Ilkley Rocks

Well, got a little Parish Newsletter from our beloved rulers at the end of last week.

It’s effectively one of those tick-box exercises so beloved of our government. In order to get ‘Quality Parish Council’ status, the PC has to produce a newsletter. There’s nothing really to put in it, of course, but its required in order to get the extra funding, so we do it. Hmm.

Of course, it’s designed to tell us all the great things the junta do for us (which basically boils down to a few community grants using our money), but it’s also quite revealing about the state of our local system.

At the last local elections, every single councillor returned in Ilkley represented the Conservatives. This, I guess, is not much of a suprise (this is Ickley itself, the councillors from Burley and Menston are not Tories). This means, effectively, that there is an in-built Tory majority on our council. Machine-gun defended this at the time by pointing out the different views held by the different councillors, in order to suggest they were all their own person, as it were.

Which makes one wonder why they didn’t all stand as independents as happens in many other areas.

To which the obvious answer is that ‘they wouldn’t have been elected’. If one looks closely, however, at their addresses, it’s noticeable that our Tory regime includes outsiders brought in, presumably, for their political views. Ben Rhydding ward is worst; of the three councillors representing the ward, one, machine-gun, lives in Otley, while another, ‘Shaka’ Heslop, lives all the way away in Addingham (it’s not even on the same side of the town as Ben Rhydding for Kali’s sake!).

So what we have here is a bunch of councillors relying on an inbuilt Tory majority, parachuted into safe seats to keep the regime running. Which in turn means that decisions over what happens in the Parish, how the precept is set and spent, are not taken by voters directly but are taken by a handful of men and women in the local Conservative Club (or Ickley Golf Club…). Elected dictatorship…

As Homer once said, ‘When will people learn, democracy doesn’t work!?’

Given that this is the fifth time Boots has had its front door smashed in the last twelve months, I should think they’re starting to look at other options than having a store in our fair town.

Pravda reports that the pot of money available to our local leaders is rather more than I suggested. They actually have around 80K for special projects.

Now, that would buy some fine strapping lads to provide security, not to mention a few CCTV cameras, surely?

Of course, it won’t help breed the chaos Ma Brown needs so she can declare her military crackdown and impose a state of martial law.

Sometimes, voyeurism is good.

There’s sites like this, where you have no idea what’s going on, know nobody involved, but it’s a form of escape…

Seems to be that some of them were once at Ilkley Grammar, so it’s on-topic. Which is important.

My considered opinion is, hmmm….

Which definitely sounds like a damn fine jazz track (either from Louis and his Hot Five or the sort of Miles Kind of Blue days).

What it is, though, is a damn fine deli. Bread, pies, ice cream (including the finest chilli ice cream) made on the premises by young Andy, who is the ex-Chef of Tubby’s.

Compared to the Rocky Deli, the service is friendly, the cheeses are tops (and so are the meats the carnivores in the family tell me), and he does catering too.

He even made me a pie specially for xmas dinner. So this is by way of payback.

Just opposite Lishman’s too…

The phrase comes from, I believe, Byron, who, when asked how his honeymoon went, replied, ‘Call it rather a treacle moon’.

Thanks to a variety of contacts, this site has been doing rather well on Google recently. It’s good to notice that if one should get the spelling right, and Google for ‘Visit Baht’at Country’, the official site comes second and my attack on it comes first, which is sort of heart-warming.

And then if you should happen to be searching for ‘breaking glass’ and don’t really want to know about that dreadful old Hazel O’Connor film (I drink my coffee and you drink your tea indeed), you’ll get a top ten link to here.

Of course, just to ruin the party, D. pointed out that Google is all up the spout at the moment and we should all be using vivisimo.

But it rather begs the question of whether I should be attempting to get top google searches in everything. Maybe I should restrain the headline puns for a minute?

Questions no one has asked so far.

What is ‘Ilkley’?
Ilkley is a town of some 14,000 inhabitants, located in Wharfedale, Yorkshire, England. The town is sandwiched between two areas of stunning moorland, part of the North Pennines. It’s one of the most beautiful places in the country, if not the world. And those of us who have a home here are very privileged.

Who are you?
I live here.

Are you being serious?
Sometimes. But, no, Ilkley doesn’t really exist under a fascist jackboot. It just sometimes feels like it. It is, however, definitely a gerontocracy.

Are you aware of the libel laws in the UK?
Oh yes, but I’d always claim the satirical defence. If anyone threatens me with lawyers I will, of course, cave in straight away.

Does anybody read what you write?
Hey, you can’t have got here from google. As insular, cynical, blogs go, this one is doing just fine.

Do you hate where you live?
See above. I just like complaining. And if I can’t complain, I like to whinge.

If I had an afternoon in Ilkley, what should I do?
If it’s not raining, get thee up t’moor.
If it is, get thee down t’Old Bridge, and watch the Wharfe roar.

What’s the best pub/restaurant/tea shop/nightclub?
The Yard/Tubby Wadlow’s/Betty’s/What’s a nightclub?

