Big Brother 10

Big Brother winner Rodrigo

Yes I know there is more going on in the world and Big Brother 10 is as significant as a bag of chips left on a dustbin lid in Lewisham High Road but I am distracted by other things going on in my life (am seeing someone new.. trying to catch up with Elizabeth Taylor and Henry the viii) so Big Brother will do. Plus I am busy advising Gordon on how to lose the next election.

Impressed with Rodrigo's reaction when Noreen was bothering Angel and the way my Latin brother jumped in to defend the underdog. He was fantastic and has shown true qualities that I like. The instinct to defend those who may not be able to do it themselves. Well done Rodrigo and I stick to my prediction saying that he will be the winner. I know the United Left are meeting soon to decide whether to support Rodrigo but there are too many amendments coming in around the subject and think the seating orders committee of the politburo may rule the motion out of order.

Rodrigo for BB 10!!!

Michael Jackson

The big story today is Michael Jackson's death from a heart attack last night. He died at the age of 50 and was seen by many as the King of Pop.

The truth about Steve Reed...

I spend some time thinking on how to present and start the 'banana files' and decided that profiling those I know influence the Levithan would be a good way of doing it, so I am starting from the top.

First I have a confession to make and state that Steve Reed, Leader of Lambeth Council is a friend. I have known Steve for many years so fortunately I know the man behind the face (if you see what I mean)

Steve Reed took over from Tom Franklin before the last municipal elections in 2006. He was Deputy to Tom during that period. Steve surprised everyone by fighting a decisive battle in 2006 and winning Lambeth for Labour. This had a lot to do with his ability to chose the right people on his team and encourage Jackie Meldrum to stand with him as his deputy. There were some remarkable victories in some wards throughout Lambeth which showed how strategic and dynamic Steve is.

In terms of what and how he has performed in the last 4 years I would say that he has made a few tactical mistakes and his choice of flirting with the privatisation monster is a mistake, something that I have raised with him on a few occassions. I feel that his decision to give in to pressure from the Milbank bananas and go for the Lambeth Living venture was a big error.

Steve has been criticised by those on the left for being too right wing but that is not true. He listens to the Unions and comes from a TU background especially since his mother was an active TU official for many years. I will leave my criticism of what he did with the Lambeth Living adventure on one side for now. On the positive side Steve is not someone who will not get involved and get his hands dirty if things are not going well within the organisation something that previous leaders refused to do. He is definitely going to score another victory next year at the 2010 municipal elections and will show that Lambeth will never surrender to the Tories! He has my support on this!

Steve Reed is a hands on player and not a passenger that is good for Lambeth and good for the Labour party. I know that his desire is to become an MP and I also know that he will one day get there but for the time being there is a job to be done in the land of Lambeth and he is the right person to do this.

Dave Prentis flirts with ultra left...

I wasn't at conference the last 3 days but I understand from reports that Dave, our great leader and ex friend of mine, made a speech asking Labour Link members to suspend funding and sponsorship to Labour party constituencies not supporting Unison policies. This is of course the right thing to do and it has pleased (in some way) those on the ultra left who now see this 'gesture' as a move towards greater rebellion. But I think Dave is giving out a strong and clear message to the Labour bananas which is a simple one. You have lost your 'friends' in the city (excellent result by the way!) don't go cutting off the hand that feeds you unless you are on a suicide mission. I am hoping the Labour party understands this signal and the Miliband coup in preparation is stopped before a greater disaster emerges. A Miliband win against Brown will totally devastate the party. Miliband must stop the behind the scenes preparations now! The Labour party is not that desparate to end up with a leader like him!!

Parthenon Marbles...

Greeks all over the world and friends of true civilisation are angry at the refusal of the British museum to return the Parthenon Marbles (referred to by some as the Elgin Marbles) back to where they belong. The completion of the brand new museum below the Acropolis of Athens demolishes the last argument used by the Brigadier Trolley type of British museum curators who argued that the marbles would be damaged if they were returned.

