December 2008 Archives
As 2008 draws to a close Dale Street Blues thought it was time to take a light hearted look back over the year and dish out some gongs.
Happy New Year to everyone.
Liverpool council has had its fair share of bad headlines over the past few years due to its internal machinations and fall outs between a variety of personalities.
But the city is not alone in sharing these type of problems, indeed Cheltenham takes the biscuit.
The following story from today is a cursory lesson to councils up and down the land...
Gordon Brown and the cabinet are planning to make Liverpool one of their first ports of call in the New Year.
The historic meeting next week will be only the third time the cabinet has met outside London since 1921, when Liberal Prime Minister David Lloyd George convened an emergency meeting at his holiday location in Wester Ross to discuss the Irish conflict.
Labour will be hoping that no former cabinet members put a dampener on the day.
On the morning of Gordon Brown's last visit to Liverpool, in September, former home secretary Charles Clarke attacked the Prime Minister on Radio 4's Today Programme.
A fierce debate is currently raging on the letters page of the Daily Post about the rights and wrongs of how a landmark Victorian church spire was saved.
The spire in question is that of St John the Divine in Fairfield.
Previous stories can be found here
It seems we are going to have to wait until the New Year for the result of the Standards Board for England investigation into Liverpool Council leader Warren Bradley.
I'm told the board will not be releasing their findings before Christmas and it will be well into the New Year before the result is made public.
Journalists around the world are today saddened to hear of the death of Mark Felt - AKA Deep Throat - one of the greatest public servants and sources of all time.
He famously coined the phrase "follow the money" while helping Washington Post journalists Bob Woodward and Carl Bernstein investigate the Watergate scandal, which lead to the downfall of US President Richard Nixon.
Deep Throat's identity was fiercely protected by Woodward and Bernstein until 2005, when Mr Felt himself revealed his role in helping uncover the Watergate affair.
The example that Woodward and Bernstein set in concealing their source is the cornerstone of good journalism (one which the Daily Post proudly follows).
Here is the full case summary of the Standards Board investigation into Mike Storey:
We've just broken this story on our website:
FORMER Liverpool Council leader Mike Storey has been found guilty of breaking council rules by an ethical standards investigation - but will face no action.
Cllr Storey showed an "error of judgement" in discussing the health details of former Culture Company chief executive Jason Harborow with a member of the press, the Standards Board for England has found.
He was cleared of the potentially more serious charge of conspiring with council leader Warren Bradley to force ex-Culture Company chief executive Mr Harborow from his job.
The inability of cruise liners to use the new £20m Pier Head terminal on the Mersey to start and finish their journeys is fast becoming a major issue.
Major cruise company Fred Olsen is unhappy it is unable to base a ship at the Cruise Liner Terminal at the Pier Head and is currently forced to tie up in Langton Dock among scrapyards in Bootle's dockland.
The company is ready to pull out of the city because: "We find it virtually impossible to explain to potential customers why Liverpool has a much-heralded new cruise berth while we are berthed in a dismal industrial area."
And Thomson Cruises - owned by TUI - has already pulled the plug on a possible 30- voyage programme after trying out the unsightly berth at Langton Dock.
So there we go, Greater Manchester has roundly booted out the idea of having a congestion charge.
The "yes" vote was no where near in any of the ten boroughs.
The idea was most popular in Manchester itself, but even there only 28% of voters said they were in favour.
Profile
David Bartlett - City editor of the Liverpool Daily Post and Echo covering politics, regeneration, and urban affairs. He was previously chief reporter of the Daily Post and here he gives his insight into the workings of regional politics.
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