Time for Change: Campaign for an Independent Green Thanet MP and Ramsgate Mayor

Another call over the postal vote muckup. But very concerned over Ramsgate Town Council the other day. Every council has to hold the Town Meeting to report on what they’re doing etc. I turned up a bit late. And there was 2 members of the public. 2. Also John and Liz as KCC councillors. I would mention John’s looking at reducing signage which is really important in a tourist town and has sorted out a lot of the Westcliff truck drivers – with a ferry and police force it seems incredible they can’t do it themselves when they see HGV’s parked by the beach. Tax waste on repairing HGV car parks or chewed up grass verges makes the Port seem pointless. The remaining Gang of Four have failed us. And at the RTC meet were only 8 or 9 of the Town Councillors themselves. I left after a few minutes as it seemed rather pointless. It seems very foolish after a year not to have Albion House redecorated (the upstairs could be used as the MP office saving on overbuilding or tax-waste) – and be paying fro...

Don't forget to boycott the election. Show our politicians how they've failed us. The hung parliament means the election will be rerun in 6 months anyway. Good to see the Gasworks being cleaned so as not to poison the public, also Dreamland with a CPO (the cry for TDC has to be "Get on with it!"): 3 years derelict and destroying the area - and successful launch of the Turner with "massive public policy failure". I'm very concerned at the noise and pollution and cost and value of the Port which seems far better suited to the "Landings" tourism project and foot ferry than an HGV truckstop for lorry drivers to crap in a bag and throw on the beach and park on the verges again. A horrific meeting last night at RTC's annual meeting which I'll write more later as it does seem to have turned in on itself. But a very interesting email and reply below on why Thanet's and UK democracy is rather flawed as the main parties collapse and mess with...

Why bother voting? The same tired parties and candidates: not one Thanet policy between them just general points on “reducing crime” and “increasing employment”. You don’t say. If Messrs Ladyman, Gale and Sandys could do that wouldn’t Thanet be in better condition than it is? 30 years from Mr Gale of watching Margate burn down. 13 years from Mr Ladyman of Ramsgate falling down. 3 years from Ms Sandys parachuted in to Thanet from Tory head office to say nothing. And the election will result in a national hung parliament and will have to be restaged within 6 months or so – like every previous hung parliament. The same farce all over again. Let the other 1,300 MP’s and Lords vote on minor tweaks to give Britain a US-style governance and constitution - after 250 years. Use your vote in Thanet well. Don’t vote. Simply don't cast your vote. Or spoil your ballot paper - think of it as “None of the above”. Although spoiled papers are often excluded from the turnout figures and "none o...

http://www.guardian.co.uk/society/2010/apr/19/doncaster-council-failing-and-dysfunctional Doncaster council is described as “dysfunctional” over at least 15 years of incompetence and now has direct rule by Ministers and the Audit Commission. This comes some years after the “Donnygate” corruption scandal - which seems very tame in comparison - with councillors and civil servants fiddling expenses and 21(!) of them convicted. http://www.guardian.co.uk/society/2002/mar/13/uknews Certainly for far less amounts than MP’s expenses – now nearly 400(!) MP’s have repaid c.£3k each. One quote today from Labour’s whistleblower Ron Rose who described the Doncaster councillors and civil servants as: “even being able to drag Zurich down to Third World status” And the Audit Commission (the Government’s inspector of c.440 UK councils) said: "The council is not properly run and as a result it is failing in its legal obligation to make arrangements to secure continuous improvement in the way in wh...

Kent on Sunday letter on pollution and policing Manston below. Kent Police have also rung to arrange a meeting tomorrow which is positive - although this would be after a meeting with Special Branch and the local Police. It does seem as though you're in more trouble with Police action from shoplifitng a bag of sweets than breaching all the regulations and pollution safeguards at an airport. Rather than "citizens in uniform" there does seem a police expectation that other public bodies don't require investigation which is clearly nonsense and certainly not the casse if MP's like Damien Green are arrested even within Parliament. Let's see what they've to say. If you'd like to raise a concern over Manston or TDC then drop Mark a line for the official complaint: mark.brotherhood@kent.pnn.police.uk He's a DS in "Frontier Operations" I thought the Border Agency now handled frontiers or maybe the Coastguard - unless its frontiers of speace for K...

I'm not standing in the election: best wishes to the candidates and public. There's also a letter on P.23 of Kent on Sunday today detailing some of the air pollution from Manston.

I've been asked to take part in a study by the University of Buckingham on the environmental impacts of Manston - it should make a useful case study for future airport expansion: see below: The intention of this research is to establish what the likely major environmental impacts of expansion at Kent International (formerly Manston) Airport will be. According to the airport’s Master Plan the aim is to expand from servicing less than 50,000 passengers per year in 2010 to servicing 2.2million passengers per year by 2018 and 4.7million by 2033. With regard to the Kent International Airport (KIA) Master Plan for Expansion: To view the Master Plan please visit: http://www.kentinternationalairport-manston.com/KIA%20Master%20Plan%20LR.pdf What do you think will be the major environmental impacts of expansion at KIA? ...The exisiting water pollution, noise and air pollution are already detailed. Infratil and TDC the local council have also removed the noise a...

