River Lugg, Herefordshire

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Hfd Cattle

Member
Mixed Farmer
Location
Hereford
If a contractor is coming 200 miles to do a job for the council, I'd want a DNA test to check relationship to those councillors. Come to think of it, the DNA test would probably be a good idea if they came 200 yards -- as routine! Trust them not. Power corrupts. Absolute power corrupts absolutely.
We recently had some lads here with a chipper clearing the electric lines . They came from North Wales every day 124miles
They were tellin us that 2 gangs are going up from Hereford to North Wales every day .....to clear electric lines !
They knew this because they stopped for breakfast on the way down on the A49 and the boys from Hfd were also in the cafe having breakfast on their way up !
 

primmiemoo

Member
Location
Devon
Well put. I have seen exactly the same in my local PC. As the new Clerk likes a simple life and doesn't have to be arsed to work for "best value"!

Is the PC treating its Clerk as nobody more than a minutes secretary? I've seen that happen, and when a PC undermines its Civil Servant, it undermines itself.
 

steveR

Member
Mixed Farmer
Is the PC treating its Clerk as nobody more than a minutes secretary? I've seen that happen, and when a PC undermines its Civil Servant, it undermines itself.
I am no longer a member of the PC after 20 years, 10 as Chair. I did not like the new Clerk, but had already decided I had done my stint. Present incumbent as Clerk, is revelling in a very inexperienced Council and Chair and does her own thing...

The work and perfomance of the Council is.... less that exemplary!
 
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Bongodog

Member
Is the PC treating its Clerk as nobody more than a minutes secretary? I've seen that happen, and when a PC undermines its Civil Servant, it undermines itself.

In my experience (unlike SteveR I only managed 5 years as chairman) its the exact opposite, the clerk ceases to understand that they are paid to carry out the policies set by the elected cllrs and starts to tell the cllrs what to do. When you ask why a local inexpensive company has not been asked to quote you get back a load of guff about the clerk not being confident of their H & S policies, or how another clerk has expressed an opinion that their work is unsatisfactory.
All the clerks these days belong to an organisation the society of local council clerks, it is in effect their trade union, they expect however that the council will pay their time and expenses to attend conferences from which they return and impose yet more procedures. I had one clerk gleefully email me a document clearly stating that the SLCC said she was entitled to be enrolled in the local government pension scheme (at that time employers contributions were 12% for that) It was complete bs, we enrolled her in the state nest scheme where the contribution at the time was 1% !!
 

primmiemoo

Member
Location
Devon
In my experience (unlike SteveR I only managed 5 years as chairman) its the exact opposite, the clerk ceases to understand that they are paid to carry out the policies set by the elected cllrs and starts to tell the cllrs what to do. When you ask why a local inexpensive company has not been asked to quote you get back a load of guff about the clerk not being confident of their H & S policies, or how another clerk has expressed an opinion that their work is unsatisfactory.
All the clerks these days belong to an organisation the society of local council clerks, it is in effect their trade union, they expect however that the council will pay their time and expenses to attend conferences from which they return and impose yet more procedures. I had one clerk gleefully email me a document clearly stating that the SLCC said she was entitled to be enrolled in the local government pension scheme (at that time employers contributions were 12% for that) It was complete bs, we enrolled her in the state nest scheme where the contribution at the time was 1% !!

Oh. Then gone are the days when a Good Sort with a civil service stiffkit did their best to implement decisions from a raggle-taggle of slackly led councillors in something approaching an organisation in order for it to do its bit to maintain a worthwhile community ~ with nothing more than a peppercorn honorarium as reward? Sigh.
 

robs1

Member
It goes on all the time, in my early days on our parish Council it was down to the cllrs to find people to quote for work, the council was dominated by village farmers and tradesmen who had a good idea who was suited to which job and who would quote the least. Towards the end it was dominated by retired school teachers and such like who would accept any quote the clerk put in front of them. County highways were worse literally wanted a minimum of £5k to do anything
I've recently joined the board of a flat management company that runs a block we own a flat in, one owner complained about water pooling on the car park and they didnt like walking through it, before I joined they had decided to resurface it, they thought it would be 50 grand , I said that ridiculous for a space that holds 28 cars, anyway tenders came in cheapest 98 grand dearest 156, I got a local firm that do a lot of drives(not pikies) they said they would fo it for 14 grand.
These fools on these committees have no idea
 
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SFI - What % were you taking out of production?

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Red Tractor drops launch of green farming scheme amid anger from farmers

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As reported in Independent


quote: “Red Tractor has confirmed it is dropping plans to launch its green farming assurance standard in April“

read the TFF thread here: https://thefarmingforum.co.uk/index.php?threads/gfc-was-to-go-ahead-now-not-going-ahead.405234/
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