Esther McVey launches broadside as Wirral social landlord appoints Labour MP's husband as boss (From Wirral Globe)

Great News perhaps they can build more less expensive houses so they are not paid for by the DSS.

With Cllr Jeff "Kamikazi Campaign" Green on the board, I feel sure the actions of this new chairman will be carefully scrutinised on an ongoing basis.

"especially as this is now a paid position which was previously unpaid."

So, how much is the Chairman of WPH homes paid? Is it more than his wife the MP? Who decided on whether it was a paid position? Who was on the selection panel? Where did they advertise the job? So what's the conflict of interest? If the only conflict of interest (assuming there is only one) is that his wife represents some tenants of Wirral Partnership Homes in Wirral South, it seems simple enough to have a Vice-Chair to deal with anything his declared conflict of interest, which will give Ashwin more free time to spend with his wife and one year old daughter Riya.

So I get this clear, a Conservative MP is moaning (as so is one of her staff) that the husband of a Labour MP has been given a job and insinuates he was only awarded it either because of what party he's in, and/or because his wife is an MP?

If McVey is so deeply concerned about the representation and rights of social housing tenants why did she choose to represent West Wirral; a constituency with one of the lowest densities of social housing in the UK?

As to whether Kumar is the right person for the job, I have no idea. But then neither has McVey.

That did not however prevent her from concluding somewhat irrationally that the appointment would ''only have a negative efffect on her constituents.''

Come on McVey you have to do better. Instead of opportunism lets have some action. How about writing to the Globe to express your disgust with the utter failure of leadership at the Council. A situation in which evident cronyism and a culture of cover up from both Conservative and Labour groups ran the borough into the ground.

Nothing to say on this matter McVey?

Has this not been sufficiently detrimental to your constituents to excite your concern?

The stench of coruption from New Labour MPs, Wirral Borough Council, and any ex staff of the totally discredited Local Council, is overpowering.

This coupled with the fact that Alison knows full well she is never going to be re-elected in Wirral South, make the who episode quite murky to say the least.

Why is the position of the titular head of social housing a paid job, it never was before commecial interests took over Local Government.

This is just another smear story. I am surprised - I thought Esther was a bit above that kind of thing. But on reflection, she didn't leak the story in the first place, did she?

I am sure Esther McVey has never ever used her parliamentary position for her own benefit has she...

I see for 2011-2012 she has claimed £43,289.33 in expenses alone not including wages. (including multiple £10.21 payments for her iPad data allowance!!!)))

That is more than I will earn working full time for 3 years!!

Her halo must need polishing!!

The post of Wirral Partnership Homes Chair attracts a remuneration of £12k per annum and wil no doubt involve a great deal of responsibility and attendance of regular evening meetings.
Its a de facto part time job.

To learn that McVey claimed over £43k in expenses alone for her part time job exposes her criticism of Kumar and WPH for what it really is; the cynical rantings of a hypocritical second rate careerist Toy Town Tory.

"Jobs for the boys"? Wasn't Esther parachuted into a safe Tory seat, making her nomination and subsequent election a clear case of "Jobs for the Tory Girls"? I hear the sound of glass breaking from within...

@bickyboy Esther McVey lost in 2005 against Stephen Hesford MP, the boundaries of Wirral West were redrawn (which made it more Tory and less Labour), so she won it in 2010 against Cllr Phil Davies (from Birkenhead). To be fair though, since losing it in 2005 she did her best to be as political as is humanly possible for the next five years. One has to admire at times her chutpah at heckling at her own party's councillor (who then went onto lose his seat) at Wirral Council and other things Esther does to draw attention to herself.

Sorry chutzpah, not chutpah.