Remember the jumbo jet taking off over the towns at 2am on 1st April? No reply from Tom Wilson the new head of Manston as the email below. Who exactly is running Infratil and allowing planes to take off and land at night? And why the collusion from TDC? If a pub was serving drinks at 2am or padlocking the fire escape doors, TDC and the Police would rightly be all over them. Why the silence from our MP's, KCC, 56 councillors and TDC on an airport breaching the council's own 106 regulations? We don't hear much from our councillors on the benefits of night flights any more? Nothing on a Parkway train station at Manston from Messrs Carter and Gale? What about the benefits of landing planes on the drinking water supply? Or even the MOD Fire station squirting thousands of litres of chemical foam into the drainage system? What has been going on? Email below: Hi Tom Any news on this please. Also why did Infratil allow a plane to takeoff last night/this morning at 2am from Manston -...

Dead Towns. Dead election? And so the towns die. Charity shops full of dead people’s belongings as the townspeople age and die. High St full of derelict and closed shops. Failure to repair benches or beach shelters. Even to pick up dog muck. Empty houses as people die or leave. The public poisoned through removing noise and air monitors to expand the airport. And for £60M in council tax and £2Bn in KCC tax we receive precisely nothing. Mere vanity projects fro civil servants and politicians such as shopping centres and art galleries and cargo airports. All of which have failed. Reading the main Party manifestos none of it is relevant to Thanet. Building two new aircraft carriers? Not here. Hundreds of thousands of green jobs? Where? Unemployment in Thanet is higher than ever. A Big Society? Empty phrases for policies that invariably exist anyway. And we certainly didn’t need 4,000 new laws this decade. The reality is that the main parties have achieved nothing in Thanet. The reality is...

Still no rely from Tom Wilson of Infratil on why planes are continuing to breach the overflight ban at Manston and douse the towns in aviation fuel discharge. Email pasted in to follow. And still no news from Brian White – formerly Environment Director and now a quick job title change and 0% salary increase to Director of Regeneration - on why TDC removed the noise and air monitoring at Manston. Helping Infratil to downgrade the public safety measures as the airport was expanding verges on manslaughter. And even as late as the night flight announcement last July removing the main benzene monitor at the airport. And still the planes fly. Breaching the overflight ban in place for years. Yet repeatedly breached with the collusion of our own councillors and civil servants. Or will they blame each other? Or all keep silent? And planes landing onto the towns’ drinking water supply – under the runway and discharging into Pegwell Bay. You couldn’t make it up could you? But how many dead? And w...

TDC senior staff salaries now revealed after dozens of FOI requests: http://www.thanet.gov.uk/advice__benefits/council_departments/corporate_management_team/corporate_management_team_pay.aspx This doesn't - as yet - include expenses and other benefits eg parking. I have an Excel of all the other c.750 council salaries of £22M if anyone would like a copy. And it seems the councillors are not briefed on these salaries at council meetings - what is the purpose of councillors then? Tea and biscuits - and idle pomp and ceremony? And look at the bloat and waste. Salaries of c.£70-110k for managing monopoly public services and tax-funds. Sheer bloat and waste. And TDC is still one of Britain's worst councils. What has been going on? What have our councillors and MP's been doing with their tax-salaries and tax-expenses? Over a quarter of a million pounds for each of Messrs Gale and Ladyman - to watch tax funds being sprayed up the wall and the towns burn down. And mere silence from...

Why the delays and silence from our politicians and civil servants on the pollution, corruption and construction in Thanet? Our politicians and civil servants have failed us: · major pollution incidents and cover-up · Third World death rates · deliberate pollution from Manston · collapse of Margate · utter waste of tax-funds and tax-salaries Please email for a leaflet for your window and email to a friend: timgarbutt@yahoo.com With a 664 vote majority after 3 elections Steve Ladyman cannot win. Laura Sandys is a mere "parachute candidate" dropped in from Tory Head Office: it could be Thanet or Taunton. Stop the Pollution. Stop the Corruption. Stop the Construction. Vote Garbutt May 6th: Independent Green Stop the Pollution: • Close Manston airport: built on the polluted drinking water supply - and repeated safety breaches by TDC and Infratil • Thor mercury factory near Hornby - publish toxin cleanup details: should have closed in 1988 bu...

And Ramsgate and Broadstairs tourist centres close down. Excellent. "Improved service": electronic signs. Mobile tourist van at events etc etc. The centres already exist. Already staffed. Run for many years etc etc. The usual "minimargateism" of switching budgets etc between towns. And 0% salary fraud increases of £10-£20k. I wonder if you gave our councillors and civil servants and thousand times more budget and time if they'd simply waste more? Town Clerks underpants not even flying from flagpoles. And for this we pay £60M in council tax. Plus tax pensions for civil servants? And Infratil breach all the 106 regulations. And land on the drinking water supply. Councillors look at each other. Civil servants look at each other. Public look at councillors. TDC look at KCC. KCC look at Parliament. Parliament looks at public. Belgian Parliament looks at UK. Time rolls on. Map of drinking water supply: http://savethanetswatersupply.blogspot.com/ You couldn't make...

Infratil repeatedly breach the night flights 106 regulations at Manston. Fly loop training flights over the towns. Takeoff and land over the towns. Discharge aviation fuel into the drinking water and Pegwell bay. Last night even a jet taking off from Manston over the towns at 2am. Why the silence from Brian White? Why the failure to even warn Infratil? Why no mobile monitors to measure the fuel discharge? Infratil provided 3 mobile monitors they say. Why the failure to impose the fines and tighter regulation of Manston? I see no council approval to waive regulation. No approval to allow cancer to increase. On the contrary all the regulations are to limit public exposure to noise and air pollution. Did Brian decide himself not to bother? Was it a cosy deal behind closed doors with councillors? Which ones? It can't be Matt Clarke. He's not there. Is it Infratil policy? They don't pay Brian's wages. Nor the cleanup costs. Why allowing the cancer cost to increase? For month...