Week ending 29th July

Our Friday miscellany

of the week's

news and events

FAQs – geekspeak for frequently asked questions, often frequently produce answers that make things more complicated - rather than the reverse. So it is with Boston Borough Council’s offering to help people understand the chaotic green waste pilot scheme. Examples include: Q. I don’t create any garden waste, so do I have to take part? A. No, but you do still have to present your recycling for collection in the blue bags you have been provided with and not in the blue bin? The question “If I already have a two blue bins, can I use both bins for garden waste? – answer “Yes” – begs the obvious second question “Can I have an extra blue bin for garden waste?” The answer: “No, but if you have extra green waste please place in black bags with the top left open and next to your blue bin for collection.” So now we have green waste collected in blue bins, with any excess going into black bags, and waste for recycling – including glass – being put into blue plastic bags. And beware if until now you have merely uprooted unwanted guests from your garden. Now you must identify at least two specific weeds. “Q. Can I put ragwort and Japanese knotweed in my blue bin? A.No." Were this not Boston, we would suggest going back to the drawing board with this scheme – but we somehow doubt that a drawing board was employed in the first place!
Last week we shed crocodile tears over the demise of the BBI blog - the Bostoninnies. But a cause for some genuine disappointment is the deafening silence that now radiates from the former leader of the Conservative group - and now joint deputy leader - Councillor Raymond Singleton-McGuire. For a long time his blog addressed a variety of issues and he was forthright in his criticism of the former leadership. Now that the boot is on the other foot he has all but stopped blogging - aside from irrepressibly boring lists posted a couple of months ago of who’s who on borough committees and outside organisations. But for someone who was a key advocate of communication, openness and transparency, his departure from the blogging scene is a pity.
A pleasant and unexpected boost for Boston came yesterday in a promotion run by the Daily Mail newspaper, which is currently giving away a series of Michelin touring maps of the UK. Yesterday’s offering covered the East Midlands area, and as you can see from our photo (left) the star of the cover is Boston Stump and the Ingram memorial. The Daily Mail has a circulation of more than two million, which figures from the National Readership Survey say translates into 4,705,000 readers each day. An excellent piece of free advertising – and one which includes a name check for the town as well.
The latest spending figures for items costing more than £500 paid in June have been published by Boston Borough Council. They are always interesting, and include a few items of special note. Under “event costs,” policing the May Fair between May 2nd and 8th came to £4,577 – more than £650 a day. We wonder whether extra police were actually employed or, as officers are seldom if ever seen on foot patrol these days, the cost was compensation to those involved for having to leave their comfy offices to rub shoulders with the hoi polloi. Another item that gave us pause for thought came under the section “monies collected” which shows that in May, the Boston Business Improvement District received £24,880 – doubtless from the levy imposed on anyone with premises in the BID’s area. Given that Boston BID seems to have done absolutely nothing for months on end we are compelled to ask whether all this money is simply for wages and office space – and if so … is it worth it?
But it’s good to see that Boston BID is putting the cash extorted from hard pressed local business to some really worthwhile use. They have thrown £10,000 into the pot to fund a £30,000 music festival in Central Park in September. It’s yet another attempt to resurrect the Party in the Park - and BID manager Niall Armstrong said the BID had wanted to do an event other than the Christmas Market which would bring people into Boston. “Hence the business improvement side of it, so not only do people have a good time, but maybe our members see increased takings. Maybe is the key word here. The event will be free and have a licensed bar, fun fair, art and craft display as well as hot and cold food. It seems that yet again, the park can cease to be a designated public place where drinking is criminalised when it suits Boston Borough Council to allow it. We find it hard to imagine that local traders will benefit much – if at all – from such a knees-up. It’s something that Mr Armstrong has already taken on board. He said the BID was “only” supplying £10,000 because it was the members’ money. “If it bombs, then effectively they could accuse us of wasting £10,000, and they would have a valid claim for that, but by the same token we have got to take a risk.” Our opinion is that such an event won’t bomb, but whilst the organisers - Infodex – who are based near Grantham - will probably turn a tidy profit, we expect that local business will get next to nothing out of it. How can they expect to when the event is self contained, self catering and free to visit? Whether the event “bombs” or not, the BID is still wasting members’ money. We can only assume that - in the way that senior officers and members of Boston Borough Council liked big firework displays some years ago – there are those within Boston BID who are keen on free musical booze-ups, … as they have debated ideas about parties in the park on more than one previous occasion. Aside from that, one of their last big ideas was in October 2009, when the possibility of setting up a golfing tournament between Boston UK and Boston USA was discussed. We have little doubt that the tournament would have been played in the United States, and are sure that it would have been of huge benefit to the businesses in the town who fork out their BID levy.
In the summer people are always on the look out for things to do and places to go – and Boston Borough Council has joined with neighbours South Holland to produce a guide to summer “fun.” We place the word fun in quotation marks because most of the activities listed are sporting, and that is not everyone’s cup of tea. We also think it a shame that of the few suggestions for places to go, the first two of the three listed are the South Holland Centre and Ayscoughee Hall in Spalding – with Boston Guildhall in third place. Are we looking at a case where unless you pay to advertise you don’t get in? We don’t know – but what we do know is that Boston has much more to offer than this, and it is a shame that nothing was listed. Still, if you’re not sporty by nature, you can always visit the borough’s online guide to what’s on in the area – and with August looming, we went and took a look.