What a nasty cheap shot!
.
I wonder how Esther McVey would react if somebody openly questioned her integrity without any grounds other than not liking her political leanings.
.
Why so quiet on other "issues" related to the council that have affected vulnerable people on the Wirral? I didn't hear her speaking out about the disgraceful situation in adult social services or the way the council treated the whistleblowers,
.
Simply being a political activist, in this case a Labour activist, does not immediately result in a conflict of interests.Personally
, I think Ms McVey should apologise to Mr Kumar for making unsubstantiated allegations.

ordinary personn wrote:
What a nasty cheap shot!
.
I wonder how Esther McVey would react if somebody openly questioned her integrity without any grounds other than not liking her political leanings.
.
Why so quiet on other "issues" related to the council that have affected vulnerable people on the Wirral? I didn't hear her speaking out about the disgraceful situation in adult social services or the way the council treated the whistleblowers,
.
Simply being a political activist, in this case a Labour activist, does not immediately result in a conflict of interests.Personally

, I think Ms McVey should apologise to Mr Kumar for making unsubstantiated allegations.

Err she did ask a question at Prime Minister's Question Time about it and participate in a Westminster Hall debate with the Minister in the House of Commons, but I suppose in some people's eyes that's "quiet".

johnbrace wrote:
@bickyboy Esther McVey lost in 2005 against Stephen Hesford MP, the boundaries of Wirral West were redrawn (which made it more Tory and less Labour), so she won it in 2010 against Cllr Phil Davies (from Birkenhead). To be fair though, since losing it in 2005 she did her best to be as political as is humanly possible for the next five years. One has to admire at times her chutpah at heckling at her own party's councillor (who then went onto lose his seat) at Wirral Council and other things Esther does to draw attention to herself.

Thanks for putting the record straight, John, and apologies to Esther for my feeble and badly researched rant.

Politicians of the blue hue clearly have no conception of irony, when they can on the one hand berate someone of opposing dogma for taking a job in social housing, and on the other eagerly accelarate Labour's handing over of public services lock, stock and barrel to their pals in private commerce.

@bickyboy Esther is DWP (Department for Work and Pensions), housing is DCLG (Department of Communities and Local Government), but I take your point. Yet both social housing and the private rented sector need improving. It's just a matter of opinion as to how, but the housing reforms and welfare reforms currently going through are proving unpopular with a variety of groups that want things to stay roughly as they are.

If Esther is DWP, I wonder what she thinks about the current drive by her department to get disabled people off benefits and into jobs that don't exist by employing a private contractor to carry out work capability assessments; a contractor whose staff are often badly trained and to be honest, downright tactless in the way they treat vulnerable people when making life changing decisions about their lives? A friend of mine who claims ESA and who suffers from mental illness went to ATOS for a WCA. She was asked whether she had ever tried to kill herself. That's the level of mental health training these people have.
Social housing is in crisis because the Tories sold off so much of it to create a new Tory-voting class of homeowners from former social housing tenants. Unless Ashwin Kumar is willing to work with others to address that situation with radical policies then I really don't see how he can be accused of bringing Labour dogma to the WPH boardroom.

@bickyboy, she's a Private Parliamentary Secretary, and would therefore have to resign if she spoke out against her own government's policy. The person she is PPS for is the Rt Hon Chris Grayling MP (Minister for Employment), therefore by convention she's not allowed to publically ask those sort of questions as they fall within the Rt Hon Chris Grayling MP's remit. She can however bring up such concerns privately with the Minister. As to ATOS and the Work Capability Assessments, it's far more problematic than that one anecdote. The Work Capability Assessments are done on a points basis with the information then going to the DWP decision maker. However the rates of successful appeals against decisions because of flawed ATOS assessments is staggering. Sadly there is a lot of ignorance and prejudice surrounding mental health matters. To address your other point, I will declare an interest as I live in a house where both the neighbouring properties are owned by Wirral Partnership Homes and my wife is an own occupier, however WPH and its contractors (here's looking at you Brammall Construction Ltd, of the large donation to the Birkenhead Constituency Labour Party!) seem to at times ride a little roughshod over the rights of owner occupiers when their contractors make mistakes which causes damage. I realise people make mistakes, but if you're not a tenant of WPH at times it can be very hard to deal with what is still a slightly dysfunctional organisation (even if you work in the media). I wonder if the Birkenhead Labour councillors on WPH's board declared the financial interest of the £2,000 donation from Brammall Construction Ltd to the Birkenhead Constituency Labour Party in 2004 before awarding the contract to Brammall Construction Ltd for the current round of building work going on to WPH properties?

