The front page story in today’s Manchester Evening News shows exactly whose interests Greater Manchester’s Labour Councillors put first – and it certainly isn’t the people they are elected to serve:
PRO-CONGESTION charge councillors are planning to build themselves a private underground car park in the city centre. Senior Labour councillors – who are backing the toll in exchange for a massive expansion of public transport – want to tunnel next to the town hall to provide spaces for the 96 elected members, a handful of top officials and approved visitors.
Ironically the car park bunker, under the Peace Gardens, would be only a few yards from one of Manchester’s main tram stops in St Peter’s Square. The scheme is part of a £150m plan to carry out urgent repairs to Central Library and the town hall complex.
Actually, I dispute the last sentence. The underground car park has little relevence to the (clearly long-overdue) renovation of the Central Library. It is beyond contempt that the Manchester Labour Councillors thought they could bury details of their self-interested crackpot car-park plan as part of the Central Library documents in the hope that nobody would notice. Well done to David Ottewell’s eagle-eyes.
Incidentally, on a related note, is anyone else a little disappointed at the disproportionate coverage that Sir Richard Leese’s regular pronouncements about the TIF bid receive? He is, after all, just one of ten Council Leaders that make up the Association of Greater Manchester Authorities (AGMA) who have submitted the bid. He’s not even the leader – that’s Peter Smith from Wigan.
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