Councillor Faisal 'Two Votes' Rana Rehabilitated?

by Brian Bamford

Councillor Rana's Agent Remembering a Postal Vote

ROCHDALE is a town that doesn't have a good name.  It's seen as a kind of dynasty of dirt.  In a letter in today's Rochdale Observer* a former leader of Rochdale Council, Colin Lambert writes:
'Here we go again,  Rochdale Council have another leader putting the reputation of the entire borough on the front page.... So what we do we have now, a disposed leader suspended by the Labour Party at a national level and being investigated by the Metropolitan Police..
'A current leader found to have brought the council and his position into disrepute. One Labour area which elected a Labour councillor in May, being investigated for election fraud.'

Mr Lambert in the same letter calls on the national Labour Party 'to intervene and suspend the Rochdale Borough Labour Group', and fearing that may not suffice he says 'It is time for the Government to send in the inspectors and run the council.'

Just above Mr Lambert's letter is another letter in rhe Rochdale Ob. bearing the Monika of none other than Councillor Faisal 'Two Votes' Rana, the councillor mentioned by him in his letter, who only last week admitted to election fraud by breaching the Representation of the People Act 1983'

The same letter appeared on ROCHDALE ONLINE  minus Councillor 'Two Votes' Rana on the 16th, August.  The letter itself is signed by five local councillors including the discredited Rana himself; a local green campaigner;  the Vicar of Rochdale, the Reverend  Coleman, and it calls for 'unity' declaring the 'racists will not win'.

Councillor 'Two Votes' Rana has distinguished himself in this respect, in so far as while living among the Great and the Good up Norden in his minor mansion on Bronte Close, he has delicated himself to housing poor whites among the working-class in his vast portfollio of many rented properties in down-town Falinge and elsewhere in central Rochdale.

*  The same letter from Colin Lambert appeared on Rochdale Online on the 10 August:

https://www.rochdaleonline.co.uk/news-features/129/letters-to-the-editor/121227/letter-will-the-last-one-to-be-kicked-out-please-turn-off-the-lights

************

Shadow of Rochdale's Danczuk Dynasty survives

by Brian Bamford

ALMOST four years ago on the 3rd, June 2014, BBC News announced:
'Rochdale Council is set to have a new leader after a coup in the ruling Labour group.  Colin Lambert was unseated by former leader Richard Farnell at a Labour group meeting on Monday evening.

That brought a tweet from the then Rochdale Labour MP, Simon Danczuk:
'Good news for Rochdale that Richard Farnell is to be new council leader, commiserations to outgoing Councillor Colin Lambert.'

This 'good news for Rochdale' was to turn into sour milk as a bumbling Richard Farnell squirmed under cross-examination in the hot seat of the Independent Inquiry into Child Sex Abuse in 2017.

In 2014, BBC Radio Manchester claimed there had been a long term plan to replace Colin Lambert as leader of the Rochdale Council following the local elections of that year.

At that time it seemed that the now disgraced Councillor Farnell was being pushed by the Danczuk mafia within the Rochdale Labour Party to take over the leadership almost against his will.  Sources inside the party suggested Farnell even then foresaw his own future downfall, and was in a state of distress at the thought of taking over at the top.

Councillor Farnell, we now know is suspended and in some disgrace, though still in receipt of his council stipend.  His close colleague and pal Councillor Allen Brett replaced him in December 2017.

Coucillor Brett was Simon Danczuk's Parliamentary agent and he is reputed to have praised Mr Danczuk in the following terms:
'Simon is someone with the qualities and skills to represent Rochdale in Parliament very well indeed.  He’s got a breadth of experience in the trade union movement and in business.  He’s a former councillor and because of his own upbringing, understands how difficult life can be for people and families in Rochdale.  I’m looking forward to working with him.'

Thus, yesterday's news that Councillor Allen Brett had been re-elected as the Leader of the local Labour Party and hence the Leader of Rochdale Borough Council, will be cause for concern for a large section of the party.  The day before Brett's re-election (6th, May) in a letter on Rochdale ONLINE, over a hundred  'grassroots members of the local Labour Party' from 18 wards in the borough of Rochdale, urged local councillors to vote for Councillor Jacqui Beswick as Labour Group leader which they claimed 'will give the fresh leadership to take the borough forward.'

Instead, the Rochdale Labour Party has just gone politically backwards.

 ******

No Double Yellow Lines for Rochdale Blacklist Co.

AT LAST night's full council meeting of Rochdale MBC held in the Gothic revival Town Hall, Tory Councillor Pat Sullivan tabled a question about problems encountered by the contractor maintaining the highways in Rochdale.  Councillor Sullivan's quiery was:
'Recently contractors [Balfour Beatty] were putting yellow lines down and were unable to complete the job as two cars were parked.  Should the contractor not put notes out the night before in order to make sure that the work can be completed?'

