It's a bad idea, get it out of here
Into the lion's den
They're brave, you've got to give them that. As part of Local Democracy Week – which finishes today – councillors in Islington, Bournemouth and other authorities have been setting out their manifestos for possibly the most sceptical group of voters around: the yoof.

In the hilariously titled I'm a Councillor, Get Me Out of Here, hardy souls across 13 councils today face being "voted off" by the next-generation electorate in a mock poll. You know what they say in television: never work with children, they can be animals … or something like that.

A meeting of minds
Oh to be a fly on the wall at this particular match-up! In the red corner, we have the chairman of the government's inquisition arm, James Strachan; in the blue corner stands John Seddon, the maverick managing director of Vanguard Consulting who despises all the targets enforced by Strachan's troops.

Despite their ideological opposition, the two have recently engaged in correspondence and Strachan even confided at a recent drinks event that he would be happy to meet – perhaps even dine with – Seddon. It's sure to be a tasty encounter.

Carry on up the M6
After two shockingly bad inspection reports, one failed stock transfer bid, missed targets and an independent commission on the future of the city's council housing, the story of Birmingham's housing department has now become high farce – according to one exasperated councillor, anyway. The current situation is like a Carry On film, he or she declared at a recent council meeting. The question is, who's Kenneth Williams?

Harry Potter und die Obdachlosen
Harry Potter has been casting a little magic for German rough sleepers. Twenty-one German street magazines sold by homeless people have been given permission to print the first chapter of Harry Potter and the Order of the Phoenix.

The magazines are believed to be upping their print runs to accommodate demand from 30-something commuters.

The new McCarthyism
Top housing folk are dreading the knock on the door from the new man in government. Richard McCarthy, the incoming director of sustainable communities, is picking the brains of the sector's brightest and best before he goes full-time at Prescott Towers.

Normally, chief execs would be puzzling over their approved development programme allocations but now they are searching for cunning plans to help McCarthy kick-start the Thames Gateway. Still, not a bad chance to extol the virtues of a particular scheme you may have up your sleeve.

That plan’s a dog’s dinner

The Tory plan to give residents the right to choose their own police chiefs could, if the US experience is anything to go by, bring a host of “personalities” into the force. One elected sheriff in Arizona, who is reputed to be one of the toughest around, makes the members of his chain gang wear an unmistakeable uniform of pink trousers and socks. He also likes to say that the sheriff department’s dogs eat better than his prisoners. It’s an extreme measure – perhaps a tad too extreme, even for the struggling quiet man.

Source

Housing Today