Pat Yourselves on the Back (From Times Series)

Pat Yourselves on the Back

7:59pm Thursday 8th January 2009

• Print
• Email
• Comments(2)

This is the time of year when thoughts turn to the Council’s Budget. Barnet’s Conservative Cabinet met on Tuesday at Barnet House to discuss the Budget Headlines for 2009-10.

The Budget Headlines are a broad brush summary of what the Council intends to spend in the next financial year. It also lists the cuts, and “efficiencies” that are needed to achieve a balanced budget.

The packed public gallery listened as the Leader of the Council intoned his introduction. He reminded his colleagues that they were following usual procedures.

Er no, the usual procedure as long as I can remember is that this debate takes place at the December meeting of full Council. This is an opportunity for opposition councillors to challenge the figures and ask question about the proposals.

Anyway, the Leader then invited contributions from cabinet members. The general theme of the debate was “aren’t we wonderful and isn’t everyone else horrid.”

Cabinet members seemed to be in competition with one another for the OBN award. Whilst all this fulsome praise of the Council was being delivered, the public address system failed!

If readers have never attended a Council meeting let me explain. Microphones are strategically placed on the tables. They are joined together by leads. Any slight movement can cause a lead to disconnect.

The problem can only be resolved by finding which lead is disconnected. Unfortunately the layout of the tables (in a square) makes it physically difficult to remedy the fault.

One by one each cabinet member had their say. Not one word of criticism, not a question of doubt, simply a passive acceptance of the Leader’s report.

The most noticeable contribution from one cabinet member there came when this cabinet member declared “we should all pat ourselves on the back “(I think he repeated this mantra several times) and promptly got down on his hand and knees scrabbling around trying to sort out the microphone leads. Its ok we heard you the first time!

All over in twenty minutes; one senior cabinet member remarked on the way out. “Twenty minutes discussing a £150million pound budget, whilst in the next door committee room The Welsh Harp Joint Consultative Committee has hardly got off the ground”

Pat yourselves on the back!