Even Councillor Ashley Dearnley, Leader of Conservative Group and Shadow Portfolio Holder for Regeneration, got involved.  These construction companies are not always competent themselves, the building firm Carillion which has a partnership with Tameside MBC once claimed it couldn't repair the leaking roof of Ashton Library because it didn't have a long enough ladder at its disposal.

In March 2015, Rochdale Council took out a Highways Maintenance Contract with Balfour Beatty until 2020.

The works Balfour Beatty will do includes jobs for the repair and minor improvement work to the Council's highways infrastructure, including it seems double yellow lines.

What was not mentioned at last night's Council meeting was that the Rochdale Council has a contract with a firm labelled a blacklister by the Information Commissioner's Office [ICO].

The ICO website states:
'During 2008/09 the ICO carried out an investigation into employment blacklisting in the construction industry.  As part of that investigation, the ICO seized information from a company called The Consulting Association.  Some of the information we seized amounted to a 'blacklist' of individuals who were considered to pose a risk to their employers if employed within the construction industry.'

No doubt Labour Councillor Allen Brett, the newly crowned leader of Rochdale Council (not to mention his predecessor Richard Farnell) has forgotten what one of their earlier predecessor Colin Lambert said in 2013:  'Rochdale MBC wanted no truck with companies who blacklist workers and trade unionists'.

Ofcourse, it was Colin Lambert's friend, the deceased Labour MP, Jim Dobbin, who in 2012 sponsored the early day motion:
'That this House is aware of the campaign led principally by the trades unions, the GMB, UNITE, UCATT and others for justice for blacklisted workers, many of whose lives have been ruined by the secretive and malicious practice which has denied them employment in their industry without them having either the knowledge or privilege of being able to see or challenge information listed against them; believes such practices to be fundamentally wrong and against the very principles of freedom and democracy; and calls on the Government to condemn such behaviour and consider introducing new legislation to prohibit such practices.'

These days with Rochdale Council still under the control of Farmell's Labour Party cronies like Councillor Brett, companies such as Balfour Beatty with a history of blacklisting trade unionists are now on easy street being awarded fat public contracts by uncaring Labour councils like Rochdale MBC.

Fake News or What?

By Les May

‘EX-MP set up deal to keep sex abuse secret’ screams the half page headline on the front page of today’s Rochdale Observer. Look inside and it’s just a claim made by Martin Digan to the Independent Inquiry into Child Sexual Abuse.   A claim for which by his own admission he has absolutely no evidence.

Digan claims that a deal was struck between Cyril Smith, the late Jim Dobbin and Colin Lambert, in which Smith would ‘keep quiet’ about ‘a serious offence against a child in a public toilet’ supposedly perpetrated by an un-named Rochdale Council leader, in return for Dobbin and Lambert keeping quiet about sexual abuse at Knowl View.  He also claims to have given a ‘dossier’ about the abuse to Dobbin.  As is all too frequent when claims are made about Smith and Knowl View we are kept in the dark about when these events are supposed to have taken place.  And ‘when’ is critical in evaluating the likelihood that any of this might be true.

We’ll return to the ‘dossier’ later, but just to clarify, Jim Dobbin was Labour MP for Heywood and Middleton from 1997 to his untimely death in 2014.  He had previously been a Rochdale councillor from 1984, Labour leader from 1994 and Leader of the Council from 1996.  Colin Lambert was a Labour councillor and worked in Jim Dobbin’s constituency office.  He later became leader of the Labour group and delivered a stunning electoral result in 2014 before finding himself displaced by the present incumbent.

Now we’ve met Mr Digan before. In the section of Simon Danczuk’s 2014 book where he claims that Smith was sexually abusing the pupils at Knowl View Special School, Digan is the prime witness. I say ‘witness’, but in fact Danczuk writes that although he had been at the school since the late 1970’s he ‘was oblivious to what was happening at the school’.  ‘Oblivious’ or not, it didn’t stop him claiming in Danczuk’s book that ‘boys were sold to paedophile gangs’.  Nor can we consider him to be the most reliable of witnesses.   The story about an event at Knowl View he told in a Radio 4 programme was subtly different from the same story which appears in Danczuk’s book.

As for the ‘dossier’, it’s a favourite term in the Cyril Smith/Knowl View saga, which seems to cover everything from a handwritten note of a short telephone conversation twenty years earlier, upwards. It consisted of copies of two reports one made by Aids worker Philip Shepherd and the other by psychologist Valerie Mellor, which Digan found in the Headmaster’s office and which had previously been submitted to Rochdale Council in 1991 and 1992.