The British government should remind he museum curators that the marbles were stolen when Greece was under occupation by the Ottomans. So imagine if Britain was occupied by the Germans in 1945 and the Nazis removed the crown jewels. Would the Berlin curators have a valid argument to keep the British treasures? The answer is no! The British government needs to remind the curators that more than a million Greeks were killed in the two world wars fighting on the side of the allies and ensuring that Britain was not invaded like Greece was when the marbles were stolen!

Do the right thing and return the marbles back! Forget your imperialist past and move forward!

Nick Venedi

The trouble with Lambeth Council... The banana files part 1...

The Levithan and the banana files...

Well thought I should take on the task of coming clean with what I know about Lambeth. I have, in fact, been asked many times by people close to me to honor my pledge not to hold back and say it as it is. I have been involved with the Leviathann ( a name I have given to Lambeth Council) since 1988 and there isn't much that I have not seen or know about this body, so will start dishing out some constructive criticism on this special day of my birthday (thanks to those who send me birthday wishes including Stuart Barber our very capable - but tough and misunderstood - Regional Officer, bless him.

So where do I start? The best way to describe Lambeth as an organisation is to say that it attracts those who are committed to public service. I have known officers who spend a lot of effort getting jobs with Lambeth simply because they love what Lambeth as a Borough stands for. I, for example, chose to come to Lambeth in 1988 following the abolition of the LSPU and even though I had a choice of 8 other Labour boroughs I insisted that Lambeth was the right place for me. Lambeth is vibrant, exciting, diverse, trendy and mysterious. It also has problems that come with being a big organisation and not having a central focus or the ability to coordinate.

I once compared Lambeth Council with the modern state of Greece. Both are excellent at dealing with difficult and major crisis and have the ability to get inspired and achieve greatness never to be seen before (hence the 3 star achievement) But both have a huge problem with coordinating their internal activities and have any control over parts of their bodies. Lambeth, for example, suffers from having to introduce constant changes to the way it functions and it keeps trying to re invent the wheel so it would go back to reorganising internal structures in a frantic way. The same with Greece. The modern Greeks managed to win the European cup in 2004, win the Eurovision in that same year (not that that's a big deal) and shut up international critics by producing one of the most successful Olympics ever in Athens in 2004 but following that they went down the hill and have buggered up their economy in a big way!

Lambeth Council also has a major problem with over reacting when dealing with matters to do with staff and it often manages to alienate good, honest hard working public servants so it drives them away. The entire organisation is heavily influenced by a number of key players and these people have a lot of influence on what happens and how Lambeth (the organisation) functions. I will talk about this sector in following issues of this special edition of my journal (sounds better than a blog init?) I did, in fact, post something similar on here in March but a close ally and friend advised me to remove the material as he thought I could get into trouble so I had to remove what I wrote. But I have decided to go back and re do it all. I shall call my contribution to this the ' Banana files..' so look out for you might be referred to in the banana files.......

Happy birthday to me !

Nick Venedi

Big Brother again...

I wonder if anyone at the conference in Brighton is prepared to put up a motion to evict Halfwit from Big Brother. He is so irritating I would do anything to make sure the boring Tory boy is evicted! Why doesn't he get thrown out for inflicting irritrivable damage to those watching him? He lives on a different planet! Get him out!!

Join the Labour party...

Was invited to attend a very crowded meeting on Saturday evening in Brighton where there was a lot of debate around the bad Euro election results and the doom and gloom we will all be facing if or when Labour lose the next election and we get a Tory government. I stood up and said that whilst I agreed that things were looking bad we would all be doing better if we put our energy into making sure that a Labour government was returned. I invited the comrades at the meeting to join the Labour party and put their energies into changing things from within rather than staying out and criticising non stop! My question to them is a simple one. Do you really want to help throw Labour out? And if yes what would come in? Another 10 to 15 years of a Thathcarite type of reactionary government determined to destroy public services? Why would that be a good thing?

