Coleman insults firefighters in the Ham and High

Brian Coleman has convinced himself that the Ham and High is a sympathetic journal while the more local papers, the Times series and Barnet Press, are unsympathetic to him. Perhaps the Ham and High journalists are just more skilled at giving him rope with which to hang himself.

He has given them an exclusive interview to vent his spleen against the London's firefighters union, the FBU. The union should demand an immediate right to reply to Coleman's raving and insults.

The interview is on page 4, which you can read online in the e-edition.

P.S. There's a rumour that today is the day BC tries to get reselected as Tory candidate for the GLA elections. I wonder in what universe BC could possibly expect such a splash to improve his chances of getting the nod? Oh, hang on, this one - it is the Tory party we're talking about, after all.

Update: Here is the FBU's measured response to Coleman's outburst.

Coleman's rudeness at meeting of the Metropolitan Police Authority

Interesting news on Wednesday:

COLEMAN THREATENED WITH EXPULSION FROM CITY HALL MEETING

At a City Hall meeting of the Metropolitan Police Authority this morning, Councillor Brian Coleman was threatened with expulsion by the chair of the meeting owing to his disruptive and aggressive behaviour.

Cllr Coleman had been questioning the Met commissioner on what he was doing to investigate claims of "intimidation" by FBU members on picket lines.

During the meeting, he lost his temper and launched a verbal attack on the female chair of the meeting.

It is as yet unclear whether Cllr Coleman was eventually expelled.

Information via London Region FBU

Coleman comes clean on his fire cuts plan

The Evening Standard carries an astonishing new article about Coleman's policy-making-on-the-hoof. Their headline is "Tories propose 500 firefighter cuts after strike". And they said this dispute had nothing to do with cuts...

Here's part of the article:

Mr Coleman said the FBU action — during which the capital's emergency fire cover was provided by 700 private contractors using 27 fire engines — had highlighted an apparent surplus of equipment and firefighters.

The 27 engines remain “off the run” and are being held on stand-by at a depot in Ruislip in the event of future strikes. The brigade has also been operating with FBU staff refusing to work overtime as part of their action against proposed shift changes. London has about 5,500 frontline firefighters.

But Mr Coleman said: “We are really grateful to the FBU for showing us that there are possible efficiencies. The union has banned overtime for two to three months and London doesn't seem to have come to a halt.”

Brigade officers are due to report within a fortnight on the savings. The brigade is facing a 25 per cent cut in government funding — which makes up 60 per cent of its budget — over the next four years. It is understood that 260 firefighters are able to retire immediately, having completed 30 years' service. Other posts would be cut through two years of “natural wastage” and a continued recruitment freeze.

[An observation: AssetCo only deployed about 162 staff during the recent strikes, not 700 as the article implies.]

Coleman makes it up as he goes along

Thanks for the tip-off, Mrs Angry. Tory Troll blogger (Adam Bienkov) has a story of Brian Coleman madly improvising and setting the cat among the pigeons again at a meeting of the London Fire and Emergency Planning Authority which he chairs.

People have been wondering what's to become of the 27 London fire engines that AssetCo were handed at the start of the FBU strikes, now that the union has called off its strikes and they and their members' employer the London Fire Brigade have gone to arbitration.

Well, says, Brian, maybe the fire brigade doesn't need those engines after all. Why not, he says, cut about 16% of the capacity at a stroke? What a chief! (That was slang for "fool" in the early 90s, it might still be.)

Who's lost their engine?

A list of stations that fire engines were taken from before the first strike (23 September) by London Region FBU, to be given to the strike-breaking outfit AssetCo - and still not returned, in spite of the fact that the union and London Fire Brigade are going to arbitration:

Chelsea
Chingford
Croydon
Dagenham
Enfield
Hammersmith
Hayes
Heston
Hillingdon
Holloway
Homerton
Kingston
Lambeth
Leyton
North Kensington
Old Kent Road
Plumstead
Poplar
Shoreditch
Sidcup
Southall
Stratford
Sutton
Tooting
Wembley
West Hampstead
Whitechapel

27 fire engines still in AssetCo hands

Despite the FBU calling off the 5-6 November strike and agreeing to go to a Resolution Advisory Panel (non-binding arbitration) the strike-breaking private company AssetCo still has hold of 27 of London's fire engines. These were taken from stations ahead of the FBU's earlier strikes.

London's firefighters are thus deprived of an important chunk of their equipment and the public must be being placed at risk. Over bonfire/Diwali weekend, the FBU commented:

GIVE US BACK OUR 27 FIRE ENGINES, SAY LONDON FIREFIGHTERS

London firefighters are facing bonfire night 27 fire engines short. The London Fire Brigade have left them in the hands of the private contractor AssetCo which attempted to run London fire services during the FBU strike.

FBU general secretary Matt Wrack said this afternoon: “Government ministers and the London Fire Brigade abused us for proposing a strike on bonfire night. We cancelled that strike, and now they are withholding 27 fire engines from London firefighters and the people of London. It’s disgraceful and hypocritical.”

On the "I support London's finest firefighters" Facebook page one wag goes by the pseudonym of "Brian Coleman's mum". She says:

Still looking for those 27 engines... they are a more elusive sight than my Brian getting his wallet out.

