Thoughts, financially-savvy readers? Appreciate I might be missing something simple and honest?
Note: Any excuse to use that photo.
Thoughts, financially-savvy readers? Appreciate I might be missing something simple and honest?
Note: Any excuse to use that photo.
Talking-up Scotland 
Hi John – I confess West Midlands mayor Andy Street (tory) had largely passed me by until I saw him mentioned in your article. I’m suspecting the tory money is going on the social media advertising described by the Birmingham Mail . Link and snippets below:
https://www.birminghammail.co.uk/news/midlands-news/how-much-west-midlands-mayor-15392391
West Midlands Mayor Andy Street has refused to reveal how much he is spending on Facebook advertising, after he ran three paid-for ads.
It follows claims that he spent almost a million pounds in the run-up to the 2017 mayoral election, far more than his Labour rival Sion Simon.
While spending during election campaigns is tightly controlled, politicians such as Mr Street are under no obligation to reveal how much they spend between elections – and the official campaign lasts less than two months.
However, the mayor, or the Conservative Party on his behalf, is already spending money on political advertising, even though the next mayoral election is not due until 2020.
It raises questions about the lack of transparency in political campaigning, with politicians from all parties able to spend large sums between elections without scrutiny.
(The apparently highly expensive ads are presumably to buy him some ‘Street’ cred – OK – I’ll get my hat and coat)
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Thanks. Part of the explanation?
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I suspect that the Tories have decided that so many of the population has sussed out the fact that the centralised Westminster system has been captured by financial and landowning interests and is acting in their interests and is redistributing wealth away from us towards them. So, they will address the issue of ‘the governance of England’ – in a way that transfers little actual power, but seems to do – by creating regional ‘powerhouses’ such as around Manchester, Birmingham, Leeds, etc, led by directly elected mayors and, having managed to get Mr Boris Johnson elected for two terms to serve as Mayor of the most heavily Labour voting part of England, then they see the cosmetic value of high visibility mayors, who actually do very little.
The West Midlands was just about the only metropolitan area which actually voted LEAVE. So it is viewed as ‘fertile’ ground for the Tories, and, having a very high percentage of the population from ethnically diverse backgrounds there is scope for xenophobic and racist rhetoric to divert attention from the real issues of the distribution of wealth and power.
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