I was approached at the end of the meeting by a number of friends who smiled and said that I was very brave to say what I said at the meeting. In fact I wasn't brave at all I was stating the bloody obvious! Stop helping the Tories win power! There is (not for the next 10 years anyway) no alternative to Labour. If you have issues with the Labour party try and change what they do from within. You don't agree with most of what Unison does and you have constant debates within the Unison structures on how to change policy and direction but you don't resign or leave (which is good and positive) so why not do the same with the Labour party?

Labour party membership forms can be obtained from the Labour party link (goodle it!)

Nick Venedi

http://www.lgcplus.com/news/union-welcomes-lambeth-lbcs-decision-to-bring-service-back-in-house/1341186.article

National conference starts today

The Lambeth troops in Brighton Sat 13 June 2009!

Back from national local government conference in Brighton where I attended with 4 other Lambeth (all female) delegates who did so well. I am very proud of them.

Claire spoke on the motion from the national Black Members committee and made a very good speech. She was nervous before but stood up and did us all proud. This is because she was talking from the heart! And Anne did well by attending all the sessions and supporting the others as did Rebeca. Jon of course spend most of his time showing off but he did make some good contributions to some hot debates and I have therefore decided to keep him on for another year on the understanding that he should get a new set of t shirts! No self professing socialist should be seen wearing the same shoes every day! Anyway only joking he was good!

I have reproduced the picture from John Gray (the new Lambeth Unison friend) as I didn't bother taking a camera myself. Myself and the Lambeth girlies (I know it sounds sexist but can't think of another word!) spend some time chatting to John Gray who is, to be honest, a nice guy and quite interesting. He is, after all, a fellow Labour party member! Also had a chat with Linda Perks on the beach who was in her jeans and thought she looked good in them (more sexist remarks I know..)

Well back to London now should be at conference on Thursday and Friday but someone has to mind the shop whilst Jon of the Rogers is showing off at conference!

Nick Venedi

Local government conference 2009

Another year and another conference of the local government service group. Most of the London delegates met last night in one way or another and the Lambeth delectation got together with others and spend some quality time. Conference started on time this morning and everyone seems to be in good spirits. Will report later on the day,

Message from PM Berloscunni

Brigadier Trolley addresses national Unison conference 2009

Big Brother everywhere...

There are a lot of Big Brother shows going on right now and in the Labour party version Hazel Blears is just about to be evicted. It looks like the poor people of her constituency who had helped her get into the position where she could spend their money have no confidence in her and would rather see the back of her. This will, in my opinion, be the right decision as she has started a process she cannot manage or have any control over. She should have thought of her strategy before getting on her horse and there can be no excuses for someone in her position to be so reckless! Gordon, to be honest, is doing fine and he has done more to deal with the recession than she could ever have done or any of the others!!

In the other Big Brother show preparations are under way to ensure that the united left puts up a show in Brighton so that the proletariat can see that they are still around and breathing. They will hopefully be coming up with some new ideas on how we can re invent the wheel or have a debate with the NEC about whether the earth has always been round?

And in Big Brother no 10, the Chanel 4 version, the horrible Sophia gets evicted showing that naked aggression on television is seldom rewarded by the British public (well those watching Chanel 4 anyway) shame that Tory posh boy Halfwit could not be thrown out as well but am sure he will be following next week. And another inmate walked out saying that she could not deal with the pressure. I hope channel 4 provides support for these people who are clearly thrown in the lions den to be eaten by the blood thirsty public!!

Sister Helen and Big Brother...

Well two things for today. Well done to Helen my sister in law for getting that promotion at school. She started as a teaching assistant a year ago in an Enfield school and has now gone up. Well done Helen! And on top of that she became a Unison member straight away and recruited 5 others to the union!!! Runs in the family.

In the meantime in the not so real world of Big Brother Half wit - aka posh boy come Tory MP - has been nominated for eviction and so has the boring Sophia. I am disappointed to be honest that people can only vote for one person and I wish that everyone could be up for it and we could then get rid of them all and save us the trouble of having to watch them. I hate being negative about people I don't know but I can't see any signs of intelligence. You would say why watch it then and the answer to that is well... have no idea!!