So how likely is it that Digan’s claim about a ‘deal’ has any merit?   In cases like this it helps to ask who stood to gain? Certainly not Labour. From 1986 to 1992 Labour was running the council.  Any revelations about sexual abuse at Knowl View would have have had to be answered by them.  So why would they need any deal as an inducement to keep quiet?  I have seen the Shepherd report and can state categorically that it makes no reference to Smith.  Though I know the contents of the Mellor report I have not seen it in full, but I have been assured by someone who sees themselves as fighting for ‘justice’ for the ex-pupils of Knowl View that it makes no reference to Smith.

Digan likes to be seen as a ‘whistleblower’. Had he confined himself to trying to get the Shepherd and Mellor reports published and in the public domain so that we could see for ourselves what had been happening at Knowl View I would have felt that such a label was justified as that is what I want to see myself because these reports contain information about some very unsavoury goings on between some of the pupils at Knowl View. But, as his present claims show, he hasn’t.

In Danczuk’s book he lets himself be used as a tool for Danczuk to fashion his claims about Cyril Smith and Knowl View school. Now he’s gone freelance.   But apart from the story of ‘a deal’, the best he can come up with at the inquiry is that he had often seen Smith bouncing young boys on his knee during parties held on the premises to coincide with governors meetings.  So no ‘smoking gun‘ then?

No doubt he told the police all this when he was interviewed as part of the ‘Operation Clifton’ investigation.   The fact that the police concluded there was no evidence of a ‘cover up’ at Knowl View suggests in the absence of evidence of ‘a deal’ they did not take take the claim seriously. Claims like this just make the inquiry look like an amateurish shambles.

An Unwieldy Public Inquiry

Theresa May Bounced Into Folly of Overarching Probe

by Brian Bamford

IN April 2014, I received a message on my mobile phone from the journalist Peter Hinchcliffe from ROCHDALE ONLINE tipping me of about a press conference at Rochdale Town Hall called by Colin Lambert the then Labour leader of Rochdale Council.  At that conference Councillor Lambert changed the terms of reference of an inquiry he had previously set-up to investigate historic child abuse in Rochdale at Knowl View residential school up in Bamford village.  Following the publication in March that year, of a book by the local Labour MP Simon Danczuk, entitled 'Smile For The Camera: The Double Life of Cyril Smith', claiming to expose child abuse in Rochdale and beyond, Councillor Lambert then felt he had to respond and at that press conference he was supported by the then Greater Manchester Chief Constable Sir Peter Fahy.

But if Colin Lambert felt under pressure at that time to act on child abuse in Rochdale, the then Home Secretary Theresa May similarly responded by setting-up a national public inquiry on historic child abuse which ultimately swallowed-up the new Rochdale investigation led by Neil Garnham QC .  So began the creation of a monstrous over-arching national inquiry with 'eyes bigger than its belly' fanned to fever-pitch by ambitious politicians like the MP, Simon Danczuk, and  an assortment of hungry journalists.

The ultimate result of this all consuming national investigation has been institutional indigestion and administrative flatulence. This is obvious to most observers, though writers on this Northern Voices' Blog have been giving warnings about this for months on end.

Last Saturday, an editorial in the Financial Times (FT) announced:

'Confidence in the inquiry is so low that some alleged victims claim it it was set up to fail.'

We on Northern Voices, together with John Walker the former editor of the 'Rochdale Alternative Paper' (which had outed Cyril Smith in May 1979), in the Autumn of 2011 supplied much of the evidence of child abuse at Cambridge House that triggered this whole issue, and was used by Simon Danczuk and his aide Matthew Baker in the production of their book*. 

The FT editor last Saturday wrote:

'For a public inquiry to merit the time and money required, it must have something concrete about which to inquire.  It must be able to obtain evidence on which it can reasonably get at the facts.  And it must have a remit that it can plausibly complete within a reasonable period of time.'

The 'Independent Inquiry into Child Sexual Abuse', set up by Theresa May, did not meet these requirements.  It is too unwieldy and extensive,  It will have to depend on remembered testimony from people with ageing memories. 

The now Prime Minister, Theresa May as Home Secretary, probably acted with the best of intentions when under pressure of the Jimmy Savile and Cyril Smith revelations, she set up the inquiry two years ago.  In the end the inquiry now involves probes into 13 public bodies, and is expected to accomplish in a few years what the police couldn't do over decades.  It also aims to do a forensic study into how children can best be protected in future.

Perhaps, in the light of all this, we should not be surprised given all this that its development has been painfully slow or that the casualties and fall-out of chairs and other legal representatives have left the child abuse inquiry looking like a farce.

The first chair of the child abuse inquiry, Dame Elizabeth Butler-Sloss, resigned amid questions about the role of her brother who had served as attorney-general during the 1980s.  The second chair was driven out following a barrage of criticism about her “establishment links”.  The third resigned, and the forth, an experienced social worker, is already under attack.

