Labour cabinet plays hide and seek

3.19.54pm GMT Tue 30th Jan 2007

Lambeth Labour is so ashamed of its latest Tax and Slash policies that it is hiding away where nobody can find them on THURSDAY AFTERNOONS instead of Monday evenings at 7pm.

Being Lambeth Labour they are spinning this bizarre game of hide and seek as an experiment in democracy by making it easier for those who cannot attend on Monday evenings. Labour Leader Steve Reed even claimed that Cabinet was only a meeting held in public rather than a public forum designed to hold the administration to account.

Lambeth will now have the dubious distinction of being at the forefront of London Councils who hold such meetings at 2.30pm in the afternoon. No doubt Labour sees this as an improvement over their earlier 1998-2002 administration, which held its Cabinet meetings in secret.

If you happen to be free on a Thursday afternoon at 2.30pm rather than working and you wish to hold Labour to account - sorry, impassively observe their decisions - there's one coming up on 8th February, followed by another on 15th March and then 19th April.

Liberal Democrat Leader, Cllr Ashley Lumsden, said, " These Labour Cabinet meetings are getting rarer and harder to spot than Halley's Comet. "

Cllr Lumsden also said, "You'd think with their new fat salaries safely tucked in their back pockets, Labour politicians would be anxious to justify their extraordinary price hikes on care charges for the elderly, their savage cuts to voluntary groups, their dodgy housing ALMO stance, their rent and service charge hikes, their cuts on crime, their above average Council Tax and their astronomic increase in Resident Parking charges."

Cllr Lumsden added, " This Labour Cabinet should come out of the closet and face up to its responsibilities to Lambeth residents and taxpayers."