What’s your motto?
It’s been a long time since I did Latin, but something along the lines of ex Verbeia veni, et a Verbeia redibo.

Can we contact you?

If you really want to. Try e-mailing me here.

Occasionally a jobbing journalist will let the mask slip, and you’ll notice the hidden agenda. They’ll forget all about ethics and and just do something for the hell of it. Our local propaganda sheet has a touch of the Skibbereen Eagle about it, and allows its op-ed page to be dominated by an illiterate Tory councillor denouncing the government under the guise of a farming column, but usually it manages to keep hidden its function as the protector of the Ma Brown/’Machine Gun’ Gibbons regime.

In 1984, of course, the government of Big Brother keeps the public in line thanks to the latter’s fear of ‘the other’, through propagating a state of permanent war. Some of our national papers do the same of course–if you read the Daily Mail religiously, you’d never leave the house (not least for fear the price might drop while you’re out). The function of a newspaper is, after all, to reflect and re-inforce our own prejudices. So how does one do that in a place where a significant part of the population thinks that Mussolini was a damn fine chap? And how can that fit into the agenda of our incumbent regime?

We’ve already shown (posts passim) how the regime is intent on fostering the crime wave around Ilkley and passing pointless by-laws to keep the Police occupied. We’ve also pointed out the obvious barrier like nature of the new traffic lights. Fear of crime is of benefit to any totalitarian ruler. Tight immigration control is useful as well. The third element required is the support of the populace through fear of outsiders, of the ‘non-us’.

So, every so often, the Gazette will publish an article that re-inforces that fear. Last summer we had an appalling piece of journalism on our regular travellers, which followed close on the heels of a piece raising the (entirely mythical) possibility that a centre for disruptive youth might be sited on the playing fields of Ashlands School. Neither of these stories would have passed the simplest analysis of journalism students, being rants rather than fair and balanced.

And now the Gazette is at it again, with a piece that has an underlying resonance of racism, and is based entirely on smear and innuendo. This story purports to be about over-charging by taxi drivers.

But let’s look at it more closely. First of all, the basic requirement for any story is that you have two sources confirming any piece of information, or allegation. That’s what we were taught at cub school. So how many does this article have?

One. A Mrs Goodwin of Addingham (which, I believe, is where the writer responsible lives).

Oh, and her ‘neighbours and friends’.

That’s it. One person, who claims to have been over-charged on New Year’s Eve. Yes, that’s New Year’s Eve when everybody in the country knows that taxis charge more. Headline news? I think not…

But the main thrust of the story isn’t about the NYE over-charging, it’s about over-charging generally, and how many people make allegations of this nature? Uhhr, well there’s Mrs Goodwin again, who says her and her friends have experienced this, but makes no precise accusation, and isn’t pressed on it by the hack in question (first question you learn in journalism school, ‘can you be a bit more precise about when this happened?’).

So that’s no allegations on the main story then. It’s built on wind and water, but fits nicely into the standard Ickley prejudice about those nasty coloured gentlemen ripping off good white people. It’s smear and innuendo, in order to reinforce the needs of the regime.

It’s as if I wrote a story that went ‘The Ilkley Gazette is a racist rag claims Mrs. Blogs of Ilkley. She says her and her friends have noticed on many occasions that the Gazette is really not very nice about people descended from immigrants. She can’t remember precisely when, but we’re making this front page news.’

well christmas wasn’t what it was supposed to be, but it was a lovely one anyway. beautiful things, people and times. back to the smelly grey of the city centre, away from the fresh air and the stunning sights… memories…

Another Saturday night in Ilkley, another load of smashed glass along Leeds Road. With no Police presence and no CCTV, there’s nothing to stop drunken townies letting their feelings show at the expense of the poor shop-owners of the area. The easiest thing for everyone is to blame the Trav.

Rather more helpful would be to consider why the Council refuse to provide any protection to the citizens of the town. Our poor Ilkley boatman can be thrown into the Wharfe by visiting scum and there’s a plaintive cry towards the Police, but nothing actually DONE. Meanwhile the Council introduce more by-laws that will never be enforced, or will only distract the forces we have from protecting our populace. As I’ve suggested before, it’s fairly obvious the members of the Council have a hidden agenda here. And it’s not just the usual hidden agenda of the comfortable middle classes of blaming everyone else. Perhaps they’re in league with local glaziers.

What could be done? Well, the local precept brings in about 40K per year. Rather than spending it on inadequate xmas lights, perhaps the cash should go towards paying for security operatives to work in the town centre on weekends and bank holidays? It would certainly be popular.

Otherwise, perhaps we should look at in-comers paying a deposit before they enter the town. If they behave themselves or leave peaceably, they get the money back. Otherwise it goes towards paying for new glazing, vomit-cleaning and general security. There are barriers at the station, there will soon be traffic light gates from both directions into town. Passport controls wouldn’t be hard to set up. Let’s protect our town, and be a shining beacon for Mr Blunkett while we’re at it–automatic entry to Ilkley if your retina matches the computerised record. Otherwise, it’ll be strictly by strip-search and payment of a hefty deposit.