Last weekend the editor of the FT points to what might be the root of the problem:

'This shows the folly of allowing those who are party to an inquiry to drive the process.  There is a difference between heeding their views and surrendering to the loudest voices...'

It seems that it is vital to get the right terms of reference for these kind of inquiries.  While the inquiry into the Bloody Sunday massacre in Northern Ireland took 12 years it only had to cover the events of one day, and it took 12 years to complete.  This current Historic Child Abuse Inquiry is so open-ended it is likely to surpass that, and in two-years it has already cost £20 million and it hasn't heard one hour of testimony yet. 
* Smile for the Camera: The Double Life of Cyril Smith Hardcover – 16 Apr 2014 by Simon Danczuk  (Author) and Matthew Baker (author)› 
Neil Garnham QC

Rochdale Council Scrap Sex Abuse Inquiry

The letter below was published in today's Rochdale Observer.

It outlines the history of the setting up of the inquiry into the

abuse of young lads at Cambridge House by Cyril Smith in the 1960s,

and into the quite separate allegations of abuse at the residential school

Knowl View.  The Garnham inquiry was set up by the then leader

of Rochdale Council Colin Lambert in April 2014, it has now been

closed down by a Labour Council led by Richard Farnell.

Dear Sir,
Now that the Garnham inquiry has been axed perhaps we should remind
ourselves of why it was thought necessary to establish a local inquiry
in the first place.

Claims of a so called 'cover up' about events at Knowl View special
school can be traced back to an article which appeared in the
Independent on Sunday in September 1995.

What does not seem to be disputed is that the 1991 report by Aids worker
Philip Shepherd which detailed claims of homosexual activity between the
boys at the school, some of it coercive in nature, and of boys
importuning at the then Smith Street toilets, was sent to both the
Education and Social Services departments of RMBC and that a further
report by a consultant clinical psychologist was commissioned.  This
confirmed Mr Shepherd's findings.

Mr Shepherd's report was the basis for the 1995 article, though not for
the interpretation that was put upon it.  Cyril Smith was not referred
to in either the report or the article derived from it.

Following Mr Danczuk's rediscovery of the story of Cyril Smith's
activities at Cambridge House which had been published in Rochale
Alternative Paper (RAP) in May 1979 these two quite separate stories
became conflated.  Mr Danczuk used his book to try to persuade readers
that Smith had been involved in abusing boys at Knowl View though the
'evidence' he produced will not stand up to even slight scrutiny.

I don't believe there was a deliberate 'cover up' because I fail to see
how anyone could have found an instant solution to all the very serious
problems which were uncovered.  Immediate closure of the school was
clearly not an option.

So the question which needs to be answered is, 'did the people who knew
about what was going on at the school, whether they were officers or
councillors, make a serious attempt to sort out the problems that had
come to light?'

If Mr Justice Garnham has produced an interim report I think we can
assume that this contains details of which council officers saw the 1991
Shepherd report and the February 1992 report by consultant psychologist
Valerie Mellor, what action they took themselves, what further action
they recommended to councillors and which councillors they reported to.

The leaders of the council in the relevant time span, the early 1990s,
were Richard Farnell and Paul Rowan.

If suspicions of a 'cover up' are to be dispelled it seems to me most
unfortunate that one of these two men is leader of the council at a time
when axing the Garnham inquiry is up for discussion.  The answer would
seem to be to publish the interim report.

Les May

Danczuk Accused of 'Crocodile Tears'!

Dear Sir/Madam

I was sorry to read that Councillor Colin Lambert is leaving the council.  Over the past few years a good number of people have either been forced to leave the labour party or have left as a result of being unhappy at the actions of senior members, including the MP for Rochdale.

The long standing disagreements between Colin and Mr. Danczuk cannot be disguised by a few crocodile tears.

In Saturday's Observer Mr. Danczuk's office is accused of spreading 'malicious rumours'.  A further matter, an 'alleged smear' 'made in an email' has been passed onto police.  Let us hope that they deal with it swiftly for the benefit of all concerned.

It really is time for the more positive and honest politics voted for by a massive majority of Labour members and supporters to assert itself both locally and nationally.

 

Regards

Ex-member of Rochdale Labour Party

Colin Lambert Brand's Labour 'Bullies'!