Oh well – it looks like a cheerleading course for us, then! Rah rah – humbug!
We wonder how even handed our local “newspapers” are when it comes to the political scene. This week’s announcement by English Democrat Councillor Elliott Fountain that he is trying to get enough signatures to call a referendum on having an elected mayor for Boston was the front page lead story on the Boston Target – but as far as we can see went unmentioned by the Boston Standard. Meanwhile the Target carried just one picture of Mayor Mary Wright - resting her civic foot on a three handled spade. By comparison, the Standard also carried that picture – but also managed four further shots of Mayor Mary at Boston Preservation Trust’s Civic Pride awards. That’s more than 1% of the 238 “local faces” which this week’s paper boasted about on the front page. Certainly, the Standard began life as a conservative paper with a big ‘C’ but after all these years we thought it might be a trifle less partial.
Another story implicitly critical of the Tories which also appears to have failed to catch the Standard’s attention is the one which discloses that our MP Mark Simmonds hires his wife Lizbeth as his office manager at a salary of between £20,000 and £25,000 a year. But it’s all right. A spokesman said: “Mr Simmonds’s staff are based in the constituency and at Westminster and all work incredibly hard delivering a first class service to the constituents of Boston and Skegness.” So is it just a lucky happenstance that Mrs S possesses the skills needed for the job?
Back to that referendum bid - and as only 2,400 signatures are needed to drive it through, it may well have some chance of success. Council leader Peter Bedford has criticised the plan by saying that it would cost taxpayers a lot of money – an estimate is between £60,000 and £70,000 – and there is no budget for it. Somehow, though, money always seems to be available for other things when needed. We’re thinking of the £10,000 herb garden for Central Park, and the £42,800 “big dig” project which has attracted just 82 volunteers – which works out at more than £500 a head.
Talking of the leader, we note that he is following the line suggested by his henchman Councillor Mike Gilbert, and addressing the recent illegal distillery explosion and sales of potentially lethal vodka in dismissive terms. He’s quoted as saying: “We are not the centre of a national illegal alcohol network, but clearly there is a problem here, as there is in many other parts of the country.” It’s a neat paraphrase of Councillor Gilbert’s previously declared ambition – “I would like to make it known that Boston is like everywhere else in relation to this distillery issue rather than a place with worse issues than everywhere else. We must try and avoid giving ourselves a label we can't lose for having serious problems no one else has.” But does either man seriously believe that people will swallow such a line?
We are reminded that – 30 years ago this week our then MP Richard Body declared that Boston Borough Council was of great help to a small businessman who was likely to set up shop in Boston after being given a hard time by South Holland District Council. But when he approached Boston he got a positive response. “Three cheers for Boston Borough Council – in total contrast to the attitude of South Holland District Council” the MP declared. We wonder whether the same story could appear today – but somehow we doubt it.
After yesterday’s piece on the draft Boston strategy report which mentioned the PESTEL analysis - the Political, Economic, Social, Technological, Environmental and Legal factors that can affect an organisation. A reader tells us that pestel is the Old French orthography of the Middle English pestle –“a heavy tool with a rounded end, used for crushing and grinding” which he believes indicates something suspiciously Freudian. To advance the  acronym idea our contributor has come up with MORTAR - More Obtuse Rhetoric To Antagonise Retailers, and adds: “See, pestle and mortar do go together.”
Talking of the strategy report, there was a rapid reaction from one of our readers, Brian Robbins. He e-mailed to say: "It is no good ranting to the converted that read your pages. I’ll exclude all the now elected Conservative councillors, as they are roughly the same mob who made most of the mess before the BBI took up the challenge and managed to foul it up further. I’ll just point you to the Lincolnshire County Council website instead - www.lincolnshire.gov.uk - because that says it all about Boston.
According to the County Council we don’t have any historic buildings of interest. Ahhh, Boston Stump (world famous), the Guildhall (American famous as a prison,) the Sessions House (one of only a few left in the country), Shodfriars Hall (rare gem) Fydell House (with its Kennedy Room) , Pescod Hall (saved from demolition by the owners of Olrids), Church Gate House and Blenkin Memorial Hall, ALL in the Market Place area without going to Hussey Tower. The county website also mentions windmills BUT - according to them - we don’t have one.... so the Maud Foster Mill that I see every time I drive through town must a mirage! What gets a mention on the cCounty website.... NOTHING! No wonder Boston is lagging behind,  and who do we have to thank? Well, let’s start with our local county councillors many of whom are now also Borough Councillors. In fact Councillor Bedford was Leader of the county council before he took the mantle of Boston Borough Council Leader. Gee, that inspires confidence in the council... I don’t think! The problems in Boston are all council made. Too many councillors and council officers wish to keep Boston small for their own ends instead of delivering what the people of Boston want. After all, better to be a BIG FISH in a small pond than no fish at all.”
Finally, after the Punch and Judy style level of debate seen in the last week over whether or not councillors should receive e-mails that do not interest them from colleagues who deem them of interest, we are reconsidering our naming of the council offices. For a long time, we’re referred to the place as Worst Street – but now we think that Bash Street might be more appropriate.

Those who know them remember the Bash Street Kids with great affection – and we wonder …. given that Teacher is the leader of the group, are there any nominations as to who might represent some of the other characters?

You can write to us at boston.eye@googlemail.com  Your e-mails will be treated in confidence and published anonymously if requested.