The gossip wasp at the sector's picnic
The spinners' return
John Prescott appears to be gathering his former "super-ministry" favourites back around himself now his office is back in the thick of things. First it was Mavis McDonald, and now former DETR deputy communications director Derek Plews will become the Office of the Deputy Prime Minister's very first spin doctor at the end of the month.

Derek is currently director of news at the Ministry of Defence, so the kind of battles that ravaged the press team when Stephen Byers and Jo Moore were in charge must surely seem like a day in the park to this old warhorse.

Order! Order!
The good burghers of Liverpool council have been eagerly awaiting the end of summer and the advent of the season of mists and mellow fruitfulness.

It transpires that council meetings were being drowned out by caterwaulings from a local pub's karaoke nights as the hostelry opened wide its doors and windows to let cool air in. Acting council leader Richard Kemp recalls: "I also remember a housing select committee meeting when there was some sort of glitch in the PA system that resulted in music from the Rat and Parrot coming in through our PA system in the middle of the meeting."

It's part of the Ealing process
Hull's new managing director Jim Brooks caused a bit of consternation last week with his hair-shirt analysis of what went wrong in the council. He enigmatically titled his report Kind Hearts and Coronets. Now I seem to remember that in the famous film, Dennis Price runs around bumping off members of his own family.

Does this mean we can expect odd disappearances in the great cog city? No, no, says Jim. It's all about getting rid of the hated cog symbol and bringing back the three ducal coronets. I believe you, Jim. Absolutely.

Inspectorate breakthrough
A ring round to see if anybody has news on whether the august Audit Commission or cuddly Corpy got the job of single housing inspector drew an odd response.

An eager PR person called to report that "our chief executive has not been appointed as the single housing inspector". Bless.

Cyclists please dismount
Greater London Authority staffers hoping to dodge their mayor's traffic-busting congestion charges by cycling to their spangly new headquarters at Tower Bridge have found it's not as easy as they imagined.

For a start, no cycle routes run to City Hall, and even if the intrepid bikers do make it there, any bikes found chained to the railings around the complex are carted off by Southwark council. Now that's integrated transport.

‘Taxi for Wood!’

It seems that the blind gibbering panic that the mention of rent restructuring brings to housing types has yet to reach the tenants. Or at least that’s the case in the London borough of Newham, where housing director Chris Wood arrived at a meeting to explain rent reform to his tenants. There were only three people present, one of whom told him: “Don’t worry – there’ll be a coach along soon.” When the coach did arrive, the three tenants jumped on it and departed, leaving poor Chris alone with his retail price index.

Source

Housing Today