Lincolnshire does is to disband Lincolnshire County Council’s Flood and Water Management Scrutiny Committee.

…the closed committee allowed councillors to hold bodies like Anglian Water, the Environment Agency and Internal Drainage Boards to account.

A Labour councillor in the area describes closing it down as being “reckless, foolhardy and wrong”.

Firefighters do not trust Reform

Firefighters launched a campaign to warn people against voting for Reform in the recent Runcorn and Helsby by-election

Their union, the Fire Brigades Union, produced this flyer, highlighting how Nigel ‘man of the people’ Farage is in fact very much a hypocritical anti-worker part of the very establishment he pretends to rail against.

Flyer entitled ‘Firefighters do not trust Reform UK’

Says the union’s general secretary:

Farage and Reform present a direct threat to workers’ rights in our country.

Reform is a part of the establishment. We cannot allow their divisive anti-migrant politics to pit workers against each other.

Their policies and track record speak for themselves: threatening to slash and privatise public services, voting against improvements to working conditions in parliament.

Nigel Farage has 9 jobs outside of supposedly being an MP

It’s not very surprising that Nigel Farage doesn’t take the time to actually do the job he was elected to do when we learn that he has 9 other paid gigs on the go. And that’s excluding any responsibilities that being both the owner of the private company known as Reform UK and the political leader of that company-party might entail.

Left Foot Forward lists the jobs, along with his earnings since the last British General Election.

  • Reform UK MP for Clacton – £93,904
  • Commentator on Sky News Australia (News Corp) – £25,368.00 for 19 hours work over ‘several’ months
  • Gold Bullion ambassador for Direct Bullion – £280,500 for 4 hours work per month
  • TV presenter on GB News – £331,393
  • Influencer on Facebook/Meta – £2,794.81
  • Influencer on X – £11,111.95
  • Personalised videos on Cameo – £125,303.64
  • Public speaker at AZ Liberty Network and Nomad Capitalist – £65,378.92
  • Journalist at Telegraph – £36,000 (£4,000 per month since August)
  • Influencer on Youtube/Google – £17,545.90

Since last July then he’s earned about £900k from his many second jobs – more than any other MP. This is roughly 10x as much as his £93k salary as a member of parliament. That presumably explains why he puts 10x as much effort into his supposedly secondary grifts.

Reform councillors eliminate all zero LTNs from the areas they control

Fresh on the back of sacking non-existent DEI employees, Reform-led councils have “fulfilled their pledge” to remove all LTNs, also known as Low Traffic Neighbourhoods, from the areas that they now control.

Zia Yusuf, Reform UK’s chair, said last week there would be a “large-scale reversal” of existing LTNs in the 10 areas across England where the party won control of the councils in local elections on 1 May.

However, once again, the only reason that none exist in their areas today is because there never was any in any of the councils concerned in the first place.

A Liberal Democrat sums it up:

Reform are utterly clueless about how to run a council. From councillors who won’t take up their seats to schemes that don’t exist, it’s clear that they don’t understand the needs of their communities.

Now they have some power, they need to learn how to Google things first.

For what it’s worth, LTNs are:

…traffic interventions that filter smaller, residential roads using either physical barriers like bollards and planters or numberplate-recognition cameras to prevent motor vehicles using them as through routes.

Which set out to improve safety, health and the environment they incorporate. The science shows that:

…LTNs cut traffic, clean the air and enable more walking and cycling. Crucially, despite the tone of the debates you might be hearing, LTNs are effective and popular, and they become more popular over time.

Reform council members accused of not having a clue how to do their jobs by their colleagues

The Reform councillors’ first meeting now they’re in charge of Nottinghamshire County Council has not proceeded smoothly.

First we saw accusations of electoral malfeasance:

Former deputy leader Bruce Laughton went through the seven Nolan principles of public life and accused Reform of breaking them all in the election campaign. He said Reform made false promises on election leaflets and tried and failed to get former Conservative councillors to join Reform.

Then Councillor Lee, former Conservative vice-chair, went after Reform Councillor John Doddy:

I don’t think you have a clue to be honest of what this job entails. For my residents, I hope I am wrong, but I’m rarely wrong when it comes to politics. When I first met John Doddy, I thought he was a joke and a clown and I’ve been proven right.

To be honest, it sounds like it was actually the Conservatives that started the squabble this time, not Reform, so can’t really blame Reform for that. More damning to the latter perhaps is the reporter’s conclusion at the end of the article that reported this.

Perhaps the reason much of the atmosphere on Thursday was so bland was because in terms of policy, much remains unclear in terms of Reform’s positions in Nottinghamshire. Councillor Barton repeatedly said it was “too early to say” when questioned on issues ranging from home working to immigration.

I’m sure Reform did not campaign on it being “too early to say” anything about immigration.

