Our Friday miscellany of the week's news and events

Despite – or perhaps because of – our outrage at an application to the Boston Town Area Committee for £1,000 to celebrate volunteering by chalking on the pavement outside the Len Medlock Centre, the money will be paid. Whilst the voting was close, it really does seem that some BTAC members have no sense of values in these straitened times. We hear that the phrase “It’s only £1,000” was uttered at one point by a councillor we regularly quote, and whom we thought was old enough to know better. Instead it merely serves to underline the crass, dismissive attitude of some towards the taxpayers who provide that money, and – more importantly – who elected the councillors who fritter it away it so absurdly.
On a similar theme, as the first anniversary of the Tory landslide that took control of Boston Borough Council nears, it is interesting to note the lack of interest by so many members in the people they promised to serve. A recent list of councillors available at local “surgeries” or in person to deal with local issues totalled just ten out of the 32 member council – and a mere three of the 18 strong Tory ruling group. The phrase familiarity breeds contempt would spring to mind – except that the contempt seems to have set in ahead of the familiarity.
A few days after we queried the outcome of the “peer review” of Boston Borough Council by visitors from other authorities and the Local Government Association, an item appeared on Boston Borough Council’s website. One of the reviewers, Councillor Peter Fleming, the leader of Sevenoaks District Council, told Worst Street staff: "You should be rightly proud of the authority you've got and the direction you are going in." The borough declared the review “fairly successful.” It added: “In our case the peers found a lot of good practice and made ten or so recommendations of areas where we might do things differently. This was very valuable and we will be reporting on those recommendations with action plans in due course.” Hopefully we will hear about them in due course.
Earlier this year we pointed out a dilemma facing Boston Borough Council after local sprinter Bernice Wilson received a four year athletics ban for doping offences. Ms Wilson, who has trained at the Princess Royal Sports Arena in Boston, appeared on the borough’s Roll of Achievement – and we speculated on whether the powers-that-be would consider removing her entry. Our question has now been answered, as a recent look at the Roll of Achievement - now maundering in a dusty corner of the borough’s website after having never really taken off - shows that Ms Wilson is  now conspicuous by her absence.
A recent report on the BBC’s website claimed that the work to refurbish Boston’s 500-year-old market place had almost finished. This we have to see, we thought, and tottered into town expecting to see the eighth wonder of the world. Presumably, the Beeb were short of local news on that day – or perhaps even shorter than usual -  because the Market Place appeared little different to the last time we looked. The source of this "news" turned out to be a pot-boiler press release from Lincolnshire County Council – and we wonder whey they couldn’t have waited a few weeks longer to celebrate the real conclusion of the work. Perhaps they’re desperate to say something good about Boston for a change?  However, it didn’t stop one of our local papers running the piece – even though the true situation was just a few steps away from the office if they had taken the trouble to look.
Every time that we compare Boston Business Improvement District with Lincoln’s equivalent – Lincoln BIG - we are struck by how different they are and how much better the latter is. The latest idea from Lincoln is the re-introduction of an open topped bus tour of 12 tourist attractions in the city. Granted, such a scheme would not work in Boston, but as the Market Place totters on the brink of re-opening, we are disappointed at the deafening silence from the BID about how it plans to utilise the space. Imaginative use of the area is something which would seem to be more the responsibility of business than the council, although we suspect that events involving vegetables may well be staged from time to time. The Market Place needs to stage regular and varied activities so that it becomes known as a place worth visiting for a different day out. After all the fine words spoken about the refurbishment, please don’t let it become another missed opportunity.
Talking of vegetables, the ill-judged plan to play cabbage bowls at the Jubilee knees up in Central Park seem increasingly to be rebounding on the borough council’s Tory misrulers. What appeared at first sight to be yet another excuse for a photocall has now attracted criticism from four other members of the council. They are pointing out the waste of food and the inappropriateness of the stunt when many people are finding the rising cost of putting meals on the table is making life difficult for them and their families. If the “leadership” had any sense, they would replace the real vegetables with a paper or plastic substitute – like in the days of Crackerjack’s “double or drop” competition. But we shan’t hold our breath.
It seems a little late to be asking what the East Midlands Development Association has done for us now that it has been wound up. There was general agreement during its lifetime that it tended to favour Nottinghamshire, Leicestershire and Derbyshire rather than the region’s country cousin. Not that anything much seems to have changed now that it has been partially replaced by the Greater Lincolnshire Local Enterprise Partnership. Their list of projects to date makes no mention of Boston – and the nearest to us so far is the £6,500,000 Red Lion Quarter in Spalding where the project team identified an “urgent need” for the facilities that this development had on offer. That’s not quite how it turned out, though, as the scheme fell flat on its face within a few months – and the building has now been sold to Boston College by South Holland District Council. We hope that someone, somewhere, is making the case for Boston whenever grants are made.
Not that this appears to be the case as far as a bypass for the town is concerned. Although Spalding, Grantham and Lincoln are all getting new roads, an analysis in this week’s Boston Standard quotes  council leader Peter Bedford saying that we have to be “realistic” and that in time we will get a “distributor” road. Why is the man settling for second best? Not only that, but why is he cooling his heels by saying that a road can be discussed as part of the preparation of a local plan for the borough over the coming two years? Funding of a distributor road will  apparently come from developments along it – a form of local construction tax. But surely, the  long running and seldom challenged argument that Boston is unattractive to developers because it is considered a flood risk area with low quality employment opportunities will stifle any proposed new homes or business plans. The general view from the bridge seems to be that whilst by-passes are for other towns, people in Boston can use the bus, cycle, or walk.
There seems to be a conflict of opinion over whether native Bostonians are work-shy when it comes to taking up jobs on the land and in the packhouses. The farming viewpoint was summarised by an NFU representative  at the most recent borough council Task and Finish group investigating immigration issues who claimed:  “It seems to come down to three key things. The lack of work ethic in terms of poor time-keeping and shoddy workmanship, a lack of enthusiasm and a disengagement with the work itself.”  Ask many of the contributors to various websites about immigration and like issues in the Boston area, and they will tell you that they have been priced out of the market and marginalised.
We fear that the NFU lady is over-generalising – even though she claims to have “evidence” that employers have been unsuccessful even when they went “above and beyond the call of duty to employ UK citizens. If nothing else, it is essential to find out the truth – especially as trade unionists are insisting that the arrival of EU immigrants has had “no impact” on job availability for local people. As they said in the X Files – “the truth is out there.” We just need to find it.

Meanwhile – and despite claims such as those mentioned above that local people do not apply for jobs on the land, there is talk of “an awareness demo” in Wrangle where farming giant Staples has applied to extend the number of caravans in its “village” by 22 – to house a further 130 migrant “students” employed under a government scheme that sees them “train” for six months before returning home. It’s not that long ago that one of the great delights on a shiny night of the county’s farming industry was to salute individuals who had dedicated a lifetime to the same employer, and whose families were similarly employed. Low grade honours were often awarded to them, but the sense of pride from the recipients was incalculable. We find it hard to believe that so much has changed in so short a time.
Finally, they say that beauty is in the eye of the beholder, but we think that someone needs an eye test after the claim in this week’s Boston Target that “Fydell House is Boston’s grandest house, in one of the town’s grandest positions.”
Grand?

Here’s the view from the front gate so that you can make your own mind up.

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Our former blog is archived at: http://bostoneyelincolnshire.blogspot.com