"Social housing is in crisis because the Tories sold off so much of it to create a new Tory-voting class of homeowners from former social housing tenants." Come off it, bickyboy !!

The Tories first started promoting the discounted sale of council houses to sitting tenants in the early 1980's and by the end of that decade more than one million homes had been sold. Presumably that is what brought about the 'social crisis' you describe.

Labour (or more correctly, 'New' Labour) won the 1997 General Election and were in office for the following 13 years. If, as you say, there was a 'social crisis' in public-sector housing as a result of the Housing Act 1980 (the so-called 'Right to Buy' Act), what did Labour do during its long period in office to address this problem? Any remedial action on its part then could have avoided the 'social crisis' you now identify as being the fault of the Wicked Tories.

Housing policy is very complex, as the needs of the population vary. For example an aging population creates more demand for bungalows. One thing this new Coalition Government has tried to do is build a lot of new houses to replace old ones. The series of banking crises however as well as the multiple between yearly earning and house prices changing has priced many young people and first time buyers out of the market due to the large deposits now required due (in part) to volatile house prices and risk averse banks. This caused a ripple effect in the construction industry and led to a number of construction companies going into administration. Only some of the one million homes that were formerly public sector housing you refer to were sold on Wirral, I'd estimate between one and ten thousand households, which is a small proportion of the total.

I agree with everything that John Brace has said. Furthermore, I have been asking questions of Ms McVey since March 2011 on a wide range of subjects from banking, benefits & tax, debt & deficit, economics, general Gov't policies, human rights, Olympics, railways and Scottish Referendum and more, mostly ignored. She has taken no action with regard to WMBC's governance problems!

Referring to Ordinary Personn, I believe her to be incapable of straight thinking and action. She is a career politician unwilling and unable to rock a boat.

@Johnxx

Well thank you, if I read that correctly you're implying that Esther McVey is climbing the greasy pole, which were the same things people said about her predecessor (until he resigned on principle over the Baroness Scotland issue). Do you live in Wirral West Johnxx?

johnbrace wrote:

ordinary personn wrote:
What a nasty cheap shot!
.
I wonder how Esther McVey would react if somebody openly questioned her integrity without any grounds other than not liking her political leanings.
.
Why so quiet on other "issues" related to the council that have affected vulnerable people on the Wirral? I didn't hear her speaking out about the disgraceful situation in adult social services or the way the council treated the whistleblowers,
.
Simply being a political activist, in this case a Labour activist, does not immediately result in a conflict of interests.Personally


, I think Ms McVey should apologise to Mr Kumar for making unsubstantiated allegations.

Err she did ask a question at Prime Minister's Question Time about it and participate in a Westminster Hall debate with the Minister in the House of Commons, but I suppose in some people's eyes that's "quiet".

Come on, johnbrace - Esther's contribution in what turned out to be a real damp squib of a debate in Westminster Hall (despite Frank Field bigging it up beforehand) consisted of three very brief interventions indeed.

By the way, nothing wrong with 'climbing the greasy pole' in the political context; an expression famously used by the illustrious Earl of Beaconsfield :-)

Ben Beaconsfield wrote:
"Social housing is in crisis because the Tories sold off so much of it to create a new Tory-voting class of homeowners from former social housing tenants." Come off it, bickyboy !!

The Tories first started promoting the discounted sale of council houses to sitting tenants in the early 1980's and by the end of that decade more than one million homes had been sold. Presumably that is what brought about the 'social crisis' you describe.

