Ilkley Rocks

I forgot my manners…

Chatiry mentioned this site, and I haven’t returned the favour.

Apologies. As librarians go, chatiry is most unintimidating. She also likes books, which, IME is very rare amongst her profession.

She also likes ranting…something that you’d never see done on this site.

Oh no, not never…

(and she could give me some lessons in using typepad, I have NO idea how to find out what search terms people are using to get to this site, or how to put on records, books and other such entertainment…ho hum…)

I’m sure many of you know of the existence of this place, but anyway..

Ilkley, South Africa.

I used to have a theory that if you went to somewhere similarly named to somewhere else, you could travle between the two.

Thus Stamford Bridge would take you from Yorkshire to Chelski.

And Leeds, Utah was where the Saints came from, of course.

I’ll shut up now.

while reading the news from Iraq, I came across this.

A Mr Bahtat was the Baathist Head of Security in Nasiryah under Saddam.

Not, I’m sure, the sort of Baht’at country our local tourism idiots had in mind….

…using titles for posts like ‘Ilkley Property’ rather than something puntastic is a blatant attempt to clamber up the greasy pole that is google fame and fortune…

Selling Houses last night featured Ilkley. In particular, one of those ex-local authority houses on Valley Rd (I think). Horrible it was inside as well…supposedly decorated by an American artist, her work brought to mind Jake Chapman’s comment on the British Art Show,

like anybody needs another picture of a fucking elephant

They claimed at the end that, after the rather clean Mr Winter’s ministrations, it sold within weeks. Not true, as it was still on the market three months later. But that’s the appalling William Brown for you (the second worst estate agents in town)

Frazer’s done some rather nice drawings and images of why the new lamp posts are so idiotic…

And so it’s been announced that Bradford Council are going to go ahead with plans to pass management of Ickley’s buildings (including the Lido, White Wells, the Winter Gardens) to private companies and then pay that company to ensure their upkeep.

The three companies in the frame are Carrillion, Mapeley Accord, and LST. And I’ve raised problems with all of them before.

I am assuming the Council wil be thinking along the following lines in its negotiations…

1) Bradford Council claim that the risk of running the buildings will completely be passed over to the private companies. If it is, this will be a first. The interest for such companies in such deals is that the risk always remains with the public sector. This is why PFIs and PPPs are so profitable. I am assuming Bradford will ensure that all risks, then, remain with the private sector and that there are no get out clauses (acts of god, ‘accidental’ burnings down of the building, that sort of thing).

2) The point for private companies of being involved in such deals is to make a profit. And how do they do this? By paying minimum wage and squeezing every penny, of course. What guarantees has the Council got regarding the standard of maintenance? Perhaps they should look at the appalling lack of cleanliness, the leaking roofs and other problems in schools and hospitals managed by their favourite three bidders?

3) Carillion was responsible for the first PFI hospital–Dartford and Gravesham. The NAO reported that this hospital was no cheaper and possibly more expensive than a traditional rebuild. I’m assuming the council has carefully checked all the figures, and ensured there’s no clause allowing a slip-through of added extras?

4) Which brings me to the question of Capital expenditure–presumably the Council is expecting the private company to pay for this? Has it developed a set scale of what will be required or are we talking purely about revenue maintenance expenditure? It’s worth looking at the record of PFIs with regard to Capital expenditure–the majority of NHS Trusts operating PFIs have found themselves paying up to a SIX fold increase in the percentage of income used for capital costs AFTER the creation of the PFI (Dartford and Gravesham trust coming out worst again); I assume the Council isn’t expecting the good tax payers of Ickley to shell out?

5) As Addingham Councillor Palmer has pointed out, there is nothing in the agreements to stop the companies involved selling the contracts on to other companies. Which means lower standards and worse problems. In the last six months, there’s been a spate of PFI stakes sold to off-shore companies (Barclays Private Equity, Star Capital and others). These funds have no interest other than to make money for their very rich investors, and to cut costs wherever possible, while remaining essentially unaccountable.

6) And then there’s the question of whether Bradford Council are even allowed to do this. The assets of Ickley are owned (like the moor) by the people of Ilkley. Perhaps Frazer could comment? Especially on White Wells…

Time for independence once more.

So, tell me someone, why is it that Ickley has green bins for normal waste and, uhhr, black bins for re-cycling?

I think they’ve missed the point of going green

Glad to see the Gazette up to their old tricks.

Banner headline across the front page Postal Switch brings late deliveries–and anger.

A story of how the Post Office’s swap to mid-morning deliveries has wrecked the lives of citizens across Ickley.

Only, when you read it, you find that the ‘anger’ in question has been expressed by just one person a ‘David Bowtell’ of King’s Road, who claims ‘any sane person has got to admit a postal delivery at 12-20pm is quite absurd.’

Yup, that’s one source justifying a banner header, a quarter page story and a ‘strong’ leader.

I wonder if that source freely gave their opinion, or if they were asked for a comment (or, godz forbid, they were entirely made up)?? Who knows? What I do know, however, is that every Journalism course and Media Studies O Level in the country will tell you that two sources are the minimum required to make a story.

Strangely, the story itself doesn’t feature on pravda’s website. I wonder why?

And for the record Dave (and Ms Greaves), like many people I set off for work by 7-30 so I never see the post until the evening.

Everything I’ve said is coming true…I AM the oracle, after all.

In the last few weeks, we’ve had the continued refusal of the Civic Society to recognise the needs of local shop-owners to protect their property (Cllr Wolfie Smith even talking about not wanting to ruin the pleasant aspect of the streets of Ilkley, which so many people enjoy walking around in the evening–this would be the completely deserted streets of Ickley after six pm on weeknights, and the streets full of yout’ or drunken scutters of a summer weekend presumably?), the construction of that egregious misuse of concrete in the car park, and now we have the NEW lamp-posts and seemingly some new bricks added to the pavement on The Grove.

And it’s obvious why. The new lamp-posts will illuminate greater swathes of territory, and carry the new all-purpose surveillance machinery, while the coloured bricks used will reflect light, allowing slavering Machine-Gun Gibbons to sit on his moth eaten sofa drooling while he inspects the undergarments of the young ladeez from Betty’s.

I have a problem (just one? well, one for now…) with all this. First, and most obviously, is who the fuck asked us?.

That would be, uhhr, nobody. I live in a town renowned for its architecture, for reflecting a certain Victorian style. I don’t expect to see that charm destroyed by the installation of pieces of electrical equipment that are totally out of scale with everything around them. The moors on either side of the town work because everything is (relatively) small. It’s in scale. Constructing lamp-posts that would better be fitted with floodlighting (perhaps they’re left over from the Colditz lighting at Ben Rhydding Sports Club?) is a) stupid and b) demonstration of complete contempt for the people of the town. Now, we have a lamp-post dominating the Victorian vista of The Station and Midland pub, we have posts breaking up every view up The Grove and down Brook Street.

And where’s the fecking Civic Society? Yup, preventing shop-owners protecting their property once again.

So, yes, we have yet more street-furniture, the bane of modern day existence. Furniture that doesn’t attempt to be even modernistic, just pseudo-classic but totally out of sympathy with its surroundings. And then we have new bricks on The Grove, which look like they’re going to widen the pavements even further. Oh joy…driving up the street will be sooo much easier.

And both of these wonderful new additions to our lives have Civic Society approval apparently. And Council approval. But who the fuck asked us? I pay my Council Tax (which is more than some of the Councillors who don’t even live in the Parish do), and if they’re going to alter my town, I should be consulted. Instead of ignored…

Time to get the chainsaws out. Forget my previous condemnations of vandalism and do us all a favour…