Library Eagle

How lovely to see Friern Barnet library in community use.


Legal eagles

Naturally the new joint service with Harrow Council (looks like a takeover but allegedly isn't) was touted by the council as the best thing since sliced bread. Here is something Richard Cornelius said

"The joint legal service with Harrow will actually see us being able to employ some specialists where as in Barnet we wouldn’t be able to keep them busy all the time."

The funny thing is, that according to The Lawyer  the merger of legal departments needed outside legal support. How ironic. How many teams of lawyers does it take to merge two departments? Four. Bonkers. Lawyers just love setting the clock running and finding every pernickety point whilst the time billing mounts up.

Mr Mustard thinks that the savings to be made have been overestimated as he expects that harrow don't realise quite how many scrapes Barnet Council can get themselves into. Now we have the Friern Barnet Library squat as a prime example. The unCommercial Director, Craig Cooper and the camera shy Assistant Chief Executive, Julie Taylor don't have, as far as Mr Mustard knows, any legal qualifications and so for them to be negotiating with squatters without a legally qualified person, expert in this area of law, attending them at the time was not the smartest room. They also couldn't take any executive decisions without a Cabinet Councillor present.

Anyway Julie Taylor said on Monday last that there would be no snap decisions about evictions, the process started the next day. With legal eagles tucked away in Harrow, and then having to decide for each new request whether they would deal with it in-house, or send it out to an expert, delay and confusion will creep in. As will extra travelling cost.

Mr Mustard read the report on Roger's Not the Barnet Eye blog earlier and noticed the attitude of the lawyer in accusing the other side of wandering off with his paperwork. Unusual for a legal person not to have better command of the spoken word, you can be sure Jeff Lustig in the same situation would have employed some deadpan humour. Then Mr Mustard read the report by Dan O'Brien in the local paper and noted the name of the lawyer concerned. Is he an expert on the law of squatting, thought Mr Mustard? Let's see.

So he checked on the Law Society register. No entry for a Mr Tazafar Asghar so not a Solicitor.

Then Mr Mustard checked with the Bar Council. There is an entry, the paper loser has been a Barrister since 2001.

Ooh, prestige address thought Mr Mustard. Now the location of your office and the quality of your work are not related but given the fact that the council is a public body spending the public's money then at the least they ought to retain firms with a certain standing and reputation amongst their peers without necessarily going to Lincoln's Inn and paying a fortune, although for the parking Judicial Review they have selected an eminent QC if Mr Mustard recalls correctly. It seems that the library building isn't worth spending quite so much on. It might even be that the council want to be seen to be tough whilst being weak so that if they lose they can re-open the library without losing so much face. 

Save time and money Cllr. Robert Rams and reopen Friern Barnet library and scrap your Arts Despot plan, then you are promised a good word from Mr Mustard.

Let's take a look at 353A Station Rd where these scintillating Barrister's Chambers are:

Chambers are usually upstairs.

Further research revealed that there is a Limited company at 353A. The London Academy of Law Ltd with as a Director and Company Secretary a certain Mr Tazafar Asghar. Thanks to Duedil, Mr Mustard was able to see how successful it is. Here is the net asset position of the company.

Started skint, still skint.

Mr Mustard noticed that the Annual Return which has to go to Companies House once a year is overdue since 14 September 2012. Not a heinous crime perhaps but still not professional for a Barrister to fail to comply with Company Law; hardly the best example to set.

The final piece of research revealed a letter signed by Tazafar Asghar opposing the application for a bingo premises licence for Riley's Snooker Hall in Wealdstone Harrow. (Mr Mustard is not really concerned with that as long as the calling out doesn't put him off his shot.) The capacity in which Mr Asghar signs the letter is as Senior Assistant Lawyer - Litigation so whether or not he has packed in as a Barrister, as his financial results were not looking too hot, or whether he juggles both jobs (paperwork is going to get into a right mess based upon today's showing) or what, Mr Mustard really can't tell you.

Mr Mustard's own lawyer thought that 30 minutes would have been a much more realistic time estimate for the hearing than the 10 minutes that Harrow Council estimated. That decision has caused a wasted hearing and costs.

Anyway for one of the first jobs done by Harrow Council legal on behalf of Barnet Council then I am sure you can all agreed that they have done a ...................................... job. (Insert your own adjectives).

There is a gig at the library tonight from 7 till 9.

Yours frugally

Mr Mustard

Boris - your letter is pathetic

Now I know you won't have written the letter Boris but you have enough well paid advisers to do better than this effort. Mr Mustard will be charitable and suggest you have never seen the letter and your digital signature goes on it. You need to keep a better eye on your underlings.

sorry the copy is so poor, so is the content!

Mr Mustard will save your tired eyes. Here is what Boris wrote (it has your name on Boris so you will have to take the flak).

Dear .....

I'm writing to ask you to give Shaheen Mahmood your support tomorrow in the Brunswick Park Ward By-Election. Simples.

