Yesterday I got a call from Mrs Sane who was out on the road asking me to phone the police for her and tell them that some clever person had lobbed a traffic cone off an island onto the dual carriageway below and that just after the cone was a broken down and the two [...]
Please try not to laugh because this is very serious. Coventry has left the City Region of Birmingham, Coventry & the Black Country.
Since Telford & Wrekin parted company with the city region, it’s become more and more irrelevant as its focus narrows to providing the same Birmingham-centric services as the plethora of regional quangos infesting [...]
Last night I went to Smethwick with the Campaign for an English Parliament to protest against the Regional Grand Committee for the West Midlands.
We waved placards and held up a 12ft banner (with difficulty). Lots of motorists were stopping in the road to read them and quite a few were honking horns in support and [...]
I would love to have been a fly on the wall in Simon Murphy’s office today when he got the call from Telford & Wrekin Council announcing that they were leaving his city region quango with immediate effect.
A week ago to this day I wrote an email to the leader of Telford & Wrekin Council, [...]
The Birmingham Post is claiming that a Tory plan to strip Regional Development Agencies of some of their powers will damage the economy of the West Midlands and centralise decision making.
This is absolute nonsense. Removing the regional quangocracy will empower local communities, increase democratic accountability in the decision-making process and could provide a vital boost [...]
According to the Times, Gordon Brown is planning to create a network of London-type mayors in the “English regions” to combat Englishness and promote the Britishness agenda he has become obsessed since being parachuted into the post of Prime Minister without a mandate.
England has always been considered expendable by the Labour Party, hence their willingness to embrace [...]
No Mandate Brown is appealing to “middle England” to support more devolution for Scotland and support the union.
The One Eyed Wonder of Wankistan says that the UK is “the world’s most successful multi-national state” but that the union isn’t “a contract of convenience that can be renegotiated”. Multi-national or multi-regional? Remember, as far [...]
The following was in tonight’s Shropshire Star:
Claims City Region costs won’t be fair
People in Telford will be paying on average substantially more towards the controversial West Midlands City Region than their counterparts in Birmingham, campaigners claimed today.
The operating cots of the city region will be divided into 10 equal shares – meaning the one million [...]
FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE
Information provided to the West Midlands NO! Campaign following a Freedom of Information Request has raised some serious questions about the City Region.
The City Region will not be funded on a pro-rata basis as previously thought, but by simply dividing the costs into 10 equal shares. This means, for example, Birmingham’s 1m residents [...]
No Mandate Brown took some time out of his busy schedule to tell one of his PR guru’s to send a pointless and evasive answer to the West Midlands NO! petition calling on the British government to abolish regional quangos.
The Government believes there are issues which extend beyond the boundaries of even the largest local [...]
The following article is in tonight’s Shropshire Star …
The leader of Telford & Wrekin Council today defended himself against claims of hypocrisy for taking an unpaid job with a controversial limited company in the West Midlands.
Councillor Andrew Eade said although he had reservations, he felt that it was important for Telford to play a part [...]
Please can I ask that anyone who hasn’t yet signed the anti-regional quango petition on the Prime Minister’s website does so as soon as possible?
It has 203 signatures so far and the deadline is the 19th of January.
Please sign the petition and email the link to anyone you know that might be interested in trying [...]
PRESS RELEASE: ADVANTAGE WEST MIDLANDS
For immediate release
Advantage West Midlands (AWM), the unelected Regional Development Agency for the West Midlands, has announced its budget for the financial year 2007-08. The taxpayer will give this unelected, underperforming quango £296m for the financial year.
AWM have just given jobs to two “local” entrepreneurs – Jas Bains and Angela Maxwell [...]
I just sent the following email to Nick Clegg after reading that he has already dismissed a suggestion that we should have an English Parliament by saying that he will devolve power to “regions and communities” rather than the our country as most people want …
Dear Nick,
Could you please tell me what plans the Lib Dems [...]
Birmingham Chamber of Commerce & Industry and Birmingham City Council were criticised yesterday for arranging a seminar for local businesses on how to move their business away from the West Midlands.