Vote them all out I say!

Join a video club...

Woke up this morning with Bob Crow chatting away to tv presenters on BBC. He was saying that if Trade Union leaders don't want to fight for their members they might as well go away and join a video club. Must say I loved it! There will be a massive surge in the number of applications to join these clubs now. Bob is a bit of a wally in my opinion but he is decisive, determined and don't mess around with the likes of Boris Buffoon. Am sure this entry of mine will get me into trouble sometime in the future but the truth is Bob fights for his members!!

http://lcnsw.labor.net.au/labor_review/184/update1845.html

Big Brother and the Unison BB show...

Not much to say on developments in the Big Brother house apart from the fact that the majority of people in there are beginning to bore everyone. Lisa, the openly Lesbian older woman, shows signs of having a personality which is comforting to see.

In the meantime final preparations are made for the bigger Big Brother show in Brighton which starts this Sunday with national local government conference on Sunday and Monday followed by NDC from Tuesday onwards. Will be interesting to see if there are any evictions? Always good and interesting debates though and I shall be keeping an eye out on who does what and what gossip there is...

The Labour party makes the right decision...

The Parliamentary Labour party made the right decision last night not to remove the PM it would have been a big mistake to remove Gordon as this would ensure sure defeat and the return of the dreadful Tories. There is no question about the fact that Labour did very badly at the Euro elections but this isn't the time to throw the captain off the Titanic. I would like to ask those who keep criticising the Labour party what they think they can replace it with and what they really be happy with a reactionary Tory government in place again? Do we want to go back to the Sign Up rules again where Unions were obliged to get all their members to sign up into membership again every 3 years? Where were these people who are now so critical? That rule itself nearly destroyed us! Get real and stop splitting the vote up! Join Labour and argue from inside!

http://www.lgcplus.com/news/union-welcomes-lambeth-lbcs-decision-to-bring-service-back-in-house/1341186.article

Jon Rogers wins a fourth term! Great news for democracy!

Fellow branch Sec Jon Rogers has won a fourth term on the NEC great news for free thinkers and for democracy. Well done Jon I never doubted that London would return you. I don't have details of the other results but the fact that Jon has won has made my day!

Well done!

The Apprentic final and Big Brother...

Also watched the final of the Apprentice and whilst I know its not all about race I was uncomfortable to notice that in the final task those supporting Yasmina and Kate did not include any of the 4 Black candidates? Why was that?

And of course the first person to be removed via vote on the Big Brother programme was the Asian woman Beniziar. These trends keep cropping up on our television all the time and are disturbing... She was no great contestant but was no worst than any of the others. The three top 'undesirables' last night (those who were in the bottom 3) were all Asian. What's wrong with the British public?

Marina Yanakoudakis becomes first Brit of Greek origin to become MEP...

The hard working (but unfortunately Tory) Marina Yannakoudakis has become the first Brit of Greek origin to become one of London's Euro MEP's. She fought a vigorous campaign and used Greek community sources to increase her profile. The lesson to the Labour party is a simple one. Don't ignore an active minority of voters who will go out and support activists on principle.

The worst news is of course that the far right BNP has won two seats in the north of England. A sad day for democracy! The No to Europe and yes to Democracy party (yes to dreamland more like it) didn't get much support as was expected. Instead it gave the right more support by splitting the Labour vote. Will they ever learn?

Nick Venedi

Big Brother watch...

Not much to report as last nights episode was a non event with a few more participants managing to become 'full members'. Rodrigo, who was my favorite yesterday, did very little and said nothing so I am tempted to revise my opinion and say that he has no personality. He appears to be lost in space and will rely on the others taking pitty on him just because he is young. Not a very good recipe for success. Is he actually boring?

On the other hand the irritating posh boy (his name is Fredie) managed to push his way into the diary room and by changing his surname via deed poll to halfwitt, which he is certainly not, managed to become a full member. He even sung in the middle of the night and declared that the blond Sophie was beautiful. Vote him out I say! Not to keen on the Geordie either he talks too much and never stops!