This election is not about what the Government is doing or whether or not the Council is popular. Some people will always think about what the government does when they decide which candidate to vote for. If you don't want that then you should campaign to get the party name taken off ballot papers. The by-election will most definitely be decided on whether the council are popular or not. It is telling that you put this remark in as you know that they are not popular; you lost Brian Coleman from Barnet remember. If what the majority conservative administration is doing locally in Barnet is not popular then the message has to be sent by rejecting this candidate that policies need to change.

It's about who is going to represent Brunswick Park Ward most effectively over the next 2 years. If Shaheen Mahmood is elected she will be the new girl and will be whipped into shape and a pound to a penny she will stick her hand in the air and vote every One Barnet stupid decision through with the rest of the flock.

I strongly believe that the only person for the job is Shaheen. Natch.

This is not just because Shaheen is a Conservative; it's because she is the only candidate who lives in the ward. Shaheen is a conservative, I am a conservative. This is about the only sensible line in the whole letter. Boris has been mugged into repeating the she lives in the ward so she is the only person for the job. OK, a hypothesis. Suppose the Brunswick Park village idiot (probably horribly un-PC but never mind, have a go in the comments box) were to join the conservative party, stuff envelopes, deliver leaflets etc etc and somehow get the nomination, would they be the only person for the job. Only in the sense that they are the only conservative candidate. They would still be the village idiot. This nonsense about local is automatically best has got to stop.

This means that she is the only candidate who is in the ward day-in day-out and is therefore in the best position to understand and work towards solving the problems faced by her fellow residents. Doubtless Shaheen goes off to do her work for the Muslim Conservative Forum elsewhere. The phone number for her 0207 984 8248 appears to be located at the conservative party HQ in Millbank, London SW1. One would expect Shaheen to spend a lot of time there. Other candidates could live outside of the ward and still visit it for longer than Shaheen. Just because you live elsewhere doesn't mean you can't understand the problems; maybe you are telling us Boris that when you came to the Peel Centre you didn't understand about Barnet's parking problems because you don't live here? no, I thought not.

Shaheen is also a key member of your local Conservative team who have a proven track record of working for the local community. "Is she?" thought Mr Mustard who hadn't heard of her before. What did he do. Well he googled her of course. He put "Shaheen Mahmood Brunswick Park" into google, then he chose UK only and then he chose dates before 31/12/2011 in order to refine the search and find all of Shaheen early marvels in the ward. What did he get? He got 11 results none of which related to anything Shaheen has been doing locally. Note that the team have a proven track record. You aren't being asked to vote for the team but for the person. Call Mr Mustard picky but you can "work for" a result and not achieve it. Very weak endorsement that from Boris.

The team has been instrumental in delivering results for residents on local issues. For example, as you read this letter, work is underway on rebuilding Brunswick Park Ward's Health Centre. It is true that work has just started, see this article in the reliable local paper. So, the health centre burnt down in January 2010 and it is only just being rebuilt now. Hardly a "result". Besides, the council can't have got involved between the insurer and the NHS as they had to standing in the claim. This late rebuilding is nothing to be proud of.

It has also supported the ward's Safer Neighbourhood Team in their drive to crack down on anti-social behaviour and fly-tipping, as well as fighting to keep parking free at the ward's two car parks in Osidge Lane and Brunswick Park Road. Mrs Angry will probably explain about the loss of a number of sergeants from the SNTs in due course. Mr Mustard put a FOI question in about fly-tipping. The answer seems to be outstanding from January. What Mr Mustard does know from elsewhere was that at that stage there had been no prosecutions for fly-tipping since October 2010. Not much of a crack down! Parking, oh Boris you are a wag. The conservative administration put through new parking charges without any objection from their own councillors and then suddenly all hell breaks loose with the public and councillors in nearby East Barnet are suddenly against them. There was a leaflet about parking that had to be withdrawn. Did no-one tell you?

And for the first time in Barnet Council's history, council tax has been frozen for a record fourth year running, while at the same time safeguarding key local services such as weekly bin collections. Barnet Council does not have all that long a history. Freezing council tax is a mistake and only possible because of funding from central government. When the tax does rise it will rocket. Keeping the weekly main bin collection is a mistake. Recycling rates are poor in Barnet. The plan for the future is to have a green waste collection every 2 weeks. Plants grow when the temperature is above 5° so weekly collections are needed in summer and none in winter. The dry goods recycling will be every two weeks and that is the one that needs to be full so ought to be emptied more often to maximise opportunity. There will also be a food waste bin. The streets will be awash with bins. The people who rely on social services wouldn't agree that key local services have been safeguarded. They now have to pay more for less.

So when you go to the polling station tomorrow, I would urge you to vote for Shaheen Mahmood, who I know is just the kind of person Brunswick Park Ward residents need to represent them over the next two years. What positive reasons has Boris managed to give you that stand up to Mr Mustard's scrutiny? Not one. Don't vote for Shaheen, vote for change, vote for:

Andreas Ioannides, the Labour Party candidate.

Yours sincerely

Boris Johnson

Mayor of London

Yours frugally

Mr Mustard