Labour (or more correctly, 'New' Labour) won the 1997 General Election and were in office for the following 13 years. If, as you say, there was a 'social crisis' in public-sector housing as a result of the Housing Act 1980 (the so-called 'Right to Buy' Act), what did Labour do during its long period in office to address this problem? Any remedial action on its part then could have avoided the 'social crisis' you now identify as being the fault of the Wicked Tories.

Not sure whether you're agreeing with my post or not, Ben. Nor am I sure whether you're suggesting my post is a intended as a blanket endorsement of the policies of the Labour government from 1997 to 2010. I can assure you it is not, but are you seriously suggesting that Labour could have followed through all their other programmes of public sector expansion as well as addressing social housing provision to fill that one million home gap?

Whichever, I don't think you need to worry about anyone accusing you of being a Labour supporter on this occasion.

johnbrace wrote:
@bickyboy, she's a Private Parliamentary Secretary, and would therefore have to resign if she spoke out against her own government's policy. The person she is PPS for is the Rt Hon Chris Grayling MP (Minister for Employment), therefore by convention she's not allowed to publically ask those sort of questions as they fall within the Rt Hon Chris Grayling MP's remit. She can however bring up such concerns privately with the Minister. As to ATOS and the Work Capability Assessments, it's far more problematic than that one anecdote. The Work Capability Assessments are done on a points basis with the information then going to the DWP decision maker. However the rates of successful appeals against decisions because of flawed ATOS assessments is staggering. Sadly there is a lot of ignorance and prejudice surrounding mental health matters. To address your other point, I will declare an interest as I live in a house where both the neighbouring properties are owned by Wirral Partnership Homes and my wife is an own occupier, however WPH and its contractors (here's looking at you Brammall Construction Ltd, of the large donation to the Birkenhead Constituency Labour Party!) seem to at times ride a little roughshod over the rights of owner occupiers when their contractors make mistakes which causes damage. I realise people make mistakes, but if you're not a tenant of WPH at times it can be very hard to deal with what is still a slightly dysfunctional organisation (even if you work in the media). I wonder if the Birkenhead Labour councillors on WPH's board declared the financial interest of the £2,000 donation from Brammall Construction Ltd to the Birkenhead Constituency Labour Party in 2004 before awarding the contract to Brammall Construction Ltd for the current round of building work going on to WPH properties?

Thanks for all that, John. My only point really was to vent some spleen over the way disabled people are being treated by this government. I'm not 100 per cent sure, but I think the lanyards around the necks of some of the officials at the Paralympic Games bear the legend ATOS; if so that must count as the "public irony of the year".

As for Esther's position as a PPS precluding her from raising the incompetence of ATOS with her boss in public, I'm not so naive as to expect such an unprecedented display of political courage, not to say career suicide. However, it would be nice if SOMEONE in the Coalition stepped forward and spoke for those who seem to have no voice of their own.

Incidentally, I would have been happy to provide more than "one anecdote" about the WCAs but I might have been typing all day. I only mentioned my friend's case because it's relevant to the point I was making, not because I think she's the only person ever to be badly treated by ATOS. I've also heard that a huge number of appeals against decisions made by DMs on the basis of WCAs conducted by ATOS succeed at appeal, but I guess the strategy being employed is to make the tests so unpleasant that you browbeat people into thinking they're stealing money which could be better diverted to someone more deserving; and in many cases that clearly works.

On your final point I hope either Ashwin Kumar or someone else can sort WPH out. I went for a job interview with them a couple of years ago, and they seemed a very professional organisation. Maybe, like many other public and public funded bodies that professionalism only applies within the boundaries of their HQ, and the rest of it is nothing but smug mission statements and chaos.

Totally the wrong person for the job.

McVey belongs presenting the hayfever forecast on GMTV.

