Having decided not to discuss their silly plan for a drug treatment centre, the council have now decided, with no public consultation and like the dogs in mangers that they are, that if they can't impose a drug treatment centre onto the residents who want their library back, that they will sell the building. This will ensure it is taken out of the community's hands and can't ever be the focus of a popular campaign for it to remain a public library.
Choosing to dispose of the public asset when the property market is at its nadir for purely party-political purposes, seems to me to be a gross dereliction of the council's duty to the tax-payers and the community as a whole to protect the public interest.
Will anyone be at all surprised if it ever eventually emerges that the buyers will turn out to be connected to the corrupt clique that runs our borough, 'circuitous and co-incidental' as that connection would turn out to be?
The residents of this part of the borough are not stupid. The rumoured "training" organisation which has had its beady eyes on the library is in no way going to compensate for the loss of this community facility, nor will the new roof on the scout-hut. Residents know that Mr Robbins has already calculated that the High Street Ward has been lost to New labour at the next election. He has given up on their potential support.
But I wonder if he is ready for local residents from this part of the borough taking their campaigning skills into the neighbouring wards and helping to drive the imploding Labour Party from power there as well?
The LibDem leader John Macklin has condemned the threatened sale of the building, which is seen by some as an act of spite by Mr Robbins, more evidence if any were needed that he is a man not fit to lead the borough. Why the LibDems remain in their joint administration with Robbins in charge is a bit of a mystery to many people.
[Updated 2 July 2009]