COUNCILLOR Colin Lambert, who was leader of the Rochdale Council from 2010-2014, will not stand for re-election at the next local elections.  He claims he took the decision to drop out after he became aware of the 'skulduggery and deliberate misrepresentation' within local politics - shockingly he is referring to figures within his own local Rochdale Labour party who have been conducting a vendetta.
Last week, Councillor Lambert told the Rochdale Observer: 
'I will continue my 40 years membership of the Labour Party, however I will neither represent nor campaign for the individuals who are representing Labour on Rochdale Council.' 
When asked what he knew  of this alleged treachery, Councillor Lambert said: 'I now have a statement which names Labour councillors who were leaking confidential and commercially sensitive papers.'  
Asked what evidence he has of this, Councillor Lambert said:  
'I now have a statement which names Labour councillors who were leaking confidential and commercially sensitive papers.  Individuals smeared myself and others by feeding stories to the media which they knew to be untrue.' 
Since Simon Danczuk came to Rochdale to campaign to become an M.P., politics within the Rochdale Labour Party has seemingly degenerated to a surprising degree.  The atmosphere among Labour Party supporters is now decidedly sour throughout the town.  
Earlier today, Jennifer Williams in the Manchester Evening News wrote: 
'Labour rebel Simon Danczuk could get kicked out of his seat by party members, a senior Jeremy Corbyn ally has suggested – after he threatened to run against the new leader next spring.' 
Much dissatisfaction with Mr. Danczuk stems from what some see as his uncomradely  comments in paid articles he writes for what some see as the reactionary Daily Mail and the Mail of Sunday.   Today, Ken Livingstone, a long-term supporter of the Labour leader, has said Labour MPs who consistently make trouble could find themselves booted out. 
Meanwhile, Mr Danczuk described Ken Livingstone as a 'Stalinist', and said that he had only been practising the 'New Politics' that Jeremy Corbyn was encouraging.  And he added:  'So Ken taking such an authoritarian approach to this is sad really.'  
Ken Livingstone should remember that it was Simon Danczuk's now estranged wife Karen Danczuk, who over a year ago, so skillfully mocked Ed Milliband in a selfie eating a bacon butty.  Perhaps we should all look out, for Simon Danczuk has a reputation as a bit of a Giant Killer on the quiet.

Original Source for Story of Dodgy E-Mail?

by Les May

THE original source of the story of the e-mail defaming Colin Lambert which has been repeated by Rochdale Online, Manchester Evening News, the Zelo blog, and has been mentioned in BBC North-West news bulletins, seems to be the London office of the Breitbart news service which carries the details on a page dated 8 October 2014.

The key passages are:

'The e-mail, which was circulated by a Labour Member of Parliament’s researcher in November 2012',

and

'When asked to confirm that the original e-mail was indeed sent by him, the Labour staff member admitted it, which has raised questions as to why no one contacted the police at the time.'

No doubt Mr Lambert's lawyer and Mr Parker's lawyer will be contacting Breitbart and asking for the name of the Labour staff member who 'admitted it' and which MP he/she was a researcher for.

It looks like a couple of people are going to have to answer some awkward questions.

Northern Voices will not be awarding prizes if you guess the names correctly!

http://www.rochdaleonline.co.uk/news-features/2/news-headlines/98147/former-danczuk-spin-doctor-matt-baker-accused-of-vile-attack-and-smear-campaign

http://www.rochdaleonline.co.uk/news-features/2/news-headlines/98304/simon-danczuk-and-matt-baker-to-be-sued-by-former-rochdale-council-leader

http://www.manchestereveningnews.co.uk/news/greater-manchester-news/rochdale-abuse-inquiry-alleged-email-10118814

http://zelo-street.blogspot.co.uk/2015/09/simon-danczuk-and-rochdale-dirty-tricks.html

http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-england-manchester-34400387

http://www.breitbart.com/london/2014/10/08/exclusive-lib-lab-paedo-pact-alleged-in-rochdale/

 

Legal Action Over Political 'Smear' in Rochdale

LAST night on BBC's North West Tonight, Simon Danczuk denied there was any 'wrongdoing' by himself or his office in relation to allegations that his office had  been responsible for an e-mail that may well have 'smeared' Colin Lambert, a Rochdale Labour councillor, and former leader of the Labour Group on Rochdale Council. 
On Twitter, Mr. Danczuk said last night:  'There is no case to answer - legal action would be a waste of money.'
On September 21st, the Rochdale online website published the following report about Danczuk's former aide Matthew Baker, who now works in Bristol:
'Matt Baker, the former spin doctor of Rochdale MP Simon Danczuk, has been accused of a "vile attack" and "smear campaign" after he was revealed as the author of an email that makes very serious and highly damaging allegations about former Rochdale Council leader, Colin Lambert and a former Mayor of Rochdale, Robin Parker - allegations which they say are completely without foundation and "libellous".'
Since then Mr. Baker has said, he had:
'no recollection or record of sending this email (smearing Colin Lambert).'

Both Colin Lambert, a councillor and a former leader of Rochdale Council, and Robin Parker, say the allegations in the e-mail are completely without foundation and 'libellous'.
Colin Lambert last night was reported to be starting a legal action in defamation next week.
This morning, the BRISTOLIAN Blog is reporting that 'Baker has now claimed to a BBC reporter that his email account must have been “hacked”!'
And to think there was a time when Danczuk and Baker, were once seen as a dynamic duo up here.