Big Brother 10...

Ah well I am turning my attention away from the world of politics and diving back into the other world the real one? Fed up having to advise Gordon on how to lose the next election...

Anyway I have been forcing myself lately to watch trash television as my flatmate demands living room big telly air time so it is inevitable that I end up watching bits here and there. Good news is that there are a few music channels on freeview to watch bad news is that the rest of the land stations are full of trash. Bad the diversion can help. I even watched some of the worst tely ever with Paris Hilton a few months ago called my Best Bristish Friend or something. It was shit!!

So getting back to the subject for discussion Big Brother 10 has just started on 4. I must say that the concept reminds me of branch politics only on BB everyone watches everybody else.

So far I have decided that Rodrigo, the half Italian half Brazilian 23 yo guy is probably the one with the best chance of winning but you can never tell from day 1.

Uncomfortable about the fact that everyone seems to think (the guys at least) that identifying themselves with the gay label may give them more votes or increase their credibility. So the posh guy with the beard (not the one with the long curly hair) annoyed me last night when he declared that he is bisexual. That is always such an easy way of staying on the fence and I am very critical. So I will be voting him out the first chance I get he doesn't sound genuine and the fact that he wants to be an MP (assume a Tory one) makes me more suspicious. But will give him the benefit of the doubt and see how it goes. I understand that the United Left are not keen on him either....

Nick Venedi

Vote Labour and Stop the BNP

Simple message today. Vote for the only party that will allow itself to bring in reform and change!

http://lcnsw.labor.net.au/labor_review/184/update1845.html

European integration

Attended a meeting last night in north London where the subject of discussion was Europe which of course links in with the Euro election tomorrow. We were all reminded, not that I think anyone there needed that, of the important goal of achieving more rather than less integration within Europe.

It is a fact that the British left (and there are many variations of that) is on the whole suspicious of any form of real integration within Europe and they are, in my opinion, very narrow minded about the concept. The left sees Europe as a bastion of neo capitalism but they ignore the fact that the British state on its own is far ahead of any capitalist organisation any where on the continent and I think their attitude betrays the little Englander mentality that dominates their psychological make up.

There has been some progress made in the field of Equality and Employment Law specifically in Euro land and the changes that have been imported here as a result of that have been positive and progressive. The British left (and I am a member of that club) needs to see the benefits of a real Socialist Europe something that will do more to help the working class than any British government can ever achieve on its on.

I support total integration in Europe and look forward to the day when Europe has merged foreign and financial policy with a strong European President. It will be nice to have a Spanish President and a stronger European Parliament running a Federal Europe. And even better to have state Governors instead of Prime Ministers...

Vote for integration and support Labour at tomorrows Euro election!

Nickk Venedi

Various...

First of all congratulations to John Gray for prioritising the fight against the BNP on his blog.

The media are making sure that the negative publicity generated by the MP's expenses scandal is helping those on the extreme get the vote of those who may feel it is a way to protest against the state of British politics. And of course if this is true then the BNP will have a chance of wining at least one seat in London. That will not in itself change the world but it will allow the forces of evil to score a significant and symbolic victory which they will exploit. It is important therefore for us all to do our best to get everyone we know vote. I would of course say vote Labour but if not then I would say just don't vote for the BNP but make sure you go out and vote.

http://lcnsw.labor.net.au/labor_review/184/update1845.html

All eyes on the Euro election

The priority for this week is to ensure that we all put our efforts towards ensuring that people are mobilised and they go out and vote. The danger is that good people may see the Euro election as an opportunity to abstain and register their protest. But if they were to do that the BNP will be the winners with UKIP coming close second and that can not be allowed. Those who do not go and vote for the progressive forces will be letting the extremists get a seat in Europe. Britain has a proud record of never having done that before lets make sure it doesn't happen this time! I would urge everyone reading this (the thousands of readers...) to go back to their constituencies and mobilise. Not voting could help the BNP so vote and keep them out!