Alison Halford, Councillor

The Corporate Resources Meeting was more interesting that I had expected and the Chief Executive played a major part in taking members through the complexities of the forthcoming budget proposals. As I had expected, I did not learn much more about the Early Retirement issue that was up for discussion. Both the elected chair for the meeting and another member closed any debate down, an action I accepted as the press was present. The press is frequently used to get a story out that a member wishes to have published in a round about way, but obviously my story and my concerns of a certain early retirement did not press the right buttons on this occasion. I was chuffed when the Head of Human Resources credited me with pressing officers to bring the costs etc. of early retirements to members’ regular attention. Head of HR graciously agreed that this policy had fallen by the way side and my doggedness had put it back on the agenda once more. I was happy to praise officers in return as I thought our Chief Executive, Colin Everett had displayed a masterful command of the budget brief. He answered detailed and complex questions without …..

The Council’s been in recess but started up again in earnest on 4th January with a members review of the demolition of Flint Maisonettes. I had spent New Year in a very soggy New Forest doing a fiendish jigsaw; the subject being owls. I’d bought it years ago for a friend who died. It was a total and absorbing challenge and when upon meeting Joan, my wonderful cleaning lady in the New Year, she told me that she had purchased some too years ago as they stimulated the brain! Having spent a week on the puzzle & hardly making an impact on all those almost identical owls, clearly my brain is in serious need of re-stimulating. For the time being owls are definitely having the last hoot! Stormy weather on 3rd January made me delay the return journey as I was just not willing to risk driving in suicide road conditions with 4 dogs in the back of a heavily laden car. Regret I missed the “Call in” but had read the papers and find the timing of this decision very strange indeed. How ever it is argued, it seems that the maisonette residents have been disenfranchised from the Choices …..

Eddie Gilfoyle’s 16-year fight to clear his name Eddie Gilfoyle was jailed for life in July 1993 after being found guilty of of killing his pregnant wife. It could be a run of the mill family get-together: a devoted sister and her husband calling in on her brother to update him on the recent graduation of their children. They sit in comfortable chairs around a small table and, over coffee, proudly show him pictures of the event. But this is no ordinary family gathering. The meeting is part of an odyssey that began 16 years ago and will continue until the prisoner, Eddie Gilfoyle, is cleared of a crime he says he did not commit; a crime which his supporters say was never a crime in the first place. In a twist of fate, the brother-in-law, Paul Caddick, is a former police sergeant who spent a career building up cases against criminals. He has now used the last decade-and-a-half dismantling the evidence that convicted his wife’s brother of murder. Gilfoyle was jailed for life in 1993. In the evening of 4 June 1992, 33-year-old Paula Gilfoyle was found hanging from a beam in the garage of the family home in …..

2, PROSPECT CLOSE, EWLOE, FLINTSHIRE, CH 3RL.   6th June 2008. Dear Editor, The slain Mold Bullock and ricocheting bullet. November 2007. The shooting of the Brazilian electrician three years ago and the death of a police officer in Manchester during a training exercise recently are both more serious than the bullock incident. However, when ever police deploy firearms the public must be assured that officers are capable of handling weapons safely and the public is not put at risk. I am aware that all attempts by your newspaper to call the chief constable to account has failed other than to inform you that the matter ahs been investigated. (Full Stop!) But it has been alleged that the animal had been calmed and was with other beasts in a field and yet the creature was killed and another bullet that slammed through a window and into the wall of a near by office. The office could have been occupied and a person as well as a animal could have become victims of the North Wales Firearms Unit. Is it true that the owner of the officer was persuaded not to make a formal complaint? Surely not.! Your Chronicle is right …..

Family Fortunes Nothing matters more to the future of our country and our economy than education. Children need a proper chance to learn. But under Labour many things are going badly wrong in our schools. Almost half of ll year olds leave school unable to read, write or add up properly. The UK is failing down international league tables of educational performance. Conservatives want schools where pupils turn up and the head teacher knows their names, schools where there is proper discipline, schools where they use tried and tested teaching methods, schools where churches, voluntary bodies, and local businesses are encouraged to get involved. We will work to make our exam system rigorous and believable for the long term by bringing in business, universities and other organisations with an interest in restoring the credibility of our exams. But It is not just at school that we have to get the environment right; children need support at home and at play. We all know that the best organisation for bringing up children, giving us the right values, helping us get on with life, looking after us if we are sick or disabled, and caring for the elderly, is the family. In …..