Simon Danczuk & E-mail 'Smear'

SIMON Danczuk, the Rochdale M.P., insists he knows nothing about an e-mail that is said to have originated from his office.  The e-mail sent in 2012 was claimed to 'smear' a Labour Party rival, Colin Lambert, the former leader of Rochdale Council and Heywood Councillor.  The e-mail has now been handed over to police officers working on the Operation Clifton Enquiry into aspects of the historic child abuse case.


Mr. Danczuk claims he has no knowledge of the e-mail, and says it was not sent from his office.  Suggestions that he knew were, he said:  'completely and utterly groundless'.


This matter is now the basis of a complaint to the National Labour Party Executive Committee from the neighbouring Heywood and Middleton constituency Labour Party.  Councillor Lambert has said that he has been the target of a 'vile smear campaign' within the Labour Party. 


Meanwhile, a Labour party spokesman has said:  'It would be inappropriate to comment on an on-going police investigation.'


Operation Clifton is examining the e-mail as part of the evidence it has gathered in the last two years.  Some of us at Northern Voices assisted in the enquiry earlier this year.

Hypocrisy in Rochdale!

BOTH the main parties on Rochdale Council have expressed their anger that the two councillors, Farooq Ahmed and his wife Shefali, who left the Labour Party last weekend have now set up their own party; the Rochdale First Party.  At the same time Simon Danczuk the Rochdale MP has had to defend his misspent youth as a mature student at Lancaster University for having used Class A drugs:  in his Talking Politics column in the tomorrow's Rochdale Observer Mr Danczuk said:
'It's well known by now that my first wife spoke to the tabloids to say I'd taken recreational drugs in my past...  This was all many years ago and has no bearing on my duties as Member of Parliament now'

Curiously Farooq Ahmed was planning to resign from the Labour Party back in January 2012, when a Labour MP accused him of smoking cannabis and he had been suspended from the Labour Party after a film appeared to show him smoking something dodgy at Manchester Airport.  And guess who the Labour MP was that had it in for Councillor Ahmed at that time, and went so far as to report him?

None other than sober Simon Danczuk, the clean-living MP for Rochdale would you believe it? 

At that time Mr. Danczuk told the Rochdale Observer that 'I supplied a letter to the council leader on December 18, about a variety of issues relating to Coun. Ahmed's behaviour.'  And Danczuk added:
'When serious concerns about a councillor's conduct are brought to my attention, no matter what party they belong to, it is my duty to ensure that action is taken.  I am disappointed the council leader (Colin Lambert) has dithered and has been indecisive but I am pleased the group nationally has acted.'

The difference between Danczuk and Ahmed was that Councillor Ahmed has always denied that he had smoked cannabis on that occasion, and he was later reinstated by the Labour Party.  Meanwhile, Simon's ex-wife has given information to The Sun of their drug fuelled nights on the town.  Now Mr. Danczuk appears to excuse his drug taking by saying:  'I've not spent my whole life trying to be a politician... I'm an ordinary person who believes in the power of politics.'

And yet, knowing of his own history as a consumer of 'recreational drugs' Simon Danczuk had no hesitation in reporting on a Labour colleague to the party hierarchy.  Could it have had anything to do with the fact that Councillor Farooq Ahmed was then a senior member of the cabinet in Rochdale which was then led by Colin Lambert, whose administration Mr. Danczuk now documents as having been guilty of 'a frustrating sense of drift'.

Farooq found guilty on public order offence

THE cleavage politics of Rochdale Labour Party reached a new low today as Councillor Farooq Ahmed has been convicted by a court of a public order offence under Section 4, which he denied.  The court was told Councillor Ahmed had had an altercation on January 22nd, 2014, with fellow Labour councillor Neil Emmott on Cheetham Street in Rochdale, while Councillor Emmott was getting his lunch.  Ahmed was found guilty of being homophobic and threatening violence against Councillor Emmott, fining him £1,000 with £625 costs and ordering to pay £250 compensation to Councillor Emmott.  The expression used against Councillor Emmott was that he was a 'queer little arse licker' adding 'watch your back'.

Councillor Ahmed who pleaded not guilty is now considering an appeal.

This exchange is seemingly all part of the familiar banter now taking place between different sections of the Rochdale Labour Party.  In this case the row was related to an online article by Rochdale MP Simon Danczuk about the local child sexual exploitation grooming scandal.  Councillor Emmott is a case worker for Mr Danczuk the Rochdale MP, and it seems Farooq felt Emmott was in some way responsible for the content of the article.

Councillor Ahmed has said that the altercation was part of a split within the local Labour Party between the allies of the new Council leader Richard Farnell and the former leader Councillor Colin Lambert. 