The FBU blinks

What do you think? I reckon Brian Coleman has cracked open a bottle of champagne this evening. Brian Coleman probably cracks open a bottle of champagne most evenings, but he's probably chosen a rare vintage this evening, perhaps something he's been saving up for a special occasion. The sort of bottle he might have got in a hamper, a special gift from someone like AssetCo.

I heard the news that the FBU has called off its 47-hour strike due to start tomorrow at 10am while I was in a meeting about the recent strike wave in France (!). A friend sent me a text. And I still don't know much more about it than that. I had a lonely journey home feeling dejected, then something to eat and now here I am.

I thought I'd record my initial feelings of deflation, because initial feelings can often be quite instructive. Why am I depressed about it? Because the FBU said they wouldn't negotiate with a gun to their heads, but now, it seems, they have agreed to do just that. Because I suspect the leadership lost their nerve, worried that the ordinary membership weren't up for it. I think they almost certainly were up for it, but will feel less like that in the weeks to come, now they have seen their leadership hesitating.

And what will change in the next few weeks? Will it be possible to ramp up the confidence of members and send the management cowering back into their shells? Well, if that isn't possible now, I only think it's going to be harder in the coming period. The union has blinked, as far as I can tell. Coleman and the London mayor and the Tories and London Fire Brigade will be cock-a-hoop tonight, and so will the weasels - they are only a handful of people, let's be clear - who were crewing the AssetCo engines. And so will John Shannon, AssetCo CEO, who will now make a profit on his contract with LFB. And so will all the egits who think that firefighters - and other public servants - shouldn't have the right to strike. And so will all the journalists who researched and wrote snide little smear stories about firefighters.

Right, perhaps these initial reactions are just a sign of my ultra-leftism (increasing with age and the frustrations that go with it). I'm going off to read up on the web now and see if I'm wrong.

Coleman versus the FBU: which side are Barnet Tories on?

It's not explicit, but the coverage by the news blog London Daily News is broadly sympathetic to the FBU as it reports yesterday's picket line incidents of violence: violence against striking firefighters, that is, with two men being knocked over and another one run into by vehicles driven by people breaking the strike. A police officer was also knocked over.

London Daily News is associated with Barnet Tory councillor Andreas Tambourides. Is a section of Barnet's Tories distancing itself from Brian Coleman and his pivotal role in the battle against London's firefighters?

Can these people exert pressure in the Tory Party to get them to get Coleman to withdraw the absurd threat to sack all of London's firefighters? If they can, they should. This industrial battle is starting to look bad for them.

Update: actually, the reason this press coverage is so fair towards the FBU is because it reprints an FBU press release! "Barnet Tory blog parrots FBU" is not such an interesting headline, but it seems to be true. Why is that, then?

Hendon firefighters: we won't let the bad press get us down

I went up to the picket line at Hendon fire station today, for the start of the firefighters' eight-hour strike (10am to 6pm). There seemed to be more people attending than last time, probably a mark of how much the bad press they have been getting has increased their determination.

One woman firefighter told me: "You just can't let it get to you."

The turnout was particularly impressive given that this was mostly of people from Hendon, whereas for the strike on Saturday 23 October, firefighters had attended from all over Barnet in the expectation that an AssetCo crewed fire engine would be based at Hendon.

In the event, on 23 October, a fire engine had driven four times past the station, but evidently thought better of trying to operate from there, and drove off. Today the rumour was that an engine was headed for Barnet fire station. I wonder if it ever arrived.

The firefighters were getting a good reception from passers-by. There was very little hostility, and most people - many of them students heading into lectures at Middlesex University - were happy to take a leaflet to find out more about the dispute, if they weren't already declaring their support.

There should be a good presence of firefighters at the lobby outside Hendon Town Hall tomorrow night, Tuesday 2 November, from 6pm, for the council meeting which starts at 7pm. Please come and join us if you can.

Press coverage

As it happens, the Times series has given the Hendon firefighters some fairly good - at least, fair - press. Article here.

And here is an earlier item about the trades council's support for the FBU.

Brian Coleman: the grinch that stole bonfire night

Brian Coleman's intransigence in his dealings with London's 5,600 firefighters, threatened with the sack if they do not accept new contracts, has meant that bonfire night will be cancelled this year. And Diwali too.

The firefighters' union, London region FBU, has quite reasonably told Coleman and the London Fire Brigade that they are not prepared to work over two of the busiest days of the year with such a threat hanging over their heads.

Thus, they will not be at work from 10am on Friday 5 November until 9am on Sunday 7 November.

Obviously this will be a sore disappointment to people who have been piling up old wood for a bonfire and buying fireworks. Myself, I was very much looking forward to sending my guy up in flames.

However, there is still time to save bonfire night. Email Brian Coleman to express your disappointment and urge him to withdraw the sacking threat to London's firefighters: cllr.b.coleman@barnet.gov.uk.

London Region FBU say: Coleman doesn't cut the mustard

London Region FBU sent a delegation to tonight's lobby of Barnet council at Hendon Town Hall. They were sporting a smart new t-shirt featuring Brian Coleman, the chair of the London Fire and Emergency Planning Authority. The Region is in dispute with the London Fire Brigade who are trying to change their shift patterns and have threatened them with redundancy if they don't accept the new terms.

The region has a march and lobby of London Fire Brigade on Thursday 16 September at lunchtime. More details on their website.