If you wish to embarrass him further – ask him about all the taxpayers money he blew when he was Leader of GCC on accelerating the contract for the refurbishment of the Wintergardens in Glasgow just so that it would be ready in time for his own wedding reception. The man is a CROOK of the lowest order.

I know . . . I was one of the contractors brought into a secret meeting and told that if we wanted to work with the Council again, we would have to agree to accelerate the building process and to forget about the additional expense. Charlie wanted it; so Charlie was going to get it.

Glasgow City Council is like one of the Teamsters Unions of America circa 1960. Just look at the latest Labour Leader Purcell and his links to well known Glasgow criminal families.

I hope the SNP get their way and expose the workings of GCC to the light of day . . . and the Police!

The Labour MSP decided to use a virtual office product provided by his son that he has described as operating in the same way a high street virtual office product. So I’m only judging him on what he said he’s done and what other people would charge for doing the same things he says his son has done.

If you think that running a virtual office isn’t appropriate for an MSP (and I agree it’s hard to see how it is in these circumstances) then far from being a defence of his actions, it’s another criticism.

And while we don’t really know the breakdown between and programming, and look and feel design, any other creation, hosting, royalties, disbursements, maintenance, redesigns, etc plenty of say £5,000 websites both don’t get many hits and don’t actually need to. They’re there for those who need them and choose to visit themis all. And £13,000 as a total is quite a modest amount for the services described.

Unless you’ve got something else Mark this seems another thin one. How is this particularly piece of familial (or indeed buddy) employment exceptional in a context of dozens, nay hundreds of such arrangements?

Nadine Dorries for example has employed several of her daughters as paid interns and has now taken on one of them – a year or two out of college – at the top Office Manager etc grade.

She may be brilliant. Or not. But there was no open process of recruitment and the normally garrulous blabber mouth Nad is yet to mention the appointment in her web/blog output. We don’t know what proportion of the total staff bill young Dorries receives.

Clearly there are some Lib Dem MPs and the like who should be in hot water for the way they divvy up their staffing budget, the way they procure and describe the procurement of print, and indeed websites.

And although under discliplinary – says the word on the street – Rowen’s man Hennigan still appears to be working to a 4-letter person specification.

Back to the point, when you are doing a publicly funded government web site, there is simply too much involved for the task to be left to an amateur, no matter how well-meaning they might be. The Scottish Parliament has to bear some of the responsibility for this for failing to provide guidance and standards for consitutency web sites.

Letters From A Tory said:
“I’m sure many MPs don’t mind leaving a tip when getting their friends and family to do work for them”

I don’t actually have any objection to MPs employing family/friends as long as the work is ‘wholly, necessarily and exclusively for their parliamentry duties’, and that person is qualified to do the work and paid at the going rate – no more, no less.

But any ‘tip’ or additional payment is entirely out of order.

I’m sure many MPs don’t mind leaving a tip when getting their friends and family to do work for them, but this is really taking the ****.

http://www.lettersfromatory.com