On Monday I went along to the first Cabinet meeting since the Lab-Lib pact on the council took power on 20th February.
The first thing to say is that they survived without any obvious gaffes. Everyone was on their best behaviour.
It was quite clear to me however that this new Cabinet is totally dominated by Labour. Of the 4 Lib Dem cabinet members, 1 wasn't there, 2 didn't speak at all, leaving Cllr Adrian Vinson who had only limited involvement in the discussions. Indeed there was more debate generated by Labour and Conservative backbenchers who asked questions from the audience.
Despite claims to the contrary it was appear that the Lib Dems are very much the junior partner in this relationship and in the words of Nick Clegg MP are simply "an annex to another party" - in this case Old Labour.
All there is for the Lib Dems in this sorry set up is a false feeling of importance, a slightly smoothed ego and a few pennies for their front benchers. For Lib Dems voters there is nothing of what they voted for.
Later on today the full council will be debating the merits of the Lab-Lib pact. I am looking froward to the debate.
Subscribe to:
Post Comments (Atom)
No comments:
Post a Comment