Another Account of the Rochdale 'Tiff'

IN her column entitled 'Putsches, paedophiles and politics: the Rochdale council story so far' in the Manchester Evening News, Jennifer Williams writes:
'Over the past year I've written an endless stream of stories on the bizarre machinations of Rochdale politics, but in the last few days they have entered a new realm of madness.'

It only goes to show that we let it all hang out up here, and that we certainly don't wrap nowt up in Rochdale.  Ms. Williams continues: 
'Here is how the borough is split.
On the one side is Rochdale MP Simon Danczuk and new council leader Richard Farnell.
On the other is Heywood and Middleton MP Jim Dobbin and his employee and former council leader Colin Lambert, the man Farnell replaced in a putsch 10 days ago.'

Simon Danczuk is on a committee that has today grilled the former Rochdale Council leader Colin Lambert.  Coun Lambert - a long-standing rival of Mr Danczuk - said political ‘games’ were played, but added:  'It was an exercise in which we put it out in public and I would never do that any different. At the end of the day the public had a right to give their view and their view was quite rightly listened to.'

Lambert was being asked him why he tried – unsuccessfully – to give former chief executive Jim Taylor a £40,000 pay rise last year.

At the same time Mr. Lambert's ally, fellow councillor Farooq Ahmed, is up in court accused of verbally abusing Danczuk's employee Neil Emmott in the street.  Mr. Emmott is also a Rochdale Labour councillor.

There will surely be tears before all this is over and done with. 

'Rochdale is in the headlines for wrong reasons'

says Richard Farnell

Cleavage Politics on Rochdale MBC

RICHARD Farnell has shown a skill for stating the obvious when he claimed the other day that  'Rochdale is in the headlines for all the wrong reasons', adding gruffly 'and I will not allow a tiny minority of people to drag us down.' 

 

Mr. Farnell went on to say in the Rochdale Observer that 'I have the overwhelming support of Labour members who are getting fed up with the constant political smears.'

  

Chris Jones in the same issue of the Rochdale Observer writes:

'Coun Richard Farnell, who ousted ex-leader Coun Colin Lambert last week, told disenchanted councillors who didn't like his take-over of the ruling Labour party to keep quiet or quit the party.'

 

Mr. Jones continues:

'His (Farnell's) coup, which was backed by a majority of Labour councillors, has intensified the already simmering division within the Labour group between Coun Farnell who is backed by Rochdale MP Simon Danczuk and the dethroned former council leader Coun Lambert.'

Meanwhile in his Letter from Parliament on Rochdale ONLINE today Jim Dobbin MP for the nearby constituency of  Heywood & Middleton writes:
'Councillor Colin Lambert, who has run my parliamentary constituency office in Heywood for the past seventeen years, lost the leadership of the council in unfortunate circumstances. It is recognised across the borough that he had been a strong leader and gave it some real direction. He had the respect of council staff, trade unions and the business community. He also had cross party support. He did not deserve to be ousted in this way. I know he has had a huge number of phone calls recognising his contribution.'
 

The trouble is that with Colin Lambert out of the way, and with the floodlight of public interest falling upon Richard Farnell, who now seems to he may have some skeletons in his own history, will this lead to more trouble in the Kingdom of Rochdale?  Is Simon Danczuk safe if more flack starts to fall on his favourite Farnell?  Will Simon stand-by Richard if everything starts to go pear-shaped?

 

The folly of last week's great coup at Rochdale MBC by the supporters of Richard Farnell and Simon Danczuk begins to look increasingly like Shakespeare's tragedy Macbeth; as Farnell trembles and is said to be suffering nightmares; Danczuk's Lady Cleavage comes to the fore; and Guido Fawkes gets in on the act.  What's it all suppose to mean?  As with the earlier bacon butty performance belittling Ed Miliband's difficulties in mastication techniques, is it now being suggested that Ed Miliband's wife has the lesser cleavage and is Simon after the leadership of the Labour Party based on the dimensions of his own wife's cleavage? 

A Crazy Coup!

LESS than a week ago the leadership of Rochdale MBC was taken over by Councillor Richard Farnell when he displaced Colin Lambert, the leader of the Council since 2010.  Both are Labour councillors respectively.  Last Wednesday, we learned of the Cabinet members and the assistant portfolio holders appointed by Councillor Farnell:  Councillor Brett (Agent to Simon Danczuk MP for Rochdale) took over finance; Councillor Iftikar Ahmed Adult Care; Public Health went to Councillor Cecile Biant; Community, Culture & Tourism to Councillor Daalat Ali; Corporate Services & Neighbourhoods to Councillor Neil Emmott; Children & Schools to Counc. Martin; Housing & Environment to Counc. Beswick and Business, Skills & Employment to Counc. Williams.  Most of these seem to be allies of Simon Danczuk M.P. for Rochdale.