@bickyboy

I am a disabled person, so I know exactly how they're treated by the Government (which ironically owes its very existence in the first place to me) as when in the Liberal Democrat Party in 2010 I brought it into existence by voting for a deal with the Conservative Party. However the deal I voted for was subsequently broken by Lib Dem MPs in areas such as tuition fees (and others). So, finding myself in an impossible situation I resigned the party on principle about this and other matters. Thankfully there is less that three years left to the Coalition government before it dissolves of its own accord.

@Wirralrob

Those of us who have hayfever could tell you that information currently without the need for a forecast, but the two have similarities.

Similarity 1
Pollen forecasters rely on the suffering of others and tell you where people are suffering.
MPs rely on the suffering of others and tell you where they represent.

Similarity 2
Pollen forecasters are often in the broadcast media.
Politicians try to get in the media as much as possible.

Similarity 3
Pollen forecasters are often sponsored by a third party.
MPs are often sponsored by a political party, have donations from various third parties, other jobs, outside interests etc...

Similarity 4
Pollen forecasters use how it is now and has been recently to predict the future.
MPs sometimes predict what's going to happen.

I'll leave you to think of a few more!

John, I have similar experience of this government's treatment of the sick because a close relative of mine has a disability. Even Mrs Thatcher's government shied away from addressing the issue of the millions of people claiming what was then invalidity benefit, mainly because whilst on that benefit they didn't appear on the jobless figures. New Labour introduced more testing of the work capability of incapacity claimants but the programme was only ever employed in a piecemeal fashion during their period of office. This government, through the hamfisted auspices of ATOS is attacking the disabled with an unprecedented gusto, and even if they were getting everything else right they would deserve lasting condemnation for that policy alone.

bickyboy wrote:

Ben Beaconsfield wrote:
"Social housing is in crisis because the Tories sold off so much of it to create a new Tory-voting class of homeowners from former social housing tenants." Come off it, bickyboy !!

The Tories first started promoting the discounted sale of council houses to sitting tenants in the early 1980's and by the end of that decade more than one million homes had been sold. Presumably that is what brought about the 'social crisis' you describe.

Labour (or more correctly, 'New' Labour) won the 1997 General Election and were in office for the following 13 years. If, as you say, there was a 'social crisis' in public-sector housing as a result of the Housing Act 1980 (the so-called 'Right to Buy' Act), what did Labour do during its long period in office to address this problem? Any remedial action on its part then could have avoided the 'social crisis' you now identify as being the fault of the Wicked Tories.

Not sure whether you're agreeing with my post or not, Ben. Nor am I sure whether you're suggesting my post is a intended as a blanket endorsement of the policies of the Labour government from 1997 to 2010. I can assure you it is not, but are you seriously suggesting that Labour could have followed through all their other programmes of public sector expansion as well as addressing social housing provision to fill that one million home gap?

Whichever, I don't think you need to worry about anyone accusing you of being a Labour supporter on this occasion.

Bickyboy: Thanks for your "not sure" comment - it underlines my independent status, as does your "I don't think you need worry about anyone accusing you of being a Labour supporter ON THIS OCCASION" (my emphasis).

On a more serious note: yes, I am suggesting that 'New' Labour could have addressed social housing provision along with everything else (by which you presumably include the hundreds of hours debating the abolition of foxhunting, for instance?). They were in office for thirteen years for goodness sake. How much longer did they want?

Finally, I would certainly never suggest that you were offering a blanket endorsement of the policies of the Labour government from 1997 to 2010. Nobody would be daft enough to make such a bizarre endorsement, would they ....?

Wirralrob wrote:
Totally the wrong person for the job.

McVey belongs presenting the hayfever forecast on GMTV.

16,726 people thought she was a little more qualified than your estimation, Wirralrob.

