...this blog is delighted to have exclusive access to the document produced this morning by the Department of Communities and Local Government outlining Eric Pickle's achievements over the last two years:
Showing posts with label Eric Pickles. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Eric Pickles. Show all posts
19 October 2011
Pickles booed at local authority recycling conference
I've just returned from a work conference about waste management, rubbish and recycling. Delegates came from across local government - professional recycling officers, politicians of all parties and some of the most well known contractors in the field.
Pickles obviously wasn't there - but his image was - and it was roundly booed. His £250 million bribe to have chicken tikka massallas thrown out on a weekly basis also received short shrift. The conference was told latest research shows that 80% of those whose rubbish is taken away every fortnight don't want to return to a weekly collection, because they like the priority such arrangments give to recycling.
Given Pickles is the local government minister one has to speculate how much longer he can continue given his lack of support from local councils and councillors?
Pickles obviously wasn't there - but his image was - and it was roundly booed. His £250 million bribe to have chicken tikka massallas thrown out on a weekly basis also received short shrift. The conference was told latest research shows that 80% of those whose rubbish is taken away every fortnight don't want to return to a weekly collection, because they like the priority such arrangments give to recycling.
Given Pickles is the local government minister one has to speculate how much longer he can continue given his lack of support from local councils and councillors?
30 September 2011
It's time to recycle Eric Pickles
I was going to comment on today's announcement from the local government department of a quarter of a billion pound bribe to local authorities to reintroduce weekly bin collections - but Eaten by Missionaries got there first.
But soon the real debate will surely move on to the role and purpose of the local government department itself. If councils are going to have autonomy to decide on the form and level of local services - why do they still have a man in Whitehall telling them that he knows best?
Abolition of the DCLG would free up local government from pointless interference and save a vast amount of cash in these austere times. Enough for a few chicken tikka masalas I'd imagine...
But soon the real debate will surely move on to the role and purpose of the local government department itself. If councils are going to have autonomy to decide on the form and level of local services - why do they still have a man in Whitehall telling them that he knows best?
Abolition of the DCLG would free up local government from pointless interference and save a vast amount of cash in these austere times. Enough for a few chicken tikka masalas I'd imagine...
7 August 2011
Eric Pickles - time for a reshuffle?
Eric Pickles has been in the spotlight on a number of Lib Dem blogs - including two of my favourites - Liberal England and Eaten by Missionaries for his comments on town centre parking.
Pickles place in the cabinet is somewhat of a mystery. He's not a great communicator as this clip from Question Time at the height of the MPs expenses scandal shows:
His department is also somewhat of a mystery. For a government committed to localism (and it genuinely is - partly because of Lib Dem influence and partly because 13 years of Labour central command and control patently failed) his department is struggling for a role.
Pickles seems stuck in a contradiction - abolishing central command rules on things like town centre car parking, but yet claiming at the same time it will have some magical national effect of meeting the Daily Mail agenda.
The fact is - if you stop controlling things from the centre then local authorities will do different things. And that will include banning cars from town centres, or jacking up car park fees or agreeing out of town developments at the expense of existing town centres. And that is surely the point of localism.
But the question then is - what is the point of the DCLG?
Pickles place in the cabinet is somewhat of a mystery. He's not a great communicator as this clip from Question Time at the height of the MPs expenses scandal shows:
His department is also somewhat of a mystery. For a government committed to localism (and it genuinely is - partly because of Lib Dem influence and partly because 13 years of Labour central command and control patently failed) his department is struggling for a role.
Pickles seems stuck in a contradiction - abolishing central command rules on things like town centre car parking, but yet claiming at the same time it will have some magical national effect of meeting the Daily Mail agenda.
The fact is - if you stop controlling things from the centre then local authorities will do different things. And that will include banning cars from town centres, or jacking up car park fees or agreeing out of town developments at the expense of existing town centres. And that is surely the point of localism.
But the question then is - what is the point of the DCLG?
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