Suits you Madam Mayor

Nobody could see this one coming, as Residents Association Cllr John Mylod handed over the chains of office in May this year. I know much has already been said in the Local and National press concerning the Tory Administration at Havering increasing the Mayors allowance from £13,000 to £27,000. Quite how they can come to this conclusion, nobody knows.

Your Residents Association Councillors called in this decision for scrutiny, during the discussion one of the reasons put forward by the Conservatives was the cost of ladies clothes had increased, our very own Cllr Morgon said he could not believe that.

However, all of the Tories were on a three line whip that night and Cllr Binion (Tory Havering Park) hit back with a classic “Haven’t you ever been out shopping with your wife ?, women’s clothes aren’t cheap”. Well there you have it, no more Matalan for our Mayor and Deputy.

In a strange quirk of the rules at Havering, anything left in the pot after the year is split between the Mayor and Deputy, so if you do very little you are rewarded with more money. If you are a busy Mayor, you get nothing. Now nobody is saying that Mayor, Cllr Wendy Brice Thompson or Deputy, Cllr Georgina Galpin will do nothing, they are actually both nice ladies and I know they are working very hard raising money for the Mayors Charity.

Last year, our Residents Association Mayor, Cllr John Mylod and his wife Pat worked non stop for the whole year, they attended over 500 events and could do no more. At the time of the increase, the Conservative Mayor and Deputy had done no more engagements than John and Pat had, but hey they just got on and done the job without reward.

It’s just a shame that the Tories can not seem to get things right with allowances, and they have to go the whole way and give themselves the biggest budget in London (outer London). Watch this space for more on allowances, im sure it’s not the last we have heard.