This is just another sign of the distasteful way politicians and associates seem to think they can act in Wirral. There is a need for honesty integrity and total transparency such conflicts of interests will ultimately help nobody and should not be allowed to happen. It is the good citizens of Wirral who are continually being let down by these distasteful and questionable self interest actions by politicians of all parties and those associated with them. It is time you all pulled together to make Wirral a better pace to live rather than a place where the abnormal and distasteful has become accepted as the norm!!!!

16,726 people voted for Ms McVey, but mostly people are voting to 'keep Labour out' or to 'keep the Tories out'. The result is to elect people with broadly the same mind-set, not least that it's OK for powers and cash to continue to flow to Brussels.

RL 1952 wrote:
This is just another sign of the distasteful way politicians and associates seem to think they can act in Wirral. There is a need for honesty integrity and total transparency such conflicts of interests will ultimately help nobody and should not be allowed to happen. It is the good citizens of Wirral who are continually being let down by these distasteful and questionable self interest actions by politicians of all parties and those associated with them. It is time you all pulled together to make Wirral a better pace to live rather than a place where the abnormal and distasteful has become accepted as the norm!!!!

Agreed, RL 1952. It's smear politics, and all the more surprising coming from the party that used these tactics to such disastrous effect at the recent council elections. You might have thought they had learned their lesson, but seemingly not.

Well the bad side to smear politics & sensationalism, is that it drowns out people with entirely legitimate concerns such as public sector whistleblowers from the political debate and discourse. The subject itself has been passionately talked about in the Council Chamber, as many believe it is harming local democracy as it's leading to some being very guarded in how they phrase things and what they say. The worst thing though is doing it during an actual election in order to win. That's why we have (albeit generally unenforced ones for a variety of reasons) laws against it when it gets too untrue, too personal and is being done for impure motives.

The Labour candidate in Liscard made some very childish remarks about the Royal family. These comments were made months before the May elections.

The remarks were noted and stored away by local Tories, who revealed them in a flourish just as the election campaign stated (if they had been so offensive, why not highlight them when they were originally made?). Her words were splashed all over the local press, on sites such as this one, in Conservative election leaflets (alongside the infamous Tory 'thugs' leaflet) and were very prominently displayed on the then Leader of Wirral's website.

However, since the Liscard Labour candidate beat the sitting Tory councillor with a massive 17% swing from his previous 2008 triumph, all these sneering comments have strangely disappeared from Jeff Green's website and are no longer part of the record.

I wonder why....?

Err because the plan of the Tories backfired, when the Labour candidate apologised? It also massively increased her name recognition and led to a lot of sympathy. To be honest though, pulling such a stunt is usually a sign of desperation in a campaign when bad poll numbers are coming in...

johnbrace wrote:
Err because the plan of the Tories backfired, when the Labour candidate apologised? It also massively increased her name recognition and led to a lot of sympathy. To be honest though, pulling such a stunt is usually a sign of desperation in a campaign when bad poll numbers are coming in...

Exactly the point I was trying to make. The Tory campaign in the 2012 council elections was an unmitigated disaster all round. No wonder the last posting on its leader's now-sanitised website is his letter of resignation as Council leader as long ago as May.

Ben Beaconsfield wrote:
The Labour candidate in Liscard made some very childish remarks about the Royal family. These comments were made months before the May elections.

The remarks were noted and stored away by local Tories, who revealed them in a flourish just as the election campaign stated (if they had been so offensive, why not highlight them when they were originally made?). Her words were splashed all over the local press, on sites such as this one, in Conservative election leaflets (alongside the infamous Tory 'thugs' leaflet) and were very prominently displayed on the then Leader of Wirral's website.

However, since the Liscard Labour candidate beat the sitting Tory councillor with a massive 17% swing from his previous 2008 triumph, all these sneering comments have strangely disappeared from Jeff Green's website and are no longer part of the record.

I wonder why....?

The remarks I wrote of are now on the "Leader of Wirral ('s Conservatives)" website.

This can mean one of two things: they have either been replaced or I missed them in my original trawl.

If the latter - I apologise.