The President of Birmingham Chamber of Commerce, ironically, has a seat on the board of Advantage West Midlands, the unelected regional development agency whose job [...]
Advantage West Midlands, the unelected Regional Devleopment Agency, has some targets set by what is now the Department for Business, Enterprise and Regulatory Reform.
The half-year results for April-September 2007 have now been published and on balance it’s looking … well, a bit poor really.
The first target is job creation – how many jobs have AWM [...]
The following press release has been sent out today:
Four anti-regionalisation campaigners have dealt a blow to regionalists in the area, undermining local authority plans to register the Birmingham, Coventry and Black Country City Region as a limited company by registering the company themselves.
Stuart Parr and Andrew Bridgwater of the West Midlands NO! Campaign have joined [...]
The Campaign for English Regions (CfER) has apparently risen from the ashes with an article in today’s Guardian by their Chairman, Phil Davies, calling for more regional government.
The CfER is headed up by Phil Davies, former Leader of Telford & Wrekin Council. Davies was sacked a few years ago following a vote of no confidence [...]
The following story appears in tonight’s Shropshire Star:
A Telford campaigner against a regional Government has said that giving a “sub region” tax raising powers would be bad for residents.
Hazel Blears, Communities and Local Government Secretary, yesterday announced plans which would put Telford in a new “sub region” with the Black Country, Birmingham and Coventry.
It could [...]
Press Release
For Immediate Release
The West Midlands NO! Campaign warned, as far back as December 2006 [1], that the City Region had ambitions for tax raising powers.
Many “business community” leaders in the West Midlands have backed the City Region in return for a promise that they will get more of a say in decisions affecting both [...]
Press Release: AWM – Words are small comfort when there is very little to back them up
The West Midlands NO! Campaign is urging people not to be taken in by Advantage West Midlands’ self-congratulations over its response to the recent floods.
The £2m which AWM is claiming to be giving out in flood relief is money [...]
A couple of months ago Gordon Brown said that he wanted a “different kind of politics”. He said that he would “listen and learn”. Gordon Brown is a liar.
When Shropshire County Council first proposed abolishing local councils and replacing them with a single, sub-regional unitary authority, people said they didn’t want it. Three of the five districts [...]
No Mandate Brown has shown that he is hell-bent on the destruction of our country and the imposition of regional government whether we want it or not.
Hot on the heels of his appointment of regional ministers to each of the euroregions in England (the West Midlands has been lumbered with Liam Byrne, MP for Hodge [...]
No Mandate Brown, the unelected pretender to the office of First Minister of England, has dealt what may prove to be England’s fatal blow.
The Goblin King has appointed a Minister for each of the made-up regions of England. Before his coronation as unelected Prime Minister the MP for Kirkcaldy and Cowdenbeath made noises about resurrecting regional [...]
The DTI is using taxpayers money to fund a “task force” to investigate barriers to black and ethnic minority businesses.
Apparently, black and ethnic minority business owners find it harder to get finance for their business than white people born here.
The “task force” looks like being another one of these unelected, taxpayer funded regional quangos if [...]
Rotherwas Access Road
Work has commenced on the £12m Rotherwas Access Road, partly funded by the unelected regional development agency, Advantage West Midlands (AWM). [1]
AWM is part-funding the access road through a £9.5m “Rotherwas Futures” project [2] but the scheme has already been refused funding by the Department for Transport because it does not offer value [...]
One of the most bizarre things to come out of Sunday’s BBC Politics Show on Advantage West Midlands (AWM) was the chief exec of the West Midlands Regional Assembly (WMRA) saying that he opposes regional assemblies!
That should go down well at the EU Committee of Regions.
As mentioned the other day, West Midlands NO! will be featured on todays BBC Politics Show at 12 o’clock on BBC1.
The Politics Show website has been updated with details of the programme and a mention of the West Midlands NO! Campaign.
I was interviewed by the BBC last night for a Politics Show programme on Advantage West Midlands.
The show is being broadcast at 12 noon this Sunday on BBC1.
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