Is It a Fair Deal for Flintshire? Residents in Flintshire are getting a poor deal, and the current Labour majority on the council seem both unable and unwilling to do anything about it. It is time for change at County Hall! Conservative candidate for Ewloe, Alison Halford, said, ‘It is an absolute disgrace. We are now paying almost twice as much in Council tax as we were 10 years ago, but what improvements have we seen for our money?’ Last year, schools in Flintshire received less money for each pupil than schools in Cheshire, Wirral, Wrexham, Denbighshire and Conwy! What’s more, the Council did not actually spend all the money it had allocated for our schools. By contrast, Flintshire did manage to the priorities and concerns of local spend £13m on agency staff to support County Hall administration. Discussing these figures, Alison noted that, `This just proves how wrong the Council have got their priorities. Investing in our schools is a vital investment for our future. The Council is letting us down badly.’ But it’s not just education. We all know that crime is rising, and that anti-social behaviour is a problem for many local communities. However, Police in South …..

SAVE OUR POST OFFICE! Since Labour came to power, 1 in every 4 Post Offices has been closed, with another 2500 to be shut down over the next 12 months. It won’t be until October that we know whether the Ewloe Post Office is going to close for ever. Local Conservative, Will Gallagher, is leading a campaign to save our post-offices, because he believes they provide vital services, particularly to the most, vulnerable people in our society. `To close the village post office would be to rip’ the heart out of the community. I can’t believe that our local MP, Mark Tami, actually voted in Parliament to support this closure programme. There is a better alternative, so that Post Offices can become thriving small businesses again, providing a full range of facilities and services to the local area. At the moment, the government is taking services away from the Post Office, making it more difficult for them to survive.’ The Conservatives have developed a comprehensive plan to support Post Offices, and prevent further closures. Sub-Post Offices need to be given more freedom to offer a wider range of business services; Post Offices could become ‘One Stop Shops’ with trained staff …..

“Firearms chief caught with unlicensed ammunition. (Jan 23 2007 by Gareth Hughes, Daily Post) The head of North Wales Police’s firearms unit yesterday admitted having ammunition he was not licensed to keep.” Download the pdf of the full article below: From the Blog PPP written by citizens who are “concerned about the direction policing is going in North Wales”

An Authority’s functions are to ensure that the force is run effectively and efficiently, and to monitor how complaints are dealt with.  It is also the disciplining body for its ACPO ranks and can decide how to address any complaint made against a senor officer. The Police Authority fits uneasily between Home Office, the Chief Inspector of Constabulary and the chief constable, whose total control over operational matters can cause a problem for an Authority.  This model ensures that no one is actually accountable for mismanagement or for poor administration within the police service.  All Police Authorities set the police precept that the local authority merely collects.  North Wales policing costs has rocketed in recent years yet the chief officer still challenged the public to pay more or services could not be guaranteed.  The Authority acquiesced to two years of “begging bowl” strategy, ignoring the potential loss of confidence when promises were broken.  The Assembly continues to increase its share of force budgets yearly but has no say in how the money is spent or to determine if Wales is getting a good deal.The Welsh Assembly is committed to equal opportunities for all, condemns confidentiality clauses and Cabinet minutes are …..

The very nice men from the AA are soon to publish a new road atlas marking the location of fixed speed cameras to help motorists avoid expensive fines. More than three million punters are expected to lash out on this guide, many from North Wales, desperate to avoid further points on their licenses. Of the four Welsh forces, North Wales tops the league for speed tickets and of course, it’s never the really reckless road-hogs, only decent, careful bods like the Spanish teacher who drives the school bus as a social responsibility.   Having been clobbered three times in three months, by infamous ‘Arrive Alive’ vans invariably positioned in sneaky positions close to the 30 mile limit sign and the like, she now drives below 28 mph  concentrating more on the speedometer rather that the way ahead!  The brains behind this obsession with speeders is the controversial Richard Brunstrom; spell check helpfully suggests ‘brainstorm’ and certainly a storm of fines has brought drivers to their knees as the chief Constable is totally unrepentant over his remorseless ‘no speed policy’.  As head of the chief constables’ traffic committee, the force ensures that tickets fly even if the wretched punter wanders even a …..