Farage skips the EU summit debate to vacation in the same EU he apparently hates so much

Reform owner & leader Nigel Farage – key architect of Brexit and despiser of Europe – decided to skip a key House of Commons debate on the forthcoming UK-EU summit to go to his supposedly-hated Europe for a holiday.

Rather than skip his elected duties, he could have just waited a few days until Parliament was in recess before vacationing. But no, his priority was to get a tan under the French sun rather than actually doing his job – and this was the bit of it he pretends he cares about the most.

A Labour spokeperson sums Farage’s laziness and seemingly inability to take his job seriously nicely:

Nigel Farage has one of the poorest attendances of all MPs, turning up for only a third of votes. He already earns hundreds of thousands doing everything other than what he was elected to do – and now he’s off sunbathing instead of representing us in Clacton.

You’d think the one issue he’d want to make a song and dance about in the chamber is the EU. But maybe he’s gone quiet to avoid the embarrassment – because while he shouted from the sidelines and failed to deliver anything of substance…

Obviously he still feels compelled to shout about Starmer “surrendering” to the EU. But when it comes to actually taking some action to shape the British relationship with EU, well, that’s too much like hard work.

Reform bans councils from flying most flags

Always focusing on fixing the worst problems of society, Reform has been busy wasting its time and our money by taking the time to officially ban flags from being displayed at council premises..

Reform chairman Zia Yusuf had earlier announced that “Reform-controlled English councils will move at speed to resolve that the only flags permitted to be flown on or in its buildings will be the Union Jack and St George’s flag”.

“At speed”, no less.

Unfortunately this annoyed some of the actual local people that their councillors are supposed to represent, so they had to walk it back a bit and add county flags to the allow-list.

All other flags remain forbidden though. My guess is that the main point of this in the minds of many of Reform’s decision-makers is to ban the Pride flag, often flown as a sign on solidarity with LGBTQ+ people. And sure enough, they have been busy removing them.

Liberal Democrat councillor Ellie Hopgood condemned the decision and said it was a “disrespectful, mean-spirited act” ahead of Saturday’s Pride in Armed Forces event in Durham.

However Pride is of course not the only flag in the world. The ban includes the Ukrainian flag, frequently flown as “a gesture of solidarity we see across the whole country” with the beleaguered country currently under illegal attack by Putin’s Russia. Understandably, more normal council folk don’t like this decision, and note their leader’s deep love of that conflict’s aggressors.

A Liberal Democrat spokesman said: ‘We know the only flag most Reform politicians want to fly is the Russian flag and these plastic patriots are proving to be everything that we thought they were.

‘A bunch of Putin apologists who would rather tear down the symbols of brave Ukrainians fighting for freedom than stand with them.’

Lincolnshire Mayor attempts to fire non-existent DEI staff

Reform mayor for Lincolnshire Andrea Jenkyns recently revealed the unsurprising news that due to her recent election victory:

We are going to have a Lincolnshire Doge. We are going to ensure that we get rid of diversity officers because amazingly Lincolnshire County Council is now Reform controlled.

And sure enough there are zero diversity officers employed by the council even just a few weeks into her tenure.

Such success! Wow! Only it’s less a sign of political efficacy when you find out that there never were any diversity officers there in the first place.

Do any of these people do even the most cursory of research into the jobs they want to be elected to?

As an anonymous Conservative said to the Independent about this very local mayor who is definitely acting only in the interests of very local people tackling very local issues:

“Someone who lives in Lincolnshire would know that there aren’t any DEI roles going in Lincolnshire Council.
…
It the latest proof that Reform is a one-man band without the answers needed to tackle the problems facing hardworking families across Britain.”

Wayne Titley becomes the fifth Reform councillor to quit his job after serving 2 weeks

Wayne Titley, recently elected to be a Staffordshire County Councillor, lasted just two weeks before stepping down for “personal reasons”, unable to represent voters “in the way they deserve”.

No-one really seems to have said precisely why, but it was noted that:

…he attracted criticism for a post on his Facebook account in March that called on the navy to intercept small boats attempting to reach Britain and use a “volley of gun fire aimed at sinking them”.

So it’s probably his terrible posting habits. Reform made comments to suggest that he had received enough “abuse” to mean that he couldn’t continue as councillor.

He also quit his position on Gnosall Parish Council.

Another expensive “needless by-election” has to be arranged.

Reform loses their fourth councillor as Luke Shingler switches to be an independent

Despite appearing on the ballot paper as the Reform candidate in the recent local council election for Nuneaton’s Galley Common in Warwickshire, he ended up taking his position as an independent councillor rather than representing Reform.

He’s another one who apparently didn’t check the rules.

In a statement on Facebook on 28 April, Shingler said he “cannot run under a political organisation, party or movement due to my employment”.

It seems that he works for the RAF. And, for better or worse:

Members of the armed forces face considerable restrictions on political freedoms that are taken for granted by most of the population. They are not permitted to join a trade union or a political organisation, to speak to the media or in public without permission or to stand for elected office.