Innuendo lies and hypocrisy

One of the things a Councillor has to put up with is being criticised for what he has done (or not) by members of the public or opposition politicians. This comes with the territory and personally I enjoy debate as long as it is based on fact. However, when opposition politicians use false insinuation to attack you it is a different ball game and I for one am not prepared to let it pass.


In October I had an article published in the Wigan Evening Post about whether Councillors should fund dead Christmas trees as opposed to live ones from their Brighter Borough funding. The paper then asked for people's opinion through their Wigantoday website.

One of the few respondents to the website was Leader of the official opposition in Wigan Council, Councillor Peter Franzen who wrote the following:

‘What hypocrisy. At least the Christmas festivities bring benefit and enjoyment to the people of Wigan. Unlike the freebies goiven out ad nauseum to Wigans New Labour Councillors. Just how much was spent on Councillor Ash's trip to New York and for what purpose and for whose benefit?’

This came as a great surprise to me because I have never been on an all expenses Council trip to America. There is no reason why I should. I suspect it would have come as a great surprise to both the leader of the Council and the Chief Executive because as far as I know Wigan Council has no official links with America.

I complained to the Wigan Evening Post about the comments and they withdrew the posting by Councillor Franzen almost immediately stating that the report was unsuitable.

Now when something like this happens a Councillor has various options. He could ask for an apology. He could go to the Standards Board of England to lodge an official complaint or he could seek legal advice with a view to suing.

I decided that an apology would be sufficient so I e-mailed Councillor Franzen on two separate occasions asking for an apology. As yet I have received no apology and he has asked me to stop e-mailing him on this matter.

This case also highlights another issue. Recently Wigan Council has been in the press for being the most complained about Council because of the number of complaints that the Standards Board have received from local Councillors about other Councillors. I did not want to add to the list.

And finally on the 31st October 2007 Councillor Franzen submitted a resolution to Council asking Wigan Council to put its house in order in view of the Standards Board's call to clean up politics in Wigan. He goes on to ask the Leader of the Council to cease the campaign of lies, abuse and smears against opposition Councillors.

Well,I would suggest that Councillor Franzen should start by putting his own house in order before he calls upon others to do so.