But what at first seemed like a triumph for Farnell and Danczuk by last weekend was looking more like a political tragedy akin to Shakespeare's Macbeth.  Even last Wednesday night, after the full council meeting, it is rumoured that several councillors did not stay behind for the Mayor making ceremony:  some, it seems, left in disgust at Councillor Farnell's take over.

This weekend in the Manchester Evening News, the Heywood and Middleton MP, Jim Dobbin, has hit out at Councillor Farnell saying it was the wrong moment for him to be taking over in Rochdale.  Richard Farnell, who took power last week, was also leader in the early 1990s when the Knowl View sex abuse scandal in Rochdale was first being investigated and when the controversial reports into sexual abuse of boys at the school were being produced.

A council-commissioned enquiry is currently looking at whether there was a town hall cover-up.

Speaking to the BBC, Mr Dobbin - who was Coun Farnell’s deputy at the time in question - said he had made a ‘bad move’ by taking over again now.

Sources close to Councillor Farnell have told Northern Voices that he is presently suffering nightmares, and hadn't anticipated all the attention from the media about what he knew about what was going on in the 1980s and 1990s, when he was last in power as leader of the council. 

Mr. Dobbin said:  'I don’t think it’s very wise at this particular time, particularly with the inquiry going on into Knowl View.  Richard was leader at the time these accusations were being made, so I don’t think it’s a very clever thing for Richard to do and if he had spoken to me about it I would have said so.'

Up to now Simon Danczuk the MP for Rochdale has defended Councillor Farnell saying that he is the object of a politically motivated 'smear campaign'.  But it is hard to see that the media are doing anything other than their job in asking questions. 

Rochdale Council's new boss Richard Farnell

RICHARD Farnell, the councillor for Balderstone & Kirkholt, last night beat Colin Lambert the former leader of Rochdale Council to take over the tough task of leading Rochdale MBC.   This was decided at a AGM of fellow Labour members of the Council last night.

In recent times Rochdale council has been the centre of much scandal and controversy, including the recent case of the sexual grooming of young girls by mostly Asian men and the hangover of the Cyril Smith revelations particularly with regard to what may have happened to young lads at the former special school of Knowl View in the 1980s and 1990s.

This decision is expected to be ratified at the full council meeting later this week.

Last night Simon Danzcuk M.P. for Rochdale said:

'I’m pleased Richard Farnell will become council leader, I believe he will do an excellent job in reorganising the local authority and ensuring it supports the town more effectively.   My commiserations go to Coun Lambert. In some way the leadership was foisted upon him back in 2010 and he has always struggled to do an effective job.'

We'll just have to wait and see how Mr. Farnell performs as the new leader. 

In the pay of the Daily Mail!

Challenge to Labour MPs who write for the right-wing press

 

IN last Saturday's Rochdale Observer Jim Dobbin, the Labour MP for Castleton, Norden & Bamford, lashed out saying: 

'It upsets me when Labour parliamentarians go public and criticise the leadership.  Those are issues for internal debate and discussion and should not be subject of interviews on television or the right wing press...  some of the parliamentary articles I have read recently, some of them paid articles, do political harm to parties and politicians and very little to address the real issues for individuals and communities.'

 

This attack comes at a time when the Rochdale Labour Party is experiencing some turmoil over who will be the leader of the Labour group on the local council.  This issue should be cleared up tonight when the former council leader Colin Lambert is to face an attempt by Richard Farnell to overthrow him.  Councillor Farnell was the leader of the Rochdale Council in the early 1990s, some councillors have encouraged him to stand against Councillor Lambert. 

 

Councillor Lambert's style of leadership has been described as 'abrasive' by some councillors, but his position has not been helped by the scandals such as those of sexual grooming and the continual controversies surrounding the inquires into Knowl View special school.  Even Richard Farnell himself has been questioned as to his knowledge of what was going on at Knowl View while he was leader of the council in the 1990s:  so far he has failed to comment on this.

 

The Rochdale Labour M.P. Simon Danczuk has been strongly critical of the Rochdale Council under Colin Lambert's leadership; both over the grooming scandal and over the council's conduct of the investigation into Knowl View.  Many of his attacks have appeared in the media, and he has also blasted the leadership of the Labour Party nationally in the press, some of this he has done in articles paid for by the Daily Mail.

 

Indeed, on the day of the launch of his book in April Mr. Danczuk justified his getting paid by the right-wing press by saying that the Mail was the 'best newspaper', and in joke, that Paul Dacre was a bit 'too left-wing' for him.  At the same time he assured us that he was not involved in a 'moral crusade' of the Mary Whitehouse type.  This may be the kind cavalier conduct that worries Jim Dobbin M.P.